02-God Has Been Taking A Hand
God Has Been Taking A Hand
CHAPTER TWO
THERE ARE numerous evidences that God has taken a hand in the events that brought the War to an end, and which have followed it in rapid succession. The day that war broke out between Germany and England, ending the bloodless deliverance of Jerusalem-fell on a Jewish day of mourning, Aug. 4, 1914. On that day, the Jews mourn the destruction of Solomon’s Temple in 537 B.C. and again by Titus in A.D. 70. Jewish writers at the time commented on the coincidence and suggested that the war might have some significance for Israel.
The beginning of the end of the War was certainly on Dec. 9, 1917, when General Allenby took Jerusalem without firing a shot. This event again fell on the first day of the Jewish Feast of Chanukah, or Miracles. Just 2082 years before, Judas Maccabeus took Jerusalem, dedicated the Temple and celebrated the victory. Recall that under the courtesy of the Turks the German Kaiser had shortly before made a spectacular visit to Jerusalem to inspect the magnificent palace erected at the expense of the German government for him on the slopes of the Mount of Olives. Part of the Kaiser’s scheme for world dominion, this palace was erected at a cost of $1,500,000.
When the Turks received word that a host led by one called “Allenby” was advancing, the name suggested to these Mohammedans: Allah Beh-”Prophet of God.” They took this to mean that Providence was against them, and to resist would be to resist God.
GENERAL ALLENBY LED OF GOD
Dr. A. C. Dixon, who, during the War days, was pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle in London, related that when General Allenby was given his commission to go to the Holy Land, by King George V, the General held a protracted prayer meeting with his staff, seeking guidance as to how he should proceed.
As a result he made a decision to overcome the enemy by strategy rather than force, as far as possible, so as not to cause destruction of the ancient relics of Palestine.
Knowing that the primitive inhabitants were unfamiliar with airplanes, he requisitioned a large fleet of planes. When the Turks saw these huge birds flying over them, the forces were demoralized. Thus Isaiah 31:5 had a fulfillment: “As birds flying, so will the Lord defend Jerusalem; defending also, he will deliver it; and passing over, he will preserve it.”
The Turks had an ancient proverb: “Not until the Nile flows into Palestine, shall the Turk be driven from Jerusalem.” There was not the remotest possibility of such a thing. Yet when General Allenby’s 90,000 men fought their way north from the Suez Canal, a long pipeline was laid to water the host. Nile water, drawn from a canal in Egypt, was filtered at the Kantara Water Works, and then pumped underneath the Suez Canal to reservoirs in the East bank. Here it was chlorinated and then carried through the pipe line through two hundred miles of arid desert into Palestine.
ALLENBY’S PROPHETIC ROLE
It is interesting to know that General Allenby, at the time he was assigned his task in the Holy Land, had no interest in the Zionist movement, although in later years he became a strong advocate of it. He was not at first anxious to go to Palestine, and when transferred from the Western front, he told General de Lisle that he was not pleased at the prospect. The big guns of the British forces had been sunk in the Mediterranean. And who had attained any success in trying to conquer Turks and Arabs?
General de Lisle brought out a book on prophecy, printed in the eighties, Light For the Last Days, and showed General Allenby a chapter in which the writer, reckoning by the year-day theory, had predicted that in 1917 Jerusalem would be delivered from Turkish rule. Allenby was greatly interested.
It is a striking fact that when, after the War, Allenby when raised to the peerage, chose for his title, Viscount Allenby of Megiddo. Megiddo is the Hebrew for “Armageddon.” This indicates he felt he had played some strange prophetic part in the march of events.
In May, 1936, coinciding with the time when Palestine again suddenly came to the front of the international stage, because of the Arab uprisings against the Jews and the British Mandate, two prophetic figures were taken suddenly by death, both at the age of seventy-five years. These were Lord Allenby and Dr. Nahum Sokolow, Honorary President of the World Zionist Movement, known as the Dean of Jewish Literature. Dr. Sokolow had much to do with the decisions of British authorities to get back of the Palestine movement. A NOTICE TO ALL NATIONS The prophecy of Isaiah 18:3 contains an important notice to all the inhabitants of the world in the latter days. When an ensign is lifted up in the mountains of Jerusalem and the ram’s horn blown, let all the nations take notice. When the Allies granted the Palestine Mandate to England in 1920, and Sir Herbert Samuel, himself a Hebrew, became the first High Commissioner over Palestine in two thousand years, the flag of Judah was flown from the tower of David and the ram’s horn sounded out over the land.
