The David Koresh Transcripts:
Precis of Jonah
http:http://home.maine.rr.com/waco/jonah.html
Bible study Recorded Mr Carmel April 25th, 1989.
Curiously, at regular intervals Koresh asks the class a question, which they all appear to be able to answer in unison.
The Bible study starts with a strange point that since God made the bords and the fish on the same day, "the birds were created in the water. So the birds were to come out of the water". Koresh then says that the lesson of Jonah is clear, that there are two sides of God.
First Koresh goes though the story of Jonah. When he comes to the point that the king of Nineveh is convinced of Jonah's words, Koresh makes a number of points (1) that in other times God would have killed someone like Jonah for refusing to obey him, but instead God decides to still use Jonah (2) the king of Ninevah, like Rahab the Harlot was someone of Satan who God has used. (3) God's wisdom means he can work through someone we thought was a devil, in the desert Moses lifted up the serpent "Here is God represented as a snake. Well, we thought the devil was a snake. Well, they thought Christ was the devil, until he was lifted up". (4) It was God who convicted of sin and caused repentance, not Jonah.
Koresh now goes back to the time Jonah was in the boat, and points out the for the crew of the ship, when they "killed" the prophet (as they thought, by throwing Jonah out of the ship) the sea went calm, and they knew the God of Jonah was the God of heaven and earth. "God had now saved these seamen".
Next Koresh looks at Jonah and the gourd. Jonah would have been happy if God had destroyed Nineveh because that would have made him look like a great prophet "some people serve God because they have to and all the way along they're selfish, wicked people". So the book doesn't end with us thinking "what an awesome prophet" but "what a sorry person". Koresh then asks the class about another rotten prophet. They suggest Balam, but Koresh is not happy with this answer, he doesn't directly name him, but says "I know of a prophet, with all the other prophets, who talk about a man who overeats, who's stingy, covetous, who has a stony heart, and whose divine purpose is to proclaim a message that Babylon is the cage of every foul and unclean and hateful bird". Koresh then goes on to the book of Revelation.
Koresh argues that the Old Testament was supposed to prophecy Jesus, "but the verses quoted by the New Testament do not harmonize with the subject matter of old", however in the book of Revelation, "in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished as he hath declared to his servants the prophets", so "we can weed out what has been and what has yet to be".
Koresh then reflects on how at Mt Carmel they are receiving knowlege of scripture, but what does that mean? Are they all God's "piggy banks" in which he puts truths and at the judgement shakes them up to see how much truth they have? No, every day they must empty themselves, empty of what they are to know.
Koresh then turns to God's truth being revealed to the prophets. He asks what Corinthians has to say about the government of God. The class replies "Apostles and prophets". Koresh asks "The Lutherian Church - where is their Apostle, and where is their prophets?" to which the class replies "they don't have any". Koresh asks was Luther a good man? Was John Knox a holy man? (class answers "no") and goes on to explain that they were living up to the light God had shown them. Koresh makes an aside in Luther's marriage with the phrase "God had prepared a fish, I guess", saying that Luther had finally found the God of creation, when in Genesis is says it is not good that man should be alone.
Koresh then goes through John Knox being kicked out of the Lutheran church to form the Presbyterians, and Wesley being kicked out to form the Methodists. Each time holding to the light given to them by God. So "the Methodists had to finally become the Baptists, and the Baptists the Adventists and the Adventists became the Seventh-day Adventists...".
At this point the tape finishes.