Doest Thou Well
In the manual: Come, Follow Me lesson 48, “Seek the Lord, and Ye Shall Live,” on Gospel Library
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Nineveh was spared, and Jonah was furious (Jonah 4:1).
Read Together
Jonah finally explained why he had run away in the first place. He knew the Lord was merciful, and he did not want that mercy for his enemies (Jonah 4:2).
2And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.
10Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night: 11And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?
What It Teaches
Jonah’s complaint holds one of the kindest descriptions of God in the Bible. “I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness” (Jonah 4:2). He knew it was true, and he wanted it only for his own people.
The Lord answered with a question. “Doest thou well to be angry?” (verse 4). Then he made a gourd vine grow up to shade Jonah, and the next morning he sent a worm to kill it (verses 6 and 7). Jonah was angry about the plant too.
Jonah cared about a plant he had never planted, which grew up in a night and died in a night. Nineveh held more than 120,000 people who could not tell their right hand from their left, “and also much cattle.” The Lord asked whether he should not spare them (verses 10 and 11). The book ends with that question, and every reader has to answer it.
The sons of Mosiah felt the opposite of Jonah. They could not bear the thought that any soul should perish, so they went to teach their enemies, the Lamanites (Mosiah 28:1–3). The Lord wants us to want mercy for everyone, the way he does.
Talk About It
Is there anyone you would find it hard to see forgiven? What would help you want mercy for them the way the Lord does?
Take to Church
Jonah’s book ends with the Lord’s question about Nineveh. Each of us answers it in how we treat the people we find hard to forgive.