| Highlights of Dawn | April 1969 |
Armageddon, Then World Peace
“And He gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.” —Revelation 16:16
ONE quarter of the year 1969 has already passed into history. The world in its fear and distress is still grappling with the problems which have been confronting it for now these many years. And speaking of fear, a prominent clergyman in New York stated recently that statistics given to him reveal that ten million people in the United States suffer from deep-seated fear, a fear so intense that their entire lives are almost continuously menaced and distracted by it. And of course, other millions are plagued by these same fears to a lesser degree.
Jesus foretold this world condition when he explained that one of the signs of his second presence would be that men’s hearts would fail them for fear as they looked ahead to the things coming upon the earth. (Luke 21:26) And well might the people fear, for there are so many situations today, in so many parts of the earth, which could quickly escalate into world conflagration, with the possible use of all the modern methods of destruction which science has developed within the last few years.
When President Nixon flew to Europe on February 23, he explained to the dignitaries who welcomed him at the airport in Belgium that he hoped to be able to find a way to carry the nations further down that road to peace which President Wilson opened when he visited Belgium in 1918. President Nixon, previous to making this statement, referred to President Wilson’s failure in connection with the League of Nations, and certainly he must have realized that the fifty years since 1918 have been the darkest that mankind as a whole has ever experienced. No road to peace was opened in 1918, and whether or not Mr. Nixon can do any better remains to be seen.
There are not many living on earth today who were alive in those “good old days” prior to the outbreak of that great war in 1914 which President Wilson said was a war to end wars. The vast majority of the people today do not know what it is like to live in a world which enjoys any real measure of peace. Yet it is doubtless true that almost everyone desires peace.
Parents would like to see their boys brought home from Viet Nam, and from Europe, and from the many places where war threatens, and a semblance of peace is maintained only by armed might. The Israelis and the Arabs would like to see peace. The Nigerians long for peace. The vast majority of college students would like to have peace. The strange thing about this is that in a world—especially the western world—in which the majority is supposed to rule, the majority is unable to rule. This is another symptom of the sickness of a dying world.
Armageddon First
One thing has become apparent during the experiences of the last half century and more, which is that human wisdom is unable to find a way out of the confusion and distress which continuously mar the peace and happiness of humanity. To a degree this has been the experience of the people ever since man transgressed divine law in the Garden of Eden. There has hardly been a decade in all that period in which war has not been waged in one part of the earth or another.
What makes it different now is that the trouble is worldwide, and consists not only of war as such, but takes many and varied forms in which the selfish world of mankind display their discontent, and demand their rights, real and fancied. This global aspect of the trouble now afflicting humanity has been brought about by the phenomenal increase of knowledge which has reached the people since the advent of printing, an increase which has continuously escalated, particularly within the last century.
Knowledge Brings Chaos
There used to be a theory held by many of the bright minds of the world that increasing knowledge through science, invention, and other ways would lead to peace and good will throughout the earth. But this theory has been proved erroneous. The attainment of knowledge does not change the human heart, which essentially is “desperately wicked.” Only the Lord can do this, and he will do it through the agencies of the millennial kingdom. It will be during that period that peace and good will shall be established, permanently and universally.
But first this period of chaos and distress will be permitted by the Lord to continue until the people become more keenly aware of their need of help. The thought is expressed in our topic, “Armageddon, Then World Peace.” Armageddon is a biblical term, and is used in the closing book of the Bible in association with an event that is described as “the battle of that great day of God Almighty.” (Rev. 16:14) Revelation is a book of symbols in which is set forth an age-long struggle between truth and error, righteousness and unrighteousness, Christ and Antichrist. “Armageddon” is one of the symbols used in the book, and it is associated with the great and final phase of a struggle with which the present age ends, when the kingdom of Christ rises victoriously, establishing universal and everlasting peace.
The word “Armageddon” is of Hebrew origin and is associated geographically and historically with the hill of Megiddo. Megiddo occupied a very strategic position in the ancient Holy Land, commanding, as it did, an important pass into the hill country. The general location of Megiddo was the great battleground of Palestine. Here Gideon and his three hundred routed and defeated the Midianites. Here also King Saul was defeated by the Philistines.
Many of the symbolisms of the Bible are not unlike those with which the world is acquainted. The Bible, for example, uses beasts to represent kingdoms, or governments, and so does the world. And the use of a battlefield to convey a certain idea is also practiced by the world. When we say, for example, that an army meets its “Waterloo,” we simply mean that although it may have been victorious for awhile, it suddenly met unexpected defeat. It was Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo that caused such significance to be attached to this particular battleground.
So with Armageddon. It was Israel’s battleground, and to understand its symbolic meaning in the prophecies it is but necessary to discover the special characteristics associated with all the battles in which ancient Israel participated. It is not the fact that the Israelites were always victorious, for they were not. Sometimes God permitted his people to be defeated. This was because they had sinned against him and needed to be disciplined. However, there was one outstanding characteristic of all Israel’s battles which was not true, and never has been true, of battles fought between other nations, which is that God took a hand in them and overruled their victories and defeats in keeping with his own great plan of the ages.
When we take this fact into consideration, the word “Armageddon” assumes a definite significance. It suggests a struggle in which God directs the issue, assuring final and lasting defeat for the forces of unrighteousness. Moreover, as the prophecies show, it is the last great battle of the ages, and will result in the permanent defeat of all the agencies of Satan, thus preparing the way for the full manifestation of the kingdom of Christ. This is why it is described as “the battle of that great day of God Almighty.”
