by Rev. John MacLeod, MA, Stornoway
In the midst of changes and as we enter yet another year we ought to draw much comfort from the consideration that all power in heaven and in earth has been given to the immutable, almighty Redeemer. This may be forgotten or denied by the generality of men but yet remains an unshakeable reality. The pleasure of the Lord is to prosper in His hand and He must reign until all His enemies are made His footstool. Paul, inspired by the Spirit of Christ, would have the Colossians alert to what was happening in the world around them. In that way they would be influenced with regard to the framing of their petitions at the Throne of Grace. “Continue in prayer,” he wrote, “and watch in the same …” All who have a heart interest in the Cause of Christ must surely take note of what is happening on the world scene. Wars and rumours of wars, changes of government and events of that nature are all embraced in what He has, for His own glory, unchangeably foreordained.
The year that is past was an eventful year in many respects: Israel and the Vatican were never far from the headlines. Israel captures the headlines on account of its being embroiled in strife with the Palestinians; the Vatican because the mass-media is so much within the grasp of Jesuit and Papal activists that no opportunity to disseminate Roman Catholic propaganda is allowed to pass and Papal visits abroad, as we all know, were golden opportunities. Israel’s main aim, as we understand it, is to secure her borders and continue to exist; Rome’s aim is, as ever, world domination and universal recognition of the spiritual and temporal supremacy of the Pope. That the two should occupy such a central place on the world stage at present is a most interesting phenomena and one, no doubt, which has a very important place in the divine purpose for both. The Scripture tells us plainly that the one, the Papacy, is to be
abolished and totally destroyed whereas the other, God’s ancient people, beloved for the fathers’ sake, are to be restored. Prayer being “an offering up of our desires unto God, for things agreeable with His will” it is incumbent on us to seek at the Throne of Grace the destruction of the Papacy and the restoration of the Jews. The true people of God have been thus exercised in every age since the Papacy came to be ascendant and it came to be a matter divinely revealed that the Jews are to be in due time ingathered. Reformers, Puritans and Covenanters alike were of this mind.
That good soldier and minister of Jesus Christ, Richard Cameron, the “Lion of Covenant,” was clearly persuaded that this was his duty. On a notable occasion shortly before his death he was found at a conventicle in Ayrshire preaching on the text, “And ye will not come to me that ye might have life,” a sermon that was blessed to many. In the middle of the discourse he fell into “a rap of calm weeping” to be joined, it is recorded, by the majority of his hearers. When sufficiently recovered, he paused before completing the delivery of his sermon. In that pause “he prayed for the restoration of the Jews, for the fall of Antichrist, and for the hastening of the hour when the Stuarts should be swept from the throne.” The last of these petitions was, within eight short years, answered. The other two remain. It is to be noted that Richard Cameron, in accordance with the Westminster Confessional Statement, identified the Pope with the Antichrist of Scripture.
At a time when we see all the world wondering after the beast and the most influential and powerful of the Western nations falling over themselves to play host to the Man of Sin and when no other nation on earth seems prepared to voice criticism of Rome we find Israel prepared to do so. When Yasser Arafat, the terrorist Palestinian leader, was received in audience by the Pope in September, Israel condemned the Pope’s action in no uncertain terms. So forceful indeed was Israel’s denunciation and so keenly was it resented by the Vatican that relations between the two were said to be at their lowest since the formation of the Jewish State. Interestingly, the Vatican does not recognise the State of Israel as the Western nations do and diplomatic relations between them are non-existent. An Israeli spokesman on this particular occasion described Arafat as a man “who wants the destruction of Israel to complete the work started by the Nazis.” He further alleged that the Roman Catholic church never spoke out against the massacre of Jews for six years in Europe and, with the Pope in mind, he went on to say, “If he meets Arafat, it is merely indicative of a certain moral standard.” In
answering Israeli charges the communiqué issued by the Vatican, we are told, “stunned diplomats and other observers by its harsh language.” The Papacy criticised and its moral standards called in question! In living memory no nation had dared to do this. Such criticism, the Vatican said, was “almost incredible,” “disrespectful” as far as the Pope was concerned and, of course, quite unjust when the Roman Catholic church was charged with complicity in the Nazi mass-extirpation of Jews! It would appear that the Jews have not been impressed by the recent Jesuit “whitewashing” of Pius XII and his Curia and the claim that the Papacy was responsible for the protection of thousands upon thousands of Jews is not one which they regard as of any worth. The incontrovertible truth is that Pius XII gave his backing to the Nazi regime (Hitler, Himmler, Goebels etc were, after all, faithful sons of mother church) and he was well aware of what was happening in Germany and his guilty silence was taken note of the world over. The Jews are too interested in their own history to be unaware of the facts and the Vatican’s sensitivity is an indication of how vulnerable the Papacy really is when assailed by the truth. A tremor was felt in Rome.
We believe both Israel and the Vatican will continue to attract world news media attention until, in the words of Jonathan Edwards, “the visible Kingdom of Satan shall be overthrown, and the Kingdom of Christ set up on the ruins of it everywhere throughout the whole habitable globe.” In his “History of Redemption” he traces, in the light of Scripture, the events which will take place as the world enters this glorious period of its history and which we refer to as the Millennium. Israel and the Vatican are prominent. Again it is to be noted that Jonathan Edwards, that great and notable divine, identified the Pope of Rome with the Antichrist of Scripture.
