Ash Wednesday Sermon

Ash Wednesday – March 6^th, 2019 – Jonah 3

In the Name of Christ the Crucified +

Jonah is a terrible prophet. He is the worst prophet in the bible – might be part of the reason why I love him. In Jonah chapter 1, God tells Jonah to go preach to Nineveh, to warn them of their impending doom. And Nineveh was a wicked, brutal place, the enemy of the Kingdom of Israel – the country that would eventually wreck and ruin Israel in 722 BC. God tells Jonah to go east to Nineveh, and Jonah hops a boat going west towards Tarshish. That is a lousy prophet.

And we know the next part of the story. A mighty storm comes up while Jonah sleeps in the boat, and all the sailors are terrified, and Jonah admits that he is running from God... and finally they toss Jonah overboard and the sea calms, and they worship the LORD. But that's not the end for Jonah. God appoints a giant fish – and Jonah spends three days in the belly of the giant fish express which swims him up close to Nineveh and spits him out onto the shore. And in those three days, confronted with a watery grave and saved by the stinking belly of a fish, Jonah reconsiders his opposition to God. He will go and preach.

Our Old Testament lesson tonight starts off with his preaching. “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” That's it. Okay, I'm sure he repeated himself and expanded upon it, but that was the gist of his preaching. In 40 days, you are going to get it. You suckers are going to pay. You've been lousy jerks, and your uppance will come! Think how harsh and terrifying that preaching would sound. And the thing of it is, that's what Jonah wants. Chapter 4 of Jonah has Jonah sitting outside the city waiting for God to destroy it, wanting God to smite. This preacher wants Nineveh dead. He wants them gone. And there he goes, walking through Nineveh, proclaiming its doom.

The King of Nineveh knows a proper warning when he hears one. And the king of Nineveh knows that if God wanted to punish his city, well, they'd have it coming. Nineveh was known for being brutal – earlier this year I found a history channel show from when they actually showed history, and it was about ancient armies, and the first army they showed, the emblem of despicable power and wickedness was Nineveh. Brutal, evil stuff. The king knows they've been terrible, the people know that they've been terrible. So the King calls upon them to put on ashes and sackcloth, to fast. Everyone. Why? “Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from His fierce anger, so that we may not perish.”

Who knows. These are some of the saddest words in the entirety of the bible. They are words of doubt and desperation and fear. Imagine this – imagine this weekend we go through confession, and having said Amen, I stand up, turn around, look at you, and go – eh, who knows? The people of Nineveh knew wickedness, but they had no knowledge, no understanding of a merciful God. Of course they didn't – they themselves certainly weren't merciful, so the best that they could hope for was the best that Nineveh's victims could hope for – maybe the bloodlust will be sated before they get here – maybe the army will turn and get bored and go home. Maybe if we look miserable enough we won't be worth destroying.

Do you see? Jonah hadn't taught them of who God is. He hadn't proclaimed the steadfast mercies of God, how God is faithful. Jonah did not proclaim that the Messiah would come, the descendant of Abraham in Whom all nations would be blessed. To use the Lutheran term, Jonah preached not a drop of Gospel – it was nothing but law. And the people of Nineveh were left with no specific or concrete hope – and when God does spare them, they never hear why.

Who knows. What a horrible thing. The point of the Scriptures, the point of preaching today is so that we are focused upon the sure and solid promises of God to us! We know, because God has said so. That is who knows. And this year, in our Lenten services, we are going to look at some of the promises of the Messiah that God proclaimed through Isaiah – things where God let us know through His prophets what exactly He would be doing for us.

You know, my dear friends, how the story goes. You know that happens at the end of these forty days. Christ Jesus Himself goes to the cross and wins salvation and forgiveness and life for you. Your repentance is not one of doubt, the ashes are not ashes of ignorance – we do not repent in ignorance nor do we confess in fearful desperation. God is faithful and just to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, because He Himself wins salvation, He Himself goes to the cross. We do not heap piles of ashes upon ourselves hoping to get His pity – this little dusting of ash is a reminder for us, not for God. It reminds us that repentance leads and goes to and is completed and finished by Christ upon the Cross. Yes, dust you are, and to dust you shall return. But because Christ Jesus goes to the cross, dust you will not stay. The same LORD who in the beginning took dust from the ground and breathed into it the breath of life has purged away your sin, and His life shall undo your death. Your dust is forever changed by the Cross. Because Jesus lives, so shall you – and you shall rise to new and everlasting life, righteous and holy with Him, as He is.

And this is not a “who knows” sort of thing. It is the promise of God, accomplished for you by Christ Jesus. It is sure and certain and true, long after the ashes are washed off our foreheads. In the Name of Christ the Crucified +