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Having followed then, the sweep of events, it is timely for us to return to that earlier assault predicted to be made on Israel, before the millennium. This time segment is, according to the scriptural requirements, and the earthly signs (Luke 21:28) somewhere about the present time. That Middle Eastern adventure of evil which is predicted, that assault on newly returned Israel, back from its dispersion (Ezekiel 38:10-12, cf. Appendix A), pitilessly harassed anew, though already duly punished for so long: it will be launched by a Northern confederacy. That is, one to the north of Israel.

The land unconditionally accorded to Abraham and his generations, as seen in Genesis 17, from early times, is subjected to a cultural convulsion, a military invasion, an international outrage, a joint expedition to engulf it with the power of man, the grasp of nations. The new terminology, as that of Saddam Hussein of Iraq, may be to 'liberate' it; just as the Communists were earlier so keen to 'liberate' those to be destroyed. The effect, however, in this case has this additional dimension: that the 'liberation' is intended against what God has given to the Jews. Not that they deserve it, God says (Ezekiel 36:32 ), of their whole restoration to their land, now evident to our modern eyes. Yet this return of Israel is not to be overthrown, but rather to lead to their massive return, when assaulted, not merely to their land, but to their Lord, in specific repentance at His crucifixion (Zechariah 12:1,11; Ezekiel 36:33-38, 37:14, 23-26; 39:12 ff.).

Nonetheless, God is committed to the deliverance of Israel, in the land of His promise. "I will turn you round, put hooks in your jaws", He says to the aggressive horde, whether they call themselves deliverers or assassins. "Behold, I am against you," He says to Gog: "Prepare yourself and be ready!" (Ezekiel 39:1-6, cf. prototype Isaiah 37:26-38).

Yes, "after many days," He predicts, "you will be visited. In the latter years, you will come into the land of those brought back from the sword and gathered from many people... brought out of the nations." Israel, at long last, will "dwell securely", only to be confronted ... by this storm of multi-national invasion. It is planned to take plunder and assault the land delivered from waste and newly cultivated; such is the lure of the assault force.

That was the human intention, of the attacking armies, Libya, 'Persia,' Gog and others. What is the result predicted to be ? It is this: the Gog-dominated Northern confederacy will itself become a ravaged ruin; it will secure for itself, not the land of Israel, but the destruction it sought to inflict (*2)! This comes by divine intervention and power, involves a fiery, an incendiary method! (Ezekiel 39:6, Isaiah 66:14-16) and attests, in the crushing of the massed terror directed by men against Israel, God's factual concern for the integrity, and (in history) the fulfilment of His pledge to Abraham (Ezekiel 36:8-15).

He will not suffer the taunts (36:15) and the pillage to reach fruition. He had earlier (Jeremiah 33:19 ff.), dramatically and eloquently focussed the divine power which would keep His word to the Jews. Certainly they sinned in murdering (as an officially implicated nation) the Christ, God's own fellow (Zechariah 11:12-14; 13:7; 12:10), as was predicted so clearly.

They had broken their covenant; but God would not break His word... not even with that provocation. Rather, He proceeds to show - in delivering the returned and punished Jewish people, the grandeur of His honour - that He can absolutely be relied upon to do all He says. Such is His commitment to this 'latter day' deliverance, and securing of the land of the Jews (Genesis 17:7-8; 22:17).

Though rebellious, the Jewish nation could as well be cast away and their covenant forfeited in its unconditional elements, as the heavens and the earth have lacked divine constitution of their order! As well mess up astronomy as foul up His covenant with the Jews. God has instituted the heavens and the earth , and runs both; He has instituted His covenant with the Jews, and though fulfilling its universal blessing through Jesus Christ by specific prediction to 'bless'... 'all nations', as He said, He will also fulfil His undertaking concerning the promised land, as in fact He is, at the very moment doing, unilaterally; and this is one pivotal element of demonstration told most forthrightly and from thousands of years before (see Appendix A).

If the Heavens could be overthrown, so might God break his word of honour to the (even rebellious) Jews. Would they suffer ? Yes! But suffered to be cast out of the land to which He, after discipline, restores them! no!

In fact, evidently before that climacteric time, there is forecast a series of Jewish military victories against great odds, and the breach of enemy ownership of Jerusalem (Zechariah 12; 14:1-3); and indeed, Jerusalem would come into Jewish hands, so that it could be disputed, as by an enemy from outside! (Zechariah 12:1 ff.). All this has happened; the vicious Northern assault is yet to come; and it is to this we have been referring. Divine plans will not be reviewed in the matter; the whole outcome is foretold, with reasons indeed given, and the warning to others to profit from the sight of the restoration of the Jews (Ezekiel 36:36 ff.).

God we thus see was resolved, and statedly so, to have this land for them following the discipline of their rebellions (cf. Leviticus 26 passim, esp. 26:25,31,33), rebellions which were also in considerable detail forecast. As He would evacuate them in derision, so He would restore them with precision, sustain them with power, and contend with those who would contend, breaking their power and bringing the assailants of the land themselves to ruin: though they should be many and likewise dynamic and highly armed (Ezekiel 38:9, 4) with weapons of offence and defence.

God, it must be stressed, resolved this for the land though they did not deserve it (Ezekiel 36:22,32), and though the whole host of men in high places should seek to carve it up to the contrary (as the United Nations did in 1947, leading on to the triumphant wars of 1948, 1967 and 1973 - as well as that effective Israeli victory of 1956 and their vicarious war of 1991). He was resolved to have it for them, because He had so directed and engaged; had done so with grounds and purposes indeed; and in honour, reliability and power, He would do it.

As with the crucifixion and resurrection, themselves physical, predicted and duly performed, with infinite consequences, even that everlasting salvation which is given (Isaiah 51:6; 55:1-4), and that everlastingly enduring righteousness accorded to the redeemed (Isaiah 54:8; 62:12; 49:26; 51:11; 54:17; 53:11): so with the case-history of Israel, it is predicted. As the physical resurrection obtained its spiritual result (Luke 24:39; John 20:24-29; Romans 4:25-5: 1; 1:4), so the Jewish saga exhibits the faithfulness of Him who makes these results (Romans 11:32-36).

But what of the fate of the Northern confederacy, this allied host predicted to come and attack Israel ? For months, we read in Ezekiel 39:12-16, the bodies of the doomed attackers, of the angry and greedy assailants of Israel are to be removed from the assaulted soil.

This earlier, premillennial assault predicted to be made on Israel, and so rigorously crushed, this abortive display of the Northern confederacy which is to sweep upon literal Israel (Appendix A - these are the terms of the prophecy's reference): it is to teach to many no lesson! They will not learn, just as they will not worship God, the only rock!

Israel ? Pregnant with its individualised and predicted history of receiving the Lord, rejecting Him, and the national dispersion which followed, one at long last cancelled by the divinely directed return to their pledged land: To Israel, this Israel, so contextually defined, now is granted a stupendous victory (Ezekiel 38:18-23).

Even this, however, would yet be disregarded by millions, as a learning experience! Neither the sudden birth (Isaiah 66:7-9), the former devastations, the divinely accorded reasons nor the predictions of all these things would move the dead, embraced by death while living! After the millennium, just as before, the same spirit of rebellion is predicted to grip the earth. No grace, no power, no favour, no gospel will they learn; nor will they accept this (cf. Isaiah 26:9-11).

i) What precedes the millennial glory is an attack on Israel by one group of invading nations from one direction, the North. This, as we see, is to be demolished by divine intervention to protect Israel, evidently before (Ezekiel 39:21-29) the catastrophic days of the antichrist, with his European-based and Satanic oppression. Israel is to proceed into its substantial numerical conversion (*3) (Zechariah 12:10), through the attendant invasions (Zechariah 12:1-2; 14:1-3), coming to understand the Lord and repent. Then, with the rest of the Church that will remain faithful, this mass of converted Jews will live, one Church, with everlasting joy upon their heads (cf. Isaiah 35:10,61:7), amid eternal blessings till Christ comes (*4 ... Ezekiel 37:24-28), continuing in the spiritual format the earlier promises.

