Monthly Archives: November 2014

Some insights from Bible scholars

23 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Bible scholarship

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This past Wednesday through Friday, I attended the 66th annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society, which is the world’s largest gathering of evangelical Christian theologians and Bible scholars. As always, I could attend only a small percentage of the hundreds of presentations at the conference. I have summarized insights from a few presentations below.

Bryant Wood of Associates for Biblical Research presented an update of ABR’s ongoing excavation of Khirbet el-Maqatir, which he has argued convincingly is the biblical city of Ai. The most important recent find at this site was a scarab which, according to Wood’s analysis, can be dated specifically to the period immediately before the biblical date of Joshua’s conquest of the city (1405 B.C.). This find was ranked by Christianity Today as biblical archeology’s most significant discovery of 2013. ABR is looking for volunteers for their 2015 dig at Khirbet el-Maqatir.

Daniel Lanz, who is a doctoral student at Wheaton and a personal friend, presented a paper in which he gave a technical explanation of the geographical references in Deuteronomy 11:30. Essentially, he was responding to a common viewpoint among theologically liberal scholars that this verse mistakenly locates Mounts Ebal and Gerizim by the Jordan, near Jericho. An outline of his paper is posted online here.

John R. Rice was one of the most well-known fundamentalist church leaders of the twentieth century. Matthew Lyon, who is a doctoral student at Southern Baptist Seminary, presented a paper on John R. Rice’s view of women. He argued that Rice held a much more reasoned position on the issue than what his opponents have portrayed him as holding. Rice argued that wives should be in subjection to their husbands, and that they should not be preachers or teachers in the church, although men and women are equal before God—a position not unlike that held by many conservative evangelical Christians today. What made Rice a lightning rod for criticism was his penchant for stating his views in strong and sometimes provocative language.

On Thursday, I attended a breakfast for alumni of Dallas Theological Seminary in which President Mark Bailey gave a report on how the school has done in the past year. Essentially, enrollment is steady and there have been some big construction projects started. The school is doing well financially. Bailey did not make reference to any of the theological controversies at the school. (Note: There are not just theological controversies at DTS—most evangelical seminaries are dealing with the same trends in scholarship and the same tensions with traditional scholarship.)

Daniel Janosik of Southern Evangelical Seminary presented research which shows how the repression of Christians in Islamic countries today is no different than the way Christians were historically treated under Islamic rule. The only period in the history of Islam in which Christians were treated well was the colonial period, during which European powers forced a greater toleration of Christians by the Muslim majority. Janosik’s paper is posted on his website.

Terry Mortenson of Answers in Genesis presented a paper in which he argued that the Bible does not allow for millions of years of death and suffering before the fall of man. One interesting point he made was that the Old Testament only uses the word “death” for plant life once, in a poetic speech in Job. Plants do not have consciousness, and therefore are really only complex machines. In response to a question from the audience, Terry stated that he does not know of any credible contemporary creationist who argues that the second law of thermodynamics was not in operation prior to the fall. He said that digestion of food is an application of the second law of thermodynamics, but digestion is not a moral evil. Another questioner asked whether Adam could have stubbed his toe and felt pain before the fall. Terry said he knows a 17 year old girl who was born without the ability to feel pain, and it has created great problems in her life. She cannot, for example, sense that she should take her hand off of a hot stove, because burning skin does not cause her pain. Terry’s point was that pain can be a good thing; it is a sense that makes us aware of our surroundings and keeps us from seriously injuring ourselves. Terry also pointed out that the curse of Genesis 3:16 promised to greatly increase a woman’s pain in childbirth, implying that childbirth would have been painful in a limited way even before the fall. Pain that is too great or too persistent could not exist in a world in which everything was “very good” (Gen 1:31), but limited pain would have been part of the prelapsarian world. An earlier version of Terry’s paper can be read online here.

Although this was not part of the conference, Ken Ham refers in a blog post to a recent article in a scientific journal that presents new neurological research which indicates that true atheism is psychologically impossible. If this is right, then people who claim to be atheists are attempting to suppress an innate belief in God that they can never actually destroy. (I do think that everyone has an innate knowledge of God, but there is a question as to the extent to which someone can ignore or suppress this knowledge; see, for example, Psalms 10:4; 14:1; 53:1.)

