Date: January 2007 Series: "I Want to Be Left Behind" XXVII Title: The Battle of Armageddon

     Confused Before Concordance – Thanks to Russell Boatman, I learned to depend on the Bible and an "Exhaustive Concordance" more than popular paperback “theology” books.  Looking up and investigating the Biblical use of terms and phrases is a great way to test popular theological notions before you invest too much “faith” in them.

     One of my concordance searches was for the popular phrase "the battle of Armageddon."  When reading Hal Lindsey books like they were "Gospel," I thought the "Battle of Armageddon" was probably one of the major doctrines of the faith.  You can imagine my consternation when I could not find that phrase anywhere (no, not even once) in the text of Scripture.  The closest I came was the passage in Revelation 16:13-16.  However, I found nothing in the whole book of Revelation to parallel what Lindsey was talking about, for he used the phrase "Battle of Armageddon" from Revelation and then wove in Daniel's discussion of the movements of the "kings of the North/South" (from Daniel 11) and the discussion of "Gog and Magog" (from Ezekiel 38-39) for the details of what was, allegedly, still to happen.  Now, I was really confused.  I soon ceased to be "all agog about Gog and Magog" (thanks Russell)!

     I began to suspect that something was wrong when "Gog/Magog" were named enemies to the north of Israel in Ezekiel (38:1-7), but in the book of Revelation they represented the demonically-gathered kings of the whole world (16:13-14) and now were from the "four corners of the earth" (20:7-9).  In Ezekiel (39:12), after Israel is attacked it is said that it would take seven months to bury the dead, but in Revelation (20), the camp of the saints is surrounded but before this final attack occurs Gog and Magog are destroyed by fire from heaven and then the whole heaven and earth disappears for final judgment.  The restored/re-gathered Israel that Ezekiel described was a "land of un-walled villages” (Ezekiel 38:11) without military strength (as Israel was after two centuries under Persian rule, 536-336 B.C.), but the “Israel” restored in 1948 A.D. does not resemble what Ezekiel described as they have a potent military capability and use it when needed.  I had to conclude that “Gog and Magog” in Ezekiel and Revelation were symbolic terms applied to two different times and situations.

     Another Option - So does Jesus' return coincide with the "Battle of Armageddon" and World War III?  Well, according to my understanding – yes and no!  Since I view Revelation 20 as heaven's view of this current age, I would have to place the "Armageddon" material (Revelation 16:13-16) and the "war of the great day of God" (Revelation 20:7-9) in context with the end of the age and the return of Christ.  I suspect that Christ's return is portrayed as "fire from heaven" (Revelation 20:9 & 2Thessalonians 1:7-8) to end this “war.”  But, will "Armageddon/ War of the great day of God" be the World War III of popular expectation?  Somehow, I doubt that.

     What kind of Warfare? – Daniel and Ezekiel predicted military attacks on Israel - probably the struggles Israel would have with Greek-ruled Syria (ca. 170-142 B.C.) and Daniel clearly tied his prophecy to the historical setting of the Persian and Greek empires (see: Daniel 8:20-21 & 11:1ff) before the first coming of Jesus.

     However, in Revelation we are not shown a picture of earthly armies battling each other!  John did not describe demons gathering worldly/earthly armies to battle each other (as in Lindsey's scenario), instead they gather the kings of the earth for a battle against God and His people (Revelation 16:13-16; 20:7-9).  Thus, I believe the picture is of a demonically organized worldwide "coalition" opposing the "camp of the saints" (Revelation 20:7-9).  Why do we tend to picture this in terms of guns, tanks, and missiles aimed at Jerusalem?  Simple – that is the earthly-minded dispensational picture we have been constantly fed.  If I were Satan gathering the world against God's people, my weapons would NOT be military hardware that unbelievers use on each other!  Instead, I would encourage philosophies and speculations raised up against the knowledge of God (materialism, naturalism, hostile Biblical criticism, Darwinism, state-imposed secularism, etc.), legal and political maneuverings by which Biblical principles and concepts are outlawed in the public sector as "un-Constitutional," and then have some “bully-boys” like the ACLU threaten lawsuits whenever necessary to eradicate the last vestiges of the knowledge of God from the public education system.  I would get “my people” in control of the mass-media so that I could portray Christianity as something only for closed-minded, ignorant bigots and hypocrites, while re-defining perversion and portraying lots of divorce, extra-marital sex, horrendous deviant behavior as “normal” to corrupt the minds of the thrill-seeking and spiritually undiscerning population through their movies, cable TV, and video games.

     Folks, that kind of struggle has been under way for a long time and is exactly what the Apostle Paul warned the Church about (2Corinthians 10:3-5; Ephesians 6:10-18; 1Timothy 1:18).  Being old enough to remember what things were like before 1962, it is obvious to me that during the last forty years the forces of secularism and anti-Christian thinking have really "closed-in" on us.  "Evolution" (given enough time, chemicals accidentally turned into people) is the only origins story public school kids are allowed to hear, abortion-on-demand has killed over 30 million babies in the USA, recreational drugs are everywhere, and sexual sin is so rampant it now seems "normal."  Islam is treated with kid gloves, but “Thanksgiving” and “Christmas” are now forbidden terms in the public arena!  That is how the demonically-gathered forces of “Satan loosed” surround the "camp of the saints" – the disciples of Christ scattered in all nations.

     What, no major World War III just before Jesus returns?  Probably not.  How did Jesus describe the worldly setting at the time of His coming/end of heaven and earth?  He said it would resemble the "normal affairs of life" that preceded the flood, the visit of a night-time thief, and catching a slacking worker (Matthew 24:35-51).  Paul said that "peace" (not "war") would be the “watch-word” when destruction will suddenly fall (1Thessalonians 4:13 – 5:11).  Peter looked ahead to the end of this heaven and earth, but counseled preparation for the new ones by living the right kind of life each day now (2Peter 3:10-18).

     Maybe its time to rethink the place of earthly Jerusalem, earthly wars, an earthly kingdom/millennium, and the earthly Jewish nation (Philippians 3:18-21; Colossians 3:1-4).