His coming is as we have shown earlier, for His saints, for the intimate and festive rejoicing of the 'marriage feast of the Lamb', the communion after pilgrimage, the reunion after death, the summit scenario of unspeakable joy, in open reality, in the very presence of God. Then, God's saints apart in heaven, the judgment on the infested earth, bloated with the emblem of antichrist, proceeds. Christ, with His many saints (II Thessalonians 1:9-10, Revelation 19), will destroy the offender and He will establish His kingdom (20:3,5,6).

ii) What follows this protracted millennial glory is a broader force (Revelation 20:8), transformed into a blatant and final mustering of resistance and rejection of God Himself (shown in the bud in Revelation 16:16; 19:20). This squalid spiritual vagrancy is to reach new depths while the evil aspirations look to new heights, so timelessly expressed in the denunciatory words of Isaiah the prophet (14:13 - cf. Ezekiel 28:13ff. - the devil is the type and basis for these things):

"I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God;
I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north;
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds,
I will be like the Most High...

"Yet you will be brought down to hell."

Now it is no more a matter of a regional if massive assault (point 11 supra), soon consummated by Armageddon, but of a global and explicit affront (cf. the prototype Revelation 19:19), in this final thrust of evil. At Armageddon, it was a world spirit led by the unmasked devil's messiah and his 'chaplain'. Now a released Satan fumes direct (Revelation 20:2,7-10). For them all, only judgment is left. (Cf. *1, p. 1137 infra.)

That, then, rehearses these two evil thrusts, one before the millenium, and the other, instrumental to its close. What then? We see four phases of evil.

12.  Three of these occur before that final furious fling just noted.

i) There is the general trend to evil (point 2). In this, the church is involved at length, as there is to be a froth of false prophets and false Christs (Matthew 24) as noted, with money a magnet for many (II Peter 2:1 ff.), and lawlessness a spirit of the times. There is to be a great ''falling away'' (II Thessalonians 2:3) which thus will be coordinated with a deceptive spirit (1 Timothy 4:1 ff.) and false teaching (II Peter 2; II Timothy 3:1-6), together with a dysfunctional formalism. All this has been abundantly fulfilled already.

ii) There must also come the return of Israel to its land (point 11) so that it may be assaulted and, in large numbers, its people converted to the crucified Christ as Saviour (Zechariah 12:10), amidst great and instructive carnage (Zechariah 12:9, Isaiah 49:21-26, 66:7-16) ... "His indignation towards His enemies". This has spiritual significance for both the attacked and the attackers, as the former seek the Lord in the end, and the latter are in confrontation with God, since He promised the land to the Jews and brought them back despite their follies (Isaiah 49:14-26; 11:11ff.; Zechariah 10:6-12; 12:1-10) for the express purpose of fulfilling His promises (Leviticus 26:33-46; Deuteronomy 32:27-43; Ezekiel 36:12-15, 23-28; 37:23-28; 38:8; 39:21-29).

This is in the first stage, already fulfilled; for Israel is indeed back, and its triumphant wars are as predicted (Zechariah 12). As to the final phase of attack from the torrential Northern confederacy, what of it ? While the nations with Communism or neo-expansionism, and Mohammedanism, as diverse or even joint grounds of negative feeling (both to Jews and to Biblical prediction) are in place, and the range of forces is clear: this event seems to loom near. The diversification of the former Soviet Union may merely add to its risks, and to the scope for other partnerships, using power while it is there, to snatch goods or fame or name or territory.

Since Jerusalem is back in Jewish hands (Luke 21:44), the time is now ripe for the predicted conversion of the Jews; for Christ Himself indicated that the restoration of this city to Jewish hands meant that the special time of the Gentiles was over. And that ? It suggests the renewal of Israel is at hand (cf. Romans 11:25).

iii) If the Northern Confederacy which is to assault Israel is scripturally seen in prophecy as powerful, intemperate and ruthless, yet what is said of the European centred antichrist reveals a most subtle, seditious and a very religious person. False prophets, associated and thought of in Revelation as a trio of frogs, will hop into sacred things, all that is not protected and covered, and pollute them (Revelation 16:13).

This monolithic malady, the antichrist, like a viral infection, is centred in Europe (Daniel 7) and the Northern Confederacy, as noted, is not!, having in fact names for the nations relating to areas inclusive of Russia and near Eastern companions, with some of Europe only minimally added.

Indeed, the Ezekiel assault on newly returned Israel (Ezekiel 38:10-12, Isaiah 66:8,14-16, Deuteronomy 32:36-43) is from the far North (Ezekiel 38:15), as is Moscow; and it is not from the West as to base. That is certainly not Europe, as a map will surely show. It is fascinating how near to directly north of Israel, Moscow is. However that is not determinative; rather the company to come is named, and while as we will see, care is needed with the ancient place names, assuredly this is not centrally European at all.
 

Hence it appears the sequence is this.

Israel returns; Jerusalem is liberated; Israel fights triumphant wars; the Gentile period of speciality ends, the church in some of its forms falling away, and false prophets abound; the Confederacy assaults Israel; the Spirit of God is poured out; many Jews are converted; the Lord appears and the whole (composite) church disappears to be with Him at the marriage feast of the Lamb; the antichrist now appears in full force, unhindered by the power of Christians (Revelation 11, II Thessalonians 2:7-8); the Lord returns with His own, destroys the antichrist and the millennium ensues in which the rule of righteousness is witnessed on the earth through a Christ whose earlier crucifixion shows the height and purity of His love.

During their trials, and up to Christ's return for them, the people of God are kept inside a more powerful presence than any evil can create (Luke 21:14-15 ; Matthew 28:18-20; John 14:21; Mark 11:25; Ephesians 1:19). Then they are removed at an unexpected time (Matthew 24:50; Mark 13:32 ff.), taken from this ideological, psychological and unspiritual horror that at that time overtakes the earth.

13. But when, when is this, the return of Christ to rescue His people and allow the earth to reach its evil prime, ready for destruction ? As well as the pointers already noted and in place, we find from Christ the words of multiplied wars, rumours of wars, earthquakes and famines, a time when people's hearts 'fail for fear' and when, if it were not shortened, ''no flesh could be spared''... But when ? Before, then, no flesh could endure. But when! In a time shortened for the 'elects' sake.' How much shortened ? We do not know, so why should we be concerned!

It is enough that to Christ we look, the Lord of glory soon to appear and come in His love stronger than hate, irresistible and all wise (Jude 24-25), removing all who ''love His appearing'' (Hebrews 9:28; Matthew 24:31-40; Acts 1:7-11; I Thessalonians 4:13-18; I Corinthians 15:50-58; 1 John 3:1-3).

And then, when the rapture in its time, and the following return with the Lord of His saints, when these rejoicings are fulfilled; and when the masterly millennium in its time is past; and the final rebellion in its time (Revelation 20:2,7,10,14): then the old heaven and the earth are dismissed and dissolved (Matthew 24:35; Isaiah 51:6; II Peter 3:10) - then... ? Then is the magnificence of the New Jerusalem (Revelation 21) exposed like the butterfly from the grub; and the former things do not occupy the mind (Isaiah 65:16-17). The shakeable is gone and the unshakeable remains (Hebrews 12:25-28). As our sins (Hebrews 8:12) are forgotten, so is the trauma, tragedy and trial of the pilgrimage. The race is won; the echoes depart.

Indeed, the new, the later things so far surpass the former things that it would be as if a Professor of Mathematics should think of the former things of school's first stages, as he studies (Revelation 21:1-4; Isaiah 65:16-17).

But Christ, the eternal Son shall not be surpassed: rather shall He be found, as Revelation tells us, in the centre of the throne (Revelation 7:17; 22:3; 21:22-25): He who with the Father is one God, to be worshipped for ever. He is the God, the only God (Isaiah 45:14,21-22), who loved; and sent; and saved; and has judged and rules and is the delight of His own. For His love is fulfilled, and not frustrated; it is alive (John 17:23-26) in His adopted children.

He has done as He pleased; and His power is the path of His desire; and it is found perfect.
 Extension: on The Middle East... and Contemporary Events.

Care is needed in seeking to determine the nations intended in the prophecy of Ezekiel 38-39, concerning the international horde of assailants on Israel, destined to a very special doom, in which force in the onset is more than matched by divine power in the rebuff!

The scriptural words for these nations, relating as they do, to the geographical terminology of the times, require interpretation. Libya and Ethiopia appear similar to the nations of the present day, in this prediction of assault on Israel. The reference to Gog and Magog appears to concern us generally with the Caucasus mountain area, one indeed perhaps stretching past this to the North, where major parties named seem to have been; or towards which, reports of their early movements, seem to indicate their drift. Josephus gives some attestation here, as does Pliny, both referring to the Scythian tribes and their movements. It is the area that, after so long, concerns us in this matter. Such is the background to the chief prince, Gog, of the land of Magog.

