Listen to the audio of today’s Reflection:
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Luke 11:29-32
The Sign of Jonah
29 As the crowds increased, Jesus said, “This is a wicked generation. It asks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah. 30 For as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, so also will the Son of Man be to this generation. 31 The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with the people of this generation and condemn them, for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom; and now one greater than Solomon is here. 32 The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and now one greater than Jonah is here.
Here’s a reading that isn’t exactly well known, even among people who participate regularly in the life of the church. That’s probably because it’s not immediately clear what it’s supposed to mean to us as people living out our faith. But since it comes up in the lectionary at the same time as Old Testament readings from the story of Jonah – one of which was the subject of our Reflection for yesterday – we should probably make a point to give it some attention.
As we said yesterday, the real theme of the Book of Jonah is God’s gracious willingness to forgive those who confess and repent. And in this reading from Luke, Jesus mentions the story of Jonah and uses it to illustrate an important point. And when you stop and think about it, it’s a point that’s pretty straightforward. And one that presents a challenge to those of us who consider ourselves his followers.
Jesus starts out by saying, “This is a wicked generation.” That needs some clarification – according to the New Testament scholars, Jesus is using the term “generation” here in a way that’s different from the way we usually use it. The scholars say Jesus wasn’t talking about the people who were alive at the moment he was speaking. Instead, they say, he was using the term “generation” to designate people who lived between the establishment of the original covenant with Abraham and the moment when he came into the world to establish a new covenant with his followers. So the “generation” Jesus was talking about was one that lasted two thousand years or so.
The people from that generation wanted to see miraculous signs as evidence that Jesus really was a prophet – that he was a person acting with the power of God. We know from other places in the gospels that people would sometimes approach Jesus asking him to do miracles as evidence that he was sent by God.
That’s why Jesus refers to Jonah. He says that he’s not going to do signs and wonders to impress people, that those who were familiar with the scriptures already had “the sign of Jonah.” He says, “as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, so also will the Son of Man be to this generation.” And if you remember from our Reflection yesterday, Jonah was sent to call the people of Nineveh to repent of their sins. And when they did repent, the Ninevites were forgiven. God “did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.”
So Jesus seems to be saying that Jonah was a kind of forerunner to his own role in salvation history. Like Jonah, Jesus was calling people to repent of their sins. But his call was for all people, not just the people of one city. And Jesus was also announcing God’s offer of forgiveness for everyone who responds to that call to confess and repent.
Jesus also mentions another story from the Old Testament. He talks about “the Queen of the South,” who “came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom.” That Queen of the South seems to be a reference to the queen of Sheba, who came to visit Solomon in the tenth chapter of First Kings. During this state visit, this queen is said to have talked with Solomon about all sorts of things, and to have marveled at the great wisdom Solomon had. That wisdom led her to praise God.
The point Jesus seems to be making is that even gentiles, if they pay attention, can recognize true godly wisdom when they hear it. So the queen of Sheba’s willingness to hear and respond to that wisdom is contrasted to the spiritual blindness of the majority of the Hebrew people of Jesus’ time on earth. They were given the chance to see and hear Jesus as he walked among them. But since they failed to recognize and act on his teaching, then at the judgment, the Queen of Sheba will be a witness against them.
Then Jesus says that just as the Queen of Sheba will bear witness against the Hebrew people’s failure to recognize true wisdom, the people of Nineveh will bear witness against their failure to repent of their sins. The Ninevites repented of their sins after hearing the preaching of Jonah, but the Hebrew people were failing to repent of their sins upon hearing the preaching of Jesus himself.
Even though he was the fulfillment of “the Law and the Prophets” – the culmination of God’s relationship with the chosen people – and even though his life was foretold by the prophesies about the Messiah to come, almost none of his own people recognized the significance of his life and ministry.
Within the lifetime of most of those who heard Jesus speak, the Jesus movement would explode into the world. But it would be mostly gentiles who would follow Jesus with hearts of true repentance, just as the people of Nineveh repented. It would be gentiles who would truly embrace the wisdom of Jesus’ teachings, just as the Queen of Sheba embraced the wisdom of Solomon.
As followers of Jesus, we might read this passage and shake our heads at how foolish the majority of the Hebrew people were to miss the importance of what was happening in Jesus. But the same thing could happen to us. The fact that we call ourselves Christians doesn’t mean we will automatically see what the Holy Spirit is doing in our time. Like the Hebrew people, we can get so wrapped up in our own religious customs and practices that we fail to see and repent of our sins, while people outside the faith see theirs more clearly. The example and teachings of Jesus can become so familiar to us that we fail to respond to the radical wisdom they contain.
This passage seems to challenge us to be on guard against thinking that we have Jesus and the things of the faith all figured out. It seems to challenge us to see and hear the message and ministry of Jesus with eyes and ears – and hearts – that are open to divine wisdom we might have missed all our lives.
Let’s pray. Lord, we pray that your Holy Spirit will constantly point out to us ways that we can be more faithful to Jesus, more aware of sins we need to lay down, and more alert to the wisdom that can found only in his teachings. Amen.
Grace and Peace,
Henry
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