DOES GOD SANCTION WAR?
By T
ALL thru the Word of God He presents Himself as full of the tenderest compassion toward the creatures of His care. In language of unmistakable import He presents Himself to us as the God of love. Then how can it be possible that He will sanction the barbarities of war? He who said, “Thou shalt not kill,” will never stir up men to go upon the field of battle to slaughter each other in the most wholesale manner. To the superficial thinker it may appear that the Lord has at times sanctioned war. But a careful study of the Word fails to confirm such a theory. When the Master was upon earth in person, the Pharisees had some questionings in regard to the law of marriage. They asked the Saviour, “Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause? and He answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that He which made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they twain shall be one flesh? Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. They say unto Him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away? He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives; but from the beginning it was not so.” Matt. 19: 3–8. It is perfectly easy from a superficial reading of the old Testament Scriptures to get the idea that God sanctioned divorce. But the Lord Jesus Christ makes it forever clear that this was not the case. Because of the persistent hardness of heart God permitted this to be done, but it was not His plan. He never originated any such thing. The breaking up of families thru the divorcing of husband and wife is the subversion of the Lord’s ordained institution of marriage,—it is Satan’s evil working to destroy one of the wisest and best institutions of the divine Father. And the master cunning of the great adversary is still further seen in his effort to try to have men think that the God who is the Author of marriage is also the originator of the divorce, to break up that which He has done before. The Lord does not work at cross-purposes in this way. In just the same manner has the adversary worked to make men believe that because God has often made it manifest that He overruled in war, therefore He sanctions war. But no one can read the Sermon on the Mount, or any of the rest of the teachings of the Christ of God, and get the idea that He is any other than the Prince of Peace. And in this thing he does not represent Himself merely, but He is the perfect representative of the kindness and love of the Father. “Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known Me, Philip? he that hath seen Me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of Myself; but the Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works. Believe Me that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me; or else believe Me for the very works’ sake.” John 14:8–11. The foregoing quotation shows the perfect oneness of the Father and the Son. Christ would at no time allow it to be understood that He had any power except what He got from His Father. Neither would He allow it to be understood that His teaching was anything other than what He got from His Father. “And if any man hear My words, and believe not, I judge him not; for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. He that rejecteth Me, and receiveth not My words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day. For I have not spoken of Myself; but the Father which sent Me, He gave Me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. And I know that His commandment is life everlasting; whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto Me, so I speak.” John 12:47–50. In these words the Saviour plainly says that He spoke the Father’s words in all that He declared. So the Sermon on the Mount, and all the rest of this wonderful New Testament teaching, is nothing less than an emanation from the Father, and revealed thru the Son. In another place the Saviour says, “I and My Father are One.” John 10:30. Thus is the perfect oneness of the Father and the Son fully shown. In all of His tenderness, His loving-kindness, and His soul-comforting sympathies, He was not presenting a contrast to the Father, but was presenting to the world what the Father really is. Then, since the Father and the Son are so perfectly in harmony, that they are both One in everything that They do, it is plain that the Sermon on the Mount, with all its peaceful beatitudes and expressions of kindness, is not an emanation from Christ alone; it is the voicing of the harmony and good will that the Almighty God and His Son Jesus Christ pour forth from Their inmost soul, with the desire that these kindly sentiments may fill the hearts of all mankind. Then, again, the Word of God tells us that the Lord is an unchangeable God. Thru the prophet Malachi we are told, “For I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.” Mal. 3:6. A similar testimony is borne by the apostle James in regard to the unchangeable character of God. He says, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” James 1:17. And of the Master it is said, “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever.” Heb. 13:8. Now, since the Lord so plainly tells us that He changes not, and that there is no variableness with Him, neither shadow of turning, and since He is the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever, is it not passing strange that any one in this enlightened age should have the idea that in the old dispensation the Lord advocated war, while in the new He exhorts us to peace? And should not any one with these texts of plain Scripture open before him recognize the fact that the Saviour, in coming to us as the Prince of Peace, is not only representing His own sentiments of infinite kindness, but that He comes to us because of the love of His Father, and to represent the kindly principles of peace that have their source in the breast of the Infinite One Himself? Any view that would seem to conflict with this can not be harmonized with the tenderness of the God of love, nor with His unchangeable character. In this connection we should not forget the lesson that the Saviour gives us on the law of divorce. The Jews thought that Jehovah sanctioned the dissolving of the marriage bond. But the Saviour plainly showed that it was not God who created the divorce law, but the hardness of their hearts was the cause of it. Even so may we know from the teaching of Christ that it was the hardness of men’s hearts that brought, and ever brings, war into the world, and the Lord has nothing to do with it except to overrule for the benefit of humanity whenever He can do so. The divine philosophy of the part that God acts in any war is expressed in the following words of Scripture, “Surely the wrath of man shall praise Thee; the remainder of wrath shalt Thou restrain.” Ps. 76:10. All the wrath of man that God can use to His glory and praise by setting it in contrast to His own goodness and mercy, so as to attract and save as many as possible, that He will permit. All the rest of it He will restrain. This is a divine principle that is clear, and it is perfectly plain that it is just and right. T.