p. 4 | The World's Armageddon Battle in Prophecy

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 7, 1913

The World's Armageddon Battle in Prophecy

By R. C. Porter

(To be concluded)

Professedly Christian Nations Coming to Armageddon

THE fourth chapter of Micah is a remarkable prophecy which is to meet its fulfilment in the last days. In this prophecy it is stated that the professedly Christian nations will come to Jerusalem expecting the Lord to overthrow their enemies, remove all war forevermore, and from that time forward establish in this sin-cursed earth his kingdom of eternal peace. "And many nations shall come, and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord." Verse 2. "Nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." Verse 3. "For the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem." "And we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever." Verses 2, 5.

This is Satan's last effort to counterfeit the establishment of the kingdom of Christ before Christ's second advent. He here comes with armed nation professedly to establish Christ's kingdom of peace. Since the world's Armageddon is marshaled by the spirits of devils, doubtless it is at this time that Satan will transform himself into an angel of light and declare himself to be Christ come to establish the kingdom. 2 Cor. 11: 14.

In Micah 4:6-10 the Lord repudiates the whole procedure of these pretentious peace conferences of the nations at this time, and declares that his children over whom he will reign are the ones who at that time are driven out of the cities and dwell in the field, as Lot did in Zoar. But verse 8 makes the bold statement that this is the time when Christ will receive again the kingdom lost by Adam, and he himself will take the throne and reign in Jerusalem, the holy city,—not the earthly, but the heavenly Jerusalem. Rev. 21:1-3; Zech. 14:4.

Speaking of the disappointment of those nations which will attempt to establish the kingdom of Christ by the sword of civil power, the prophet Isaiah, in the second chapter, after giving a parallel statement to that given by the prophet Micah, says: "And the mean man boweth down, and the great man humbleth himself: therefore forgive them not." "And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth." Verses 9, 19. Zephaniah says: "The mighty man shall cry there bitterly. That day is a day of wrath, . . . and their blood shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as the dung." Zeph. 1:14-17.

This is the sequel to the world's Armageddon, as recorded in Rev. 16:12-16; 6:12-17; 19:11-21. Then will be fulfilled the utter destruction of earthly kingdoms and the setting up of the everlasting kingdom of God as predicted in Dan. 2:34, 35; Ps. 2:8, 9; Rev. 11:15.

The Heathen Shall Be Awakened

The prophet Joel says: "Let the heathen be awakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat" to this last-day battle. Joel 3:12. See Rev. 16:14. The heathen will, then, have to be reckoned with in this Armageddon conflict of the last days. They must first "awake" and "prepare war." Are the heathen awakening? Are they preparing war?

Chow Tsz'chi, chargé d'affaires of China at Washington, D. C., U. S. A., in Van Norden's Magazine for September, 1907, says:— "Progress has at last taken hold of China. Attempts to galvanize the giant out of his sleep of ages have been made many times, but until recently they have failed because the giant was not ready to awake. Now he has roused himself, stretched himself, and begun to put his house in order. It was time. Had he not awakened when he did, he would have found his house in possession of strangers. . . ."

"A few decades ago Japan was asleep, but she has awakened, and no people on earth has watched her progress in civilization with deeper interest than the Chinese. Her methods of war, her shipbuilding, her scholarship, have been studied by the Chinese, and when her little army conquered the legions of the most-feared nation on earth, Chinamen accepted it as proof that the yellow race had in it potentialities that were at least equal to those of the Caucasians."

Major-General Wilson, in the "Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science," discussing the probable terms of peace with Russia, says of the Japanese:— "They will probably stay on the Continent this time, come what may. And this makes a permanent disturbance of the balance of power in eastern Asia.

It brings about a state of 'unstable equilibrium.' It inaugurates a new epoch in the history of mankind. It becomes an encouragement to every Asiatic people. It means Asia for the Asiatics. It means that the white man is no longer to dominate the yellow man. It means that the period of spoliation has come to an end. It means that Japan is awake. Finally, it means that China must also awake, and that the two will awaken all Asiatic mankind. It makes Japan the hegemony,—the ruling people of the Asiatic races,—and will surely turn every element of discontent in Asia toward her for instruction and guidance."

In the Literary Digest, under date of March 5, 1910, are to be found the following significant words showing that another part of the above remarkable prediction by Major-General Wilson is being fulfilled:— "A league of influential Japanese and Hindus to consolidate the Asiatic people against the domination of Europe is attracting notice and concern. High officials at the court of the mikado and chiefs of the Japanese aristocracy are at the head of it, and the constitution is from the pen of Count Okuma. On the other side there are very many of the most influential people of India enrolled among its members."