Now the Caucasus area is currently in Russia (and it is becoming more and more necessary to consider the section of the former U.S.S.R. which concerns us, as the union loses its force, though not yet its identity!). They are close to Turkey and Iran as well.

In fact, Persia (now Iran) is one of the nations specifically mentioned as joining in the attack. At its height, it incorporated much territory, and Iraq could be considered as within its domain.

Indeed, Iraq and Iran point directly to the general Caucasus area, if one takes them together, in their northern tips, just as Russia would appear indicated, in its southern extremity at least. Iran's recent call for a pan-Islam attack approach to Israel is, in this context, of extraordinary interest, and this the more in that it was echoed in a conference of nations held in Iran.

It is conspicuously important to realise that many of these areas, are Moslem. The barking of Saddam Hussein for help (September 1990) in 'liberating' Jerusalem and Iran's attitude, one tolerating if not actually endorsing Iraq in its action, appear in this setting of special significance. An all-Islam movement of regional bodies is certainly possible, and it is nothing less that Hussein seeks ... as more recently also, as we shall see, does Iran (1991). The former U.S.S.R. bodies of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan (recently seething centres of unrest, resentment and gory uncertainty) in the period following World War I, in fact were named the "Caucasus", a unit of the Soviet Republic! (See p. 631A-B infra.)

In general, the people mentioned seem to have been driven to (or through) the mountainous areas south-east of the Black Sea, or to have moved there.

Let us, in view of the contemporary, indeed 1990 Middle East events, look further.

Daniel 11 has some words of exceptional interest for the present time.
In his long narrative, most of which covers historical incidents before the time of Christ, and which are readily identified, he comes with this emphasis on detail to the time near the end of the Age, near indeed to the resurrection (Daniel 12:1).

In this last phase of the account in chapter 11, designated "at the time of the end" (in verse 40) such that the essential spiritual identity of the forces in view is now crystallised into the malign presence of an artful king, there appears a fascinating revelation of things to come. Evil glares in ultimate manifestation (11:35-36, 9:27).

First, one should observe, the way in which the area king at the time of the end is introduced, is such that this arrogant autonomy noted in vv. 36-39 preceding it (v.40), must at least be relevant. His essential element of continuity with that phase of history is made clear; and while it could be dangerous to assume that each detail is precisely the same, there can be no reasonable doubt that the general character as described in vv. 36-39 must be to a large, or at least significant degree, applicable.

Then as to the end phase of his matter (11:40-45 cf. v.35): there is to come on this satanic potentate an assault from the South. Now since the regime of Antiochus Epiphanes has been in view at an earlier phase of the chapter, and this involved one of the four quadrants or quarters of the broken-up empire of Alexander the Great, it would signify an area geographically extending to the North of Israel, and in close proximity to it. This would relate to countries such as Iraq, Syria, Iran and beyond.

Aptly at the present time, the notorious and demonstrative forcefulness of Saddam Hussein of Iraq is a modern legend, and the amazingly increased proximity of purpose which he seems to have generated with Iran is also noted; as is the pan-Moslem aspect of the two countries, with, to no small extent, that of Syria, as well as Jordan, apparently somewhat in Hussein's shadow economically, not to say religiously.

The possibility that some such alignment on a pseudo-religious basis, or even simply including such an element, could act in company with other Moslems such as those of Russian (Soviet ?) Georgia, or Azerbaijan and related areas (the Soviet has no insignificant number of Moslems in its midst, in various outlying areas in particular) in an attack on Israel requires virtually no imagination to envisage. (Saudi Arabia, is in fact to the South.)

The possibility of a pan-Moslem contribution at least, to such an assault is not lessoned by the report (Time, November 4, 1991) of the Tehran Conference 'called by Iran's parliament to discuss ways of assisting the Palestinian intifadeh; with endeavour to "Islamicize all opposition to Israel".' Allied with a reported offer of Iran's President to 'dispatch troops to fight Israel along with the Palestinians', and a conference agreement to establish an 'Islamic army', there is evidence of a dynamic in the area in extraordinary concord with the scriptural predictions for the assault on Israel, its place and it participants.

It may be that the current crisis then will lead on to the predicted invasion of the Northern multinational force, against Israel. A further reason that this is so easy to conceive is, very conspicuously, the repeated challenge to Israel which the oil-enriched potentate of Iraq has laid down. A holy war, he feels, would be a good idea; Israel has moreover been given notice to quit 'Palestine', their tiny enclave amidst the rolling lands of the Arabs.

Those lands are vast, extending to loss of view, rolling into the dim distance of the deserts, and not without substantial civilisation. The desire for an Israeli exit seems then to co-exist with oversight of this circumstance, and of Jordan in particular, which indicates its lack of desire, really, to be involved with the Palestinian question. After all, if it is a Palestine, and it were to be thought of as such, the refugees could inhabit such Moslem tracts with small discomfort of religion.

Instead, they appear, despite the initial, apparently almost entirely voluntary departure from Israel, some with the alleged intention of returning with victorious Arab armies in the 1948 war of Israeli independence, to have a desire to return there. Perhaps the leader of Iraq could contribute some returning armies, so conspicuously absent when the Jews won the 1948 war, by the very clearly predicted grace of God, even to a nation which per se did not believe in the Messiah... in Him, whom God indicated in advance, they would reject (Isaiah 49:7, 53)! In view of Daniel 11:41, 44, he may have some peripheral success before the final destruction awaiting him, he or some other convenient fulcrum of power.

It may be, however, that it will merely set the scene. Events of this kind have, it certainly seems, a way of coming in fascinating ways, fulfilling what is predicted with a certain independence of spirit. But fulfilled the prophecies are; and whether this current event leads on immediately or distantly to the fulfilment of Daniel 11 as shown above, and whether this is found to be identical, as might well be, with Ezekiel 38-39, remains to be seen.

Already clearly visible are a number of prophetic preliminaries: events conducive to and markedly in line with the predictions yet to be fulfilled. Thus it has been in the providence of God, the King of the nations, that:

i)  An Arab cartel has been permitted, by which through oil a vast and truly remarkable, epochal transfer of wealth has occurred to the Middle East, so that a civilisation not remarkable for its industrial and financial clout, now is.
 

ii)  This transfer has increased Western 'interest' in the area, and
 

iii)  It has been used to transfer enormous masses of sophisticated weapons to the now wealthy Arabs, whose religious animosity to Judaism, very often, has new practical power.
 

iv)  A break-up of the Soviet empire, has occurred, allowing Moslem regions in the
South-West to achieve new forms of alliance, or some of them to do so, or be ready to do so, on anti-Israeli religious grounds.
 

v)  A ruthless seeming dictator in Iraq has given such attitudes uninhibited expression, rallying against Israel antagonistic forces, which now have new practical power, while recalling that war is still in force between the two nations.
 

vi)  This power in fact was augmented by the U.S.A. in earlier aid to Iraq. An Armageddon wind (Revelation 16:16; 19:20) ?
 

vii)  A resurgence of anti-Israel force has occurred in Iran, freed from the overpowering presence of Iraq for the time, through US intervention. A specific call has been made for, and steps taken to establish a pan-Moslem, and solely Moslem international 'treatment' for Israel: including a large army, and hostile promulgation of attitudes on a religious basis. Further points might be added:
 

viii)  The U.S. is by no means so pro-Israel as under President Reagan, the Bush administration seeking quite decisively to induce Israel to cede even more land back to those Arabs who lost it in the extermination wars against a harassed and tiny Israel. The September 1993 'Accord' formalises rather than normalises this situation (see p. 881 infra), and focusses the Biblical dynamic of unresolved ... Jerusalem. (Cf. pp. 816 ff., 832 ff. infra.)

They did, after all, try it before, when Zechariah 14:1-2 was forthwith fulfilled, there being not only the local intention in the surrounding nations, the relevant ones, but the international fulfilment through the very international power body which is called the United Nations and professes international form and format for world action.

The Israelis fought the Arabs in 1948 against just such an international form and force of resolve, sanction and resolution: the formula in force and the Arab forces jointly making the assault.

Objectively, the fulfilments are decided, distinct, detailed and dramatic; and the scenario requirements for the next set of fulfilments, are also decidedly advanced. (See also Ch. 9, Section 4, pp. 837-884; and pp. 631A, 973A infra.)
 
