Stephen
Terry, Director
Babylon
and Armageddon
Commentary
for the June 23, 2018 Sabbath School Lesson
“But they deliberately
forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens came into being and the earth
was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that
time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth
are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of
the ungodly.” 2 Peter 3:5-7, NIV
At almost $700 billion dollars,[i] the United States’ annual spending on its
ability to project military force around the world is greater than that of any
other country in the world. China’s spending comes in at about a third of ours,
while Russia, typically our greatest nemesis spends approximately a tenth of
what we do.[ii] This is not because we have the largest army,[iii] but the budget reflects our heavy investment
in advanced military technology. It is not hard to see the cost of that
investment when a single Raytheon Cruise Missile can cost $1.4 million,[iv] and we
have used many of them in our war on terror.
Our willingness to project devastating force around the globe has been
apparent since the detonations above Hiroshima and Nagasaki that ended World
War II. While that conflict was a declared war, we have continued to devastate
opponents through the use of advanced military technology without often
bothering to enter a state of a congressionally declared war. In many ways,
this echoes the might and methods of the ancient Roman Empire.
Rome, which began as a republic with
some similarities to our own democratic republic, eventually became an
imperium, ruled by the decrees of successive Caesars. The Roman Senate,
intended to be a check on power, devolved into irrelevancy on issues of major
consequence. It apparently was the sense of their waning influence that
prompted the assassination of Julius Caesar by some of those senators.[v] Nonetheless, their action did not stop the
death of the republic and perhaps even precipitated it. Without the hindrance
of the senate, Rome became an unrivaled military power, able to project its
might and will on three continents for centuries. Is this the direction the
United States is headed? Some seem to fear that as we develop we are creating
an image to that power similar to the “image of the beast” in the book of
Revelation.[vi]
With our military and economic might,
we determine through sanctions who might “buy and sell,”[vii] and we
dictate what the terms of their relationship with the United States must be.
This has brought untold wealth to our shores and to the shores of those
countries’ kings and merchants we extend preferred status to. Too often
morality has taken last place next to the desire to keep that abundant wealth
accumulating in our dragon’s horde, a horde which gives us the ability to have
the power we project. We are too willing to make the “devil’s deal” to keep
that power and what it provides. Those, who might challenge the basis of that
power, whether countries or individuals, are soon “outside the loop” of
national favor.
Some, who might take a more literal
approach to their study of the prophetic books of Daniel and Revelation, may
see all this as leading toward a climactic battle to take place in the Middle
East, perhaps in a war to determine who shall have possession of the holy city,
Jerusalem. It is truly a potent brew, the admixture of our desire for cheap oil
and our feeling that Jerusalem is intrinsically holy. Our willingness to quaff
it to the dregs has kept us involved in the part of the world for a very long
time. Thousands of Americans have watered the sands of the Middle East with
their blood in order to keep our fingers in that pie, to say nothing of the
tens of thousands who did not want us there and paid with their lives, and too
often the lives of their families, attempting to prevent us. So are we
irrevocably destined to a great final battle in the Middle East, a battle of
Armageddon?
Uriah Smith[viii] and some of the Adventist Pioneers were
inclined to believe this. When they looked around for belligerents, they
decided the Ottoman Empire fit the role of the King of the North of Daniel,
chapter 11 and so have felt that the Ottoman Empire would re-establish its
capital in or near Jerusalem and that would hurl the world into the final
crisis that would bring all the players together for that apocalyptic battle.
Then while that battle was raging, Jesus would step in at the head of his
heavenly army and intervene like a parent would with misbehaving children, only
with a more permanent solution. But this information has been around for almost
two millennia, so how could such a battle take place if the outcome is already
known? Why wouldn’t we take steps to prevent it ever happening? To be sure,
mankind has tried. We have had the League of Nations and its successor, the
United Nations. But for all of their promise, they have proven ineffective at
preventing warfare or at reigning in the power of the permanent members of the
Security Council. They often find their efforts stymied instead by the vetoes
of one or more of those members. Likely, each of those vetoes are given in the
belief that they are acting in the best interests of the world, but the Bible
tells us that perspective will be self-deluding as the end approaches. Paul,
the Apostle, wrote to the worshippers at Thessalonica, “They perish because
they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them
a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie.”[ix]
This was modeled in ancient Israel.
After the death of Solomon, the majority of Israel split from the tribe of
Judah. Believing their course to be the right one, they decided to substitute a
counterfeit worship for the worship at the Temple in Jerusalem, for they feared
the peoples’ loyalty would return to Jerusalem instead of remaining with the
new capital in Samaria.[x] They
instead set up idols of golden calves at two places, Dan and Bethel, that may
have been influenced by the golden calf set up by Aaron while Moses was on
Mount Sinai.[xi]
That earlier event had been strongly condemned and thousands died as a result.
Saying that the setting up of these later calves was like a dog returning to
its vomit would not be too strong to portray what they had done. Severing
themselves from the temple and worshipping these golden idols made it easier to
justify syncretism with the pagan peoples who still lived among them. The
worship of Baal, the storm god and Astarte, the queen of heaven, became far
more common than the worship of God, the Creator. By the time of King Ahab and
his wife, Jezebel, the Sidonian, the priests of Baal numbered in the hundreds.
So few apparently still worshipped God that the prophet, Elijah, thought he was
alone in remaining faithful.[xii]
In a confrontation that presaged Armageddon,
Elijah faced off against four hundred fifity of those prophets of Baal on Mount
Carmel with a “Duel of the Gods.” The outcome proved that the truth does not
rely on majoirty opinion. The majority can believe that Baal, Astarte, or even
no god at all is the truth, but God is not elected by majority vote of mankind.
In fact, a god that required that kind of validation would be no god at all,
only a projection of our human perception of power, and that power, being only
our perception, is all too often impotent. People may come to such a god for as
long as the vending machine is dispensing what they desire, but should it fail,
their faith follows suit. Perhaps this is why Elijah confonted the Baal
worshippers in this way. He knew that under close supervision, their vending
machine would prove empty. The story supports that view, for Baal failed to
meet the challenge, but the true Creator consumed offering, wood, stones, and
water in a fiery blast from heaven.[xiii] The
people then, apaprently at Elijah’s direction, turned on those priests of the
false god, Baal, and slew them all.
The day will come when fire will cosume
all that we have made more important than God. We have created a Tower of Babel
in our attempt to usurp the power of God by bringing our own fire down from
heaven through nuclear holocaust.[xiv] Our
golden calf no longer resides in Bethel or Dan, but in Wall Street and the
entire world worships that beast. When it shudders the economy of the whole
globe falters. But amidst the lamentation of all, it will also fall, according
to the book of Revelation, and those who have grown rich from this world will
be wtihout recourse on that day. The Babel of commerce in hundreds of languages
will cease, replaced by the desperate cries for refuge as cataclysms mount one
upon another. The only sure refuge will be the one already secured by those who
sought to make God their strong tower[xv] rather
than their own strength and power. Their wealth will no longer secure anything,
being fit only to toss away.[xvi] On that
day, where will we be?
