PRAYING FOR HELP IN TIME OF WAR.
-2 CHRONICLES
14:1-12.-JULY 17.-
Golden Text:-“Help us, O Lord our God, for we rest on thee.”
OUR lesson relates to
the two tribe kingdom of Judah under its good king Asa, the great grandson of
Solomon. We have already noticed the tendency to idolatry stimulated by
Solomon’s marrying heathen women, and then, to please them, introducing their
heathen religions. We have seen how only a small portion of the kingdom was left
in the hands of Solomon’s son Rehoboam, and that true religion for a time was
stimulated by the adversities of the government. Nevertheless, idolatry
flourished, not only in Israel under Jeroboam, but also in Judah under
Rehoboam, and also under the reign of his son Abijah, mentioned in the opening
verses of our lesson.
CONFLICT BETWEEN LIGHT AND DARKNESS.
Under all the circumstances one is inclined to wonder whence Asa received
his aspirations for righteousness and loyalty to God. We are to remember,
however, that the gathering to Judah of many of the religious people of the ten
tribes and the Levitical tribe gave true religion a strong foundation in
Judah. The heathen religions were fascinating to the people, not only because
they were showy, but because they contained a large element of licentiousness,
and it is a weakness of the fallen human nature to want to be right and yet to
be wrong at the same time-to pretend to be doing good and serving righteousness
and exercising the religious elements of human nature, while at the same time
gratifying the lower and baser instincts. The entire human family is weak in
this direction, as is evident by all the heathen religions of the world. The
religion of the Bible is the only one that lifts its standard far above all
baseness, and which demands of its followers the highest ideals, as represented
in our text for the year,-“Brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever
things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever
things are lovely, whatsoever things are reputable, if there be any virtue, or
any praise, think on these things.”-Phil. 4:8.
Our Lord, in telling us to let our light shine before men, informs us that
the darkness will hate the light, that there will be continually a conflict
between the two, and that this will cause the “children of the light”
continually to walk in the narrow and difficult way. Nevertheless the light
reproves the darkness wherever it shines. We may be sure that some such conditions
prevailed in the kingdom of Judah when the best people of the whole twelve
tribes had gathered in Judah and were letting the light of their faith in God
shine before their fellows. The influence of the Truth took hold upon the
heart of Asa, and upon his reaching the throne, at the death of his father
Abijah, he promptly availed himself of the opportunity to strike a blow at
idolatry-to take his stand on the side of the Lord and his Law, which the
nation centuries before had accepted as the basis of their government with God
through Moses.
ASA’S COURSE NOT A PATTERN.
The work of reform consisted in the destruction of the altars erected
on various hilltops, at which the orgies of heathendom were practiced. These
altars were surrounded by groves for the worship of Baal and Ashtaroth by those
who affected to be in a large sense worshipers of nature, and groves of trees
on hilltops were their temples. Asa not only destroyed these unlawful
accessories to a false worship, but he caused a proclamation to be made
throughout the kingdom calling the attention of the people to the true God
Jehovah, the God of their fathers, and to his Law and all the commandments
connected therewith.
Such action on the part of Asa has been misunderstood by many well-meaning
Christian people to imply that other kings and rulers in other countries should
similarly take active measures for the destruction of all false religion and
for the establishment of what they conceive to be the true religion. This has
meant religious persecution throughout the past. For instance, in Great
Britain, Germany, France, etc., time and again Roman Catholics coming into
power have overthrown Protestant worship and persecuted Protestant worshipers,
and, reversely, Protestants coming into power have endeavored similarly to
persecute Catholics. Sometimes the persecution has been between various sects
of Protestants, sometimes between Mohammedans and Christians, etc. Of late
years a more tolerant spirit has disposed intelligent people to let each other
worship different gods or the same God according to the dictates of the
conscience of each. Nevertheless there are many today, who, if they had the
power, would feel it to be their duty to emulate the example of Asa, and
destroy any and every religion disapproved by their consciences.
Such misapprehensions of proprieties are built upon misunderstanding of
the course of Asa and others of his time, who had God’s approval in their
course of opposing false worships. In order to grasp the situation thoroughly
and to see the principles underlying it, we should remember that no nation in
the world today occupies the same position toward God that Israel occupied in
its day. God chose Israel-the natural descendants of Abraham and Isaac and
Jacob-to be his peculiar people, to be his nation. They were thus separated
from all other nations of the world, which were accounted heathen. In this his
chosen nation God established his Law, and made a covenant with that people by
which they were to be obedient to certain directions and to receive from him
certain blessings, protection, guidance, etc. It was in harmony with this
special arrangement that Asa was properly doing his duty in destroying any and
every religious system in his nation contrary to the divine Law and Covenant.
