Old Testament
Jonah 4:10-11
10 The LORD said, “You have been concerned for the vine, for which you have not laboured, neither made it grow; which came up in a night and perished in a night.
11 Shouldn’t I be concerned for Nineveh, that great city, in which are more than one hundred and twenty thousand persons who can’t discern between their right hand and their left hand, and also many animals?”
New Testament
Matthew 22:34-40
34 But the Pharisees, when they heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, gathered themselves together.
35 One of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, testing him.
36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?”
37 Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 A second likewise is this, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’
40 The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.”
Jonah ends in a question. God speaks of a great city filled with people who do not know their right hand from their left, and of “many cattle” besides. The line is almost comic, and yet it is a mercy. God is not petty. His compassion is wide, and it includes those Jonah would rather see judged.
Lord, forgive us when we resemble Jonah more than Jesus. Enlarge our compassion. Teach us to love our neighbours sincerely, to speak truthfully without contempt, and to seek a common life where dignity is honoured and peace is protected.
Jesus, asked for the greatest commandment, names love: love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind; and love your neighbour as yourself. Love is not agreement. Love is not approval. Love is willing the good of the other, because they are made by God and seen by God.
In a plural society, we have neighbours whose worship differs from ours, whose stories and convictions may trouble us. Jonah warns us against spiritual smallness: wanting our enemies to be reduced to a lesson. Jesus calls us to a larger heart. We pray for our neighbours’ good: for peace, for safety, for truth, for mercy. We refuse mockery. We refuse fear.