Let us go to Jonah 3:10:

And God saw their works, that they turned 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.

The Hebrew word translated as “evil” in this verse is the same Hebrew word used in Jonah 4:1, but it is not translated there as “evil.” It says in Jonah 4:1:

But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry.

The word translated as “exceedingly” is the same word translated as “evil” in the preceding verse at the end of Jonah, chapter 3. You know, we struggle as we try to understand the Bible, verse by verse, but can you imagine being a translator and trying to faithfully translate the words? And we know that the King James Bible is the most faithful translation because they stuck the closest to the original text – much more so than modern Bible translators that have taken all kinds of liberties in updating, supposedly, the language and thereby changing the meaning. For example, the King James translators were faithful to the original Greek when they translated the word as “the faith of Christ” in Galatians 2:16, but modern Bible translators have changed the theology according to their own understanding by saying, “faith in Christ.” They are trying to help the reader, perhaps, but what they are actually doing is leading the readers of their translation away from truth.

So, again, the King James translators were faithful overall to the original Hebrew and Greek, but in the case of Jonah 4:1, they just did not get it. They tried to help the reader because in the previous chapters Jonah had fled from God and His command and then spent three days and three nights in the fish’s belly and then he reluctantly went to Nineveh to preach what God told him to preach. So, the translators thought that Jonah must be “displeased” and angry, which fit the understanding of what theologians and commentaries have developed in the past concerning Jonah.

But, God had turned from the “evil” He was going to do to the Ninevites and that “evil” was cast, in a figure, upon Jonah, as a type of Christ. Just think of it this way: When Christ bore the sins of His people and those sins were cast upon Him, He was full of darkness as He bore those sins and then God poured out His wrath upon Him as He bore our sins. That is the idea. Turn to Matthew 5:29-30:

And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.

If you pluck out your right eye and cast it from you, it somehow saves the rest of the body or if you cut off your hand and cast it from you, it will be profitable because one member will perish and not the whole body. In both verses, the “right eye” and “right hand” are pictures of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is that one “member” that saves the whole body. You pluck out the right eye or you cut off the right arm, it represents the elect body of Christ being delivered through the removal of one part of the body. You might think, “No – that sounds too much like we are involved in a work. We are plucking out the eye or cutting off the hand.” But, who threw Jonah overboard, in Jonah, chapter 1? And what did Jonah tell them to do? In Jonah, chapter 1 they cast lots and the lot fell upon Jonah and then it says in Jonah 1:12:

And he said unto them, Take me up, and cast me forth into the sea…

There is that idea of being “cast,” as was done to the eye and the hand. The sea would picture hell. Jonah is saying to take just him and cast him into the sea. Then it says in Jonah 1:12-15:

… so shall the sea be calm unto you: for I know that for my sake this great tempest is upon you. Nevertheless the men rowed hard to bring it to the land; but they could not: for the sea wrought, and was tempestuous against them. Wherefore they cried unto JEHOVAH, and said, We beseech thee, O JEHOVAH, we beseech thee, let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not upon us innocent blood: for thou, O JEHOVAH, hast done as it pleased thee. So they took up Jonah, and cast him forth into the sea: and the sea ceased from her raging.

You see, the language that says, “Let us not perish for this man’s life,” relates to what we read in Matthew 5:29:

And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.

The sea typifies “hell” and they are already identifying with that language when they cast Jonah into the sea, in Jonah, chapter 1. It is the idea of “plucking out the eye,” which is one part of the whole body. Our body has many members, physically. We have hands, feet, legs and arms or many members, as it says in 1Corinthians 12:12-14:

For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many.

Then it says in 1Corinthians 12:26:

And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honoured, all the members rejoice with it.

This exemplifies God’s substitutionary program: Take one member and it represents the whole. The Lord Jesus Christ suffered and we suffered with Him. When He was resurrected from the depths of the grave and came out of “hell” at the point of the foundation of the world, all the elect rose, in a figure, with Him. That is the figure here.

We can also look at Romans 5:19:

For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.

One member is sacrificed for the whole.

Or, we can go to John 11:47-52:

Then gathered the chief priests and the Pharisees a council, and said, What do we? for this man doeth many miracles. If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him: and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation. And one of them, named Caiaphas, being the high priest that same year, said unto them, Ye know nothing at all, Nor consider that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not. And this spake he not of himself: but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for that nation; And not for that nation only, but that also he should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad.

