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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, etc. I shall use these verses as presenting an emblem of man's earthly good, and an emblem of God's disciplinary procedure.

I. AS AN EMBLEM OF MAN'S EARTHLY GOOD. I take the "gourd" to represent this. What this plant was, whether it was, as some suppose, a kind of cucumber, which sprang swiftly from the soil, and covered the booth which Jonah had reared and under which he sat, or a kind of ivy that crept up and overshadowed his dwelling, or some plant of more rapid growth and more luxuriant foliage, it matters not. We are told the Lord "prepared" it. It was some indigenous plant, characterized by a speedy growth and abundant leafage, and whose growth, perhaps, was stimulated by a Divine infusion of an unusual amount of vegetative force. It was a great blessing at the time to Jonah. It screened him from the rays of the Oriental sun, and refreshed his sight with its verdure. And it is said that "Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd." He felt that it was good. Now, this gourd was like man's earthly good in three aspects - in its development, its decay, and destruction.

1. In its development.

(1) It came out of the earth. The gourd was not a plant sent down directly from heaven. It grew out of the soil. So with all our worldly good. From the earth come all our granaries, our wardrobes, our houses, and all that blesses our material existence. It is all out of the earth.

(2) It came out of the earth by Divine agency. It was not the less a Divine gift because it seemed to grow in a natural way. God produced it. He "prepared it. All the earthly good we possess, even that for which we have laboured with the greatest skill and persistent industry, is the gift of God. He it is that gives us our daily bread, and that furnishes us with food and raiment.

2. In its decay. But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered." Not long, perhaps only a few hours, had the gourd spread its shady and refreshing influence over Jonah's dwelling place before the worm began to gnaw at its vitals and soon smote it. Mark the decaying agent, a "worm."

(1) How mean! It was not some huge quadruped of the wild, or some royal bird from the craggy cliffs or towering forests, but a worm. The work of destruction is very easy. We are crushed "before the moth."

(2) How prompt! Decay commenced at once. "When the morning rose the next day" it had done its work. The worm of decay begins its work with the commencement of our earthly good. It gnaws at the foundation of mansions as soon as they are built, at friendships as soon as they are formed, at life as soon as it begins. "As soon as we begin to live we all begin to die." This worm of decay is working everywhere.

(3) How secret! It works unseen, underground. It gnaws at the vital roots. It is an unseen agent. Who sees the worm that strips the trees in autumn, that steals strength from the strongest animal, and gnaws away the life of the youngest? Verily man and all his earthly good is being "destroyed from morning to evening."

3. In its destruction. "God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die." "This wind," says an old expositor, "was not as a fan to abate the heat, but as a bellows to make it more intense." It may be that this vehement east wind was that terrible simoom which was common in that land, and which smote the four corners of the house in which Job's children were. How desolate is the prophet now! The burning beams of the sun are beating on his head. His booth is destroyed, his gourd is withered to the roots, and the east wind like a breath of fire is drying up the current of life. His existence became intolerable. He wished in himself to die. Here, then, is a picture of our earthly good. However abundant in its nature and delicious in its enjoyment, like this gourd it must go from us. The worm will gnaw out its existence and the east wind will utterly destroy it, and when it is gone and we are stripped of everything but sheer existence, unless Christ is formed in us the Hope of glory, our life will be intolerable, and we shall seek for death as our only relief.

II. AS AN EMBLEM OF GOD'S DISCIPLINARY PROCEDURE. The Eternal, in order to get Jonah into a right state of mind, employs a variety of agency. It is suggested:

1. That God disciplines man by facts. Precepts and theories are powerless in the human soul compared with actual facts. "I have heard of thee," says Job, "by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee." Nature is a system of facts. Human life is an experience of facts, the Bible is a record of facts, and by facts God disciplines the human soul. The gourd was a fact, the worm was a fact, the east wind was a fact, and these facts went down to the centre of Jonah's soul.

2. That these facts are varied in their character. Here was the pleasant and the painful. The gourd, how pleasant! the simoom and burning sun, how painful! So now God employs the pleasurable and the painful to discipline our souls to virtue. He employs the small and the great. Here was the insignificant worm and vehement wind. "Lo, all these things worketh God oftentimes with man, to bring back his soul from the pit, to be enlightened with the light of the living" (Job 33:29, 30).

3. That these facts are adapted to their end. Jonah did not wish that mercy should be shown to the Ninevites. He desired their destruction. This was his state of mind, and a bad state of mind it was, and God dealt with it by giving him a lesson in personal suffering. He taught him what suffering was.

CONCLUSION.

1. Let us not trust in earthly good. It is but a mere gourd. It must wither and rot. "All flesh is grass." Trust in righteousness. "Trust in him that liveth forever."

2. Let us improve under the disciplinary influences of Heaven. Life is a moral school, a school in which the great Father seeks to make his children meet for the "inheritance of the saints in light." - D.T.

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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.

WEB: Yahweh God prepared a vine, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shade over his head, to deliver him from his discomfort. So Jonah was exceedingly glad because of the vine.