 

*1 See Extension on pp. 516 ff..

*2 Just as, incidentally, did Saddam Hussein - proclaiming war and destruction to Israel - secure, on a far smaller but still impressive scale, widespread destruction for both his land and his people. If that was an entrée, the arrival of the main course will be a very prodigy!

*3 Zechariah 12:10 ff. gives, on the occasion of the manifestation of the crucified Christ to the spirits of repenting Jews (Zechariah 12:10 ff.), such an effusion of grief, and pangs of repentance so individualised, as to strike a keynote of Christian conversion.

*4 Then Christ comes to collect His actors, His agents, converted and called: they are removed from this temporary stage, which after the millenium will be wholly dismantled (as are indeed spectator seats or even stadia ... by ourselves).

*5
Some further elements of the case may prove instructive and helpful for some.

It is worth emphasising that the IMPACT of the Northern confederacy's assault on the Jews is this:

"And the nations shall know that the house of Israel went into captivity for their iniquity; because they trespassed against me, therefore did I hide my face from them, and give them into the hand of their enemies; so that they fell by the sword.

"According to their uncleanness and according to their transgressions have I done to them, and hidden my face from them... Now will I bring again the captivity of Jacob and have mercy upon the whole house of Israel, and will be jealous for my holy name, and after they have borne their shame....

"When I have brought them again from the peoples, and gathered them out of their enemies' lands, and am sanctified in them in the sight of many nations, then shall they know I am the Lord their God, who caused them to be led into captivity amongst the nations ... neither will I hide my face any more from them; for I have poured out my Spirit upon the house of Israel, says the Lord God."
 

• Thus this is an event (as in 38:8) which in impact has basic emphases:

	1) Israel is delivered in such a way that it is plain her earlier and prolonged (as in 38:8, 39:23) exile from her own land was indeed a discipline (as forecast in fact in Leviticus 26), a divine prerogative, especially apt and chaste for those who had entered into formal covenant with Him.
	2) This will be an immediate and deep effect, proclaimed in effect with vociferous volume, mighty obviousness.
	3) There is to be no further national chastisement (38:28) of any such dimension or scope.
	4) The outpouring of God's Holy Spirit is associated in some way with this event, so that it is emphasised at the end of it, that it has happened.

Eight  things at once are clear.

1)  That Israel is the major focus in this episode.

2)  That its history and chastisement are a centre of attention, and an obvious teaching outcome for those who watch what has happened.

3)  That this is at the international level, a lesson to all peoples.

4)  That the outpouring of God's Spirit is highly relevant to the entire proceeding.

5)  That the major player is from the North, in company with many others, and the aim is plunder rather than politics.

6)  That a declaration of war against God (as in Revelation 19:19) is in view at the end, at the Coming of Christ with His people (as in II Thessalonians 1); whilst the focus in Ezekiel 38-39 is Israel and the result a lesson about Israel, divine discipline upon it and its historical past.

7)  That a direct divine interposition as in Zechariah 14 is one thing, with the Lord personally apparent; while a divine help to enable victory is another, less specific, far more normal in the miraculous dealings with Israel over time. It is neither categorical nor per se final. The Coming however ends the Age.

8)  That the correlation of Zechariah 12:10 with Ezekiel 39:28-29 is intense, just as Zechariah 14:4 is separable from the mere defence of Jerusalem and destruction of the aggressive enemies who know neither compunction nor shame, but savagely yet further oppress the returned Israel, whose restoration to its land is fresh enough to be an appropriate emphasis (as in Ezekiel 38:8).

With these things in mind, we note that the Bible has two events entirely correlative, namely Ezekiel 38-39 and Zechariah 12. The lessons in both cases are similar, Jerusalem centred not merely geographically, but historically and didactically. Those of Zechariah 14 and Revelation 19 however specifically include the direct and personal return of the Lord, and are correlative with II Thessalonians 1.

The question whether, therefore, the deliverance of Israel in Ezekiel 38-39 is the return of the Lord is given a simple answer: NOT BY ANY BIBLICAL INTIMATION, AND THE ASSUMPTION THAT IT IS MERELY AN ADDITION THEREFORE TO THE TEACHING OF THE BIBLE, WHICH SPECIFIES DIFFERENTLY IN FOCUS, HISTORICAL FORCE AND TEACHING IMPACT THESE TWO THINGS.

It is, as noted earlier, however, by no means certain that we are far from the Second Coming of Christ for His people (as in Matthew 24), by the time of the events of Ezekiel 38-39 and for that matter Zechariah 12. These may in fact may well be two aspects of one thing, each with the same highly concentrated focus and impact relative to the Jews, and each stressing the outpouring of the Spirit of God on the Jews, which is an epochal matter in these New Covenant terms (cf. Ezekiel 16:60ff., 37:26 cf. Jeremiah 31:31), and hence not a mere repeatable episode. These Northern confederacy events  could well be a climacteric preliminary to that Advent of the Lord; though this is not certain, it will be a simple sequential step.

It is quite possible also that, following this invasion of Israel,  the grip of the antichrist in his UNIVERSAL scope and EUROPEAN amphitheatre of operations, as to base and glory (as in Daniel 7) will quickly develop to that final and self-glorying and vanquishing  force (as in Revelation 13:4,15ff. and II Thess. 2:4-8) which signals the coming of Christ personally, so that the world-wide nature of the rebellion which by then has developed, and the directly anti-divine character which is then expressly taken by the assault, may amplify what has differently preceded in the mere multi-national attack on Israel.

Those won in Israel during this outpouring of the Spirit (as in Zechariah 12:10ff.), at the time of that international attack on it,  are  as one bride with the Gentiles: there is no sense of bigamy, or a divided bride or any other gospel - Revelation 14, Galatians 1 -  or of any other bridesmaids waiting outside the shut door as in Matthew 25, but there is an end. Whether then

• very soon after the gathering of the Israelites in such numbers to the Lord through the Spirit, which is associated as in Zechariah 12, with a specialised assault on that land, or

• after a little further development, the European forces not being then ready,
   
• soon the Lord WILL COME for all His people, the deliverer to Zion, and so ALL Israel will be saved, the Jews superadded to the long-term phase of Gentile conversions (the time of the Gentiles, during Israel's long dispersion and aversion to the Messiah) as studiously detailed in Romans 11.

"So shall the deliverer come to Zion", as Isaiah 59 puts it,  and its scope will be a Zion with a new name (Isaiah 62:2) and a people who, while geographically distinct, are covenantally merely one more element in that diversified totality given unity in the New Covenant of the Lord (cf. Isaiah 65:13-15, 66:20-21).

Neither the Jews nor the Gentiles nor any other part or particular will ever be central in the theme of the Covenant in Christ; but neither will man dictate to the Lord the diversified elements and the developmental lessons which He chooses to make, step by step, as the culmination of this vast palette of history reaches the final finesse and shows its eventual dimensions: ONE the author, ONE the gospel, ONE the bride, ONE the conclusion, so that indeed we may say with Paul:
 

• "Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out out! "


The background to this statement is the DIVINELY PARTICULAR way of merging and diverging, making history teach and nations illustrate, as the outcomes of the ONE GOSPEL through many elements of history, are brought into ONE GLORIOUS UNITY IN CHRIST.

Incorrigible corrections

Carter of course, in dealing with the alleged higher cancer incidence just noted, makes the point that the extra work imposed on the immune system having to clear away the sludge of dead cells, limits its availability for cancer protection.

Meanwhile, 'control' of insects leads to pesticide and other industrial waste (often derived from other efforts to control this or that) seeping frequently into the ground-water supply, one widely used both in the country and in some cities. A 1975 test carried out by the National Academy of Sciences, Carter notes, revealed 74 pesticides in drinking water and 22 carcinogenic compounds; while on chlorine in particular, he notes that Russian scientists carried out tests showing a correlation between chlorine in 1.4 parts per million concentration in drinking water, and higher blood pressure: compared with the case of a control group with lesser concentration of the chlorine 'remedy.'

So barriers to plagues create new barriers in this setting, and no simple answer smiles from the lips of a triumphant science.

Far from it: indeed Time magazine, April 23, 1990 in an article by Marguerite Johnson cites Hoimer von Ditfurth in his Reflections by a Member of the Species, a West German contribution as commenting: "We are celebrating our consumers' party on the edge of a volcano." What, however, is being consumed is the time to repent not of the fact, but of the motive for consumption; and even more of this: of the motives mismatched in millions, with the lives they live.

