Then God concluded: “For my part, ought I not to feel sorry for Nineveh the great city, in which there exist more than one hundred and twenty thousand men who do not at all know the difference between their right hand and their left, besides many domestic animals?”​—Jonah 4:10, 11.c

21. (a) What object lesson did Jehovah teach Jonah? (b) How may the account about Jonah help us to take an honest look at ourselves?

²¹ Do you see the depth of Jehovah’s object lesson? Jonah had never done a thing to take care of that plant. Jehovah, on the other hand, was the Source of life for those Ninevites and had sustained them, as he does all creatures on earth. How could Jonah place more value on a single plant than he did on the lives of 120,000 humans, in addition to all their livestock? Was it not because Jonah had allowed his thinking to become selfish? After all, he felt sorry for the plant only because it had benefited him personally. Did not his anger over Nineveh spring from motives that were likewise selfish​—a prideful desire to save face, to be proved right? Jonah’s story may help us to take an honest look at ourselves. Who of us is immune to such selfish tendencies? How grateful we should be that Jehovah patiently teaches us to be more selfless, more compassionate, more merciful​—as he is!