Peace, Not Carnal Warfare
Carnal warfare is self-destructive, while the peace of God is self-preservative. Christ was announced, at His advent, with the heavenly proclamation, “On earth peace, good-will to men.” His kingdom has been built up on the principle that it was “not of this world,” and that His soldiers were not to fight with carnal weapons. See John 18:36; 2 Cor. 10:4; Eph. 6:11-18. Thus the kingdom of Christ struggles on amid the angry strifes of sinful nations, meeting all opposition in the faith of the all-conquering One, who will soon fall upon the whole mass of earth’s proud nations, as a stone “cut out without hands,” and will “break them to pieces,” itself filling the whole earth. See Dan. 2:34, 35, which is interpreted in verses 44, 45. Such is the triumph of peace, as a means of bringing in a condition of universal peace, over all the world-powers that have thought to establish peace through bloody warfare. Such is the “throne of David,” that is soon to be occupied by the “King of kings and Lord of lords,” an eternal result now being hastened to consummation by the “zeal of the Lord.” See, also, Rom. 9:22-28.