Facing Armageddon by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Aug 27, 1912

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 39, No. 33.

Facing Armageddon.

By Editor

It is quite interesting to note the many writers and speakers who are coming to mention Armageddon as a thing just before the world. In concluding his speech at the regular Republican Convention in Chicago and also in concluding his address before the convention of the newly formed Progressive Party, Mr. Roosevelt said as the climax to his peroration, "We stand at Armageddon, and we battle for the Lord." The word "Armageddon" occurs only in Rev. 16:16. By the best authorities it is made to refer to Mount Megiddo. The Revised Version gives the rendering "Har-Magedon," which is simply giving us the English spelling for the two Hebrew words that are translated "Mount Megiddo." Kitto, in his "Cyclopædia of Biblical Literature," says, "Megiddo was famous in the sacred history as the place where the Canaanitish kings were overthrown by Israel, and hence by the plain where the antichristian kings shall congregate against Christ and His church being thus named, it is intimated that it shall be with those kings as it was with the Canaanitish kings at Megiddo."

A little study of the text as found in the book of Revelation will enable any one to see that Armageddon stands for "the war of the great day of God, the Almighty." The Bible plainly shows that the world is facing that war right now. All this intense preparation for war that is filling the world is the prelude to Armageddon. But do the men who are talking so dramatically of Armageddon realize what they are talking about? Have they studied these prophecies that are so clear in their utterances? Or are they simply feeling about for impressive figures of speech? Or may it not be that the Lord's providence is behind all this in order to move men in spite of themselves to become familiar with some of His most impressive prophetic utterances?