It was also great to meet with dozens of friends, old and new, at the conference. Looking forward to next year’s meeting in Atlanta!

Shattering Babel, and our illusion of security

17 Monday Nov 2014

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This past March, German chancellor Angela Merkel said after a phone conversation with Vladimir Putin that he was “in a different world” and “not in touch with reality.” More than seven months later, it can rightly be asked whether it was in fact Merkel and the West that were out of touch with reality. Russia continues to take an aggressive military posture in Ukraine, and both Russia and China continue their military buildup, with signs of increasing aggressiveness against the West. Clearly the West has, at a minimum, failed to anticipate Vladimir Putin’s behavior in Ukraine and elsewhere. It seems to me that the West still does not fully appreciate Putin’s nationalistic ambitions and the lengths to which he will go to realize them. But the real problem lies not in a failure to understand Putin, but in the failure of people in the West to see the world through biblical eyes.

To understand what is happening with the resurgent nationalism and militarism in Russia and China, it is necessary to go all the way back to the formation of the nations of the world in Genesis 11:1-9. This passage describes how, at an early point in the history of the world after Noah and his family survived the Deluge in a ship, the entire human race came together at a place called Babylon (Babel). Their purpose in coming together was to glorify themselves, rather than their Creator, through a construction project of epic proportions, which would unite the people of the world into a single family instead of dividing them into many distinct nations and scattering them. Their intent was to build the mother city of the new world, from which man would rule himself—no longer recognizing God’s sovereignty—and would build a great civilization. Mankind was on the fast track to the next all-out rebellion against God, just like the situation before the Deluge, and had God simply let man go his own way, He would have been forced to wipe out the human race yet another time in another cataclysmic judgment. Thus, God interrupted man’s activity by mixing up human language (i.e., by making each family group speak a language that was completely unrelated to all the other languages), which destroyed the unity of the human race and prevented man from effectively working together in opposition to the will of God. The history of the world since Babel has been a history of distinct nations which have competed with one another, and thereby have prevented each other from accomplishing separately what all could accomplish together. World unity is a serious problem, for, left to their own devices, the vast majority of men will always give themselves over to their sinful desires, and will seek to give full expression to their wickedness (cf. Gen 6:5; 8:21; Ps 2:1-3).

The world has had as its goal ever since Babel to unite again as one in order to achieve sinful human ambitions and to glorify man. But there have been two great problems in the way of this evil dream. First and foremost is the problem of the lack of a common language and a means of global communication. This problem has been significantly lessened in modern times through a system of global communication and travel, the use of English as a common language, and the development of automated translation software. The second problem in the way of world unity still exists in a more serious way. This problem is the competing ambitions of nations and rulers with a national, rather than a global, identity. The history of the world since Babel has been a history of violent conflict between rival nations. There have been many rulers in the history of the world who have wished to unite the world, but they have always faced stubborn opposition from competing rulers and nations who want world unity to come on different terms.

The West, particularly Western Europe, has been enamored with the dream of creating a utopian world since at least the eighteenth century. While such dreams were temporarily placed on the shelf by two world wars and the Cold War, they quickly reappeared with the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991 and the subsequent rapid global adoption of the internet. The late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries have been characterized by utopian visions of a world without borders, in which people would be “global citizens,” would travel freely from country to country without restrictions, and would enjoy the same rights and freedoms everywhere. The internet and other new forms of communication were supposed to be the ultimate instrument which would create world unity. However, this vision is quickly being reshaped due to the resurgence of strong and oppressive central governments in Russia and China, which are opposed to the Western world for the age-old reasons of nationalism and power-hungry rulers. It has been discovered that the internet and cell phones can indeed be controlled through a vigorous program of monitoring, blocking, and coercion of providers. It is currently being discovered that leaders such as Vladimir Putin are willing to use any means necessary, including brutal military force and nuclear brinksmanship, to achieve their objectives. The response of the West has been timid and tepid. The ultimate result will be a return to a world that is badly divided politically, though with strong economic and cultural linkages.

