Jonah like you've never seen him

Ok, so when was the last time you read the book of Jonah? Probably seminary. Get out your Old Testament and open up to the book of Jonah.
Come on now
Just do it

Ok, I wanted to bring this story up because its one of my favorites.
I learned about something in the scriptures called a Chaism- it's basically when the elements of a story repeat themselves in reverse order.
Chaotic passages points to the center of the story. In this story the center is the Lord delivered salvation- first to Jonah then to Ninivah on the the same terms...repentance.

Ok, so here is the chaism of the story

1. The Lord commands Jonah to preach against the wicked Ninivites.
2. Jonah sins, not wanting ninivah to be saved
3. Jonah repents, lord saves Jonah
3. Ninivah repents, Lord saves Ninivah
2. Jonah sins not wanting Ninivah to be saved
3. The lord asks "should I not spare Ninivah?"

This story is quite fascinating when you really study it.
The point I wanted to share at this- even a prophet of God wanted to give up. I want to share an experience that i had with this book to better emphasize my point.

So i was feeling very beat up and hopeless. I was so upset at the fact that this person in my life was, in my opinion, not worthy to be saved or forgiven or spared.
I had had enough and felt like i wanted to just die. I quickly felt guilt over that thought and the thoughts of not wanting God to save this person for any reason whatsoever.
I dropped to my knees crying and seeking help from Heavenly Father. I felt that i just couldn't hear him so i opened up my scriptures in a desperate hope to find Hid counsel to me in there.

I turned to the book of Jonah. I started to read and I started to see this man, a prophet of God, so downtrodden and depressed- upset rather- that the Lord was asking him to call the people of ninivah to repentance. These people had been awful, barbaric even and he saw no point in the Lord forgiving them. He refused to call them to repentance. So he RAN!
A prophet of God ran! Lol
Then i noticed that he even took it further than just running away. When the men on the boat were about to drown in the storm and they were scared- jonah knew why the storm was about to overtake the ship- God was angry with him. But he wanted to just be thrown overboard! He wanted to die!
A prophet of the lord wanted to die rather than see these people repent and be forgiven. Oh my gosh I couldn't believe what i was reading.
I kept reading and remembered the question the Lords asks him in the end... should I not spare Ninivah?
Johan finally asks the Lord to spare him from the belly of the whale. Which the Lord does. But then why would the Lord not spare Ninivah? Wasn't Jonah sinning too by not obeying the command of God and then running away?!

I learned a couple things this night when reading the story again. First, that im not alone in my feelings. Second, that if i wanted to be spared then I had no right to judge, prevent or discourage others from being spared too.

No matter how you want to apply this to your situation right now, I just wanted you to know that youre never alone in how you might be feeling and that you will always find comfort in the scriptures.