Introduction

Narrator: Chris Genthree
Duration: 13min
 •  10 min. read  •  grade level: 9
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In the way of thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for thee; the desire of our soul is to thy name and the remembrance of thee -Isa. 26:88Yea, in the way of thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for thee; the desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee. (Isaiah 26:8)
The object of judgment is to obliterate evil; and when it is a question of sin, according to God's estimate of it, death is the just and the only penalty in so far as life in this world is concerned. "The soul that sinneth it shall die." But as that rigorous sentence would carry every soul into eternal punishment, God, who desires not the death of the sinner, introduces the principle of substitution, executes judgment to the uttermost upon His own Son, making Him, who never knew sin, to be sin for us, and then preaches peace and life by Jesus Christ. This at once divides the world into two classes,-those who accept God's proclamation of peace and life, upon His condition of obedience to His Son, and those who do not. It also leaves God free to act in minor judgment (so to speak) in His moral government of this world. That is, to deal with evil in a way that a divinely instructed man must acknowledge to be holy, just, and good. And this minor judgment (such as loss of friends and property or bodily suffering), suiting itself to the needs of the two classes above mentioned-needs observed and estimated by a God of perfect wisdom and perfect love and grace-takes the form respectively of chastisement (properly child-training), or else, as in the case of the prodigal son, of special appeal or solemn warning. So that what might appear, at first sight, to be judgment, is really nothing but the divine movement of the heart that yearns over His ignorant, self-willed, and erring people, of the God that speaks in righteousness, mighty to save. "Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth."
But this government of grace does not hinder the present execution of real judgment-that is, death-upon those who refuse to receive the testimony which God has proclaimed, and to heed the warnings He has given to them individually. In such judgment God accomplishes two ends:-1 st, He manifests His righteous indignation against sin; 2nd, He gives occasion to those who are witnesses of the judgment executed upon others to profit by the warning. But it needs the special interposition of the Spirit of God to enable any one to deny himself and turn to God.
The knowledge of good and evil, which man acquired in the fall, has so constituted him that judgment is the only action of God's power which he understands; naturally enough, he resists it, and blasphemes God, because his conscience tells him that he must be the object of His righteous vengeance; so that to calm his conscience he tries to persuade himself that he is not wicked, and he hides himself from God, like Adam, and in his folly seizes with avidity the smallest pretext for denying His existence. "The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God." (Psa. 14;53.)
But man understands judgment perfectly well, and thinks it the only way of maintaining social order amongst his fellows. He likes to execute it upon his fellow, and, when sober, he is forced to admit its justice when executed by God upon himself; but that does not make him love God; on the contrary, it hardens his heart. And the more he learns what righteousness is, by means of God's visible judgments, the louder his conscience accuses him, and the more his heart breathes out hatred against the almighty power which he cannot resist (Rev. 16:9,219And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory. (Revelation 16:9)
21And there fell upon men a great hail out of heaven, every stone about the weight of a talent: and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail; for the plague thereof was exceeding great. (Revelation 16:21)); for "the mind of the flesh is enmity against God." (Rom. 8). And when the respite comes, if the long-suffering of God has prolonged the day of salvation, it only finds the heart of the sinner harder and further from God. 'Because sentence against an evil world is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.' (Eccl. 8:1111Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. (Ecclesiastes 8:11)). Thus, in the Revelation, the effect of the plagues with which the earth is smitten is rather to provoke blasphemy, even though men be forced to give glory to the God of heaven, acknowledging the justice of His decrees while affrighted by them; but they will not give Him glory by their repentance. (Rev. 3:21;9:20,21;11:13;15:4;16:9-2121To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne. (Revelation 3:21)
20And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: 21Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts. (Revelation 9:20‑21)
13And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven. (Revelation 11:13)
4Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for thou only art holy: for all nations shall come and worship before thee; for thy judgments are made manifest. (Revelation 15:4)
9And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory. 10And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast; and his kingdom was full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues for pain, 11And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds. 12And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared. 13And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. 14For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. 15Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame. 16And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon. 17And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air; and there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It is done. 18And there were voices, and thunders, and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such as was not since men were upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great. 19And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath. 20And every island fled away, and the mountains were not found. 21And there fell upon men a great hail out of heaven, every stone about the weight of a talent: and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail; for the plague thereof was exceeding great. (Revelation 16:9‑21).)