Vladimir Putin is delivering a reality check to a complacent West that has believed its own utopian wish. Too many people in the West had thought that the age of great wars was over, that liberal democratic values were inevitably taking over the world, and that people in developed countries would never have to fear another large-scale military assault. While there might not be a large-scale war between great powers before the end of world history (the seven-year tribulation period), there certainly will be smaller wars and a great military buildup as part of a new and more dangerous Cold War. It is apparent that Vladimir Putin has ambitions to rebuild the Russian Empire, and that he would ultimately like Russia to dominate the entire world. China would like to do the same. Putin has no qualms about the use of military force, and he appears poised to use his military power to gain as much territory as he thinks he is able to get. Since Europe and the United States do not have the stomach to challenge Russia on the battlefield, it appears that Putin and his successors will indeed successfully expand the new Russian Empire to include not just the territory of the former Soviet Union, but also any other lands beyond where he may be able to extend his reach (Iran? Finland? Africa?).

Tomorrow I am traveling to San Diego for the annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. This is the largest gathering of evangelical Bible scholars in the world. I hope to have some insights from the conference to share on my next post.

Some unheralded evidences for a Creator

13 Thursday Nov 2014

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The European Space Agency’s Rosetta space probe successfully placed its Philae lander on Comet 67P yesterday, which is a remarkable achievement. The Rosetta probe is carrying a prototype of the Rosetta Disk, a three-inch nickel disk which contains, among other things, Genesis 1–3 engraved microscopically in 1,000 languages—a great irony, considering that one of the major aims of the probe’s mission is to look for evidence to support Darwinian evolution. (Water, which is an essential ingredient for life on earth, could not have been part of the original planet if the earth was formed by pieces of rock slamming and melting together, as evolutionary theory claims. So where did the incredible amount of water that is on the earth come from? The best evolutionary hypothesis out there is that the earth was hit by A LOT of comets, and that the icy cores of these comets—which are not that large—melted to build up the oceans. Presumably this theory will be ruined if the probe finds that the chemical composition of comets is significantly different than the chemical composition of the earth.) As the Rosetta probe gives unwitting praise to the Creator in outer space, we can pray that it moves men on the earth to recognize and praise the God who made them. In what follows in this post, I will present some evidences for a Creator that have impressed me personally, that I do not recall reading elsewhere.

There is in nature a simple, yet profound and incredible mark of an all-wise Designer that is very impressive: colors never clash in nature. Have you ever looked at a multi-colored flower, and said, “Those colors just don’t go together”? Have you ever seen a peacock or a parrot with colors that did not match? Tropical fish may have many different stripes and spots, and yet the colors always complement each other beautifully. There are many exotic birds of wild and varying colors, yet the colors never clash. Of all the millions of species of plants, flowers, fish, birds, and land animals, there is not one that is not color-coordinated. The colors always meld together perfectly and complement each other. And this does not hold true merely for living organisms alone—the colors of the rainbow, for example, never clash. The colors in a sunset always meld together beautifully. Telescopic images of celestial bodies find an extraordinary amount of variation in colors and in combinations of colors; the microscope and the chemistry lab reveal the same sort of variation. How is it that the colors they find never clash, no matter what is imaged? If everything in nature came about by random, mindless accidents, why don’t the colors clash? If we decorated our homes and put together our outfits randomly, the colors would not just clash, they would be raging all-out war! We can only keep colors from clashing by giving careful thought and intention to how we put them together. Only a perfect Designer of infinite wisdom could have color-coordinated every last living organism, and even inanimate objects and elemental compounds.

Remaining on the subject of colors, one may observe by looking at nature that God made green, blue, and brown the predominant colors in nature. Plants are overwhelmingly green, the sky and sea are blue, and the ground and trees are brown. This makes perfect sense, for greens, blues, and browns are much easier on the eyes and are more calming than brighter colors such as red, yellow, orange, purple, or pink. There are many bright colors in nature, but they occur in small patches for variety and excitement. If colors occurred by random chance, all colors should occur with about the same distribution. The world would look like a tie-dye t-shirt, and nature would be anything but calming and peaceful.

