How Nineveh Was So Quickly Warned by STEMPLE WHITE

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 5, 1914

How Nineveh Was So Quickly Warned

By STEMPLE WHITE

STEMPLE WHITE

THE wickedness of populous Nineveh had come up before God. Like Sodom of old, it seemed ripe for destruction. Yet the infinite love of our Heavenly Father would spare the city awhile longer, if there were manifested by its people the least disposition to repent of sin. God takes no pleasure in the death of his creatures, but offers life to all on gospel conditions. Although infinite in love, the cross declares him to be likewise infinite in justice. Rom. 3:24-26.

Were these Ninevites absolutely beyond the reach of infinite love? Foreseeing the whole experience of Jonah as related in the Scriptures, and how he could use all this in a peculiar way to arrest the attention of those wicked city dwellers, God said to Jonah, "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it. . . . But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord."

Jonah fled in the opposite direction, or toward Tarshish (now Spain), instead of obeying God. Many today, after hearing the call of God, are following the Jonah tactics, and, like him, soon fall asleep in their sin, from which nothing short of God's judgments can awaken them.

As in the selling of Joseph and in the sore, bitter experiences of Naomi in Moab, God used the wrath of man and the apparent disappointment and sorrow of his children to the accomplishment of his eternal purpose, even so would God use the very flight of Jonah to the salvation of souls.

"God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform; He plants his footsteps in the sea And rides upon the storm."

On comes the terrible storm, sent of God. The experienced mariners become fearful, and all tremble for their lives. Mercy is vainly implored of all gods save the great "Unknown God;" and because of the ever-increasing fury of the elements, the very cargo is thrown overboard in a futile effort to lighten the ship. Jonah is found below, fast asleep. He is quickly awakened and urged to call upon his God for help. But poor Jonah had not the heart to pray in the full assurance of faith, for he well knew, with the apostle John, that "whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight."

Self-condemned, he tells his story to all, and confesses that he is the cause of the disaster. Much against the wishes of the shipman, Jonah is cast overboard. The waters become still, many vows are made by the thankful worshippers, and who can doubt that some of these very souls will be saved in the kingdom of God as the result of this most peculiar experience?

No sooner had Jonah sunk beneath the waters of the Mediterranean than he found himself housed in a real, live, submarine boat, which took a bee line toward Nineveh. Jonah, who had paid the fare clear out to Tarshish, never got that far, but received free transportation back, though not with the most pleasant accommodations. He reviewed his past life in those three days, and sincerely lifted his heart to God, who can do for us all abundantly above all we can ask or think.

Jonah being willing now to go to Nineveh, "the Lord spake unto the fish, and it cast up Jonah upon the dry land. And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying, Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee. So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days' journey. And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.

"So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything; let them not feed, nor drink water; but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?"

"And God saw their works, that they repented from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not."

From the time of Jonah to the final destruction of Nineveh, no doubt many honest souls who had been almost case-hardened by heathen education were at last led from darkness to light.

Wells, Minn.