Johnson also notes Michael Mueller, a Bundestag member, professor of natural philosophy, in terms of the following analysis:

Despite extraordinary growth in environmental awareness,the sellout of the world's natural resources has not stopped: more than 50% of global ecological damage occurred in the past three decades. In the foreseeable future, 40 countries will not have adequate water supplies. The drought in Africa is spreading at a rate of 2.3 million sq.mi. a year. The world's rain forests, the earth's "green lungs", will cease to exist within 50 years at the current rate of destruction. Add to this projected population growth from 5 billion today to 8.5 billions by the year 2025 - plus the potential for a climatic catastrophe - and the specters of starvation, mass migration and social conflict become all too plausible.(Italics added.)

The resources of Time itself, time to repent, are also being hideously depleted, for the Lord is not slack in His promise to return, as Peter tells us, but not willing that any should perish: while men gambol, or squirm, according to mood, the gospel of God goes forth to the day appointed, and the earth conforms with rigour to the stated plan. Meanwhile, God does not cease in compassion and charity to proclaim His remedy, which would lead not only to removal of inward pollution menace, but outward judgment, should the world have only heard:

God commands all men everywhere to repent (Acts 17:30),

In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you. Behold,now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation (11 Corinthians 6:2).

If the world will not hear, there is no need for each of its inhabitants to be deaf, for God is still calling (Hebrews 3:7). It is not as if God is without love because He is equipped with plan, or unconcerned because things will draw to their completion. He completed His work (John 19:30); man is required to accept what He did, and to entrust his life to Him.

Yet there is not merely a failure to respond, with many, and that in religious places; there is a rebellion of method as well as of fact, which bids fair to become the worst affliction of all.

A new plague, given some more reputable beginnings in the largely ineffective League of Nations, and the United Nations, helped by the World Council of Churches, unity-religions, and the whole tribe of human tantrums to push back God's words in Christ into His mouth and 'run the blessed thing themselves', this little world of ours: This is to come and is coming. Revelation speaks of the kings at the last giving their power to the ultimate 'answer' of man, the 'beast', the unifying ruler with its worldly religion (cf. Chapter 9, Daniel File, Part B, The Coming Consummation, infra.)

These are of one mind and will give their power and authority to the beast - Revelation 17:13.

We have tasted the repressive ... expressive and suppressive power of police-state Nazism and Communism; but this will be a plague (*17) to remember - as an instructive episode in the history of disaster-seeking, rebelling man; or to forget - for those caught in its turmoils, without Christ.

The drive to unity without God, this becomes a tertiary pollution problem; it is logically subsequent to the primary efforts at (physical) control, and the secondary problems with the consequences of the controls. Here is the ultimate control; and its pollution also is ultimate: the determinate dereliction and desolation of the human heart. The language of Daniel of this phase, long after the predicted killing of the Christ (the Messiah of Daniel 9:26), as the end prior to judgment itself rushes forwards like a sprinter from the starting blocks (having, as it were, become exasperated with the delay, and acting at last... 11 Peter 3:1-5)... this Danielic language is expressive:

And till the end of the war, desolations are determined... and on the pinnacle of abomination shall be one who makes desolate, even until the consummation, which is determined, is poured out on the desolator - Daniel 9:26-27. (It is this desolator to whom Christ refers, concerning the last times, before His return, in Matthew 24:15.)

This drive to earthly unity as one of the 'control' measures of a desperate though wholly misnamed 'world community' (such a title, now a cliché, almost seems like deliberate satire, as events unroll...), this will bring the fears of a polluted and misused environment into proportion.

Why ? or how ? Man the environmentalist will then be struggling not merely nationally, as in the French (*18) and Russian revolutions, or in the Chinese, with its Tiananmen Square, dripping with blood but also with tears of broken dreams, shattered ideals, betrayed hopes: and indeed in endless seeming tyrannies from other and equally proud quarters. The struggle will then also be international, with the misdirected sacrifice of sovereignty, national sovereignty on the international altar: Yes, and more than that, Mrs Thatcher ... though the attempted 1992 'union' in Europe is a start! (Nov. 1, 1993 indeed sees the Treaty for 'European Union' in force.)

The sacrifice will become, increasingly clearly, what it always has been for the 'world' in principle: it is the sacrifice of the soul and its everlasting destiny handed over to the world, for what does not profit, no, not if one should get all of it. Isaiah puts the underlying position poignantly:

Ho, every one who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money; come, buy and eat; yes, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend money for that which is not bread ? And your labour for that which does not satisfy ? hearken diligently to me, and eat that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness. Incline your ear, and come to Me: hear, and your soul will live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David. Behold, I have given him for a witness to the people, a leader and a commander to the people... Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near... (from Isaiah 55:1-6 - itacics added).

The price of such a 'control' on man, to contain the damage of his spiritual sin, expressed so diversely and inventively in so many ways: the 'system', the 'plan' or 'new age' or whatever else it be called. This will give the undoubtedly this-worldly majority an opportunity to 'manage'. To manage what ? To manage their own unity; and there will be given a man, the 'man of sin' (II Thessalonians 2), to manage it, with strong hands and sightless eyes, fittingly representing a race that is lost and has lost, and will not receive the victory (1 John 5:4). From that pollution, the power of God will keep the people of God (Revelation 13:14-15, Matthew 24:24, Revelation 7:14, Luke 21:15, Revelation 12:10-11, 14:13):

And they overcame him by the blood of the lamb, and by the word of their testimony: and they did not love their lives unto the death (Revelation 12:11).
 

*17 Extension: Some biopsies on the tertiary plague

There is, as we shall see, a certain universality in this plague. This preliminary feature relative to the special working ... of this plague, is pertinent, as it starts to froth.

The point should be made, and made forcibly, that there is a moral declivity appearing almost like a precipice in much of the West. While this does not mean that morals are gone, principles passé, or that pollution has no cleansing opposition, it does imply that any statuesque conception of moral opposites between East and West is no longer, at least accurate.

In much of the West, in those liberal democracies to which one refers, there is a departure so immense and so intense, currently deceptively guised in the habits of pseudo-sacred community will, its wishes and declarations, that not only do many schools impart the follies as matters of learning, at times explicitly at times implicitly, but even quasi-governmental bodies can pour the inflammatory oils of anti-Christian incitation, incantation or application onto the raging fires of youth.

Raging? alas frequently, for collective arson has been at work so long that sparks can create unthought of combustion, one of the extinguishing agents of which is now AIDS. As to that, as so often, the relatively innocent are being caught in the spiritual madness of State agencies through the results - whether total or partial is indifferent when death is concerned - of fatal and flawed philosophies.

It is as if, having escaped the radically dissimilar (in theory) and radically similar (in much moral practice) follies of Hitler and Stalin, and of their philosophies, many in the West are determined to have an outlet for autonomy, of their own. Not to be denied their fling at the fluent destinies of absolutist desires, masquerading however confusedly under the appearance of relativist ethics, they have created a communal philosophy of death.

There is a difference between the two cases, certainly. In many Western nations, there has not been the overt and physical oppression of religious freedom, (though there has been much of the subtler variety), that has occurred under Communism. Large bodies of professing Christians 'adorn' the tarmac; and still significant bodies of actual believers in and practisers of the gospel and commandments of Christ are found in these nations, or in some of them. Increasingly, however, the courage, conviction and power needed to prevail is lacking, as church after church, though by no means the whole church, comes to fade. Thus in one Australian capital, the Anglican church most noted for being 'evangelical' refused to come out in a clear and public manner in favour of... no, not anti-abortion, just this: in favour of the doctrine of creation.

If such an event in a long established and noted denomination at the alleged acme of 'spirituality' can occur, what might be said for much of the rest ? Departures from clear Biblical teaching are an epidemic, increasingly endemic to much of 'Christendom' and in danger of becoming pandemic, just as Peter (11 Peter 2:1-3) and Paul (11 Thessalonians 2) predicted, and Christ has implied (Matthew 24).

A specially significant point here to be noted is that in Victoria, an AIDS council has been baulked by one of the media from publishing an advertisement which among other things, advises the young that homosexuality is natural and that, rightly performed, it can lead the practiser of it to... a great deal of fun.

Fermented folly fragmenting the broken! Such is this situation, as the word of God designates (Ecclesiastes 11:9-12:1 ff.; Romans 6:1-2; 1 Corinthians 6:9, Romans 1:27 ff.). What then was the source of this... advice of man, given in Victoria so recently ?

