| Highlights of DAWN | March 1975 |
The Cry for the Kingdom
“Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever.” —Isaiah 9:7
“TODAY, the world economy is … threatened with breakdown and disintegration. Monetary disorder afflicts the entire non-communist world. Nations coming up against the interlocked threats of trade and payments deficits, inflation, energy shortages and unemployment are growing increasingly nationalistic in their policies. … We are … facing a choice between economic chaos and a difficult, unprecedented, peacetime collaboration among major governments.”
Opening his article in a recent issue of The New York Times Magazine on the world economy with these ominous words, economist Leonard Silk proceeds to describe in thought-provoking detail the factors that have brought the world to its present precarious condition and suggests a course of action to be undertaken if the threatened worldwide economic and financial chaos is, hopefully, to be averted; namely, abandonment by the nations of the world of their beggar-my-neighbor policies of self-interest, and the adoption of an unprecedented peacetime collaboration among major governments.
Society’s Foundations Threatened
Mr. Silk is far from alone in his deep concern anent world conditions. He notes the warning of Chairman Arthur F. Burns of the Federal Reserve Board, that “if long continued, inflation at anything like the present rate would threaten the very foundation of our society.” He also quotes Ashby Bladen, a senior financial executive of the Guardian Life Insurance Company, as saying, “A return to either price stability or financial stability without an intervening crash appears to me to be practically impossible. … And the longer the crash in postponed by continuing the inflationary process of excessive credit expansion, the worse it will be when it does come.” Further on in Mr. Silk’s scholarly article we are given the view of Dr. H. Johannes Witteveen, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, that “it is no exaggeration to say that the world presently faces the most difficult combination of economic policy decisions since the reconstruction period following World War Two.”
Be it noted that these are not the views of alarmists, but rather of temperate, responsible, and thoughtful men reporting on world conditions as they honestly see them. After noting the concern of his fellow economists, and suggesting his program for averting world disaster, Mr. Silk asks, “Is such an effort to restore world economic order politically feasible and realistic? It had better be!” The primary, essential ingredient in that effort, according to Mr. Silk, is international co-operation, and he puts the matter very simply, though forebodingly. He says, “The United States, Western Europe and Japan must recognize that they are all in the same boat, and must either work together or they will sink together.”
Co-operation—or Disaster
The widely read Kiplinger Washington Letter said recently, “Remember, the U.S. economy is now a part of the WORLD economy. In years past we were somewhat of an island, but now international trade is vital to our fortunes … as it is to Europe’s, Japan’s and Mideast’s. We breathe in and out with them. … The U.S. is no longer an island unto itself. Like it or not … we’re becoming integrated into the world economy. … We depend increasingly upon foreign countries for raw materials. This means we have less control over our own economic destiny … and what happens in the world at large more and more touches us directly.”
Later in the same article Mr. Silk makes an observation that should particularly interest students of God’s Word, who since the first advent of our Lord have been praying for the coming of God’s kingdom and the doing of his will on earth. He says, “In an increasingly integrated world economy, such programs need to be international and not merely national in scope. Yet the time for supranational [universal] government is not yet.” Seemingly, he leans to the view that the only and ultimate solution to the world’s problems must be through the agency of a powerful world government.
The renowned mathematician, Albert Einstein, expressed the same view. Following the atomic bombing of Hiroshima toward the end of World War Two, which he most deeply deplored (and his genius helped create that awful weapon) he said, “The only salvation for civilization and the human race now lies in the creation of world government.” And on the occasion of Mr. Nixon’s visit to Moscow to discuss the possible limitation of the nuclear arms build-up, the King of Belgium said to Mr. Nixon, “All men seem to be bound together by the same destiny.”
There is, we see, a definite, growing realization in the minds of thoughtful people of the inescapable truth that if men are to live happily together on this ever more crowded planet they must learn to communicate, co-operate, and deal justly with one another.
“The Whole Creation Groaneth”
This craving for universal peace and happiness has stirred in the hearts of men for long ages. At Jesus’ first advent, Luke tells us that “the people were in expectation” (Luke 3:15), probably through their vague understanding of Daniel’s prophecy concerning the coming of the Messiah. (Dan. 9:23-26) The people did not know what to expect from his arrival. But they were a subject people, suffering under the heel of the Roman Empire, and longing for deliverance at the hand of that Great One who had been so long promised. The Messiah did indeed come, but he did not bring the literal deliverance from oppression that the Jews had so eagerly anticipated, for it was not the due time for that part of God’s plan on behalf of mankind to occur. He came to die; to give his life as a ransom for all mankind, and to call out of the world during this Gospel Age a people for his name.
