IN a world distracted by the horrors of war with its desolating effects felt in millions of homes it would be well to turn to the glorious promises that are given in the Bible of the bloodless conquests of the Prince of Peace. The nations have taken their own ways and followed their own paths in reaching the goal they had set before them of attaining peace and prosperity. The peace they sought was not the peace of Heaven and the prosperity they aimed at was not based on righteousness. The tragic failure of man’s plans does not seem to have been realised by the builders of the so-called new order as they seem to be as busy as ever in planning a new world order in which the Lord and His Anointed appear to have as little place, as in the order which is lying crashed in ruins at their feet. God’s decree that His Son shall reign is not to be set aside by the short-sighted schemes of worldly minded politicians. The reins of the government of the world have not fallen from helpless hands and the present tragic, chaotic condition of the world is no indication that the present situation so utterly beyond the power of man’s control is beyond the power of Him who occupies Heaven’s high throne. He has made it clear that His Son must reign until all His enemies shall be put under His feet. Individuals and nations which ignore that decree do so at their peril. This divine purpose is not some plan invented or planned by men, it is a plan which is the outcome of the unsearchable wisdom of heaven and behind which is the whole omnipotence of the Godhead to make it effective in God’s appointed time. Whenever any plan comes into conflict with this pre-ordained order or clashes with it, it is bound to cause an upheaval of a catastrophic kind just as would happen if man had the power to interfere with the laws that regulate the heavenly bodies. May the present sad state of the world not be accounted for because the nations were determined to pursue their own course and ignore the clearly revealed purpose of God as made known in His own Word. Thousands are asking why God allows war and such a war as this? The answer to that question has been given long ago. It will be found in God’s Word—”From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence even of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain; ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ask not. Ye ask and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts,” James, iv. 1-3). It has also been asked: “Is there a God at all when He allows the world to be drenched in blood as it is at present?” But, what if in the awful spectacle presented to our eyes we are witnessing the inevitable consequences of man’s perversity and disobedience and his determination to ignore the holy laws of heaven. Can we trifle with the recognized laws of health and not pay a terrible penalty which affects not only ourselves but the circle to which we belong? We can no more break the laws of heaven than the laws of nature without paying a penalty and the greater the scale on which these laws are broken the greater must the penalty be. Should the laws which regulate the moon’s motion be in any way interfered with who can tell what catastrophic results might follow?
Again, it is not to be forgotten that the Lord may have purposes in such confusions caused by the fire and the whirlwind that are beyond our ken. In the exercise of His divine prerogative He may overturn, overturn, overturn, until He shall bring to pass His own purpose (Ezek. xxi. 27). It may be that in the welter of things so hard for us to unravel there is an overturning of those false ideas of men which were fast reaching a peak in ministering to their pride and vanity. Whatever may be the case at present we will not take upon ourselves to say; nor, in a light-hearted way, raise expectations which may never be realised as is the manner with some who dabble without knowledge, in the hidden prophetic utterances of the Bible. One thing, however, is certain, there are bright days yet in store for the Church of Christ and, we feel, we are on solid scriptural ground in following the best and safest interpreters of God’s Word in believing that such days will yet be witnessed by His Church. One of the promises which is full of hope is the one in which Moses blesses Judah—“The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a law-giver from between his feet until Shiloh come; and unto Him shall the gathering of the people be” (Gen. xlix. 10). True, this promise has reference to the first Coming of the Messiah but the latter part of the promise—“Unto Him shall the gathering of the people be”—was not exhausted in the first Coming. In one of his noblest sermons* Ralph Erskine, preaching on the above text, the great Secession preacher after calling attention to the primary application of the words goes on to enumerate the different classes of people that will be gathered to Shiloh. It is hard for us to believe at times the different kinds of sinners that the Lord will gather under His banner but we have the assurance that they will be gathered from every kindred and tongue and people and nation. At the end of the sermon the preacher makes the following arresting appeal: “And now, this gathering of the people here is to part; but, O happy parting, to those who can date their first or farther gathering to Shiloh, from their gathering to Carnock? For, part with whom ye will, Christ and you will never part again: whatever clouds may be in your sky, yet your sun is risen and will never set. But the most part of you here were never yet gathered to Shiloh: and, Oh! how can you find it in your heart to go away without Him, and without so much as a desire after Him, who is the Desire of all nations. For my own part, I cannot think of your going away in such a case. Alas! shall He have to say it: “I would have gathered you as a hen does her chickens under her wings, but you would not!” Oh, wherefore did you gather to this place, if you would not be gathered to Shiloh! And if you be more willing to be gone than willing to be gathered, woe is me, that my text will be no more but a witness against you upon Carnock green that you would not; and that the devil, and the world, and your lusts, were more desirable, and you had more heart to be gathered to them than to be gathered to Shiloh. Oh, then, sirs, heartless parting, while you are content to part with Shiloh for ever, rather than to part with the base lust or a black devil! If that be not your choice, then let your heart say, in the sight of the living God, if you can; ‘Lord, I think I would be gathered, and would rather choose to die upon the spot than not to be gathered unto Shiloh; and my soul could wish that all my dearest lusts were buried in this green, never to rise again, and that Christ might have my heart for ever, in room of them all.’ Why, man, can you say that to the heart-searching God! Then, poor soul, let me desire you to take the first convenient closet or corner you can get, and there tell Him this over again more solemnly; and, at the same time, bless Him that ever Shiloh came to you, and that ever you felt the virtue of His promise—that ‘to Him shall the gathering of the people be.’
* The Sermon will be found R. Erskine’s Complete Works, iv. 397-557. The sermon is a small treatise in itself and we recommend our readers to give it a perusal if they have a copy of Ralph Erskine’s Works.—Editor.