Prophecy—Its Exact Fulfilment
THE prophet Isaiah tells us in his 42d chapter and 9th verse, “Behold, the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them.” God would have us learn from this, by the things which He has declared, and which have come to pass, that the things which He has declared, but which have not yet come to pass, will just as truly be fulfilled as were the former. In these days of skepticism, it is well for us to recall some of the prophecies which God has given in ages past, the fulfilment of which have been manifest to the world for centuries. Let us take one uttered by the prophet Isaiah himself. It is found in his 13th chapter. It is a prophecy concerning a city that had not yet reached the height of its glory. It did not reach the height of its power and influence until more than one hundred years after this prophecy was uttered. There was nothing in the history of the cities of the world at that time by which one could predict such particulars as Isaiah uttered concerning this city. He could in a general way have said that Babylon would go down, that it would come to nothing. But God through the prophet not only tells us that Babylon would come to nothing, but He tells us how utter that ruin would be, and what the character of the ruin would be in ages after. This is the prophecy. After saying that God would stir up the Medes against the Chaldeans, more than one hundred years before this occurred, he speaks thus of the city: “And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldeans’ pride, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. It shall never be inhabited, neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation; neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there; neither shall shepherds make their flocks to lie down there. But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and ostriches shall dwell there, and wild goats shall dance there. And wolves shall cry in their castles, and jackals in the pleasant palaces; and her time is near to come, and her days shall not be prolonged.” What a fearful picture of desolation it is, how particularly and clearly it is traced. In B.C. 538, the Medo-Persian army conquered Babylon, entered “the two-leaved gates,” and thus fulfilled another prophecy; and the doom of Babylon was pronounced. From that time the city began to go down. It existed in a dying way for a few centuries, but for many more centuries its very site was forgotten. Not until the archeologists, in their excavations in recent years, was it known just where Babylon stood; but delving in the mysteries of the past, men have found the old records, the very bricks in the wall of the city, stamped with the name of the great builder, Nebuchadnezzar, the king who saw Babylon reach the height of its glory, the king who said in his pride, “Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honor of my majesty?” Dan. 4: 30. God’s Word could not fail, and in all the prophecies which He has given concerning the other wicked cities of the world, and the nations which deny Him, His Word will be just as literally fulfilled. “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away.” All that God has said regarding the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, concerning the destruction of this sinful world, concerning, too, the glorious and blessed reward of His children and of that coming city whose Builder and Maker is God, shall not fail. Men may anchor their hopes in that Word. Rejecting it, they may become a part of the great Babylon of the world, and go down with it. Accepting it, they will find that “He that doeth the will of God abideth forever.” In the city of God there is hope. “What shall one then answer the messengers of the nation? That the Lord hath founded Zion, and the poor of His people shall trust in it.” Isa. 14: 32.