Gone to Hell, Could've Been Saved...

I've been thinking about the story "Jonah and the Whale". Yeah, I know it wasn't necessarily a whale. Could've been a whale, a shark, a whale shark, or any other 'Great Fish' that swims in the sea. Anyway, I've been thinking about the story, and how God told him to "GO!" and Jonah went. He went so quickly that he ran the other way, stowed away, was thrown overboard, and swallowed by a leviathan and spent three days and nights in it's belly repenting.

But to do the story justice and go deeper, I have to start at the beginning of the story where God tells Jonah to "Go". God told Jonah he needed to get himself over to Nineveh and preach about the town's wickedness. Obviously, the whole town was a mess and God was pretty fed up with them. The part that strikes me funny, is that God gave Jonah a taste of the message he was to preach when he got there (the wickedness part), but later we find out that God gave the rest of the message after the whale/fish puked him out on the beach. If you'll recall, the rest of the story is that Jonah goes to Nineveh, tells the town it's going to be overthrown/destroyed if the people don't repent, the whole town repents and is spared.

The big question that I have is this:

What happened to those people God was trying to reach that died sometime during the three days and nights Jonah was in the belly of the great fish and not reaching out to them as God instructed him?

Obviously, the town of Nineveh was thoroughly wicked. So much so that God was getting ready to destroy it. But since He is gracious, He would send Jonah to warn them. But when Jonah ran and didn't get there when God wanted him to, people were still doing the same wicked things, dieing, and going to hell. Nineveh was a large town so I'm pretty sure they had several die in those three days. I can't help but wonder how many of those that died and went to hell could have been spared and eternity of separation from God, had Jonah not been a coward and RAN AWAY WHEN GOD CALLED HIM.

So, is there anything you are running from today? Or better yet, is there a conflict or disagreement that you know is going to turn into a fight, so you have resigned yourself to run from it, and take a coward's stance? Remember, if God is for you who can be against you...