(a) After Jonah had been thrown into the sea, God chose a big fish to swallow him and Jonah was in the belly of the fish for three days. Inside the fish, Jonah prayed to God for deliverance and the fish spewed him on to the dry land very close to Nineveh. After he had been delivered, God commanded him to go and proclaim His message to the people of Nineveh. He carried out the instruction of God and when the people of Nineveh heard his message, they believed and repented.
God forgave them because of their repentance and the city was spared from destruction. The action of God did not go down well with Jonah when he saw that God had forgiven the people. Jonah went to sit under a booth outside the city looking forward to God's destruction of the city. God appointed a plant and it came over him as a shade to save him from his discomfort and Jonah was very happy at this. His annoyance came again the second day when God caused the plant to die and the sun continued to beat upon his head. He requested that the best thing for him was to die. God told him that he was annoyed because of the plant he did not labour for, but wanted the city of Nineveh which had more than one hundred and twenty inhabitants to be destroyed.

(b) Jonah had to learn some lessons from the experience. These include:
(i) God is omnipresent. It is not possible for anyone to run away from Him for He is everywhere.
(ii) We learnt from the story that God is merciful
(iii) We also learnt that God forgives those who repent of their sins.