This is part of what he wrote in regard to both of them:
“The kingdom of Antichrist shall be utterly overthrown. His dominion has been much brought down already by the vial poured out on his throne in the Reformation; but then it shall be utterly destroyed. Then shall be proclaimed, “Babylon is fallen, is fallen.” When the seventh angel sounds, “the time, times, and a half a time, shall be out; and the time shall be no longer.” Then shall be accomplished concerning Antichrist the things which are written (Rev. xviii) of the spiritual Babylon, the idolatrous Roman government, that has for so many ages been the great enemy of the Christian church, first under heathenism, then under popery. — That proud city which lifted herself up to heaven, in her pride and haughtiness; that cruel, bloody city, shall come down to the ground.
Then shall that be fulfilled, Isa. xxvi. 5. “For he bringeth down them that dwell on high, the lofty city he layeth it low, he layeth it low, even to the ground, he bringeth it even to the dust.” She shall be thrown down with violence, like a great millstone cast into the sea, and shall be found no more at all, and shall become a habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. Now shall she be stripped of all her glory, and riches, and ornaments, and shall be cast out as an abominable branch, and shall be trodden down as the mire of the streets. All her policy and craft, in which she so abounded, shall not save her. All the strength and wisdom of this great whore shall fail her, and there shall be none to help her. The kings of the earth, who before gave their power and strength to the beast, shall now hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire, Rev. xvii. 16.
Jewish infidelity shall then be overthrown. However obstinate they have been now for above seventeen hundred years in their rejection of Christ, and however rare have been the instances of individual conversions, ever since the destruction of Jerusalem — but they have, against the plain teachings of their own prophets, continued to approve of the cruelty of their forefathers in crucifying Christ — yet, when this day comes, the thick vail that blinds their eyes shall be removed, 2 Cor. iii. 16. and divine grace shall melt and renew their hard hearts, “and they shall look on him whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness as one that is in bitterness for his first-born,” Zech. xii. 10, &c. And then shall the house of Israel be saved: the Jews in all their dispersions shall cast away their old infidelity, and shall have their hearts wonderfully changed, and abhor themselves for their past unbelief and obstinacy. They shall flow together to the blessed Jesus, penitently, humbly, and joyfully owning him as their glorious King and only Saviour, and shall with all their hearts, as with one heart and voice, declare his praises unto other nations.
Nothing is more certainly foretold than the national conversion of the Jews, in Rom. xi. There are also many passages of the Old Testament which cannot be interpreted in any other sense, which I cannot now stand to mention. Besides the prophecies of the calling of the Jews, we have a remarkable providential seal of the fulfilment of this great event, by a kind of continual miracle, viz. their being preserved a distinct nation in such a dispersed condition for above sixteen hundred years. The world affords nothing else like it. There is undoubtedly a remarkable hand of
providence in it. When they shall be called, that ancient people, who alone were God’s people for so long a time, shall be his people again, never to be rejected more. They shall then be gathered into one fold together with the Gentiles; and so also shall the remains of the ten tribes, wherever they be, and though they have been rejected much longer than the Jews, be brought in with their brethren. The prophecies of Hosea especially seem to hold this forth, that in the future glorious times of the church, both Judah and Ephraim, or Judah and the ten tribes, shall be brought in together, and shall be united as one people, as they formerly were under David and Solomon; (Hos. i. 11, &c.) — Though we do not know the time in which this conversion of Israel will come to pass; yet thus much we may determine by Scripture, that it will be before the glory of the Gentile part of the church shall be fully accomplished; because it is said, that their coming in shall be life from the dead to the Gentiles, (Rom. xi. 12, 15.)’
Samuel Rutherford, anticipating the restoration of Israel, gave vent to his feeling in this manner: “Oh to see the sight, next to Christ’s coming in the clouds, the most joyful! Our elder brethren the Jews and Christ fall upon one another’s necks and kiss each other! They have been long asunder; they will be kind to one another when they meet. Oh day! Oh longed-for and lovely day-dawn! Oh sweet Jesus, let me see that sight which shall be as life from the dead, thee and thy ancient people in mutual embracing.” And what of Rome? ‘As you love the glory of God,’ he wrote, ‘pray instantly (yea engage all your acquaintance, and take their faithful promise to do the like) for everyone that Zion’s King armeth, to execute the written vengeance on Babylon. Our Lord hath begun to loose some of Babylon’s corner stones. Pray to Him to hold on, for that city must fall, and the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth must make a banquet of Babylon; for He hath invited them to eat the flesh of that whore, and to drink her blood. And the cup of the Lord’s right hand shall be turned unto her, and shameful spewing shall be upon her glory. He whose word must stand hath said, “Take this cup at the hand of the Lord, and drink and be drunken, and spew, and fall, and rise no more.” (Jer. 25:27). Our Jesus is setting up Himself, as His Father’s ensign (Isa. 11:10), as God’s fair white colours, that His soldiers may all flock about Him. Long, long may these colours stand. It is long since He displayed a banner against Babylon in the fight of men and angels. Let us rejoice and triumph in our God. The victory is certain; for when Christ and Babel wrestle, then angels and saints may prepare themselves to sing, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen.”