Another amazing fact which points unmistakably to a Creator is that everything makes sense in nature. There is a reason for everything. There is a reason why white people have white skin. (Their skin produces low levels of melatonin, which is a trait passed down through genetic coding. This trait is beneficial in northern latitudes, and therefore likely to be passed on in those regions, whereas it is not beneficial in warmer regions.) There is a reason why birds migrate south for the winter, and why certain species always migrate to certain areas. There is a reason why volcanoes tend to occur near subduction zones. Indeed, a fundamental assumption underlying all scientific research is that all scientific phenomena make sense, and therefore the job of the scientist is merely to discover the orderly principles that govern the universe. Everything in nature is regular and logical. To see how impossible it is that this could have come about by chance, consider how much more regular nature is than even that great invention of modern man, the computer. Computer programs invariably have bugs; they are not designed as efficiently as they could be, and they are constantly being improved upon. There is a basic natural cause for everything that happens in a computer, to be sure, but it does not all make perfect sense. Why, a computer expert might ask, did the authors of a particular program write such inefficient code? A user might wonder why a program crashes unexpectedly or why the interface is so clumsy. The answer is probably that some things in the computer program just don’t make logical sense. There is no such thing in creation. Everything in the original creation, and everything about it, was very good. There were no defects and there was no room for improvement. There was a reason why God made everything the way He did, right down to the smallest detail.

When you see a picture of a famous person on a billboard, the TV, or elsewhere, you normally recognize that person right away. When you see friends or acquaintances on the street, you recognize them right away. Have you ever stopped to consider how astounding it is that with more than seven billion people in the world, we can still identify everyone on sight? Every single human face is unique, and each is unique enough to be distinguished from all the others. Given the fact that every face has the same basic features and underlying bone structure, it is truly amazing that each one is unique. The best artist in the world could not draw seven thousand unique faces, let alone seven billion. Only God could create man in such a way as to make every person with a unique face.

And what about the power of the human mind to distinguish between all the different faces that are physically quite similar on the basis of minute differences? What’s more, God created man with a large number of small facial muscles that are capable of working together to express a wide variety of emotions, yet faces remain recognizable even when they are altered by making these expressions.

We differentiate other images all the time without even thinking about it. If we look at a clump of bushes, our mind automatically distinguishes the different bushes from each other, even if they all belong to the same species. If they are different species, we can tell which leaves and branches belong to which bush, and we can see which are in front and which are behind, even though the leaves may be of a very similar color and shape. When you look at a lawn, you can immediately differentiate the weeds from the grass, and the different kinds of weeds from each other, even if they are all the same color, the same height, and are mixed together.

We can see from these and countless other examples that our world, including ourselves, did not come about by random, mindless chance. The world had to have been created by an all-knowing and all-powerful Creator God.

The war in the heavenlies

09 Sunday Nov 2014

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In my last post, I described what I think are the most significant battles in military history. In this post, I will give an overview of the war the Bible describes between spirit beings in heavenly realms. The two greatest battles in this conflict occur at the beginning and end of world history, but the Bible teaches that there is a constant, ongoing struggle between Satan’s forces and God’s forces.

The war in the heavenlies began when Satan, who like the other angelic beings was created morally perfect but with the ability to choose to confirm this perfection or to rebel against it, pridefully coveted God’s lordship of the universe and determined to rebel (Isa 14:12-14; Ezek 28:14-15). (For more detail regarding the interpretation of Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28, see volume 4 of my Interpretive Guide to the Bible.) Satan left his station as the cherub who covered God’s throne (Ezek 28:16) and persuaded large numbers of other angels (one-third, according to Rev 12:4) into following him in an attempt to take over heaven (Isa 14:12-14; Rev 12:3-12). Presumably Satan promised to make them princes in his new world order. Satan then attempted to storm God’s throne and take it for himself. Although Satan could never win a direct battle with God, in fact he was not even able to break through to the divine Presence: a great battle was fought between Satan’s angelic army and God’s angelic army, and God’s angels won this battle decisively. Satan and his angelic followers were cast down to earth for a time (Isa 14:12; Ezek 28:16; cf. Rev 12:9), and the lake of fire was created immediately to be the place of eternal punishment for the devil and his angels (Matt 25:41). Satan then continued his war against God on the earth by tempting Adam and Eve to sin (Gen 3:1-6), and the rest of the Bible tells the story of how God comes to the rescue of the fallen human race.

