Waiting to Be Right
In Flannery O'Connor's short story "Revelation," Mrs. Turpin sits in a doctor's waiting room while gospel music plays on the radio. To pass the time, she thinks about the people she looks down on being crammed into a railroad car and gassed to death. As she considers how good she has it, she thanks Jesus for making her the way she is. Suddenly, a girl attacks her, saying, "Go back to hell where you came from, you old wart hog." As Mrs. Turpin recovers at home, she goes out to the hog pen on her farm and starts to argue with God. To answer her, God gives her a vision of everyone who is going to heaven. At the front of the line are the poor white and black people she can't stand. At the very end are people like her. When she looks closely at them, "she could see by their shocked and altered faces that even their virtues were being burned away."
God asked Jonah: "Is it right for you to be angry?" Instead of responding to God's word, Jonah walks out. Not towards the ocean, but east of the city. He makes a shelter for himself while he waits for the Ninevites and their homes to be destroyed. He's no longer trying to warn them. He wants them to get what they deserve. While the Ninevites sit in sackcloth and pray to God, Jonah sits in comfort, avoiding God. After talking to a therapist, Christina Buttons decided her parents were abusive. So for five years, she cut them out of her life. At the time, she wrote in her journal, "I'm just going to have to make it on my own now." She was certain they were too toxic to be trusted. It wasn't until she learned that her mom was diagnosed with cancer that she came to her senses. Days later, she returned home and, over time, rebuilt her relationship with her family. She now says, "Outside of my husband, my relationship with my parents is the one I value most." This part of Jonah's story can be used to manipulate people into staying in hurtful relationships. It's easier to fake an apology than to repair the damage that was done. There are situations where children rightly and reasonably break contact with their parents. But Jonah is watching a city fasting and praying, with cattle draped in sackcloth. We know that "God saw their actions—that they had turned from their evil ways—so God relented from the disaster he had threatened them with" (Jonah 3:10). In Luke 18:9-14, Jesus tells a story about a tax collector and a Pharisee. The Pharisee thanks God that he is not like bad people and recounts his good deeds to God. But the tax collector stands at the back, looks at his feet, strikes his chest, and pleads, "God, have mercy on me, a sinner." The original listeners would have thought the Pharisee was better off. But Jesus explains that "everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted." The Ninevites are turning their lives around, but Jonah doesn't want to change his mind about them.
God let Jonah build a shelter and watch the city. What do we learn about God's patience from how he deals with Jonah?
When has it been hard for you to believe someone has really changed?
Who do you want to fail at repentance?
Ask God, "Is it right for me to be angry at [their name]?" Listen for his answer. Be honest with him.
Source:
Flannery O'Connor, "Revelation," in The Complete Stories (FSG Classics), Kindle edition. Christina Buttons, "I Went No Contact with My Parents. I Regret It," The Free Press, August 12, 2026, https://www.thefp.com/p/i-went-no-contact-with-my-parents.