Certain recent events in my life prompted me to take a closer look at the story of Jonah. Sadly, at most the last time I read the book of Jonah was in high school. I remember as a child thinking the moral of the story was obey God or He’ll punish you. Cleary I missed the mark. My conclusion had a lot to do with how I viewed God then. I’m not exactly sure why but, I grew up feeling especially special to God. I even remember sitting in church thinking to myself about how while I knew God loved everybody if He had to have a favorite it’d be me. Don‘t judge me ;). While I didn’t worry much about God punishing me for doing wrong, I did believe that my fairly obedient behavior, my desire to please God and inherent specialness meant that God would spare me from any really bad experiences. All in all, whether the belief is that you will be spared from harm or punished in complete accordance to your behavior it’s pretty much the same thing and is it ever truly the case? We all can look back on our lives and remember times when we didn’t experience consequences we very well deserved and times we endured adversities we didn’t. But still, we all from time to time, find ourselves certain that the wrath of God will be upon us at any moment or angry with God because of our misfortune. I think it all stems from the notion that this Christian walk begins and ends with behavior. It’s more than that.

Just like an earthly father, God wants to commune with you and prosper you (Jeremiah 29:11, 1 Timothy 2:3-4) both in this life (the womb, developing you until your birth in…) and in heaven (…eternal life). Now when I say that God wants to prosper you, I don’t mean that God wants you to have a rolls royce but, that He wants what’s best for you. Not everybody can handle a rolls royces, worldly wealth or certain successes. If you gain the whole world for say a short 70 years and lose your soul it will not be prosperity but, foolishness (Mark 8:36). Even earthly fathers will not allow their children to indulge in every pleasure of this world only to find themselves in ruin. The only way he can truly prosper you and be in relationship with you is to save and transform you. In the most practical sense sin separates us from God.
“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” Romans 6:23. 
“For the living know that they will die, but, the dead know nothing; they have no further reward, and even the memory of them is forgotten” Ecclesiastes 9:5. 
There is nothing prosperous in death and having a relationship with someone who is dead just won’t work. Therefore, God journeys with us so that we will know/experience Him, accept His gift of salvation and its resulting sanctification.

Many times this journey can be perceived as coercion. For example, when Jonah refused to obey God and decided to run he ended up in a whale. What could be seen merely as punishment is only love. God knew Jonah would run and he used it as an opportunity to show him, and us for that matter, his love for mankind. Jonah finally obeyed the Lord and as a result Nineveh repented "But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. And he prayed to the Lord and said, "O Lord, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.” And the Lord said, "Do you do well to be angry?" Jonah went out of the city and sat to the east of the city and made a booth for himself there. He sat under it in the shade, till he should see what would become of the city. Now the Lord God appointed a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to save him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the plant. But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant, so that it withered. When the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint. And he asked that he might die and said, "It is better for me to die than to live." But God said to Jonah, "Do you do well to be angry for the plant?" And he said, "Yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die." And the Lord said, "You pity the plant, for which you did not labor, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?" Jonah 4

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