“YE ARE A HOLY NATION.”
However, Israel has ceased to be God’s people since the time of their
rejection of Messiah, and God has not adopted any other nation of earth to be
his nation instead of Israel, and he is no longer in covenant relationship with
any other nation. Believers in the Lord Jesus, consecrated followers in his
steps, are, from the Lord’s standpoint, his “holy nation,” his “Royal
Priesthood”-spiritual Israel. But these do not constitute a nation from the
worldly standpoint. They are the embryo members of the coming nation, the
Kingdom of God’s dear Son, which will be established in power and great glory
at the second coming of the Lord and the establishment of his Kingdom. For this
reason it would be entirely improper to any king or governor or president or
emperor of earth today to attempt to use any such power as that exercised by
Asa with divine approval. During this Gospel age the Lord’s plan is that his
people shall be as lights in the world in the midst of the darkness of sin and
error, and that the light which they let shine shall reprove the world of sin,
not nationally but individually, so that those who experience conviction of sin
and who go on to repentance may become associated with the light-bearers, the Lord’s
people, and while still in the world and still of the world, according to the
flesh, and still bound to it by certain obligations and laws of men,
nevertheless as our Lord expressed it, such, from the time they become members
of the Royal Priesthood, the holy nation, are not of the world even as Jesus
was not of the world, because he has chosen them out of the world.
King Asa built fortress cities in the highways connecting the land of
Judah with the outside world, as a protection against attack from Egypt on the
south and west, from Syria on the north and east, and from the ten-tribe
kingdom on the immediate north. He organized also a militia army subject to
call. These preparations for war had the divine approval, but in no sense of
the word indicated that we, the antitypical Israelites, should take a similar
course. On the contrary, as the Apostle points out, we are to have on the
armor of God, the armor of righteousness; we are to fortify our hearts against
the attack of spiritual enemies in every direction; we are to note the quarter
from which the enemies are to be expected-the world, the flesh, the Adversary.
The battles of typical Israel represented or prefigured and illustrated the
battles in which we spiritual Israelites are to engage and the victories which
we are to win on a higher plane, for we contend not with flesh and blood, but
with principalities and powers and wicked spirits in places of influence.
The ten years of quiet mentioned in verses 1,5 and 6, in which Asa
instituted reforms amongst the people and equipped them for defense, were
evidently all needed for the struggle recorded in verse 9. Zerah, the
Ethiopian, with an army of 1,000,000 men, is supposed by some to have been
Osorkon II. of Egypt, who was of Ethiopian descent. Others suppose that Zerah
was the general of this king. In the days of Rehoboam the king of Egypt had
invaded Judah and conquered it, and had taken away from it an immense treasure
in gold accumulated by King Solomon, including the solid gold shields which
Solomon had hanging from the pillars of the Temple. It is assumed that Judah
became practically a vassal nation to Egypt as a result of this war, and that
Asa’s organization of the nation on a military basis and the erecting of
fortifications meant a declaration of independence and a refusal to pay tribute
to Egypt, and that Zerah’s army was sent to punish him, to bring away more
spoil and to reduce the nation again to the condition of a vassal.
KING ASA’S PRAYER FOR VICTORY.
Asa called into requisition his army, which numbered only about
one-half that of the invading foe, but his confidence was in the Lord, and he
cried unto him in prayer for help that the war might result favorably to the
Lord’s people, the Jews. His recorded prayer is beautiful for its simplicity
of faith:-
“Asa cried unto the Lord his God, and said, Lord, there is none beside
thee to help between the mighty and him that hath no strength: help us, O Lord
our God; for we rely on thee, and in thy name are we come against this multitude.
O Lord, thou art our God; let not man prevail against thee.”
The Lord blessed the forces of the Jews. The enemy was discomfited,
scattered, routed, and pursued through the land of the Philistines, who
evidently were in league with them as enemies of the Jews. This was one of the
most remarkable victories ever achieved by the Jews over any foreign nation.