A little later, in writing to the church at Rome, Paul also calls attention to this longing for deliverance from the tribulations of this present evil world, not only on the part of the Jews, but of all mankind. He writes, “We know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.” The world does not comprehend the full implications of these stirrings within their hearts, but actually, Paul tells us, they are unwittingly longing for the completion of the church and the dispensing of the promised kingdom blessings. Now, as iniquity appears to be reaching its fullness; now that the millennial reign of Christ and the church is drawing nigh, as we believe, may it not be that the world is coming to realize its need? May it not be that, here and there, God is beginning to prepare the hearts of men, wearied with wickedness, suffering, and seemingly insoluble problems, for the coming in the earth of the kingdom?—Rom. 8:19-22
World Peace Through Violence?
Indeed, there are even certain misguided elements of so-called Christianity who are so frustrated at the obvious lack of world progress toward peace, love, justice, and righteousness as they see it, and so impatient and anxious for the time of kingdom blessings to arrive, they are seriously suggesting that those who call themselves Christian must take matters into their own hands to bring about that much desired time, even to the point of using violence. This rather recently advocated approach to attaining the elusive earthly utopia is put forward by one Jurgen Moltmann under the label “the theology of hope.” The horrors of revolutionary violence, suggests Moltmann, are necessary and justified to overcome the greater sin of tyranny and unrighteousness under which mankind lives.
As Ernst Bloch, another advocate of this philosophy writes, “Christians have taken a new look at revolution. … Present evils are too great to be handled in any other way than by that of revolution.” Thus, we are exposed to the” latest application of that ages-old fallacy that has caused untold suffering over the centuries, that the end justifies the means.
“Turn the Other Cheek”
One wonders where the scriptural authority exists for adopting such a course. Paul instructed the church to live at peace with all men, and to “be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God; the powers that be are ordained of God.” (Rom. 13:1) And Jesus never preached violence. He did not even resist the rabble mob that came unjustly to arrest him, and he rebuked Peter when that apostle sought to defend him. “Then said Jesus unto Peter, Put up thy sword into the sheath; the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?”—John 18:11
Far from advocating violence, Jesus instructed his followers to turn the other cheek if the occasion required it. Jesus made it clear that the task and privilege of the church during this age is to preach the gospel of peace, the gospel of love, the gospel of hope; and to lay down one’s life in fulfilling that assignment. We are to pray for the kingdom, not use violence to attempt to bring it into being. If we have faith, we will leave the timing and the modus operandi for accomplishing that important and glorious event to the will and judgment of the Heavenly Father, as indicated by Daniel the Prophet. “The God of heaven,” said Daniel, “shall set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these [presently existing, worldly, and evil] kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.”—Dan. 2:44
Is our faith too weak, and our impatience too great, to take these promises into our hearts and lives, and to wait on the Lord? And surely the Lord’s people have been greatly blessed with the clear evidence of the Lord’s hand in the affairs of the world since the end of the Times of the Gentiles in 1914, realizing that this was preparatory to the beginning of the millennial reign of Christ and the establishment in the earth of a universal, righteous government—the only real solution to earth’s ills.
The Confusion of Tongues
The world today is composed of many scores of nations and peoples of varying sizes, each of which is more or less like a large family unto itself. These nation-families have their own customs and cultures; often their own religions. They are separated by boundaries, physical or artificial, by national aspirations, by ideological differences, and by hatreds generated by centuries of wars, so that communication and exchange of ideas and development of sympathetic understanding between these nations (composed as they are of imperfect human beings) is well-nigh impossible. Apart from the inherited imperfection and selfishness of humankind, perhaps one of the principal obstacles to understanding and co-operation between nations is the language barrier. This obstacle, under Christ’s reign, will be removed.
When God created man he placed him in a beautiful garden paradise eastward in Eden, and surrounded him with all that he would need to sustain life everlastingly. God there blessed Adam and his wife and, among other things, instructed them to “be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish [Hebrew, fill] the earth, and subdue it.” Evidently it was God’s purpose for man to scatter throughout the whole earth, populating and subduing it, and rendering the entire planet one large, beautiful, and peaceful garden.
