Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai, saying, ‘Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before me.’ But Jonah set out to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.
Jonah 1:1Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,
ché la diritta via era smarrita.Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straightforward pathway had been lost.
The Inferno, Dante, Stanza 1
One of our running jokes at Northcote is around including something to do with a whale at as many events as possible. This week we will spend some time with the story of Jonah and the Whale (yes, I know it wasn’t a whale), that powerful story of suffering, flight, and the love of God that will never let us go.
Every Tuesday evening we gather together to talk about what it means to be Jesus’ disciples in contemporary Melbourne. Sometimes that’s a Bible Study, sometimes something more thematic, and sometimes something more reflective.
We eat together at 7pm - bring your own dinner, or buy something from one of the many takeaway options on the street - and the “serious bit” begins at 8. We’re done by 9:15
Swanson, John August. Jonah, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=56549 [retrieved September 20, 2023]. Original source: Estate of John August Swanson, https://www.johnaugustswanson.com/.