THE KI NG' S BUS I NESS
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“ Because they came not to the help of Jehovah, “ To the help of Jehovah against the mighty.” Try this statement from Psalm 78: (9) “ The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows. “ Turned back in the day of battle. (60) “ So He forsook the tabernacle of Shilo, (61) “ And delivered his strength into captivity. “And his glory into the adversary’s hand. (67) “ Moreover He refused the tent of Joseph, “ And chose not the tribe of Ephr aim.” Saul lost his kingdom for failure to exterminate the Amalekites when God had commanded him to do so. His excuse of saving goods for sacrifice availed him nothing. When God com mands judgment executed He will not be appeased by partial performance (1 Sam. 15:3-23). Israel failed to carry out God’s program of destruction upon the Canaanite nations, whose cup of iniquity was full, and she suffered for it throughout all her after history (Judges 1:27-34). Since God must needs'send the fire of war to devour utterly Damascus because of her. cruel instruments of war; Gaza for carrying away whole peoples into captivity; Tyre for breaking brotherly covenants; Edom for casting off all pity; and Ammon for ripping up women with child, (Amos 1:3-14), woe be to us if we fail Him in visiting His wrath upon nations that have surpassed in all these barbaric cruelties those ancient nations. Not until the crime against God and humanity shall have been expiated and restoration made for wanton destruction and the atheistic philosophy which lies back of it all be discredited can the sword of God’s vengeance be safely sheathed. Not until the God of justice shall say, “ It is
enough,” shall the allied armies be brot home. 4. God punished national sins by wars. His instruments of judgment have usually been the forces, of nature, pestilence, famine and war. The sins of individuals may be punished in the next life. The sins of nations must be pun ished, if at all, while they are on the earth. If God is just He must punish the guilt of nations as surely as He does the guilt of individuals. In all those wars of the past,, of which we have an inspired record, the history is written from God’s viewpoint and the guilt which caused God to send the war is emphasized. In the case of many of these nations they had filled up the full measure of their guilt and God sent other nations against them to remove them from the face of the earth by wa’r. In the case of the Israelites, war was sent to chasten them, bring them to repentance and reform, that they might be forgiven and be restored to God’s favor. “When He slew them, then they inquired after EÇim; “ And they returned and sought God earnestly” (Ps. 78:34). This chastening of the better nations, by those that are worse, for their recov ery from national sin helps to the understanding of the bitter experience they are often called upon to endure. England’s drunkenness, Prance’s athe ism, Russia’s persecution of the Jews, Belgium’s guilt on the Congo, and thé spreading of materialism and disregard of God and His Word in the United States furnish sufficient grounds for national punishment, even when being used to punish greater transgressors. Lowell had some such viewpoint when he wrote in The Present Crisis: “ Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the throne; Yet that scaffold sways the future And behind the dim unknown
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