The Sign of Jonah

A little later in the narrative of Matthew, Jesus is asked by the Pharisees to show them a sign. Jesus’s response is one that I think is taken for granted and glossed over far too often.

Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.”

He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. 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 something greater than Jonah is here. The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom, and now something greater than Solomon is here.”

We often read this passage and think to ourselves: Jesus responded to the Pharisees’ request by saying, “You want a sign? No. The only sign you are going to receive is the fact that I’m going to be in the tomb and rise again after three days. That’s all the sign you’re going to get!” While there is certainly some truth in this reading, it misses the depth that lies at the heart of what this rabbi says to these Torah-trained teachers.

First, while the connection of “three days and three nights” to the resurrection is obviously there, this would not have been Jesus’s original teaching point. I think there are many tongue-in-cheek inferences to Jesus’s resurrection by Matthew that all the readers are going to catch as they read this gospel on the other side of Jesus’s resurrection; but as we’ve seen before, a prophetic teaching will not make an empty (or cryptic) statement about the future that could not be interpreted by the present listeners. Whatever Jesus is saying, it has to find its primary meaning in what the audience can glean and learn from the reference. So Jesus has to be saying something else about Jonah that is disconnected from His own resurrection.

Second, this typical interpretation misses and ignores the rest of the paragraph — namely, the mention of Nineveh and Queen Sheba — which is clearly an intentional reference by Jesus. Whatever we do with Jesus’s teaching, it needs to make sense of these two references.

So what was Jonah known for? As we looked at earlier, Jesus has already used Jonah as a great teaching point regarding Jonah’s ministry to the Gentiles. Jesus says the only sign that the Pharisees should need is “the sign of Jonah.” What was the sign of Jonah?

Why will Nineveh rise at the judgment and condemn that generation? Because they heard the preaching of Jonah and repented. Why was the Queen of Sheba referenced? Because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of the LORD.

Jesus responds to the Pharisees: “You want a sign? The Gentiles are believing this stuff! Nineveh repented at the preaching of Jonah and the Gentiles are repenting at the preaching of the Kingdom of God now! This is exactly what your Scriptures tell you will happen! Sheba came from the ends of the earth to hear Solomon; and the Gentiles are coming to hear from me! Someone greater than Solomon and Jonah is here and you’re missing it!”

Jesus’s answer is rooted in Text. His claim is that the very thing the prophets spoke of and sought out was happening before their eyes and they were missing it.

This story always gives me pause. I must ask whether or not I’m missing the obvious. I think of how often I hear people trying to explain away how “non-believers” can do good things. We go to great lengths to explain how all the people who aren’t wearing the right labels are not “in the Kingdom of God.” And I wonder how many times we set up camp with the Pharisees and ask God for things that are already happening around us.

Rob Bell likes to say, “What you look for, you will find.”

If we look to find the world corrupt and falling apart, we will find it. If we look for all the broken places and things that exist in disharmony, there are plenty of examples to see. If we look for everything that’s wrong and all the ways people mess up, failure abounds around us. What we look for, we will find.

But if we look for the Kingdom of God bursting forth in all kinds of places we’d never expect; if we try to find light shining in dark places; if we stay attentive to the work of God in people who don’t wear the T-shirts — I wonder if we would find God more than ever. I wonder if there are signs of Jonah all over our world, and we are missing it.

What we look for, we will find.

I want to look for — and be surprised by — God.