Following the custom of Asa and David and Moses, and others of bygone
times in Israel, it is the habit of Christian peoples of our day to offer up
prayers for success in war. We recall well the prayers that were offered for
the armies during the civil war of this country; we remember the accounts given
of the prayers of the British and Boers during the recent British war; we
remember in the Spanish war the prayers of the Catholics of Spain and of Italy
for the success of the Spanish forces, and how the Pope’s blessing was given to
the Spanish war vessels. We have heard lately of how the Czar of Russia, on
learning of the outbreak of the war, repaired to the Cathedral for prayer to
God, and how the leading Russian generals have similarly gone to confession and
to prayer and for other public recognitions of the Almighty and appeals to him
for success to the Russian arms in the present war with Japan. We have seen
pictures in the public press of how the regimental standards, flags, are
blessed by the Czar and assisting priests, and the telegraphic reports declare
that an image of the Virgin Mary, which was taken with the army in wars of long
ago that were successfully waged, is to be taken to the far East as a kind of
talisman to give good luck to the Russian side of the warfare. How shall we
view these appeals? Shall we view them as others do as being on a parity with
the appeal of Asa in our lesson? Shall we consider that they are equally
appropriate in God’s sight and that they are bringing a blessing and victory?
We answer, No. The prayers offered for the success of the Confederate armies
did not bring them victory; the prayers and blessings upon the Spanish forces
and vessels brought them no victory; the prayers of the Boers brought them no
victory; the prayers of the French in their war with Germany brought the former
no victory; the prayers of the Russians have in no sense of the word stayed or
turned the tide of battle as yet.
GOD’S INTEREST AND CARE AND OURS.
We would not be understood as declaring or even implying that God has no
interest in the affairs of the world, and that he does not in any measure take
a hand in the results of the wars of our time. Quite the contrary. We believe
that the Lord’s power, especially in this day, especially in this time of
“harvest,” is supervising and shaping the affairs of the nations with a view to
bringing about the grand consummation of the age so long foretold in the
Scriptures, which will result in a great time of trouble through a social,
political and financial upheaval which will prepare the way for the Kingdom of
God’s dear Son in its due time. But we deny the propriety of Christians
attempting to pray or otherwise direct the Lord in connection with these
matters, and the outworking of the divine program, which we cannot fully and
clearly comprehend. No nation in the world today is God’s nation in the sense
that Israel was his people. With no nation in the world today has God made a
covenant such as that which subsisted between himself and Israel for the centuries
between the giving of the Law at Sinai and the rejection of the Lord at the
time of his crucifixion. No nation or kingdom in the world can claim divine
authority or right or backing. The title, “Christian nations,” is entirely a
misnomer, unauthorized by anything in God’s Word. All these nations, from the
Scriptural standpoint, are “kingdoms of this world,” Gentile kingdoms. The
Lord acknowledges none of them, but describes them unitedly as great Babylon,
which in due time would fall and give place to the glorious kingdom which the
Lord has promised-the antitype of the Jewish kingdom under a still more
favorable covenant, under a still better Mediator, under a still more grand and
glorious king than David or Solomon or any other.
The proper attitude, therefore, for the Lord’s consecrated people to
occupy is that of neutrals. “Ye are not of this world, even as I am not of
this world; for I have chosen you out of the world, and ordained you, that you
should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain.” The fruit
which the Lord’s people are to bear is not strife and enmity and vain glory,
but love, joy and peace in the holy Spirit. This does not mean either that we
are to quarrel with the world and seek to bring all mankind to the same
position that we occupy. On the contrary, we are to realize that the world is
of one nature and the Lord’s consecrated and accepted ones are of a new nature;
that the Lord has not given to the world the same law that he has given to his
consecrated ones, and that he is not expecting of the world the same course of
conduct that he is expecting of the house of sons begotten of his Spirit,
adopted into his family and guided by his Spirit and his Word.
Let the world fight its fight: the Lord will supervise
and the results will be glorious eventually. Let us who belong to the new
nation, to the new Kingdom that is not of this world, who use no carnal
weapons, but the sword of the Spirit-let us fight the good fight of faith, lay
hold upon the glorious things set before us, and not only stand ourselves, but
help all those begotten of the same Spirit and members of the same heavenly
army corps to stand, complete in him who is the Head of the body, the Captain
of our salvation. By and by God’s loving care over all his creatures
will be manifested in the glorious Kingdom of his dear Son, which shall bless
and rule, instruct and uplift mankind in general. “The groaning creation” will
then be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of
the sons of God-so many of them as will then accept the blessing. Then all
will see that God so loved the world as to give his Son to die for us and to
thus open the way for his Kingdom blessings.