So, one man died for the whole nation, which would represent all God’s elect. That is what is in view as God turns from the “evil” intended for the Ninevites, which represent the elect who were children of wrath even as others. And, yet, God cannot just dismiss sins and say that He forgives them. There must be satisfaction of the sin and that is justice. That is why Christ performed the atonement. For God to turn from seeing sin upon a person, it must be turned to another, like we saw in the example in Exodus 32, where Moses (as a type of Christ) interceded for the people and said, “Destroy not the people.” God turned and repented of the evil He intended to do.

Here in our passage, Jonah is in the place of Moses here. It is not understandable until we carry over the idea of the “evil” from Jonah 3:10. It is the same “evil” that God turned from them (the Ninevites) to Jonah, a type of the Lord Jesus.

Then it says in Jonah 4:2:

And he prayed unto JEHOVAH, and said, I pray thee, O JEHOVAH, 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.

Here, we see an explanation for why Christ entered in to the human race and why He went to the cross and did the things He did. We could even go back to the point of the foundation of the world when Christ emptied Himself of His glory and took upon Himself the sins of His people: “Was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country?” Of what “country” was He? He was of the kingdom of heaven. Then it said, “Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish,” and I mentioned this when we went through Jonah, chapter 1, but it had said in Jonah 1:3:

But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of JEHOVAH, and went down to Joppa; and he found a ship going to Tarshish: so he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it, to go with them unto Tarshish from the presence of JEHOVAH.

It was emphasized twice that in fleeing to Tarshish Jonah went “from the presence of JEHOVAH.” He went “with them” unto Tarshish from the presence of JEHOVAH. When we compare it to what it says in Genesis 3, it begins to fit together, as it says in Genesis 3:8:

And they heard the voice of JEHOVAH God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of JEHOVAH God amongst the trees of the garden.

From that point forward, mankind was going away from JEHOVAH. It is sin that has separated man from God and now man flees from the Light and prefers the darkness. In fleeing to Tarshish from the presence of JEHOVAH, it is akin to Christ entering the human race to go with mankind as they fled from the presence of JEHOVAH.

So, when Jonah says in Jonah 4:2, “Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish,” it is as Christ entering the human race and becoming a man, emptying Himself of a glory and humbling Himself. Then it says, *“for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil,”8 and these are really words of explanation for why the Lord Jesus did humble Himself and sit in sackcloth and ashes, figuratively, because He knew that God had a salvation program wherein He desired to bestow mercy and grace upon His elect. These are all things that identify with God’s salvation program. Again, it said, “and repentest thee of the evil,” which is also showing Jonah as a type and figure of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Then it says in Jonah 4:3:

Therefore now, O JEHOVAH, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live.

What a rebel, right? What a terrible man! He is so angry that God saved the Ninevites that he wants to die, as he said, “It is better for me to die than to live.” Yes, it plays along with the narrative, apparently, and we understand that he was not perfectly obedient, historically, but what is the deeper spiritual meaning? The deeper spiritual meaning is that He is a type of Christ What if the Lord Jesus had said in one of the Gospel accounts, “Therefore now, O JEHOVAH, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live.” Would that be a true statement of the Lord Jesus Christ? Why was He sent into the world? He had to fulfill the determinate counsel of the Father. He had to go to the cross and die; it was better that He die, especially when we look at the actual atonement at the foundation of the world when the law of God received satisfaction and justice was served. If Christ had not died, then there would be no salvation for anyone. From our perspective, it is far better that Christ died or none of us would live.

So, again, Jonah is a type and figure of Christ: “O JEHOVAH, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live.” Notice that it is God who must take His life from Him. This all fits with God’s overall program and why the Lord Jesus did the things He did by doing what He did the first time (before the foundation of the world) and demonstrating what He had done the second time in 33 A.D.

Then, it says in Jonah 4:4:

Then said JEHOVAH, Doest thou well to be angry?

