Did the Ninevites have Saving Faith?

The Bible tells us that the Ninevites “believed God” (Jonah 3:5). Was this saving faith or something short of it? While the Bible does not give us all the details, it seems that the Ninevites did turn to Jehovah God in true saving faith. The same expression is used of the faith of Abraham when the Bible says that “Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness” (Rom. 4:3; cf. Gen. 15:6). Commenting on the phrase “and the men of Nineveh believed God” (Jonah 3:5), one Bible commentator objects and says: “this phrase does not carry the same significance as the modern understanding of ‘in God,’ denoting a conversion to faith.”[1] In other words, the commentator is saying that the Ninevites did not have saving faith. But that conclusion cannot be supported from the text, which uses virtually the same wording to describe both the faith of the Ninevites in Jonah 3:5 and the faith of Abraham in Romans 4:3.[2] B. H. Carrol (the founder and first president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary) affirms: “‘Believed God’ in 3:5 is equivalent to ‘believed on God’ and is saving faith, as with Abraham. Fasting and sackcloth are external evidences of repentance.”[3] Commenting on Jonah 3:5, John Phillips similarly states: “‘So the people of Nineveh believed God.’ After one day’s preaching a million people turned to God. This was a genuine evangelical revival. The Ninevites were soundly saved—not just saved from national overthrown, but saved in a spiritual sense. They ‘believed God.’ Paul told us that ‘the father of all them that believe’—that is, Abraham—‘believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness’ (Romans 4:11, 3). If Abraham was saved when he ‘believed God,’ why should not the Ninevites have been saved when they ‘believed God’?”[4]

Jonah preached that the city of Nineveh was about to be destroyed (Jonah 3:4), so where is the message of grace? This is where it is important to read the whole story in context. Are we really to believe that the city of Nineveh, the greatest and most cultured city in the then-known world, had no knowledge of the Hebrew God, nor of the Jewish writings? Commenting on Jonah 3:5, T. T. Perowne affirms: “What they [the Ninevites] knew of the Hebrews and their God (for doubtless they recognized in Jonah a Jewish prophet) may have contributed to the result.”[5] But as John Phillips has said: “The prophet’s most eloquent message was himself. He was a living epistle known and read by all men (see 2 Corinthians 3:2). The people of Nineveh listened to him and looked at him. The effects of his sojourn in the belly of the fish made him a horrifying sight to behold. ‘God punishes sin,’ they surely said. ‘Look at the man. He is livid.’ But the fact that Jonah was alive at all probably caused them to add, ‘God pardons sinners.’”[6]

It’s important to understand that Jonah’s preaching was not only a message of judgment. Rather, it was a message of grace (cf. Jonah 4:2) and then judgment. Notice what he cried out and said: “Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown” (Jonah 3:4). God’s grace is evident in the phrase “Yet forty days”. This opportunity to repent is similar to how when God preached through Noah, he gave that wicked generation time to repent while Noah built the ark and preached to them (Gen. 6:3; 1 Pet. 3:20). Also in the book of Revelation, God gave the wicked woman Jezebel “time to repent” (Rev. 2:21), but she did not want to repent. Commenting on Jonah 3:4, B. H. Carrol affirms:  “The ‘yet’ here indicates God’s attitude toward a sinner. Though he thunders the law of Sinai over the sinner’s head, it is only that the sinner may be prepared to hear the voice from Calvary. ‘Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown,’ but the ‘forty days’ furnish space for repentance.”[7] And so we see God’s grace in Jonah’s message to the Ninevites.

I want to conclude with a few thoughts by Warren Wiersbe (1929-2019), former pastor of Moody Memorial Church. He writes: “How deep was the spiritual experience of the people of Nineveh? If repentance and faith are the basic conditions of salvation (Acts 20:21), then we have reason to believe that they were accepted by God; for the people of Nineveh repented and had faith in God (Jonah 3:5). The fact that Jesus used the Ninevites to shame the unbelieving Jews of His day is further evidence that their response to Jonah’s ministry was sincere (Matt. 12:38-41).”[8] 

In the book The God Who Loves, John MacArthur similarly writes: “Some have suggested that the ‘faith’ of the Ninevites stopped short of true, saving faith. But I do not share that view. It seems obvious from our Lord’s own testimony that for multitudes in Nineveh this represented an authentic saving conversion. In fact, Jesus cited Nineveh’s repentance as a witness against His own generation: ‘The men of Nineveh shall stand up with this generation at the judgment, and shall condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and behold, something greater than Jonah is here’ (Matt. 12:41; Lk. 11:32). An entire generation of Ninevites was thus brought into the kingdom of God solely by His loving grace.”[9]

I’m not a fan of John MacArthur because he promotes the false teaching of Lordship Salvation, but I believe what he says here is true: “An entire generation of Ninevites was thus brought into the kingdom of God solely by His loving grace.”

ENDNOTES:

[1] Billy K. Smith, Frank S. Page, The New American Commentary: Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Volume 19B (Nashville: B & H Publishing Group, 1995), p. 261.

[2] Notice how the phrase “believed God” reads in each of these verses in Greek. Jonah 3:5 reads: “καὶ ἐνεπίστευσαν οἱ ἄνδρες Νινευη τῷ θεῷ” (Jonah 3:5, Brenton’s Septuagint), which can be translated: “And the men of Nineveh believed God” (Darby Translation). Similarly, Romans 4:3 reads: “Ἐπίστευσεν δὲ Ἀβραὰμ τῷ θεῷ” (Romans 4:3, Stephanus Textus Receptus 1550), which can be translated: “And Abraham believed God” (Darby Translation). The point being that the Ninevites had the faith of Abraham, “the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well” (Rom. 4:11, ESV).

[3] B. H. Carroll, An Interpretation of the English Bible, The Prophets of the Assyrian Period, The Book of Jonah.

[4] John Phillips, Exploring the Minor Prophets (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1998), pp. 150-151.

[5] T. T. Perowne, The Cambridge Bible for Schools: Jonah (Cambridge: The University Press, 1879), p. 43, emphasis his. Note: The Roman numerals in the original statement have been updated to their corresponding numbers (e.g. “Luke xi.30” has been updated to “Luke 11.30”, and “Matthew xii. 38-41” has been updated to “Matthew 12.38-41”). 

[6] John Phillips, Exploring the Minor Prophets, pp. 150-151. 

[7] B. H. Carroll, An Interpretation of the English Bible, The Prophets of the Assyrian Period, The Book of Jonah.

[8] Warren Wiersbe, The Wiersbe Bible Commentary: Old Testament (Colorado Springs, David C. Cook, 2007), p. 1448, commentary on Jonah 3.

[9] John MacArthur, The God Who Loves (Nashville: W Publishing Group, 2001), p. 53.