Mr. William T. Ellis in the Independent, in the year 1910, said: "When it comes to China, with her four hundred millions of people, one is tempted to abandon any attempt to convey even the most superficial impressions of the seriousness of her present crisis. China's awakening is portentous. It is marvelous. It is indescribable. It is incredible. It is limitless in its influence. For the sake of the world today, for the sake of the next generation, for the sake of China herself, some new prophet watchman should ascend the housetops of civilization and cry aloud with megaphonic voice: 'China is awake! China is awake!! CHINA IS AWAKE!!!' The biggest of all nations,—the people with the greatest latent powers,—the heirs of tomorrow,—have started to school to learn all the ways, and weapons, and wisdom of the West. This is the news of the day that most deserves 'scareheads' in the newspapers. Here is the subject upon which every wise man will inform himself and instruct his children."

China's sending her young men to the military schools of Europe and America as Japan did before her conflict with Russia, as well as her change of government to a republic from her staid customs of forty centuries, is an alarming evidence of an awakening to war.

The East Against the West

The Armageddon battle will doubtless be a religious war. The different religious bodies of the world are becoming very jealous for the triumphs of their religious creed. The talk about a holy war is not confined to the Mohammedans. It may be traced also to Catholicism, Protestantism, and heathenism. The world is divided religiously approximately as follows: Jews, 9,000,000; Greek and Eastern Churches, 115,000,000; Protestants, 175,000,000; Mohammedans, 210,000,000; Roman Catholics, 240,000,000; heathen, 845,000,000.

From the scriptures already cited it is evident that the final conflict will be between professedly Christian and heathen nations. On this point, as quoted in the New York World, Mohammed Barakatullah, speaking for China, says:— "Yes, it is we who do not accept it that practise the gospel of peace; it is you who accept it that trample it underfoot, and—irony of ironies!—it is the nations of Christendom who have come to us to teach us by sword and fire that the right in this world is powerless unless it is supported by might." "O, do not doubt that we shall learn the lesson! And woe to Europe when we have acquired it! You are arming a nation of four hundred million,—a nation which, until you came, had no better wish than to live at peace with itself and all the world." "In the name of Christ you have sounded the call to arms; in the name of Confucius we respond." "In not many years a power will arise in China that will make the entire world listen."

The late Oscar II, of Sweden, was a man of great diplomacy and far-seeing political sagacity. Prince Adam Wiszniewski publishes part of a letter written by King Oscar to him, dated March 22, 1896, in which the king expresses himself thus:— "I hope to die in peace. My military and warlike inclinations, which were rather strong in my younger years, have gradually died down, and have now all but disappeared. But I believe that in the bloody conflict, sure to take place somewhere, and on the outcome of which the fate of Europe will probably depend, the Occident will be conquered by the Orient."

The greatest of English scholars of the Far Eastern question, Weale, on the first page of his history, entitled "The Reshaping of the Far East," quotes from the sixteenth chapter of Revelation a description of the battle of Armageddon as the probable result of present conditions in the East.

Again Weale, in a late work entitled "The Truce in the East and Its Aftermath," says:— "Instead of the flames of war lighting Manchuria's hills and plains as they do now, they may soon leap sky high once again along an immense land frontier extending from Asia Minor to the sea of Okhotsk, involving the whole world in the bloodiest conflict ever known."

In an article in the "Daily Mail Year Book," 1908, by Archibald R. Colquhoun, F. R. G. S., entitled "A Great World Color Problem, How It Challenges the White Man's Supremacy," appears the following paragraph:— "There is no question that the victory of Japan over Russia, and the Anglo-Japanese alliance, raised the question of relations between white and yellow in an entirely new form, and moreover that a spirit of renaissance is at work throughout Asia, which is destined to challenge the vaunted supremacy of the white man. This spirit is as strong, in its way, as the spirit of democracy now rising in Europe is in another. Japan has demonstrated the efficiency and energy of a yellow race. China is awakening, and no one can predict what that amorphous giant will do when thoroughly aroused. India, where one fifth of the world's population is living, is stirred unceasingly to her depths by all sorts of new doctrines and ideas. The Mohammedan countries of the world are enjoying a spiritual revival. Africa is a seething mass of unrest; and the black man is seeking an outlet for that long-suppressed energy which he used to work off in intertribal wars."

The following is a statement by the German emperor, as reported in the London Daily Telegraph of Oct. 28, 1909:— "Look at the accomplished rise of Japan, think of the possible national awakening of China, and then judge of the vast problems of the Pacific. Only those powers which have great navies will be listened to with respect when the future of the Pacific comes to be solved; and for that reason only, Germany must have a powerful fleet. It may be that even England herself will be glad that Germany has a fleet when they speak together on the same side in the great debates of the future."

These utterances of the greatest statesmen and scholars, taken with those from leaders of the heathen world, are too significant to be passed by indifferently. They confirm the prophetic word.