The Tower of David is a monument that has served to keep the identity of Jerusalem for many generations. The first fortress built on this site is said to have been built by Herod in 24 B.C. When Titus took Jerusalem in A.D. 70 he preserved the towers, but when Julius Severus took the fortress in A.D. 135 he reduced all to ruins. Hadrian rebuilt it, and it was demolished again in 1219. The Turks erected it again in the sixteenth century. The present tower is four hundred years old. From this historical site, the ram’s horn sounded forth, and the flag of Judah flies today.
According to the prophecy important events are to follow. What has happened? The Jews at once started to return to Palestine and organizations were formed throughout the world to promote Palestine colonization. Within a short time, the Jewish forces were split into quarreling factions and it appeared that Zionism would accomplish nothing.
HITLER, THE MODERN HAMAN
Then came Adolph Hitler, the modern Haman, an inveterate Jew hater. Strange to say, there are Christian leaders in America who have been so gullible as to be taken in by Hitler’s anti-Jewish statistics and to glorify this “Aryomaniac” as the Saviour of the German nation from “Jewish Communism.”
Nazi propaganda concerning the Jewish domination of Germany when Hitler came to power, has been completely exploded. No one can estimate the depths of Hitler’s Jew-hate who has not read his book, My Struggle, in the unexpurgated German edition which he refuses to allow published abroad.
The Nazi persecution revived Jewish passion for racial and national solidarity. Some of the great scientific experts of Germany, who were Jews, were driven to Palestine to hasten the revival of the land. Stupendous engineering feats were undertaken, great archaeological discoveries were made, and due to the influx of Jewish medical experts, Palestine is being called the Switzerland of the East.
BIRTH PANGS OF A NEW NATION But thanks to Nazi and Communist propaganda against the Jews in Palestine, and to anti-British propaganda there from Italy, the Jews who have returned, find themselves in serious trouble. It has taken little to fan the fires of the old hatred of Ishmael for Isaac. Remember that the Arabs proudly trace their ancestry to Ishmael, the son of Hagar. The Jews have little chance of dwelling in peace in the land while it is so largely dominated by their ancient enemies.
“The time of Jacob’s trouble” foretold in Jeremiah 30 is not difficult to conceive at the present time. But will the Zionist movement be stopped? We have before us much evidence that it is God who has opened the doors to Palestine. The door God opens cannot be closed by any man or set of men. “Here the word of the Lord, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off and say, he that scattered Israel will gather him and keep him as a shepherd doth his sheep” (Jeremiah 31:10).
DEFINITE PROPHECIES FULFILLED
It is a remarkable fact that all the Jewish activity in Palestine is being carried on in the Hebrew tongue. Fifty years ago Hebrew was but the language of ancient literature. Today, it is spoken by ninety per cent of the Jews in Palestine. Every Jewish child babbles in Hebrew, the signs are Hebrew, the papers are Hebrew and the new radio stations announces, in Hebrew, every day: “This is Jerusalem speaking.” The prophecy of Zephaniah 3:9 declares: “Then will I turn to the people a pure language.”
“For ages the rains in Palestine have been lacking,” writes Dr. Chalmers, “so that the crops could not be produced in their former fulness, Isaiah 5:6; Ezekiel 22:24. Then the Lord renews the rains, according to Joel 2:23; Zechariah 10:1. It is a fact that between 1860 and 1900, the rainfall of Palestine increased over fifty per cent, and the amount of rain equals that of London. No wonder the land is fast becoming a garden like the Garden of Eden. We saw, in the autumn of 1929, the marvelous orange groves in Southern Palestine, beautiful almost beyond compare. Last year the orange crop was the greatest ever, according to experts the most delicious oranges on earth, and over seven million boxes (each containing seventy pounds) were shipped abroad.
MINISTERS LED OF GOD In the summer of 1917, the late Dr. F. B. Meyer became convinced through his study of prophecy that the “times of the Gentiles” were swiftly running out. He believed that events of tremendous import from a prophetic standpoint were immediately at hand. Dr. Meyer called into his study a number of leading ministers, including such men as Drs. G. Campbell Morgan, A. C. Dixon, Stuart Holden and Dinsdale Young. In Dr. Meyer’s study on October 15, 1917, they drew up a resolution to be presented to the churches, calling for a movement for the emphasizing of the study of prophecy. This was to be published.
