The World's Armageddon Battle in Prophecy by R. C. Porter

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jul 31, 1913

The World's Armageddon Battle in Prophecy

By R. C. Porter

The Nations Arming for Armageddon

R. C. PORTER

THERE are two remarkable prophecies which are to meet their fulfilment in the last days. They are paradoxical. They are the true forecast of the two-sided scene of international diplomacy of our time. The nations hold peace congresses, and talk discontinuance of war. While doing so they take good care to greatly increase their appropriations for armaments. For the convenience of the reader in viewing the entire picture as portrayed by the prophets more than two thousand years ago, we shall place the two predictions side by side.

The Nations Say Peace

“But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow unto it. “And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. “And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. “But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig-tree; and none shall make them afraid: for the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken it. “For all people will walk every one in the name of his god, and we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever. “‘In that day, saith the Lord, will I assemble her that halteth, and I will gather her that is driven out, and her that I have afflicted; “‘And I will make her that halted a remnant; and her that was cast afar off a strong nation: and the Lord shall reign over them in Mount Zion from henceforth, even forever.’ Micah 4:1–7.”

God Says “Prepare War”

“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand.” Joel 2:1. “Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake let all the men of war draw near; let them come up: “‘Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. “‘Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O Lord. “‘Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about. “‘Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great. “‘The Lord also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the Lord will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel. “‘So shall ye know that I am the Lord your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more.’ Joel 3:9–13, 16, 17.”

It is marvelous how both these last-day prophecies are being fulfilled. The nations are talking peace, but all of them are making such preparation for war as was never known in any previous age of the world. So striking is this diplomatic peace talk that it has become a matter of caricature and ridicule. Mr. H. N. Brailsford writes in the London Daily News as follows:—

“If war there is to be, of this we may be sure, that no one inside the inferno of struggling races will think twice of The Hague and its humane regulations. The armies that advance and retreat will march amid bands of reckless guerrillas. The villages will be smoking in their path, and women and children will choose between the passions of the combatants on the plains and the chaste cruelty of the mountain snows.”

In June, 1909, Lord Rosebery, former prime minister of Great Britain, speaking before a large number of press delegates assembled from various parts of the British Empire, said:—

“There is a hush in all Europe, a hush in which you may almost hear a leaf fall to the ground. There is an absolute absence of any questions which ordinarily lead to war. All forebodes peace; and yet at the same time, combined with this total absence of all questions of friction, there never was in the history of the world so threatening and so overpowering a preparation for war. “. . . Now, what do we see? Without any tangible reasons we see the nations preparing new armaments. They cannot arm any more men on land, so they have to seek new armaments upon the sea, piling up these enormous preparations as if for some great Armageddon; and that in the time of profoundest peace.”—H. R. Chamberlain, on “The Ominous Hush in Europe,” McClure’s Magazine, October, 1909.

Admiral Fournier, formerly commander of the French fleet in the Mediterranean, predicts “that all the European powers will eventually become involved in what will practically prove to be the Armageddon of the Apocalypse.”—Literary Digest, April 23, 1910.

These utterances from the greatest of cool, deliberate thinkers of our time, echoing the utterances of the prophet of Patmos, who wrote his predictions A. D. 96, is one of the most striking fulfilments of God’s prophetic word.

With the nations talking peace and holding peace congresses while arming on an enormous scale, it is but natural that the real situation should be thus expressed in the public press:—

“Immediate destruction, in the name of humanity, of the half-completed Peace Palace in The Hague, is demanded by the Matin of today, for the following reasons: When its construction was decided upon, the Anglo-Boer war broke out, and plans were laid for the Russo-Japanese war. When the first stone was laid, the kaiser made his first voyage to Tangier, which event was the beginning of the Morocco-European complications. When the first floor was finished, Austria seized Bosnia and Herzegovina. When the second floor was completed, the Franco-German controversy arose. When the roof was put on, the Turkish-Italian war began. ‘Only think,’ the Matin exclaims, ‘the painters, glaziers, decorators, have not yet begun their tasks! We have also heard rumors of statues symbolizing peace. Beware! Each time one is unveiled it will rain shrapnel somewhere. When the temple is completed, look out for a grand scrimmage.’”

The Chicago News of March 27, 1913, under the heading “Terror Besets Europe. Millennial Dream of Statesmen, and the Fruit It Has Borne After Twelve Years,” says:—

“Lucien Wolf writes in the London Graphic: ‘Universal peace and a possible reduction of armaments! The years which have elapsed since this was talked of as practical politics have been the bloodiest the world has ever known since the close of the Napoleonic epoch, while armaments have now swollen to proportions which would have staggered even the unbridled imagination of the Corsican Colossus. One thinks of the

witty conventional who exclaimed, “Have a care! They are talking of peace!” “‘Certain it is that ever since we talked so familiarly of the millennium, they we have been drifting more and more in the direction of Armageddon, and now it looks very much as if the dread thing were in sight.’ Shanghai, China. (To be continued)”