Daniel 10 describes how Satan and his angels are fighting God’s angels in the present age. It describes how heaven’s second most powerful angel (excluding the four cherubim) was sent to deliver a critically important message to the prophet Daniel, but was blocked en route to Daniel by Satan. While Satan and this powerful angel were fighting each other, many other good angels and evil angels joined the fray; however, Satan successfully blocked this angel’s path for twenty-one days. Daniel continued to pray throughout the twenty-one days, until finally God dispatched Michael, the chief angel (archangel), who freed the other angel from Satan’s grasp and enabled him to reach Daniel. Before this angel revealed his prophetic message to Daniel, he described how he had been engaged in a constant conflict with Satan since the establishment of the Persian Empire, with the object of their struggle being influence over the king of the empire. He described, further, how he would return to this conflict with Satan immediately after he left Daniel, and how this conflict would continue in the new Greek empire after Alexander the Great had conquered Persia. Angelic beings are capable of exerting a powerful influence over human thought and behavior in ways that we do not fully understand, and Satan’s forces are fighting God’s forces for influence in the governments of every country in the world. The conflict which the prophecy of Daniel 11 describes between kings, between governments, and between wicked rulers and the people of God, is the visible manifestation of the invisible conflict between armies of angels; what is happening in the spiritual realm drives what happens in the physical realm.

Since the object in the war between good and evil angels is influence in the human realm, it stands to reason that Christians are participants in this spiritual battle. Indeed, Ephesians 6:10-20 teaches that the Christian’s real and primary battle is in the spiritual realm. However, we do not fight this battle the way the angels do, since we do not possess supernatural powers. We fight this battle by using all the tools at our disposal—prayer, the Bible, fellow believers, and the exercise of our faith—to lead a righteous and holy life that is pleasing to God. This is the way to resist the devil’s influence, and thereby to win victory in our spiritual war. James 4:7 teaches that by subjecting ourselves to God we are resisting the devil, and he will flee from us.

Christians also have a duty to pray for the leaders of government, in order to have peace and stability in their land (1 Tim 2:1-2). While there is a spiritual battle being waged in every country in the world, I believe that today powerful Satanic forces are fighting in Washington, D. C. with the angel who appeared to Daniel, in order to influence the government of the world’s most powerful country. Michael is identified as the special guardian angel of the nation of Israel (Dan 10:21; 12:1), which means that he is very likely in Jerusalem today, fighting with powerful Satanic forces who want to block the fulfillment of biblical prophecy by removing the Jewish people from their land. The prayers of believers have a profound effect on these struggles, as demonstrated by Daniel 10.

At some point after the fall of man, Satan and his angels (the demons) were given access to heaven once again, but only to present themselves before God (not to fight—see 1 Kgs 22:19-23; 2 Chr 18:18-22). Satan’s main activity in heaven in the present age consists of slandering God’s people on earth for their real or alleged faults (see Job 1:6-12; 2:1-6; Rev 12:10). But at the end of history, when he knows his time is short, Satan will make one more attempt to do what he originally set out to do—to gather all his forces and make an all-out assault on heaven in order to cast God off His throne (Rev 12:7). The release of large numbers of particularly bad demons from the abyss (Rev 9:1-11) will augment Satan’s forces, and Satan’s henchmen (the antichrist and the false prophet) will be in the process of seizing political power over the earth at the same time (Rev 13). However, Satan’s second attempt to storm heaven will be just as unsuccessful as his first attempt, and when Satan and his angels are cast out of heaven by Michael and his angels, they are expelled for all time (Rev 12:7-10). The final 3½ years of the tribulation period, which occur after Satan’s final fall from heaven, will be particularly difficult from a spiritual point of view because the energies of Satan and his forces are focused exclusively on the earth (Rev 12:12-17).