This is another verse the translators got wrong. You see, the translators were stuck at this point because they had already mistranslated verse 1 and then they went with their “theme” of the rebellious prophet, so when they saw the original language, it just did not make sense. So, they translated: “Then said JEHOVAH, Doest thou well to be angry?” I cannot find my literal translation of this verse, but it basically said something like, “Is wrath rightly kindled to you?” That is the question the Lord asked. If you look in Jay Green’s Interlinear Bible, the English that is shown underneath the Hebrew, it does say “to you.” But, in the English translation that they list off to the side, they changed it to you “in you.” So, if you look underneath the Hebrew word, you will see it indicates “to” or in the direction of Jonah. So, “Doest thou well to be angry” is a wrong translation, but it should be something like, “Is wrath rightly kindled to you?” The wrath is directed from the Ninevites to Jonah. I will try to find my note and make sure it is correct, but I think this is a correct. Apparently, Jay Green also was influenced by the KJV translation that Jonah was an “angry guy,” just full of all kinds of anger and, yet, when you look at the Hebrew preposition, Jonah is the object of the anger or the one that God is redirecting His anger toward, because He is a figure of Christ.

It says in Jonah 4:5:

So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city.

Jonah went out of the city of Nineveh and he sat on the east of the city. Why the east? It is because that is the direction that most identifies with the kingdom of God. The Bible says, “For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.” It is the direction that identifies in a few places with the coming of Christ. Jonah was waiting on the east side of the city and this identifies with the end of the world and the judgment by God’s kingdom that is associated with the east.

And there Jonah made him a booth and the word “booth” is the word also translated as “tabernacle,” and the same word that is used in connection with the Feast of Tabernacles. He sat under it to see what would happen to the city. So, the purpose of him going out of the city was to build a booth and wait. He had to do quite a bit of waiting. He was out in an open area and he had a booth made out of a few branches and maybe some leaves or whatever else he could gather from around the area. How long did Jonah wait? He was waiting to see what would happen to the city. Would he have found out what God would do to the Ninevites the second day or the second week? He had to wait 40 days. Well, not necessarily, because the Ninevites repented: “And God saw their works, that they turned 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.” So, God may have turned His wrath away very quickly, after the first day or second day or third day. Yes, but did the Ninevites know that God turned His wrath away? No – they would not have known because this took place in God’s kingdom above in the invisible realm. No one on earth knew and the Ninevites did not know. All they knew was that they had 40 days, so they were beseeching the Lord for mercy and crying out to Him. And Jonah did not know because God had given this timeline, but he did not know that God had saved a great many people in Nineveh. He could not know until he reached the conclusion of the 40-day period, until, as it said, he “might see what would become of the city.”

The poor guy. He was just sitting out there. Maybe he found 40 stones and he put one out and then another and another until he got to 40 stones. {Laughter] He is counting the stones every day to see how many days he has left. You can get a little delirious under a hot sun! Then the 40 days came and he may have thought, “God told me to proclaim that in 40 days Nineveh would be destroyed.” He was probably looking very closely at the city and up at the sky, but, historically, nothing happened. Talk about disappointment.

You know, Moses was once disappointed about a timeline he thought he understood. The promise drew nigh of the 400 years and it was now at the 390-year mark, so he thought he would be the deliverer because of his position as someone of authority in Egypt. And, yet, God did not deliver Israel at that time, but 40 years later.

Jonah, too, must have been very disappointed and maybe he was even angry. He was weary and tired and he may have dragged himself in to the city after the 40 days passed. The 40 days did pass, historically, and nothing happened. And if anyone could be charged with lying and being deceitful and with saying something that did not turn out as he said it would, it would be Jonah. Maybe Jonah did not go back to the city, after all, as he may have been afraid to do so – the Bible is silent about that.

But is Jonah at fault for what he said when God commanded him to do it? God did not give him an option, but He commanded him and sent him to Nineveh and God chose the words Jonah would preach. The Lord Himself said, “Preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee.” The very words we read were what God commanded him to say: “And yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.”

Do you see the problem? Do you see why it is that I, personally, and others I know…when people say to us, “Well, are you going to apologize for what you taught and it did not happen?” No – because, in all good faith, we looked to the Word of God for truth and direction and God’s Word had locked in a date. And, you see, God’s Word also locked in a date for Jonah – it locked in that calendar date for 40 days later. So, is it possible that God would give a date and then the thing does not take place? It just does not make sense, does it? We look at it and look at it and we said, “Why did it not happen?” Everything was so certain: “The Bible guarantees it!” We received it from the Bible and we know the Bible is the Word of God and we know it is just as true and faithful as it was when Jonah heard the message from the mouth of God in his day. Jonah trusted what God told him to proclaim and he proclaimed it.

