THE Pharisees would not let Jesus alone. Somehow his words troubled the conscience. All their training and belief rejected him, but they could not ignore the teaching which Jesus directed towards them. The result was that they continued to pursue him, and asked him to give them a sign. Presumably this was so that they may have some unmistakable proof of his identity and validity for his teaching and his claims. However secretly in their hearts they wanted to find a way by which they could quieten their consciences and reject him. They hoped that Jesus would not be able to give them the sign they wanted. This was of course true, because Jesus had given ample signs of his deity and Messiah-ship in his healing and raising the dead, and still they would not believe. Jesus knew that if he gave another sign, they still would find some reason for seeing it as inadequate.

Jesus gives evidence that he knew all this. He saw the hypocrisy behind their request for a sign, and saw it as an excuse to be able to say to themselves that his teaching was false. Because of this Jesus refused to give them a sign at that time, but told them he would give them a sign soon. The fact is that when the sign was given, the Pharisees rejected this sign even more vehemently than they had rejected all the signs they had already had given them.

The sign that Jesus promised was the sign of the prophet Jonah. Jesus explains this by saying the he, the Son of Man, would be three days in the heart of the earth, just as Jonah was in the belly of the big fish for three days. In both cases death is being spoken of, followed by resurrection by the power of God. Jonah's experience was a type of Christ's death and resurrection. However the reality far exceeded the type, for Jesus really died on the cross. He went into hades, and then God raised him from the dead.

There is no greater sign to prove that Jesus is both God and Saviour. This sign is for all to see and receive for their soul's salvation, but like the Pharisees most seem to refuse and reject this sign to their eternal loss.

To refuse and reject this great sign which testifies to Jesus as Lord and God and Saviour, and so be the one in whom we trust and commit our life, is the greatest folly of all, and is the greatest sin, for it throws back into the face of God and Jesus his love and grace and mercy. This is why Jesus tells the Jews that both the people of Nineveh to whom Jonah preached, and the Queen of Sheba who listened to the spiritual wisdom of Solomon, will stand in judgement on the Pharisees and all like them who reject Jesus who has risen from the dead. They will stand in judgement because with far less evidence, and before Jesus came to work salvation and worked it fully by his death and resurrection, they believed and were saved. The Ninevites in Jonah's day repented and believed the message, and were saved through their faith. Later Ninevites turned away from God and the city was destroyed, but those alive in Jonah's day believed and were saved.

God has given in Jesus and in his resurrection the greatest evidence that Jesus is the one given for our salvation. His resurrection proves that Jesus is the Son of God. It proves that all his words were the word of God. If we reject Jesus we have no excuse. The witness is there. Thank God, if we like the Queen of Sheba and the Ninevites have been given grace to believe. What wonderful salvation and love God has lavished upon us that we believe, and in believing have been given the right of being children of God.

It is important to notice that Jesus speaks of Jonah, the big fish swallowing Jonah, Jonah spending three days in the fishes belly, as fact, historical fact. To sneer at those who accept Jonah as history and set ourselves up as too wise to believe such fables, it to sneer at Christ, and call the Son of God an ignorant fool. If we deny this historicity of Jonah and his time in the fishes belly, we take much of the power from the words of Jesus here, and destroy faith in his death and resurrection.