1917_The_Finished_Mystery_Text

kindness; and I said so before I left my owncountry." Jonah went out, sat in the hot sun onthe outside of the city, and began to sulk.The Lord took pity on him and caused a gourd togrow up over him, to shelter him from the hotrays of the sun. And Jonah was exceeding gladbecause of the gourd. Then the Lord prepared aworm to smite the gourd; and a strong east windblew up and the gourd withered. Jonah's shadewas gone, and he was angrier than ever. TheLord said, "Doest thou well to be angry?" and hesaid, "Yes, I do well to be angry, even untodeath." Then the Lord said, "Jonah, thou hast hadpity on the gourd that spring up in a night andperished in a night; and should not I spareNineveh, that great city wherein are more thansix score thousandFM92persons that cannot discern between their righthand and their left hand?"We live in a day when a class have beenpreaching that the world is to be destroyed; and,like Jonah, they have not properly understoodtheir message. The kind of world that is to bedestroyed is Satan's world, Satan's empire,arrangement, or order of things— not our literalearth. The word world does not always refer toour literal earth. For instance, when the ApostleJames says, "The tongue is a world of iniquity,"he does not mean that we have inside our jaws alittle planet that turns over every twenty-fourhours, that has spring, summer, fall, winter,snowstorms, rainstorms, and a moon revolvingabout it, with once in a while a comet and ashower of meteors thrown in for good measure.When they think about the Panama Canal, andthe wonderful works of irrigation which arecausing the desert to rejoice and blossom as therose, and all the other wonderful achievements ofour day, these people are beginning to see thatthey have made a mistake and are now aboutwhere Jonah was when he said, "That is what Imight have expected, for I know that Thou art ajust God, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy."They are now outside the city, and the scorching