What happened to Nineveh can happen to America

Over the past year, I have taken great inspiration from the Hebrew book of Jonah, a short account (about two pages long) that speaks volumes about the limitless, miracle-working power of the eternal God of the Bible.

We often focus our telling of the story on Jonah’s rebellion, his subsequent repentance, and the incident with the whale, but what happens after the whale is equally significant and holds deep cultural relevance.

Let’s read the entirety of chapter 3:

“And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey. And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water: But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not? And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not.”

For context, God had previously denounced Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, as a wicked city on the brink of destruction. In His mercy, the Lord sent His prophet Jonah to preach against the Ninevites, providing them one final opportunity to repent. In chapter three, after a long and stubborn detour, Jonah, at last, answered that call. With eight simple words, he warned of the city’s impending doom. And with those eight simple words, God kickstarted perhaps the greatest revival in history.

This is what stands out to me, given the dire situation our nation faces: the entire city was changed. Radically. Miraculously. Everyone, “from the greatest of them even to the least of them.”

That is exactly the kind of transformation we need to see in America. Imagine if, suddenly, almost overnight, all of Chicago, Milwaukee, New York City, or Washington, D.C., cried “mightily unto God” and turned from their wicked ways. Imagine if from California to Florida, red, blue, and swing states joined together in prayer for our country. The very news would send shockwaves from sea to shining sea: revival, at last, had come to our shores.

Ah, but that would be impossible, you say. Miracles like that don’t happen anymore.

Are you so sure?

Another ancient Hebrew prophet, Isaiah, proclaimed, “Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear: But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear. For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness. None calleth for justice, nor any pleadeth for truth: they trust in vanity, and speak lies; they conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity” (Isaiah 59:1-4).

In other words, it’s not that the God who radically transformed Nineveh is any less powerful today; it’s that we’ve lost our desire for Him. The people of Nineveh, wicked though they may have been, responded to the call for revival. Are we willing to do the same?

People of faith, I’m calling on you. We want to preserve this country. But in order to do so, we must re-embrace a simple virtue that stands at the bedrock of any prosperous society: faith.

Faith in the God of Nineveh. Faith that transformation is still possible. Faith that where two or more are gathered in His name, YHWH Himself is in the midst of them.

Many of our past leaders spoke extensively about this kind of faith. Notice, for example, what President Ronald Reagan attributed the Allied victory on D-Day to: “What inspired all the men of the armies that met here?” he asked a band of survivors. “We look at you, and somehow we know the answer. It was faith and belief; it was loyalty and love. The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead or on the next.”

If we lose that faith — faith in the impossible or anything worth fighting for — we might as well throw in the towel. But if we still believe that miracles and transformation are possible, may I recommend that we each find ourselves on our knees daily, praying that the God of Nineveh would heal, protect, and bless our land?

Revival may have seemed impossible for wicked ol’ Nineveh. But they had no idea what God had in store.

Let us hope and pray the same will be true of us.