“Look also at ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires.” James 3:4
Ships of state are ever careering off the courses set by their human pilots.
Their “governors” can hold things together for, maybe, a generation and stave off annihilation; at worst, they steer the people, wittingly or no, into armed conflict.
By a kind of dialectical irony, they inexorably undermine the very order they depend on.
They manipulate currencies, thereby distorting the signals of markets. They do all of these things for perceived short-term gain.
And the governed go along with their governors whom, ironically, they sometimes have the high honor of electing to high office.
President Donald Trump, America’s kybernesis (1 Corinthians 12:28), is attempting to decelerate social and civilizational decline and reverse certain evil tendencies. Enjoying partial success, he may get re-elected.
(I don’t deny the relevancy to Trump of the Apostle James’s next verse: “Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things.”)
But the transient enjoyment I experience is a function of my self-centered projection of my expected lifespan. I’m hoping that the worst possible outcome will occur only after I’m safely dead.
Beneath the waters on which Trump steers the ship of state from one superficial “victory” to another, however, is an undertow of evil. It consists of (to name but a few horrors): slavery, including child sex-trafficking; the African diamond trade; drug trafficking; the predations and designs of the fascist ethnostate of China; radical Islamic terrorism and its state enablers. Let’s not forget the barbarism-promoting communists who are currently vying to replace Trump. There is no permanent escape from any of these scourges in this dispensation.
Sin as warp
Sin introduced a fateful, and fatal, warp into history’s flow. Daily, in big ways and small, we increase that distortion. The driver of each of these malignancies has a sinful demand component. The root of evil is the propensity of all of us to sin, and we cultivate that root when we actually sin.
The flow of evil is reaching a point where if God does not inject Himself into history, the world-order (κόσμος, kosmos) will be destroyed—the very order that God so loved that gave His Son to save (John 3:16). Here’s the Apostle Paul’s prophecy (not a current-events report):
. . . in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. But they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest unto all men, as theirs also was. 2 Timothy 3:1-9
They shall proceed no further.
But God shall shoot at them with an arrow; suddenly shall they be wounded. So they shall make their own tongue to fall upon themselves: all that see them shall flee away. And all men shall fear, and shall declare the work of God; for they shall wisely consider of his doing. The righteous shall be glad in the Lord, and shall trust in him; and all the upright in heart shall glory (Psalm 64: 7-10).
Behold My Servant, Whom I have chosen; My Beloved, in Whom My soul is well pleased: I will put My Spirit upon Him, and He shall shew judgment to the Gentiles (ἔθνεσιν, nations). He shall not strive, nor cry; neither shall any man hear His voice in the streets. A bruised reed shall He not break, and smoking flax shall He not quench, till He send forth judgment unto victory. And in His name shall the Gentiles trust (Matthew 12:18-21, quoting Isaiah 42:1-4, see also Isaiah 11:10 and 42:4).
God will govern the nations
God must govern, because we demonstrably cannot, due to cosmos-warping sin. And that’s exactly what He has promised to do.
Thou shalt judge the peoples righteously, and govern the nations upon the earth (Psalm 67:4).
In 1901 Samuel J. Andrews (1817-1906) published God’s Revelations of Himself to Men as Successively Made in the Patriarchal, Jewish, and Christian Dispensations and in the Messianic Kingdom. (It was reprinted last year.) Therein is a passage in which Andrews describes the Kingdom of God succinctly, and Otis Q. Sellers quoted it in “The Kingdom: Present or Future?,” Seed & Bread, No. 31.
All prophecy, as we have abundantly seen, pointed forward to the universal kingdom of Jehovah, administered by the promised Son of David. For this the world is to wait, in it all nature will be blessed: it is the consummation of prophetic hope.
All His prior actings in redemption are to prepare the way for this, its last stage. . . . Thus there is during the Kingdom period a well-ordered system of government, embracing the whole earth, administered by Christ through those whom He appoints; a system adapted to meet the needs of all its inhabitants in all their varied conditions and degrees of intellectual and spiritual development.
Now is first seen the full power of the Divine institutions of the family and state, when filled by His Spirit, to produce the purest and noblest fruits in individual life. Now is, also, seen the full development of national life, the solution of all social and political questions, and the true unity of nations. All that men have ever imagined of human progress in science and art will fall far short of those who will study God’s works, not from personal ambition or vanity, but out of love for Him, delighting in every new discovery of His wisdom and goodness, and using all knowledge for the blessing of their fellow-men (pp. 318, 323-324; emphasis added).
This is the kingdom or government (βασιλεία, basileia) that Jesus proclaimed and for the coming of which He taught His disciples to pray (Matthew 6:10) and commissioned His Apostles to herald (Matthew 10:5) throughout the Acts period and which the Apostle Paul preached in his house at the period’s end (Acts 28:28). And that’s what’s next. As Sellers explained:
At the close of the Acts period, God had accomplished everything He set out to do. He had finished the work, He had cut it short in righteousness. A conclusive and concise work had been done on Earth (Romans 9:28). Israel had heard the Word and saw the works of God (Romans 10:18). The Israel of God had been discovered (Galatians 6:16). The remnant had been established (Romans 11:5). A definite company from among the Gentiles had been called for His name (Acts 15:14).
Everything was ready for the full establishment of the manifest Kingdom of God upon the earth (Romans 13:11-12). But it did not come.
At the close of the Acts period, all of God’s Kingdom purposes were suspended while He accomplishes a purpose that had never before been revealed. “Truths concerning Acts,” Seed & Bread, No. 9; emphasis added.
And what is that purpose?
He will take time to write into the history of His long dealings with mankind a complete record of the grace that is inherent in His character. This is now being done in a dispensation of absolute grace. The truths that were applicable in the Acts period may or may not be applicable today. As Paul tells us in Philippians 1:10, we must be testing the “things that carry through” (Greek, diaphero). We must study “rightly to divide the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15). “The Acts Dispensation,” Seed & Bread, No. 7; emphasis added.
And waxing lyrical about that record will be the prerogative of Christians who have lived in this dispensation of grace (Ephesians 3:2) before an audience of those who will only know God’s justice:
The Day of Christ is the day of His unveiling (apokalupsin), the day of His manifestation (epiphaneia). It is the day when the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh will see it in the same amount and at the same time (Isaiah 40:5). In that day, we who are now believing in Him will be privileged to extol the glory of His grace, a task for which He will grace us in the beloved One (Ephesians 1:6). “The Four Great Days,” Seed & Bread, No. 54; emphasis added.
The Day of Christ, the manifest Kingdom of God, not the great and notable Day of the Lord, is next on God’s prophetic timetable.
Excellent. Thanks For Writing And Sharing This 🙂