You know, sometimes God allows His people to experience these disappointments and even experience embarrassment or scorn from people that heard the timeline and declared a date, like Jonah. And Jonah certainly would not have understood that he represented the dove or Holy Spirit and his going to Nineveh the second time would represent something that would happen nearly three thousand years in the future. He did not have any of that understanding. All he knew was that God told him to preach a certain thing and then it did not happen in the way that Jonah thought it would happen.

But it is interesting that it said, “So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city.” He sat in a booth or “tabernacle” for the 40-day period until it expired and this ties in with the Feast of Tabernacles, which we had thought back in 1994 that it related to the Feast of Tabernacles in September 1994 and that October 21 would be the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles and the time of the rapture. But what we did not understand is that the Feast of Tabernacles is not just the “last day” when God will destroy this world, but it applies to the entire judgment period of 40 years.

Why did God institute the Feast of Tabernacles? Does anybody know? Why did God command Israel to keep the Feast of Tabernacles? God actually tells us in Leviticus 23 where He spoke of the Feast of Tabernacles and the Feast of Ingathering. It says in Leviticus 23:34:

Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, The fifteenth day of this seventh month shall be the feast of tabernacles for seven days unto JEHOVAH.

Then He spoke of the offerings on certain days of the feast. Then it says in Leviticus 23:39:

Also in the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when ye have gathered in the fruit of the land, ye shall keep a feast unto JEHOVAH seven days: on the first day shall be a sabbath, and on the eighth day shall be a sabbath. And ye shall take you on the first day the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook; and ye shall rejoice before JEHOVAH your God seven days. And ye shall keep it a feast unto JEHOVAH seven days in the year. It shall be a statute for ever in your generations: ye shall celebrate it in the seventh month. Ye shall dwell in booths seven days; all that are Israelites born shall dwell in booths: That your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am JEHOVAH your God.

They dwelt in booths, just as Jonah dwelt in a booth. All that are “Israelite born” shall dwell in booths. It almost stands out as representing the elect of God or spiritual Israel. How long did God require Israel to dwell in booths? It was 40 years, from the time of coming out of Egypt to the time they entered into the Promised Land of Canaan. They dwelt in booths. It was the only option. It was not practical to build a house, even if they had the materials because as soon as they got the houses built, there would go the “cloud” to the next camp site and they would follow the cloud. So, they would gather what they could of branches or sticks and they could pack them on a donkey and travel from camp site to camp site. When the cloud rested, they could unpack and establish a spot for a tent and build the booth. They dwelt in “tabernacles” throughout the entire wilderness sojourn.

Why is that significant? It is because of the number “40.” It was 40 years and why were they 40 years in the wilderness? Did it have a relationship to 40 days? Yes – it was 40 days that the spies searched out the land and they came back with an evil report and because of their evil report God judged them and pronounced that they would spend “a year for a day” that they searched the land and, therefore, they would wander in the wilderness for 40 years, the Feast of Tabernacles, we could say, multiplied from 40 days to 40 years.

And, here was Jonah sitting in a tabernacle or booth after proclaiming, “And yet forty days,” and we have already looked at Ezekiel 34 and we saw the 3,900 years to 1994 and another 40 years to 2033. We have already seen Joshua and the battle of Jericho. They went 13 times around and blew the trumpet of the Jubilee. Do you see how God is drawing our attention to the Jubilee year? It was in 1994 that we first started thinking about the Feast of Tabernacles and its relationship to the end of the world, but what we are starting to learn is that the Feast of Tabernacles is a prolonged feast. As God fulfills it, we have been dwelling in “booths” for quite a while now, since 1994.

Lord willing, in our next study we will go to Isaiah, chapter 4. I do not know if anyone remembers the study Mr. Camping did regarding a booth and what he related it to, but he called it the “feast of the Bible.” The Feast of Tabernacles is synonymous with the idea of the “feast of the Bible.” It is significant as we look at Jonah and why he was dwelling in a booth.