This ... it was from a body intended to help the nation depart from practices not only obviously contrary to design, at the reproductive level, but contrary to physiological safeguards of the kind built in to normal heterosexual intercourse: and that in a day when the rewards, the penalties of promiscuity with unnaturalness, are becoming not merely painful, not only threatening at least a world epidemic, including a whole category of the disadvantaged, but even more than that. How would you like to have a more or less guaranteed five years or so of slow dying and increasing vulnerability to diverse diseases! Such was the state in July 1990.

Our point here is simply this: the West has avoided some philosophic follies, and fought hard, and sometimes splendidly against them, even in military combat; but it is increasingly, under the fatal seeming fascination of wholly illogical philosophies creating a hand-made grave, and carving a tomb of its own. It is time to repent, for God regards the cry of the righteous, whose righteousness is of Him (Isaiah 54:17, Jeremiah 33:16, Psalm 33:10-34:8). Meanwhile, all of this is showing the way to that Armageddon where the people as a whole will fight against... yes, The Lord! (Revelation 16:16, 19:19.) Our apologetic point here is simply this: That the predicted, virtual universal character of the revolt against the Lord in doctrine  and practice (cf. Revelation 16:11) is as clearly being depicted by current events as a vastly observable trend, as by future predictions, as a coming fact. It is multi-dimensional and highly manifest.

Within this context, it should be emphasised that this is no attack on the young; but rather on the follies of men, whether in or out of government, who indoctrinate, propagandise and follow propaganda which they create, away from the absolute morals, the actual truth, the sacrificial certainties where peace lies.

The truth of the Bible has been established earlier in this work; currently we see what could be called applied theology, dealing with the fruits of its denial; and as such, this becomes practical apologetics through the force of the form and formula of fulfilment of prediction. It is not only so in direction but even in kind: the case of a remorseless renegade, learning by experience the things the spirit will not acknowledge.This will is being seen with increasing rage and ineffective opposition to the ways, word and will of the Lord (cf. Revelation 16:11, 9:21).

In full accord with the very historical meaning of the symbolically used term 'Babylon', which though focussed as we show, in Rome of the 7 hills (Revelation 17:9, cf. Extensions 3-5, pp. 946-957, with 1060 infra), is yet an approach, a projection, a rambunctiously renegade movement, a monument to confused and evil - not to say forceful (Revelation 17:6) - religion: there is also more generally, a type of propaganda. This, broadly promulgated, adopts the spirit of this sort of confused compromise. As to its specifically Roman embodiment, we shall treat this in detail in the next chapter. It can create a religion of authoritarian terror (cf. that of pagan Rome, leading on to Nero, pp. 469 supra, 902 infra; or that from Muhammad, pp. 988-990 infra), or one of barren indifference: one explicit or one implicit.

As to the latter: what is this type of propaganda, this truly Babylonian spirit of mix in religions ? It is this. The young, being frequently mentally violated with little redress, are taught through the messy spirit of this Age, that all is relative, all morals, all religion, all is convenience; and that it is most convenient to act on this basis, never asserting (publicly) anything in religion which suggests, far less asserts that any one thing is the truth. That, in this modern society, is about as near to the unforgivable sin as you can get (in its eyes). I have personally seen this manifested at high level, and with remorseless desire, in the Army, in the School system and in the area of Radio broadcasting, in tertiary teaching also, at lecturing level.

While we consistently emphasise the fact that you need to know absolute truth, in order to claim that such things as these propaganda points are so, and that on their own basis, this cannot be known, so that their whole system falls: the myth, the mirage of man continues, while he runs with rigour the race that is set before him, like a pack of lemmings dedicated to drowning in the sea that swamps their very beings.

The predictions of Revelation itemise with some detail points on the way, where the natural results of this wild assault on design, which so much of the world follows.... this refusal to heed to standard reference work on how to treat the body, mind and spirit of man... are compounded. The compounding ? The specific and indeed, not lightly undertaken (Revelation 8:1) divine wrath at the follies. This is beginning to be seen more pervasively on the scene; while some profess themselves shocked at the thought that this is so, masses continue to provoke it with a seemingly prodigious indifference (Romans 1:31, Mark 12:7, 11 Timothy 3:2-3, 11 Thessalonians 2:9-10, Luke 18:8).

Indeed, although Christ predicted the unvanquishable character of the Church which He inhabits (Matthew 16:19, Revelation 1:19), He also predicts a situation in which the faith will not have either an implicit or an explicit grasp on the globe, and history is moving towards this like an express train, directed by the Proprietor, who has declared the end of the matter:

When the Son of man comes, will He find
faith (or the faith) ON EARTH ? (Luke 18:8).

*18 The French Revolution had its own proto-unity calls of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, which in practice often led to the unity in death through slaughter, even of such cardinal revolutionaries as the 'sea-green immaculate', Robespierre. Now France is taking a strong lead in the European unity push which some in England rightly fear could develop a little into a homogenising putsch. Its contribution to prophetic fulfilment may be profound.

Mitterand, the President of France, appears to be in a very different quarter: his leadership is towards what Time ( July 15,1991 ) calls (emphasis added):

an autonomous European
"defense identity," along with his goal of E.C. political union.

Seeing what is deemed a 'banalisation of politics - the end of ideology, after religion and monarchy, as the pivotal center of political life', the writer speaks of France 'practising political pragmatism instead of debating ideology'. In fact, there is seen to be a danger: France 'risks losing [pride in a singular civilization] in the homogenising vat of that mysterious entity called Europe'.

The State with its powerful, impoverishing and destructive interplay with the Protestant Huegenots, in Louis XIV's day; the State with its assault on an often corrupt nobility and church, a Romanist rule, somewhat later; the State with its 'new' eighteenth century ideologies, the State with its dripping axe, Mme Guillotine, as Dickens puts it in A Tale of Two Cities; yes and the State with failure repeatedly before the Germans, with a gloire of de Gaulle and a sophisticated civilisation, a force de frappe, its independent nuclear-deterrent, for the sake of which it pollutes the Pacific: the State, it now appears more clearly, it develops!

In which direction ? From false religion (very often, and infamously linked with the vigorous persecution for long of the Protestant Huegenots, many of whom it drove to America, many to death, some to torture); to false ideology, which had Europe in grief for decades, culminating in Bonaparte and his downfall; to what Time calls a search for identity, or rather a fear of losing or failing to gain one, as history develops.

Our point is not to generalise unduly concerning France, which is far broader and deeper than the mere emblems and implements of power, however grossly these have been misused on the one side and on the other: it is rather to discern a trend, a movement in modes or even modishness. France appears set for a maximal impact on Euromysticism, with a religious past considerably secularised, and a secular ideology considerably chastened, and a desire for... something, some quiddity, in... dear old Europe. Its tendency to compare itself with Germany is noted in this article, along with its multi-billion dollar deficits in trading with that nation, prior to the new German unification move.

German integration and French homogenisation move within the mystique of Europe with its... deep culture, on which, with its actual historical cleavage, we dwell later (Daniel File, Part B, The Coming Consummation (6), pp. 923-931 infra). The desire to avoid the realities in order to 'invent' a mystique of a unity which is not there, but which is, shall we say encouraged to be there, and which, it seems later had better be there... is something reminiscent in another vein of the last decade in Australia (see Extension C, this Chapter, infra and other references listed, to this nation).

One can see the need (with forsaken religion, to no small degree: that is, Christ increasingly relegated and the desire for ersatz undiminished), for a Europe, as many will see it, which somehow will in itself tend to suckle its young with a sort of distillate of culture, an essence of morality tinged with religion of the most general kind: all bound with the fear of conflict and the desire to rule an unruly earth, topped as with a rich cake, by a throne, an emblem set amid its lusciousness.

It is not meant by this, that royalty will return: this is the day of Gorbachev, now Yeltsin of popular vote, the day after mass-murdering Mao. A demonic 'head' will sit upon these well-cultured shoulders of Europe, to brood if not breed some mystique and personality into the mix, that essence made by beating what was there before and crushing into it some polluted vestige of the pure religion of Jesus Christ (cf. pp 750 B-E infra). That head, viewed from varied angles, always looks just the same: it is that of him who 'shows himself' that he is God (II Thessalonians 2), astride Daniel's 4th and final Empire! (q.v.).

As to that... it will, as we have just noted, be 'a plague to remember', rather as if the 'world', having bared and snared its soul, sells it. It is not of course merely one nation, but Europe that Daniel predicts for the scene: With one head (see Daniel File, pp. 911-917 infra).