The resolution of the war between spirit beings comes at the second coming of Jesus Christ to earth, when Satan is bound for a thousand years (Rev 20:1-3) and his angels are judged by the saints and sent to the lake of fire forever (Isa 24:21-23; 1 Cor 6:3; Rev 20:4). The ensuing thousand years (the “millennium”), in which Jesus and the resurrected saints rule over a human population with mortal bodies, will be a time of great peace and order, since the world will be entirely free from the destructive influence of Satan and his angels. But at the end of the thousand years, Satan is briefly released from his prison in order to reveal which people are genuine followers of God and which were insincere (it turns out most were insincere—Rev 20:7-8). Satan shows that he has not changed, as he leads the people of the world to surround Mount Zion in yet another attempt to cast God off His throne. Satan’s followers are killed, but are raised shortly thereafter for the final judgment, while Satan himself is immediately sent to the lake of fire for all eternity (Rev 20:9-15). In the final creation (the “eternal state”), the saints are entirely separated not just from their own personal sin, but from the very presence of evil, which is confined to the lake of fire (Rev 21:1–22:5). The spiritual conflict which is now being fought in the heavenlies will have been won forever, with God, God’s angels, and God’s saints fully triumphant.

The most significant military battles in history

06 Thursday Nov 2014

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One characteristic of some newer books on military history is that they tend to just present a narrative of what happened without a reflective analysis which shows the significance of what happened. This was a complaint I had with an otherwise excellent book that I purchased, The Encyclopedia of Warfare (Metro Books, 2013). More than 5,000 battles from the history of world civilizations are listed chronologically and described, but the reader struggles to develop a sense of which battles were the most significant ones for the course of world history. So let me try here to identify history’s most significant battles (not wars). From my biblical Christian worldview, the most significant battles will be ones that had the greatest effect on the place of true religion in the world.

There are many battles recorded in the Old Testament, and each was significant in its own way. Probably the most significant ones were Joshua’s conquest of Jericho in 1405 B.C. (Josh 2–6), followed by his defeat of a coalition of southern Canaanite kings (Josh 10) and his defeat of a coalition of northern Canaanite kings (Josh 11). It was Joshua’s providential victories in these battles that gave the Israelites possession of the land of Canaan, to which the nation of Israel has been tied ever since.

Many historians consider Marathon (490 B.C.) and Salamis (480 B.C.) to be the two most important battles in world history. In these battles, the Persian king Darius Hystaspes (in 490) and his son Xerxes (in 480) were soundly defeated by the Greeks. The presence of an unconquerable and vengeful foe on the western border of the Persian Empire made eventual conquest of Persia by the Greeks inevitable, which in turn resulted in the spread of Greek language and culture throughout the center of world civilization. It was largely the two battles of Marathon and Salamis that determined the future of Western civilization, and that indeed created the concept of a common civilization. These battles therefore largely shaped the biblical world of the New Testament and the early church—though, in truth, Marathon and Salamis were only the outworking of the predetermined plan of God, and were not determinative in themselves (see Dan 8:3-8, 20-22; 11:2-4).

There is another battle which had nearly as great an impact on the course of world history as Marathon and Salamis, but which is much less famous because the victors did not celebrate the battle in literature, theater, or art. As Caesar Augustus expanded and consolidated the Roman Empire, he recognized the threat posed to Rome by the Germanic tribes, and he sought to conquer and annex Germania (Germany) for this reason. His invasion failed disastrously: three Roman legions, along with their auxiliary forces, were annihilated by a makeshift army of Germanic tribal warriors at the Battle of Teutoberg Forest in A.D. 9. Stung by this rout, the Romans contented themselves with establishing a strong defensive perimeter along the Rhine and Danube rivers. However Augustus’ failure to subdue Germania, like the failure of Darius and Xerxes to subdue Greece, portended a further disaster for some future day. It was the invasions of such Germanic tribes as the Visigoths, the Angles, the Jutes, the Saxons, the Franks, the Vandals, and the Ostrogoths which gradually weakened the Roman Empire and directly caused its fall. Germanic culture melded with Roman culture to form the culture of medieval Europe, and the influences of “barbarian” Germanic culture are still strongly felt in the Western world today.

