Jonah 4:6 And the LORD God prepared a gourd, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head… Let the subject be — The precise personal action of God in the discipline, or teaching troubles, of His people. The Lord's teaching by grouping and combination. One teaching suggested to us by these combinations of God is the need of profound humility in judging any of His dealings while they are going on; and of unlimited faith in Him as the preparer and arranger of everything. In no case do we know the whole of a matter. We see but one part, and do not understand the relation of that part to the whole. Jonah did not know what real relationship that gourd had to him. We are taught that we must not quarrel with any one dealing of God. We must not think there is failure because one part of a dealing is, to all appearance, not doing its work. Though one mean and another has apparently come short in your hand, view God in combination, and do not despair. God taught Jonah by a combination of facts, by personal experiences, personal suffering. The incidents of our lives are instinct with educational power. Only, we must see God in them. Alas! that life's facts are so barren of teaching to many. Men fail to read their own lives. By this education of facts God's teaching is very penetrating. Observe also the grouping together of opposites — of pleasure and pain; God reproduces in daily life — the gourd, the worm, the wind. Often we see light and darkness; or conversely, darkness and light mingled in our homes, our business, our relationships, and our only way of being at peace, and being helped heavenward by all that comes, is by seeing in them the preparations of the Lord. The same thoughtfulness by which God arranged the prophet's teaching arranges ours, if only we will learn. The same sovereignty which has the gourd, the worm, and the wind at command has things great and small, all ready to do us good. The same patience in waiting while His combination of circumstances were doing their work is waiting on us now. (P. H. Power, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: And the LORD God prepared a gourd, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd. |
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