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CanWe Afford toWrite
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Off
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A
cities went it was a fairly
arge one. To date it haden–
joyed a fairly influential
existence in its particular geo–
graphic region. And for the most
part the city fathers had no reason
to suspect anything but continued
prosperity for the future.
But then it happened. lt was just
one man who carne crying in their
streets with a chilling message
that their great metropolis would
be overthrown in 40 days. They
could have laughed, scoffed and
written him off as a visionary
crackpot. But a funny thing hap–
pened . They took him seriously.
The king responded by dressing
in sackcloth, calling a city-wide
fast, and ordering everyone to
clean up their individual lives.
By now you've probably sur–
mised that the city was ancient
Nineveh and the bearer of the bad
tidings was Jonah. The most sig–
nifican! part of this story isn'l Jo–
nah ' s three-day stay inside a
specially prepared fish, but the
fact that the people of Nineveh,
from the king right on down, ac–
tually took his message to heart
and embarked on a program lo
clean up the crime-laden streets of
lheir city (Jonah 3:7-8). And God
honored lheir righteous action by
sparing Nineveh from impending
calamity. Bulas far as Jonah was
concerned lhis was
bad news!
Being a good lsraelite with rather
strong nationalistic and perhaps
even racist fee li ngs, he had
wanted to see the Ninevites "get
theirs." In fact that was the reason
he tried to avoid going there in the
first place (Jonah 4:1-2).
The "Write-Off" Syndrome
Most of us might say that the ac–
tion the Ninevites took was a giant
historical fluke- especially in view
of the overall track record of the
human race . Subjectively we
might feel that most men in the
world are on the whole unrepen–
tant, hard-hearted sinners who are
going to deserve everything they
get. With this approach we could
easily assume that collective re–
pentance as it occurred in Nine–
veh "can't happen here."
Like Jonah we might reason,
"Why bother? We've gol ours
now; you'll get yours later. In the
meantime enjoy the Great Tribula–
tion. "
Fortunately, Jesus Christ took an
entirely different approach to this
problem during His brief ministry
on this earth sorne 1900 years ago.
Un like Jonah, He was not about to
write off His cpntemporaries. He
and His disciples actively went out
preaching the gospel of the King–
dom. And not just for reasons of
form. Christ was concerned about
the present we lfare of those
people. On one occasion He even
used the repentance of Nineveh as
an example of what sorne of the
more recalcitran! " religious" types
of His day
should have been doing
(Luke 11 :32).
But no matter what approach
was used these lsraelites weren' t
about to change. And it wasn' t un–
til after He sensed thal His mes–
sage was going to be rejected lhat
Christ began speaking in para–
bies. By that time lhe need lo do
so had become readily apparent.
As He explained to His disciples:
"This is why
1
speak to them in
parables . ... for this people's
heart has grown dull, and their
ears are heavy of hearing, and
their eyes they have closed "
(Matt. 13: 13-15).
lt would have been somewhat
presumptuous of Christ to have
made these statements
before
that
particular generation had been lib–
erally exposed to His gospel. Their
rejection of it meant that He would
henceforth center His particular
efforts during His earthly ministry
on the
Church,
not the nation of
Israel. Hence the parables. As He
explained it to sorne of the scribes
and Pharisees: " 'The very stone
which the builders
rejected
has
become the head of the cor–
ner' .... Therefore
1
tell you, the
kingdom of God will be
taken
away from you
and
given to a na–
tion producing the fruits of it''
(Matt. 21:42-43).
Fulfilllng A Basic
Humanltarian Need
The apost le Paul showed the
same burning desire in his own
time for the welfare of his country–
men. In the 1Oth chapter of Ro–
mans, he wrote: " Brethren, my
heart 's desire and
prayer to God
for them [Israel] is
that they may
be saved. "
And Paul was thinking
about the
here
and
now.
That's
why he could be "all things to all
men,
that [he] might by al/ means
save some"
(1
Cor. 9:22).
lf God was willing to spare
Sodom for the sake of only
ten
righteous men,
who's to say He
wouldn 't do the same again?
Now maybe you figure that
none of this matters because the
world has been automatical ly pre–
programmed to follow the worst
possib le course of prophetic
events. But isn' t it just possible
that much of humanity might not
have lo experience every lasl
grisly plague written in the book of
Revelalion befare il comes to its
senses?
lf
prophecy can fail as it
did with Jonah's dire prediction
for Nineveh, who 's to say it can 't
happen again?
Maybe, just maybe, there are a
few Ninevehs out there waiting to
hear from sorne modern-day Jo–
nahs. And even if it turns out there
aren't, for humanity's sake, can
we afford to assume other–
wise?
George Ritter
The
PLAIN TRUTH Apríl 1977