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Prepare war - Let all the enemies of God and of his people join together; let them even call all the tillers of the ground to their assistance, instead of laboring in the field; let every peasant become a soldier. Let them turn their agricultural implements into offensive weapons, so that the weak, being well armed, may confidently say, I am strong: yet, when thus collected and armed, Jehovah will bring down thy mighty ones; for so the clause in Joel 3:11; should be rendered.
Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles - God having before said that He would “gather all nations,” now, by a solemn irony, bids them prepare, if, by any means, they can fight against Him. So in Isaiah; “Associate yourselves, O ye people, and ye shall be broken in pieces; and give ear, all ye of far countries; gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces; gird yourselves, and ye shall be broken in pieces; take counsel together, and it shall come to nought; speak the word, and it shall not stand, for God is with us” (Isaiah 8:9-10; see also Jeremiah 51:27; and the enemies of Judah encourage themselves, “sanctify ye war against her” Jeremiah 6:4; and Micah says, that whosover bribed not the false prophets, “they sanctify war against him” Micah 3:5, i. e., proclaim war against him in the Name of God. The enemies of God, of His people, of His truth, declare war against all, in the Name of God. The Jews would have stoned our Lord for blasphemy, and, at the last, they condemned Him as guilty of it. “He hath spoken blasphemy. What further need have we of witttesses? behold, now ye have heard His blasphemy” Matthew 26:65. And He foretold to His disciples, “Whosoever killeth you, will think he doeth God service” John 16:2.
Stephen was persecuted for speaking “blasphemous words against Moses and against God, this holy place and the law” Acts 6:11, Acts 6:13. Paul was persecuted for “persuading people to worship God contrary to the law and polluting this holy place” Acts 18:13; Acts 21:28; Acts 24:6. Antichrist shall set himself up as God, “so that he, as God, sitteth in the temple of God shewing himself that he is God” 2 Thessalonians 2:4. Heretics and unbelievers declaim against the Gospel, as though it, and not themselves, were opposed to the holiness and Majesty and love of God. The Gnostics of old spake against the Creator in the Name of God. Arians affected reverence for the glory of God, being, on their own mis-belief, idolaters or polytheists. The Apollinarians charged the Church with ascribing to our Lord a sinful soul, as though the soul must needs be such, find themselves held the Godhead to have been united to a soulless, and so a brute, nature.
Manichaeans accused her of making God the author of evil, and themselves, as do Pantheists now, invented a god who sinned. Novatians and Donatists accused the Church of laxity. Pelagians charged her with denying the perfectibility of man‘s nature, themselves denying the grace whereby it is perfected. Muhammed arrayed the truth of the Unity of God against His Being in Three Persons, and fought against the truth as idolatry. Some now array “Theism,” i. e., truths as to God which they have stolen from Holy Scripture, against the belief in God as He has revealed Himself. Indeed, no imposture ever long held its ground against truth, unless it masked itself under some truth of God which it perverted, and so “hallowed” its “war” against God in the Name of God.
Wake up the mighty men - Arouse them, as if their former state had been a state of sleep; arouse all their dormant powers, all within them, that they may put forth all their strength, if so be they may prevail against God.
Let all the men of war draw near - , as if to contend, and close, as it were, with God and His people (see 1 Samuel 17:41. 2 Samuel 10:13), as, on the other hand, God says, “I will come near to you to judgment” (Malachi 3:5; see Isaiah 41:1; Isaiah 50:8). “Let them come up” into His very presence. Even while calling them to fulfill this their vain purpose of striving with God, the prophet keeps in mind, into whose presence they are summoned, and so calls them to “come up,” as to a place of dignity.
Satan has been having things his own way; but the Lord has raised up men and given them a solemn message to bear to His people, to wake up the mighty men to prepare for battle, for the day of God's preparation. This message Satan sought to make of none effect, and when every voice and every pen should have been intensely at work to stay the workings and powers of Satan there was a drawing apart; there were differences of opinion. This was not at all the way of the Lord. 3SM 167.3
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