The Patience of God (3:1-4):

3:1–4 Though undeserving, Jonah has been delivered from death by God’s merciful working through a fish. The book of Jonah is, before all else, a lesson concerning God’s free grace. But it is also a portrayal of God’s incredible patience. As Jonah confesses in 4:2, Yahweh is a God who is “slow to anger,” and it is amazing that God says nothing to Jonah in 3:1–2 by way of rebuke or admonition. Instead, God simply calls Jonah again, using the same words that he used in 1:1: “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city . . .” (RSV).

Previously, Jonah was to cry out against the city, 1:2. This time he is to proclaim the words that Yahweh will speak to him, but we do not hear the content of the proclamation until 3:4. The word for “proclamation” (qerîʾâ) is found only here i…