Also deserving of mention is Constantine’s victory over Maxentius at the Milvian Bridge in A.D. 312, fought under the sign of the cross. This battle, which gave Constantine control over the western Roman Empire, had a profound effect on the history of Western civilization as a whole, and on the history of the Christian church in particular. Constantine’s Edict of Milan (313) freed the church from official persecution, and the later adoption of Christianity as the state religion led to the development of a distinctly Christian civilization. Constantine is also significant for moving the center of the Roman Empire from Rome to Constantinople, and for convening the Council of Nicaea in 325.

The rapid conquest of the Middle East by Islamic armies created a grave crisis for the church in the early Middle Ages. In what has often been called one of the most significant battles in all of history, Charles Martel (“the Hammer”) and his Frankish army decisively defeated an invading Muslim army at Tours (Poitiers) in 732, driving the Islamic forces back from the heartland of Europe. Although the Muslims retreated south of the Pyrenees Mountains, they were not finally driven out of the Iberian Peninsula until 1492, the year Columbus discovered America. Martel’s force was the last Christian line of defense in Europe against Muslim expansion, and there can be no doubt that the hand of God was with him to preserve Europe as a bastion of Christendom in the Middle Ages.

The American Revolutionary War was one of the most important wars in the history of the world, for it created what has become the most powerful and prosperous country that the world has ever seen. More than any other entity, the United States has essentially shaped the world of the end times. The battle that led Great Britain to concede defeat was the Battle of Yorktown, where Lord Cornwallis surrendered a British force of 8,000 to General Washington on October 19, 1781. However, Yorktown would not have been possible without earlier American victories—especially at Saratoga, where the surrender of 5,000 British soldiers on October 17, 1777 convinced France to enter the war on the side of the fledgling United States.

Surely World War I and its sequel, World War II, were two of the most significant wars in the history of the world. They vastly reshaped world civilization, altered the balance of power in the world, reshaped world economic structures, gave rise to totally new types of weapons, and led to the establishment of the modern state of Israel. The key battle of World War I was the First Battle of the Marne, fought on September 5-10, 1914. This battle turned back the German advance on Paris and created a stalemate on the Western Front that was to last until 1918. The most significant battle of World War II was the Battle of Britain, which was fought in the skies above England in August–September 1940. The Royal Air Force won this battle by the narrowest of margins, thereby frustrating Adolf Hitler’s ambitions to invade the British Isles and forcing him to turn his attention to targets reachable by land.

The greatest and most decisive battle in world history is still to be fought—the so-called Battle of Armageddon. This battle will occur at the end of the seven-year tribulation period, i.e., seven years after Christian believers are removed from the earth at the rapture and a treaty between Israel and the antichrist takes effect (these two events evidently occur simultaneously). The first 3½ years of the tribulation period will witness some incredibly devastating wars and battles, the likes of which will make the carnage of World War II pale by comparison. But at the midpoint of the seven years the antichrist seizes economic and religious power over the world, and he conquers much of the world to control it politically, which results in relative political stability for a few years. However, at the end of the tribulation period, the Bible describes how armies from the north and from the east will march on Israel, which is where the antichrist has moved the center of his operations (Dan 11:44-45; Rev 16:12-16). These armies evidently come to Israel with the intention of fighting the antichrist for political power; however, as the signs of Jesus’ second coming begin to appear, they decide to instead turn their firepower against the armies of heaven (Ps 2:2-3; Rev 16:14). But when Jesus actually appears they realize that they are infinitely overpowered (Rev 6:12-17), and they are killed simply by Jesus speaking the word: “Drop dead!” (Zech 12–14; Rev 14:17-20; 19:11-20). The angels proceed to gather all remaining unbelievers out of the world to be judged (Matt 13:41-42), and Jesus establishes direct political control over a new earth, which only believers may enter (Isa 65:17-25). Armageddon is the most decisive battle in the history of the world, since it will result in the complete and permanent changeover of power in the world from human government to direct divine rule (Dan 2:44-45). There will be one final battle 1,000 years later (Rev 20:7-10), but this is essentially a failed rebellion, with all the casualties on the side of the losers.