*19

Extension D: on the dignity of the war syndrome. See pp. 707-709 infra.
 

*20 The fulfilment of Daniel 12:4's prediction of much heightened world travel, is to be seen in a further perspective. It is not merely 'travel' in the sense of business and pleasure; there is no such limit to the prediction - though of course all this is included. It is (for whatever reason) moving about the face of the earth which is to increase, to the point of becoming a characterisable feature.

An article in The Australian, November 14-15, 1992 brings to sharp focus another element: immigration, both 'temporary' and permanent.

First, of course, we are most familiar with the painful scenes of Afghans moving under duress and deadly assault, into Pakistan, as well as to less accessible mountains; and earlier Siberian 'exile' for vast numbers of Russians. Now sad scenes of populaces, in ethnic or religous groupings, leaving for... whatever may be found, are commonly seen on television - recent tragedies being found in Yugoslavia, Ethiopia, and in the case of the Kurds, in the Middle East.

The seemingly remorseless and ruthless conflict produces refugees, as if World War 11 were still being enacted - and indeed, it was in that war, a sign of our times, that such scenes became a trade-mark of the tenderness... of man in the twentieth century, man (with women and children) very much on the move, often... ably assisted at that time, by dive-bombers or other aerial supervision, machine guns and allied testimonies of man's advance (one does not say in which direction). Sad as it was, and intensely grievous, it was yet fulfilment in stark realism of the prophecy which characterised the time to come, leading on to the time of judgment, man's "moving to and fro". It lay in this: the final seizure in which "there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation". It is "at that time", Daniel was told and hence prophesied, "that your people shall be delivered" (Daniel 12:1).

In this setting, was the intensified people movement predicted ^A. This then is just one component of the fulfilment of this prophecy of Daniel 12.

Now we may ponder our article from The Australian. Considering for its part 'long-term social, economic and political forces', the article (by Tom Dusevic) speaks of 'enormous population movements' as 'now occurring all over the globe'.

This horde, he notes, includes ''tourists, specialist workers, economic migrants, students and refugees'', and ''they are becoming increasingly difficult for governments to control''. Thus we find the knowledge and the travel components mutually reinforcing, relative to the Danielic prediction...

An extremely relevant point, when applied to prophetic fulfilment, comes in what is attributed to a deputy secretary in the Department of Immigration, Local Government and Ethnic Affairs - Wayne Gibson. "We have witnessed a revolution in global communications at least as remarkable as the spread of the railway and the steamship in the second half of the 19th century, that enabled the great waves of migration to North America of the time ... I doubt if there has (sic) ever before been mass movements of people on such a large and globally comprehensive scale."

With the sheer numbers now on earth, the multiplicity of forces, and the growing communication of concepts and cultures, the structure for mobility is in place, while the results speak for themselves. Fortifying it in this second National Immigration Outlook Conference, was an emphasis on temporary immigration, an additional force of propulsion for the predicted 'to and fro' movement, we note from Daniel. Dusevic says 'many speakers' indicated that 'globalisation would lead to more temporary movements' of migrants on a scale 'challenging the foundations of government migration policies.' For the physically minded, this may seem almost reminiscent of a Brownian movement: these however are not particles but people, predestinatively propelled, just as, in the marvel of the wonder of freedom, purposively operating. God has created freedom; but He is not its servant.

Fluidity physically, culturally, ideationally and economically, with multi-national companies vying with multinational thought: all these things together with the means of pursuing abroad pleasure, business and scholarship, while others in masses are being pursued, escaping from death: they are complex elements of the 'to and fro' sweep of man over the earth, like a spinning top, now reaching its humming whine.

What even augments this feature is the way the combination of knowledge and movement is focussed in the Conference, the former operating to augment the latter: and both to fulfil Daniel! The two together are precisely in situ, in contemporary fact, as in the envisagement of Daniel, the prophet, provider of the word of God.

*21 And what of the silent legions of the battered dead, men, women, children, with babes smashed, in some: those of the Kurds, or in Bosnia, Zaire, Chechnya... Rwanda ? lying at the altar of hatred, pride, imperialism, nationalism, genocide ... of the Unknown Passion. (Cf. pp. 579-580, 648-649 supra, 840ff. infra: the appeals and the predictions of God, often alike, lie likewise unheeded; but these, they are not dead.) Refer: pp. 1186A-C infra.
 

*22
For just one of the many nuances of the nebulous aspiration of the spiritually dispossessed (the French might put it, déracinés)... of this vacuous flirtation -

	for which the U.N
	the W.C.C. (q.v.),
	the New Age Movement, and in differing measures,
	neo-orthodoxy (q.v.),
	neo-evangelicalism (q.v.), 'community' (q.v.),
	'post-modernism' with its dilettante existentialisms (cf. p. 833 infra),
	the World Court of Justice with its centrality,
	and the numerous European yearnings, turnings and burnings for unity, community and collectivity are phases, if not parts:

Of this the New World Economic Order, much publicised by Communist Russia that was, is in turn, one phase. The modern Babel (q.v.) is rapidly being built. The architect is in his (secluded) office (cf. pp. 750B-E infra), but assistants bustle everywhere.

Thestructural ingredients are forming, just as are the spiritual, the ideological and the moral - and with no mean relationship to the location for spiritual hegemony prophesied in the Bible.

(Cf. pp. 660-674, 683-690, 694-695, 699-705, 717, 720-732B supra, and pp. 743-744, 749-750A, 833, 877-879, 902-931, 946-959, 967-970, 973A, 991-995, 999-1002C, 1008-1111 infra, and for detail on Rome: Part B, Ch. 10: pp. 1042 ff; 1174A infra.)

Indeed on the topic of Rome there are 3 interesting nominal ingredients:

1. the Club of Rome, with its forecasts and formulations for the world.

2. the Treaty of Rome for the inauguration of what was once the European Common Market, but is already the European Union; and

3. the Roman Catholic body - these together forming a commercial, religious and political combination at a hub. Such developments must await Chapter 9 infra.

Meanwhile, with a sense of development, we observe that Hitler, like Napoleon, Stalin, and perhaps more regionally, Mao and Tojo (the latter being possible forerunners of the 'kings of the East' - Revelation 16:12-15): ALL have grasped for such power and glory, downward trail-blazers. Likewise in a little, a deft move at the new contemporary and forming structural level, could consummate many subtle steps at the psychological, deviously diplomatic and orientative levels. Daniel 11 certainly suggests a full organ prelude of specious attractiveness before blatant domination.

Such usurping action (cf. Daniel 7:8-10,25, II Thessalonians 2; Ch. 9 infra) could utilise international movements,

a spectrum of bodies and concepts (cf. pp. 127-128 supra; 837-847, 861-863, 867ff., 919-930, 965, 983, 1002A, 1009-1010 infra, and above list): as preliminaries, prototypes, patterns or as ideological tools.

Amongst this array are found
 

• the U.N. - already with its New World Order thrust and synthesis in motion, and regarded as an international emblem... if so far rather weak;

• the New World Economic Order concepts from former Soviet Russia (some adjustments ? dreams sometimes linger and metamorphose rapidly...), not noticeably with love;

• the W.C.C. with its religious synthesis already in prolonged motion, though starting only in 1948; the papacy with its world pastoral concepts most apt for adaptation, and indeed for supersession as predicted (pp. 743-744, 946ff., 956, 1060 infra): much based or concentrated in the already formed might of Europe, now itself stabilising like the wings of a new-made dragon-fly before first flight, with suggestive tremors.

The course is laid out before us - as if by aerial survey for the forthcoming International Open - in the prophetic areas already noted (above). It is at this stage still under historical construction, and well-advanced in its observable development. The passion, the plans, the philosophy for 'play', the preliminary moral and religious bull-dozing enhanced by U.N. supra-moral Declarations in the interests of the ultimate racism (q.v.) - that of man: all these are throbbing with life. Australia, for its part, acts as if obsessed with the U.N. international supersession of its national popular sovereignty (refer U.N.). All this the W.C.C. feeds with a ferment of pseudo-moral provocations (cf. Revelation 13:11, 16:13, as to predicted type).

History is following prophecy like a lamb - alas, in this, prepared for the slaughter (cf. Revelation 16:14-21, 19:1-8). But again, though its tragedy is epochal, as the French put it, Que voulez-vous ? They crucified Christ (in a Jew-Gentile co-operation in essence), and predicted forces in a world unrepentant in its ways, are gathering like a storm, obviously increasing in power, just off the coasts of the planet.

