I had to write the following assignment for school, and enjoyed doing it so much that I decided to share it with you guys. I had to write a short testimonial of a Ninevite who heard the preaching of Jonah.

---Testimony of a Ninevite--

Once, as I made my way through market place in the great city of Nineveh, I saw a great commotion- a great crowd had gathered around a man who shouted loudly with great urgency, “Yet in forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” This was all that he kept shouting over and over again. As I pressed through the crowd for a better look, I managed to make my way up to the front, and a gentle breeze began to blow. I saw the most peculiar person whose skin looked like it had been bleached, and without one whisker of hair on his entire head. As the breeze blew more towards me, I could not help but be overwhelmed by the foulest, most ghastly smell that I had ever come across. I could not help but sigh in disgust: “Oh God!”

No sooner than I had said, “God,” I was amazingly gripped. I found myself repeating over and over again, “Oh God, Oh God,” as the sound of this man’s voice echoed in my heart. My heart began to beat hard within my chest, and I began to think of what I had come to the market place to do this day: I had come to make my living by stealing from merchants who were too busy dealing with all their customers to notice me as I stole from their unattended money bag. I never stole much though, I only took a little more than what I needed to get by in life- I was not a greedy thief. But now, the greatness of my crime gripped my heart as I heard this man was speaking.

Then I thought of how many others there were like me in the city, as I did not work alone. I knew other thieves who helped themselves to much more than I ever took, and not only did they steal, but they also did things that were unspeakable, things I would never do. I thought, perhaps this man is right. Perhaps this city is ready to fall as an act of Divine judgment. As my conviction grew worse, I doubled over on my knees and began to moan, and cried out to God for mercy. As I did, others began to moan around me and do the same. Soon, our wailing ended up drowning out that of the prophet’s. With that, the prophet began to quickly run away from us. He was as urgent to get out of our midst as he was in the urgency of delivering his message.

For the next forty days all activity in the city came to a standstill. Many could be found fasting and wearing sackcloth. For forty days everybody in the city, including the king himself, could be found praying to God to spare our city. To our surprise, forty days came and forty days passed, and our city still stood. No fire fell from heaven and consumed us, no foreign army stormed our city gates. We were spared. It worked. God showed us mercy.

Though we could not understand it. God had decided to show us mercy, and relented of destroying us through some unknown calamity, though we all knew how great our sins were. We were all so sure that destruction would befall us all, but it did not. Unable to find anybody who could explain why we were not destroyed, some purposed that we search after that man who came through our city and announced judgment so that he might explain why we all did not perish. Such an odd looking man should not be too hard to find. But when it was decided to form a search party to look for him, people were unsure if he left through our western gate, or if he went right out of the city through the eastern gate. So, the search party decided not to go looking for him after all.

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Jimmy H