However, “sin entered the world, and death by sin” (Gen. 3:1-19; Rom. 5:12), and mankind started down the long, broad road that leads to destruction. (Matt. 7:13) By the time that Noah came on the scene some sixteen centuries later, iniquity had become so general and the earth so filled with violence that God decided to destroy all mankind in a great flood, preserving only Noah and his wife, and their three sons and their wives, for these God had found to be righteous in his sight.
Be Fruitful, and Fill the Earth
Now the slate would be wiped clean, so to speak, and the earth populated afresh. “And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish [fill, RSV] the earth.” (Gen. 9:1) Here the Creator instructed Noah and his sons even as he had Father Adam and Mother Eve so many centuries earlier, to multiply, and fill the whole earth. Noah’s offspring did indeed multiply greatly, as God had instructed them to do. But apparently they did not comply with the remainder of God’s instructions; namely, to scatter abroad and take possession of the whole earth. We read of this in the eleventh chapter of Genesis.
“And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.”
Evidently they had found a pleasant situation that appealed to them, and they decided to make it their permanent habitation. But seemingly this was contrary to God’s instructions to fill the whole earth, and the Lord was not pleased. “And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.”—Gen. 11:5,6
The Confusion of Speech
The Lord was determined that they should move on into other parts of the earth, and he rightly concluded that the best way to separate them and make them travel on was to confuse their speech. “Go to,” said the Lord, “let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.” And how immediately effective was this confusion of their language in bringing about a separation among the people! “So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth; and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel [Confusion]; because the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth; and from thence did the Lord scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.”—Gen. 11:7-9
This confusion of speech largely remains to this day, and is an important element in keeping peoples separated, and in thwarting the development of understanding and co-operation between nations. It is a large factor in the stubborn continuance of selfish nationalism, of hate, and of animosity of one nation toward another. And the Lord has promised that in due time this barrier to universal love and peace shall be removed.
This promise is recorded in Zephaniah 3:8,9: “Wait ye upon me, saith the Lord, until the day that I rise up to the prey; for my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them mine indignation, even all my fierce anger; for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy. For then will I turn to the people a pure language, that they may all call upon the name of the Lord, and serve him with one consent [one accord, RSV].”
The Work of the Kingdom
However, mere removal of the language barriers between peoples will not automatically and of itself bring about co-operation and understanding between the nations. Helpful as it will be, it is but one step in God’s overall program to accomplish that glorious end. After the world of mankind is brought forth from the grave in the resurrection, as a result of Christ’s redeeming sacrifice, the long process of writing God’s law of love in the hearts of the people will begin. And when it is completed, mankind will once again enjoy that wonderful at-one-ment; that glorious communion with their Heavenly Father that was lost when our first parents disobeyed God’s loving instructions. For thus “saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”—Jer. 31:33,34
In the thirty-fifth chapter of Isaiah the prophet beautifully describes the blessings that will flow from the work of restitution when Christ and the church are reigning. Even the desert shall blossom as the rose! “It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing; the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.”—Isa. 35:1,2
The prophet tells us that these blessings follow the Day of Jehovah. He says, “Behold, your God [Jehovah] will come with vengeance, even God with a recompence; … Then [after that great and terrible day] the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing; for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert. … And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those; the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein, … but the redeemed shall walk there: and the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”—Isa. 35:4-10
One World, Universal Love
This work of writing God’s law in men’s hearts and restoring them to that image of their Creator from which they have fallen will take a thousand years. Then will be brought to pass that presently uncomprehended, but so hungrily sought, “desire of all nations” for a world that is truly one in heart and mind and love and reverence for their great Creator, and in love and sympathy and co-operation with one another. For then that one world, under one universal righteous government for which thoughtful men are even today proclaiming a need, and for which Christians have been praying since the first advent of Christ, will gloriously come into being, and hold sway for a thousand years under the beneficent rulership of Christ and the glorified church. (Isa. 9:6,7; Rev. 20:6) Then will the troubles that plague this poor world he removed by the only government that is wise enough, powerful enough, and righteous enough to accomplish that great work—God’s universal kingdom under Christ and the church.
We believe the signs are clear which indicate that we have already entered upon the beginnings of the Day of Jehovah, immediately beyond the completion of which the promised blessings shall begin to flow to humankind. How we all long for that time when our loved ones shall hear the voice of the Son of man, and come forth from the sleep of death, to be brought to a knowledge of the truth and of the Father’s great love, and have an opportunity to gain happy, everlasting life in that wonderful new world under Christ wherein dwelleth universal righteousness!—II Pet. 3:13