History and Our Bible – Our Two Great Teachers
In my September article, “The Once Best of Times”, I led off with a Charles Dickens’ quote, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times …….”. I suggested if you injected the present world with each negative in his phrase, you would have a description of today’s Israel nations. One negative in his phrase was “it was the season of darkness” and again, isn’t this so as you look around the Israel nations. Are we travelling through the “worst of times”? Certainly, we are mostly a blinded people groping through a world that hardly seems our own anymore.
The late Reverend Ansley F. Rash, of England, wrote of a prophecy from one of the minor prophets, Habakkuk, and reading it, it is difficult to miss the similarity in Habakkuk’s day to present sorry conditions. Of course, through Habakkuk, was God describing another fulfillment? Remember, Habakkuk was describing a time when darkness covered the earth and gross darkness the people. An apt description of our Israel nations and peoples today. At that time, as it is now, the whole world appeared to lie in the lap of the Evil One, and even the chosen nation [True Israel], so singularly blessed and favoured by the Almighty, had wandered far away from God [as we mostly have now].
We Christians are anxiously looking forward to the Return of our Wonderful Lord Jesus Christ to restore the Light and reverse the great falling away prophesied by the Apostle Paul in 2 Thess. 2:3; note his warning, “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition”. The puzzled Habakkuk could not understand why the rebellious people were not punished, and in his bewilderment, he even questioned the wisdom of God. Today, in frustration, we often utter a phrase like, “When is God going to act”, or, “How much longer is He going to permit the evil”, so, like Habakkuk, we too might include in our prayers, “0 Lord, how long shall I cry, and Thou wilt not hear! even cry out unto Thee of violence, and Thou wilt not save! Why dost Thou shew me iniquity, and cause me to behold grievance? for spoiling and violence are before me: and there are that raise up strife and contention. Therefore the law is slacked, and judgment doth never go forth: for the wicked doth compass about the righteous; therefore wrong judgment proceedeth” (Hab. 1: 2-4).
Rev. Rash described the current situation very well when he wrote, “The righteous appear to be engaged in an unequal fight with no possible chance of victory”. It’s so true of today and it will take the Lord Jesus Christ to overcome the powers of darkness when He returns. I like the wisdom given us in Habakkuk 2:3 when the Lord refers to the vision Habakkuk was given, “For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie; though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry”. We must have continued faith, for as Rev Rash wrote, “Evil may perform its part upon the world stage in the blinding glare of publicity, ever occupying the limelight; but within the shadows God is silently working out His purpose as year succeeds to year and is hourly keeping watch above His own”.
I like the small poem Rev. Rash employed to end his article:
Behind our life
the Weaver stands
And works His wondrous will;
We leave it in His all-wise hands,
And trust His perfect skill.
Should mystery
enshroud His plan,
And our short sight be dim,
We will not try the whole to scan,
But leave each thread with Him.
To appreciate the following article supplied by Michael Clark, our good friend and the leader of the British-Israel-World Federation in the United Kingdom, we provide this brief bio of Oliver Cromwell for those unaware of his role in history. He was an English military and political leader, served as Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland and of the dominions thereto belonging” from 1653 until his death, acted simultaneously as head of state and head of government of the new republic. He was one of the signatories of King Charles I’s death warrant in 1649.
On April 20th, 1653 Cromwell delivered the following speech to the then Long Parliament. Mr. Clark was good enough to send us a few remarks to set the stage.
He wrote, “Oliver Cromwell’s speech to the Long Parliament of 1653 is indeed what can be seen in the Westminster Parliament of 2019. It is extremely applicable in respect of the long drawn out Brexit saga, especially when Cromwell says “gold is your God,” thinking of the European Union and the pagan financial fraternity that have engineered the Remain campaign to overrule the centuries-long British Constitution, which at law is the democratic monarchy of “The Queen-in-Parliament under God.”
The history of the struggle surrounding the Throne of the Lord upon earth has been one of constant wresting this way and that for supremacy, now quite evidently reaching a climax, as the cleansing of His Sanctuary is accomplished prior to the Appearing of the King of kings.
So now, readers, you may wish to reflect on today’s environment as you read Cromwell’s words:
“It is high time for me to put an end to your sitting in this place, which you have dishonored by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice; ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government; ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would like Esau sell your country for a mess of pottage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money.
Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye have no more religion than my horse; gold is your God; which of you have not barter’d your conscience for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth?
Ye sordid prostitutes have you not defil’d this sacred place, and turn’d the Lord’s temple into a den of thieves, by your immoral principles and wicked practices? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation; you were deputed here by the people to get grievances redress’d, are yourselves gone! So! Take away that shining bauble there, and lock up the doors. In the name of God, go!”
So here we have evidence from the past for the United Kingdom to free itself from the trickery that led them into the EU in the first place. In the 1916 referendum, the people basically said, “In the name of God, let’s go!
