In today’s Gospel, Jesus speaks to the crowd and calls them to repentance. Christ reminds them of what happened to Jonah and how the Ninevites responded to him. God came to Jonah and told him to set out for the city of Nineveh and “preached against them; for their wickedness has come before” Him. However, Jonah disobeyed God and “made ready to flee to Tarshish, away from the Lord” (Jonah 1:1-3). As we all know, the “Lord sent a great fish to swallow Jonah, and he remained in the belly of the fish three days and three nights” (2:1). It was during this time of distress in the belly of the fish that Jonah prayed to the Lord, his God. The Lord God heard Jonah’s cry for help and answered him (2:3). The “Lord commanded the fish to vomit Jonah upon dry land” (2:11).
Jonah repented for being disobedient to God and the Lord delivered him from the belly of the fish. After his repentance, God called him a second time: “Set out for the great city of Nineveh, and announce to it the message that I will tell you” (Jonah 3:1-2). This time, Jonah obeyed God and announced to the Ninevites: “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be overthrown” (3:4). Jonah had gone only a single day’s walk when “the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth. . .the king of Nineveh. . . rose from his throne, laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes” (3:5-6). The Ninevites repented. “When God saw their actions how they turned from their evil way, he repented of the evil he had threatened to do to them; he did not carry it out” (3:10).
Jesus said to the crowd: “Just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation. . . at the preaching of Jonah they repented, and there is something greater than Jonah here.” In other words, Jonah prefigures Christ and calls us to repentance. Similarly, John the Baptist was the forerunner of Christ and calls us to repentance. But there is something greater than Jonah and John the Baptist here - our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Christ came and preached repentance, saying: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17) and, again, “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15). “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God” (John 3:16-18).
Let us therefore listen to our Lord and God and repent and believe in the Gospel. “For freedom Christ set us free; so stand firm and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.”
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