Before the resolution was in type a crisis developed. The Germans were advancing and it appeared as though the Allied cause was lost. At this time Dr. Weizmann made his discovery known, and in return asked that the British government use its influence to open Palestine to the Jews.
On Nov. 2, Dr. Meyer picked up his morning paper to read the famous Balfour Declaration:
“His Majesty’s Government views with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jews, and will use its best endeavors to facilitate the attainment of this object.” So startling was this in view of the document prepared by the ministers that Dr. Meyer called the ministers again to his study. As a result it was decided to arrange a great mass meeting in Queen’s Hall for December 13 that people might be informed of the prophetic significance of these things.
Four days before this meeting a miracle occurred. Allenby took Jerusalem without firing a shot, although the Turks had put up signs on the trenches around the Mount of Olives, saying: “No British soldier shall ever come up this hill.” In one day, the Turkish domination of the Holy land, which had covered a period of seven hundred thirty years, was brought to an end. The vow of the Turks that before they would surrender they would blow up everything of value in Palestine was thwarted.
Imagine the excitement at the great meeting in Queen’s Hall on December 13! Here was positive proof that God had been behind the arrangement of the ministers who had called the meeting, when there was not a probability that these dramatic events would happen! Out of this meeting came the Advent Testimony Preparation Movement which to this day holds its regular meetings in many of the cities of Europe for the study of prophecy. The prophetic conference movement in the United States also grew out of this London movement. Throughout the world, as never before, the cry has been going forth: “Behold the Bridegroom cometh.”
ALLEGORY FROM HEBREW TALMUD An allegorical cumulative tale known as the Sephr Haggadah is found in the Hebrew Talmud. In English, it runs as follows:
1. A kid, a kid, my father bought for two pieces of money.
2. Then came the cat and ate the kid.
3. Then came the dog and ate the cat that ate the kid.
4. Then came the staff that beat the dog, etc.
5. Then came the fire that burned the staff, etc.
6. Then came the water that quenched the fire, etc.
7. Then came the ox and drank the water, etc.
8. Then came the butcher and slew the ox, etc.
9. Then came the Angel of Death and killed the butcher, etc.
10. Then came the Holy One, blessed be He, and killed the Angel of Death who killed the butcher, who slew the ox, that drank the water, that quenched the fire, that burned the staff, that beat the dog, that bit the cat, that ate the kid, that my father bought for two pieces of money.
The meaning given is a summary of Israel’s history, past, present and future, with a prophetic touch in No. 10, remarkable considering its early date (1731). It runs:
1. The kid, as a ceremonially clean animal, represents the Hebrew race. The Father is the Lord God. The two pieces of money are Moses and Aaron.
2. The cat represents the Assyrians who led Israel into captivity.
3. The dog is the Babylonians who conquered the Assyrians and the Jews, and took the Jews captive.
4. The staff is the Medes and Persians who conquered Babylon.
5. The fire is the Grecian Empire that conquered Persia under Alexander the Great.
6. The water is the Romans who conquered the Grecian Empire, including Palestine.
7. The ox is the Saracens who subdued Palestine and drove out both Jews and Romans.
8. The butcher is the Crusaders who fought the Saracens.
9. The angel of death is the Turkish power.
10. The Holy One is the Lord who will take vengeance on the Turks, after whose overthrow the Jews will be restored and will shortly live under the government of the Messiah.
WAITING FOR THE MESSIAH
Dr. W. Lamb of Australia tells of a tourist in Palestine who was walking early one morning recently in the Mount of Olives. There he met an aged Jew. The Jew told the visitor that every morning for four years he had gone early to the Mount of Olives, for, he said: “We Jews believe that the time of our Messiah’s coming is close at hand. Zechariah the Prophet told us that His feet will stand in that day upon the Mount of Olives. I am hoping and praying that I might meet Him here one of these mornings.”
Every orthodox Jew repeats daily the thirteen articles of faith which include this statement: “I believe in the coming of the Messiah. Though He tarry, yet will I wait for Him.”
What will be the surprise of the Jews when, at the end of the “time of Jacob’s trouble” they look upon their Messiah to find that He will bear the marks of Calvary’s wounds in His hands!