The Bible also describes a war being waged in the heavenly realms which has a much more profound effect on world events than most people realize (see Dan 10; Eph 6:10-20). This war, and the most significant battles in this war, will be the subject of a future post on this blog.

A biblical perspective on Tuesday’s elections

02 Sunday Nov 2014

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Government is a necessary, God-ordained institution whose primary purpose is to restrain sin by maintaining law and order in society (see Rom 13:3-4; 1 Pet 2:13-14). Christians who live in a democracy should seek to influence the government by casting their vote—though, admittedly, sometimes we feel that we are voting for the lesser of two evils. Some Christians are even called to a career in government and politics, although this is becomingly increasingly difficult in the American context.

This Tuesday, November 3, is an important “midterm” election for congressional and state officials. How can we put this election in biblical perspective? First of all, we can say that it is a mistake to place your hope for the future on the results of this election. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that if the Republican party can just win control of Congress, followed in two years by the White House, they will fix the spiritual problems in America. While there are some evangelical Christian politicians in the Republican party, most Republicans are essentially secular, and most have a secular agenda. Even if all the Republican politicians were Bible-believing Christians, there still is just not much interest in the Christian gospel in America today. If the Republicans regain control of the Senate, this will, at best, only slow down America’s moral and spiritual decline.

Our hope as a Christian has to do with the world that is to come—that world where the redeemed are raised from the dead, where there is no pain, no suffering, and no death, and where God Himself is ruling directly and visibly. If you set your hope on anything in this world, you will be sorely disappointed, because this world and everything in it is passing away. Don’t hope for a political party or a politician to solve the world’s problems. Don’t think that government, science, or business will solve the world’s problems. Put your hope in Jesus Christ, who is the only Solution to the world’s problems. Jesus will in fact solve all the problems in the world at His second coming to earth; until then, people everywhere are called to receive Him as their Savior in order to obtain a place in that glorious world to come. It is okay to be involved in politics, but the church needs to stay focused on spiritual causes. If you choose to give money to a political cause, make sure that the bulk of your giving is still going to the church, which is where it will really make a difference.

I know many Christians who are fearful of the political future of America. Is there a big economic collapse coming in America, as the doomsayers perennially forecast? Neither party wants to hurt the economy; the economy will probably grow no matter which party is in power, though in different ways and at different rates. The prospect of religious persecution of evangelical Christians is much more real, though it is still unclear exactly how and when this will unfold. Should the rising tide of anti-Christian sentiment scare us? Not if we see our duty as simply being faithful to God, which is something we can do in tough times as well as in good times. (By the way, most American Christians that I know who are very worried about the direction of their country, and who are praying fervently for political change, seem to feel “locked in” to life in America. But if pressure on Christians in America becomes too great, there is nothing in the Bible that says Christians cannot move to another country for their own safety. It would probably actually be good for the spread of the gospel if more American Christians moved overseas [cf. Acts 8:1-4; 11:19].)

The Bible teaches that God is sovereign over rulers and nations; in fact, this is the theme of the book of Daniel (2:21; 3:29; 4:32; 5:21; 6:26; 7:27). So if people who are opposed to God, and who are opposed to biblical principles, win Tuesday’s elections, does that mean God has lost control? Should it shake your faith? By no means. In fact, God will not impose direct political control over the earth until Jesus Christ returns to set up His kingdom. The Bible reveals that the end of the present age is marked by a great rebellion against God, in which the world will continually grow worse until it finally unites in worship of a man known as the antichrist (cf. 2 Thess 2:1-12). The antichrist will lead the world to the ultimate expression of evil, such that God will finally have to intervene and put an end to the kingdoms of this world. Since this is how the Bible reveals the age will end, it should not surprise us when leaders and cultures in the world grow ever more anti-Christian. When things go from bad to worse to worse yet, it is because God’s sovereign plan is unfolding to bring the powers of this world to an end. Our job is to be separate and faithful. By doing so, we obtain a share in the spoils of victory when Christ returns to conquer the world.

Come, Lord Jesus! (Rev 22:20)