This Week's Bulletin

National Security - The Real Solution (Part 2)
By WAYNE JACKSON

National Security
Contrary to the view of many people, national security is not determined by sophisticated spy systems, a stockpile of nuclear weapons, or political activism. Ancient Babylon was known as "the glory of the kingdoms." Behind her gigantic walls (according to Herodotus, three hundred feet high and seventy-five feet thick), this pagan mistress felt absolutely secure, but God Almighty destroyed her. Read Isaiah's thrilling prophecy of Babylon's impending doom in the thirteenth chapter of his book.

The ancient Edomites (descendants of Esau) became the perpetual enemies of Israel. When the Babylonians invaded the holy land and took Judah captive, Edom stood on the side, as it were, and cheered, shouting, "Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof" (Psalms 137:7). All the while, the Edomites, perched in their fortress city of Petra (with granite cliffs fifteen to twenty miles wide and some two thousand feet high), exclaimed: "Who shall bring me down to the ground?" (Obadiah 3). God informed them, through the prophet Obadiah, that he would! These haughty people were finally expelled from their homeland some time between 550 and 400 B.C. by the Nabataeans.

The fact of the matter is simply this: when the wickedness of a people drops to a certain level on the Lord's moral "barometer," he will terminate their prosperity. Note the following examples.

1 When Abraham was ushered into the land of Canaan, he was informed that several generations must pass before his seed could actually possess the land? Why was such the case? Because "the iniquity of the Amorite" was not "yet full" (Genesis 15:16). The comments of M. Jacobus on this point are excellent. The longsuffering of God towards the wicked makes Him even postpone the deliverance of His people, showing that in His dealings with us He has also to regard others, and He will order all things well. Abraham was now living among the Amorites, and they were the most extensive occupants of the territory. Here we are taught: (1) God foreknows the moral character of men. (2) In His providence He administers the affairs of nations on the principles of moral rectitude. (3) Nations are spared until their iniquity is full. (4) They are then cut off in retributive justice (1864, 272).

The implication is that when the Amorites reached a determined level of depravity, they would lose their "deed" to Canaan. Similarly, Israel lost her right to the Promised Land centuries later, due to her own wickedness (cf. Joshua 23:15, 16). Modern millennialists ignore this truth.

2 When the Lord surveyed ancient Sodom and Gomorrah, he announced: "Their sin is very grievous" (Genesis 18:20); hence, he purposed to destroy these wicked cities. He promised Abraham, however, that if but ten righteous souls could be found, mercy would be extended. As every Bible student knows, those communities were judged by Heaven for a lack of six godly people! There was obviously a certain depth of corruption which Jehovah would no longer allow to continue. He will not strive with rebellious humanity indefinitely (cf. Genesis 6:3).

3 Jehovah instructed Jonah: "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it; for their wickedness is come up before me" (Jonah 1:2). The people of Nineveh were warned that they would be destroyed in forty days. This message of judgment struck a note of terror in their hearts; accordingly, they repented, and the Lord lifted the impending disaster. The revival was relatively short-lived however, and that nation eventually drifted again into degradation. The prophet Nahum was raised up to proclaim "the full end" of the Assyrian capital (cf. Nahum 1:8).

4 The history of the Hebrew nation represents a checkered pattern of intermittent fidelity and apostasy—the latter gradually gaining the upper hand. This spirit of lawlessness would see its culmination with the crucifixion of Jesus and the subsequent Jewish persecution of the church of Christ. The Lord thus challenged the Jews of his day to "fill ye up then the measure of your fathers" (Matthew 23:32). Subsequently, he indicated that upon "this generation" a judgment would descend from God which would spell disaster for the Jewish nation (cf. 23:35ff; 24:1-34).

TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT WEEK....