A MISAPPREHENSION OF SCRIPTURE.
By Editor
A PROMINENT religious journal, the Christian Herald, in an editorial on "The Game of War in the Far East," closes an otherwise timely paragraph with an allusion to a scripture which is being continually misused to-day. We notice it only because so many have come to believe that the scripture in question teaches what it does not teach. The paragraph reads:— The world makes its boast of the advance of civilization; but the boast is ill-timed when hosts of men, armed with the deadliest weapons that can be made, confront one another on sea and land, intent on battle, and with murder in their hearts. Lust of territory and power still holds its throne in the breasts of potentates and statesmen, and produces its awful results in death and desolated homes. Not for such a condition did Christ come to teach men that God was their Father and they were brethren. After nineteen centuries the lesson has not been learned, and we fear will not be learned until He comes, whose right it is to reign, who shall judge among the nations, and at whose word they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks, and not learn war any more. It would be interesting to know where the authority is to be found for the statement that there would come a time when the Redeemer would come and command the nations to "beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks, and not learn war any more," and they would obey Him. It is not in the Bible—it is not in the text there indirectly quoted, tho preachers and editors have been teaching it for years. A reading of the context will show the most casual student that the language there used is a prophecy of what the people will be saying and teaching. The context plainly states that it is; but men have been trying to put that language into the mouth of the Lord. The text in question is found in Isa. 2:2-5, also in Micah 4:1-5. It states that at a certain time the people will be saying that the Lord is going to judge among the nations; that the people will be saying that men shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning-hooks, that the people will be saying that the nations will learn war no more. But the Lord is not saying that, and will not say it; for it will not be true. As long as "nations" exist there will be jealousies, bickerings, and wars; and it matters not how much talk there may be about converting implements of war into implements of peaceful pursuits, the "nations" will not disarm, and the hearts of men will not be changed save by the converting influence of the Spirit of God. In no place in the Word of God is it stated that God will command the nations to learn war no more. He has set before the people of this world during all these years the better way, and has left it with them to choose. Nevertheless, there is coming a time when wars shall cease. It will be when sin has been wiped out of this world. At that time the "nations" will be broken in pieces as a potter's vessel. The only way that He will rule over the "nations," as such, will be with "a rod of iron." Ps. 2:8, 9. That means punishment, and that punishment is followed by the setting up of His everlasting kingdom—one kingdom, not "nations;" one Ruler, not many. That is the stone that was "cut out of the mountain without hands" (See Dan. 2:44, 45; Ps. 110:4-6), which is to displace all the "nations," and fill the whole earth, and continue throughout all eternity. Over against what the people will be saying in these times, the Lord, through the prophet Joel, tells us what the true condition of these times will be. Read it in Joel 3:9-17. War, strife, persecution, and desolation are the portion of this old earth till sin and sinners are removed in the fires of judgment.