The ending of the book of Jonah is a bit of a quandary.  It leaves us with a lot of unknowns but it also leaves us with two very clear knowns. The first is that religious guy – Jonah the paid pastor – is on the outside having a pity party. Jonah is the only one not celebrating God’s mercy. The other known fact is that God makes it clear that His heart is to have compassion on those that are far from Him.  Through studying Jonah’s reaction and seeing God’s response in Jonah 4 we see how religion produces unrighteous anger – the gospel produces godly compassion.

Everyone likes a good comeback story. In Jonah chapter 3, we see Jonah getting a second chance. God is giving Jonah a “re-do”. But before we are tempted to make this part of the story about Jonah’s second chance… we have to see that it is primarily about the work of a gracious and merciful God who is patient and whose love extends to us even after we fail Him. God is a God who saves and we see in Jonah 3 what Paul would later say in Romans 1:16: "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek."

John Piper famously said, "Missions exists because worship doesn’t." The primary goal for the follower of Jesus is not missions but worship. Missions is the means by which the Christian seeks to help people from every tribe, tongue, nation and language encounter Jesus and follow His way. The book of Jonah is a fairly simple book that shows us this deep biblical reality. In many ways it is a simple book about a man running away from God and God pursuing him and whose heart for all peoples.