As to the New World Order, did not President Bush speak of it with perhaps suppressed but still real enthusiasm, at the time of the international co-ordination and co-operation while Saddam Hussein was being blasted for 100 hours (stopped too soon, the suffering Kurds might well say!) ? Jeremy Lee, international Australian lecturer, gives valuable documentation of its literature and origins at the political level, in his video WHAT IS THE NEW WORLD ORDER ? The proposed regionalisation of the globe, supra-national disposal and control of resources, from bullocks to banking and grandiose global concepts, well-presaged by Communist publications, make an invaluable contribution to what ? Why for us, to the eruption of means for the fulfilment of the antichrist prophecies (q.v.) and the same very old, but New World Order, in different dress, dreamed of since Babel (q.v.).

Despite its frequent turbulent violence: before the word of God, history is surpassingly docile, like a dog which, however rambunctious, knows his master. The verification of the prophetic force of the word of God should leave all weather-forecasters lame with wonder; for their predictions frequently fail within 24 hours; but the word of God endures and abides forever, as unfazed as practical, as unhurrying as deft, as sure as steadfast, immovable, nor having any occasion for movement. It is history which moves. (Cf. p. 973A infra.) As to the word ? It directs.

Footnote:

1. The Jews of course are now back in their land, multiply moved ... and delivered.

731: DEMONIC 'HEAD' - The desire for 'something greater' (p. 958 infra), yet without God has long been pathological: it is now pandemic. It multiplies, growing and showing in sects, politics, philosophy, sociology, biology, physics; while spiritual pollution at nearly every level shows no sign of levelling off. (Cf. pp. 251-252G, 315Aff., Ch 4, 578-581, 685-689, 693-732B supra, 836ff., 922, 955-958, 972, 999-1002A, 1010, 1076 infra, 1088G-H.)

It is indeed becoming a monster which is at the last to show its demonic head, in the devil's 'messiah', the "man of sin" (II Thessalonians 2:8), long in preparation. (Cf. pp. 506, 515, 696-697, 721-725 supra, 732B-C, 955-959, 963, 972 infra.)

  Over the history of ideas, ideologies, associations and quasi-churches, that final 'head' will have much from which to synthesise, select, develop for its fateful days of expressive evil. Chemist, chameleon and deceiver, his lineage is long. The 'father of lies' (John 8:44, 14:29-30) is his background, the beast his foreground. (Cf. pp. 422N, 481, 686, 696, 723, 743-744 supra; 886-887, 1031C infra - and refer Satan.)
 

There is, moreover, a river of events, prepared for its pathway, both over time and with growing force over more recent years, and it has many converging tributaries. The Hitlers and the Stalins have failed; but their eyes were on the world with weird hallucinatory philosophies, gurgling together with obtrusive or unobtrusive, but always real 'religion'. They have not failed to encourage the thought, long latent in mankind and often displayed: something greater without God, something human without limits, something international with glory. Other modes of this evil, this delusive stream - filled with the pathogens of unbelief - have earlier left their legacy in favour of spiritual supinity within the race. Today, we see a gushing with many memories and vast breadth, of this stream, like some expansive gulf, into the sea of destiny. There its man, its messenger, its delusive 'head' awaits in his time , the cue to 'arise' (II Thessalonians 2:7-9).

Consider some of the contemporary tributaries of this stream.
As to NATO ? This lacks some cohesion, has some awkwardness with growing European glory and dimming American power mixed, lacks something of identity and is already finding another body, the Western European Union (q.v.), as the defence arm - of an ignited and increasingly excited Europe. Even if it be only oil burning as pollutant on the waters, it is showy. NATO was more practical following World War II; Europe has the glamour of past and the progressive self-intoxication that brewed in the minds of many a dictator.

But what of the UN ? (cf. pp. 749ff. supra). It has panache and propositionalises its barren 'laws' as Declarations, to many. Often it speaks like a modern Moses, but meretricious - and ex-God: an omission... of some infinite significance. The International Labour Organisation, ILO: it has a past rather than a future, more passion than morality, more Marx than marketability. The World Council of Churches - W.C.C. (q.v.) ? THERE is presumption, enough for any dictator, but it is parasitic on Christianity: with little power, and with no glamour or glory. It should of course be of considerable help to the devil's chaplain (Revelation 13:11-12, see infra). 'Community' ? (q.v., cf. pp. 1191-1192 infra). What of this artefact of social engineering and verbal creationism ? THIS, rather than 'people' (as in 'people power') or 'proletariat' (a befouled symbol of betrayal) is a code word for would-be dictators. It has the same principle as in the Communism of Marx, where the concept is a delusive substitute for tyranny by oligarchy, appropriately propelled by a ... 'Secretary'.

  The papacy ? Its glory is done, as it wobbles downhill to revelation of the falsity of its ... specialised revelation, in an explosive, itching, twitching, new-thing seeking world. (See Ch. 10 infra: pp. 1032-1088H.)
 

All of these, and many more referred to in this work, are looseners of mankind's fibre, integrity of virtue, independence, pollutants of the race's discriminating, critical faculty. Their IDEA of subordinating man to man, or to man's idea, or to man's empty but clamant claims... to losing oneself, one's group or one's nation in 'mankind' or in an international base supposedly representative of it, one of (hoped for) power, importance and (de facto) presumption: THIS IDEA it is which is here significant for the future (WITH its spiritual bases!). No mere idea, it has a passion like a psychic alcohol to the godless; and it drugs many idealists into its empty vision. The feelings (on the one hand) and the facts (on the other) of LSD experiences ... are an excellent symbol of its mode of operation. Of value, it suggests much: but it secures... nothing.

Indeed, they become, such things, like a swamp from the endless seeming insurgencies, which are a preparation...

  The demonic 'head' to come of it, then, and his aid, in this spiritual swamp ? (Revelation 13:1, Daniel 7:8, II Thessalonians 2:8). What of them ?

  Revelation 13:4-5,11,13-16, with II Thessalonians 2, Daniel 7:8,25 exposes both the devil's chaplain and his 'messiah' vigorously stirring the pathogens, enriching the mixture. Meanwhile, Revelation 12 is depicting for us Israel as a whole (12:1) with her famed 12 tribes, from which (Romans 9:5) came the Lord's Christ (Luke 3:26). This people has suffered and was to suffer during the whole church age (cf. Revelation 11:2, 12:6), and in this, our more recent era - a "time of Jacob's trouble" (Jeremiah 30:7) - exceedingly!

As to the devil, ousted from heaven (Revelation 12:9), this proud spirit is overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of the testimony of the brethren of Christ (Revelation 12:11), who do not "love their lives to the death". The wrath of the devil, exposed and degraded, is fierce on earth (Revelation 12:12). That fallen being is at war with the spiritual "offspring" of the woman: those who obey God's commands in Christ (Revelation 12:17, cf. Luke 3:8). That is, Biblically, the "Israel of God" of the now-installed New Covenant (Galatians 6:15-16, Romans 2:28). The dénouement is brief (II Thessalonians 2:8); but the preparations which we survey: they have been long. (Cf. pp. 422J,M-O, 451-453, 744 supra, 857ff., 999 infra.)
 

Let us change the figure. Such preliminaries set a stage, aided by New Age 'consciousness' (pp. 867 ff. infra) and fragmented Messianic hopes, with the spotlight of fear lighting it up, lest the race fail to survive ... in its angers, its passions, its godless deeds and its 'quasi-needs' that aspire to predominate, with its frustrations and its bombs.

  It awaits the antichrist man-of-sin, as an audience awaits the rising of a curtain, for the agents of action, and for the lead rôle. (Cf. pp. 422L, 451-453 supra, and The Thrills of Contemporary Rills, earlier in this entry.) An anticlimax however is this anti-christ. Summarising the evil of many generations, and currently in his preparations, prophetically right on course for his appearance in the correct and predicted milieu precisely (cf. pp. 683 ff.; Ch. 9): he is scheduled to meet the authentic Christ - His advent as Saviour long past; and this he does in the epoch of Christ's coming return to judgment.

  Once the display, and the teaching, and the grand permission to history for so long, for the illustrative freedoms to instruct the human race, and to give it place: once these are past over many centuries, the end is short. II Thessalonians 2 is pithy. (Cf. Revelation 19:11-20.)