That “Great Day”
The prophecies clearly show that “that great day of God Almighty” is the period of time which marks the end of the present age. It is the time in which “this present evil world,” or social order, comes to an end. It is described in the Bible as the day of God’s “vengeance,” and as the “last days.” It is also spoken of as “the day of the Lord” because it is the time when the Lord intervenes in the affairs of the world to halt the mad and downward rush of the people into sin and destruction, preparatory to the establishment of his long-promised kingdom.
Every phase of the “last days” distress upon the nations has to do with the overthrow of Satan’s social order. Note, for example, the prophecy of Isaiah 13:4-6: “The noise of a multitude in the mountains, like as of a great people; a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms of the nations gathered together: the Lord of hosts mustereth the host of the battle [gathers them to Armageddon]. They come from a far country, from the end of heaven, even the Lord, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land. Howl ye; for the day of the Lord is at hand; it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty.”
While God fought for his people on the ancient battlefield of Megiddo, giving them the victory when their obedience deserved it, his strategy was not always the same. In the case of Gideon’s victory over the Midianites, the Lord’s strategy resulted in Israel’s enemies destroying one another. Thus it is in one aspect of the great battle by which “the kingdoms of this world” are set aside preparatory to the manifestation of. Christ’s kingdom. One of the prophecies declares concerning this that “every man’s sword shall be against his brother.” (Ezek. 38:21) Already the peoples and nations of earth, in their fighting against one another, have wrought terrible destruction against the strongholds of civilization, and the end is not yet.
Specifically, Armageddon is not the war in Viet Nam. It is not the Israeli-Arab conflict in the Middle East. It is not the tension and conflict between Eastern and Western Europe. It is not the struggle between big business and gigantic labor unions. It is not the protests and riots on college campuses the world over; it is not the rebellion of priests against the authority of the pope. All of these are but contributing factors to the disintegration of a social order, which the Bible calls “this present evil world.”
All of these efforts, the well-intentioned and the evilly conceived, in their failures to accomplish hoped-for goals, will, in the final picture, help to convince mankind that peace cannot be established upon the basis of selfishness, and that God’s way of love is the only sure way of attaining “the desire of all nations.”—Hag. 2:7
The Promised Land
Out of the chaos of a disintegrating world has come another factor foretold by the prophecies of the Bible. This is the acquisition by Israel of at least a part of their Promised Land. A prophecy recorded in the 38th and 39th chapters of Ezekiel relates some of the difficulties encountered in this development, and indicates that the final skirmish in “the battle of the great day of God Almighty” will be participated in by enemies of Israel who desire to take a “spoil” from them.
The forces which then will attack Israel are said to come from the “north,” together with others. Students of prophecy suggest that the nations here depicted are Russia and her allies. The prophecy reveals that it will be in this attack against Israel that the Lord will outwardly demonstrate his intervention. The prophecy states that the Lord will plead against Israel’s enemies “with pestilence and with blood; and … will rain upon him, and upon his bands, and upon the many people that are with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire, and brimstone.”
We may not know how literally this will be fulfilled, but it seems clear that in this prophecy is described the great climax of Armageddon. Here it will be divine, miracle-working power that will defeat the enemy, even as it was at times in the ancient struggles at Megiddo. The prophecy reveals that as a result of this divine intervention all the nations, including Israel, whom the Lord then delivers, will as a result of this demonstration of his mighty power have ‘their eyes opened to behold his glory. Then all nations will know that there is a God in heaven who, through the Messiah, is ruling among the children of men. Then Armageddon will be over.
A Pure Message
And what will be the result of this complete victory for the Lord? Zephaniah 3:8,9 also forecasts the gathering of the nations to Armageddon, and states that the Lord pours upon them the fire of his zeal—mistranslated jealousy in the King James Version. As the other prophecies indicate, this will result in the destruction of man’s social order, here spoken of symbolically as “the earth.” But the people remain, and after their social order is destroyed God turns to them a “pure language,” or message. This will result, the prophet asserts, in all calling “upon the name of the Lord, to serve him with one consent.”
This will be one of the ways by which, during the reign of Christ, love will be caused to replace selfishness as a motivating power in human affairs. And under the administration of that kingdom of righteousness all mankind will find satisfaction and joy. Indeed, during that kingdom reign even the dead are to be raised, that they also may enjoy the life-giving blessings which no worldly ruler has ever been able to give to his subjects. But Christ can, and will, give them the opportunity to enjoy everlasting life in peace and happiness, being restored to perfection as humans to live on the earth forever.
It is through our assurance of divine ability and purpose to restore all who lose their lives in Armageddon that we are able to see God’s love and justice in the method his wisdom has chosen to overthrow Satan’s rulership over the people. The millions who lose their lives in this great struggle will be, from God’s viewpoint, merely asleep. Divine power will awaken them in the morning of the new day. They will thus have an opportunity to see the final, glorious outcome of that great struggle in which they suffered. Without doubt, most of these will then gladly take the oath of allegiance to the “King of kings, and Lord of lords,” who then will be the recognized sovereign of the whole earth.”—Rev. 19:16; Ps. 72:1-14
The experience with sin and death throughout the ages has been a trying one, and is particularly so now when, because of human selfishness, there is worldwide “distress of nations, with perplexity.” (Luke 21:25) But the lessons to be learned therefrom will be of inestimable value. Through this experience all mankind will learn the terrible results of disobeying divine law. By contrast, when the kingdom blessings are showered upon them, they will learn of divine goodness and, as the prophet declares, their hearty response will be, “Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, … we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”—Isa. 25:6-9