As before noticed, judgment is the only manifestation of the mighty power of God which man understands naturally; and yet judgment is said to be "his strange act." (Isa. 28:2121For the Lord shall rise up as in mount Perazim, he shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act. (Isaiah 28:21).) Of himself man is an entire stranger to grace, and the spirit which he outrages is the spirit of grace. (Heb. 10:2929Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace? (Hebrews 10:29).) Man lost the knowledge of God when he fell, and now by searching he cannot find out God, moreover God has no place in his heart or in his thoughts. But God will win him in spite of himself, and melt his heart by grace. It is God's will, God's prerogative, the necessity of His nature, because He is Love. And therefore He makes judgment an opportunity of acting in grace, so as to bring home in the clearest way to man's heart and conscience, what is the very hardest lesson for him to learn, namely, that God can and does love the sinner: and that He can be perfectly just in forgiving him. If this be so, it is clear that the more terrible, the more unsparing the judgment, the more the grace which delivers through and from it shines out. "God hath concluded all in unbelief that he might have mercy upon all." (Rom. 11.) And the power we are called to learn now is the mighty power which raised Christ from the deepest depth to the most exalted height, the power of resurrection. (Eph. 1.) Thus where sin abounded grace much more abounds.
Scripture is decisive in showing that judgment is always the opportunity of grace. God gave coats of skin to Adam and Eve, who had vainly tried to hide their misery: and the moment they accepted their sentence of death as the wages of sin (for "Enos" means "mortal") they were able to call upon Jehovah, even though banished from the garden; and their relations with God were reset upon the footing of grace. (Gen. 4:2626And to Seth, to him also there was born a son; and he called his name Enos: then began men to call upon the name of the Lord. (Genesis 4:26).)
Thus also the Deluge became the occasion of the wonderful deliverance of Noah and his family; thus Lot was saved from Sodom; and Rahab from Jericho; thus Joshua and Caleb were guarded all through the desert, and brought at length in safety to the promised land. But what need to multiply instances? It is clear that if the Lord puts on the garments of vengeance, the helmet of salvation is seen upon His head as a part of those garments. (Isa. 49:16-1816Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me. 17Thy children shall make haste; thy destroyers and they that made thee waste shall go forth of thee. 18Lift up thine eyes round about, and behold: all these gather themselves together, and come to thee. As I live, saith the Lord, thou shalt surely clothe thee with them all, as with an ornament, and bind them on thee, as a bride doeth. (Isaiah 49:16‑18).) And so in another place: "The day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come." (Isa. 63:44For the day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come. (Isaiah 63:4).)
It is very important not to confound these two things: -1st, judgment which is sure, though it may seem to linger, and yet which must sooner or later overtake sin; and secondly, the opportunity which is thus given to grace to shine out all the more conspicuously the more terribly overwhelming is the judgment. For grace must work; because God works, and God is love.
But grace never mitigates the punishment of sin. It may change the object of judgment, and thus, by substitution, satisfy the claims of justice, while exercising mercy toward the sinner; but only blood can wipe out sin. "Without shedding of blood there is no remission."
And, therefore, in the midst of this scene, where one finds so many things incongruous and hard to understand, the Holy Spirit sets the child of God upon his guard, and bids him not judge after the appearance of prosperity, which the wicked seem to enjoy for a time, for death is the appointed portion of all who are not Christ's. "Surely, thou didst set them in slippery places; thou castedst them down into destruction." (Psa. 73.)
In accordance with this, we find that the character of the apocalyptic judgments is death, in its four terrible forms: of sword, famine, pestilence, and beasts of the earth. (Rev. 6.) And the Lord Jesus shows, in Matt. 24, that these evils operate in the earth before the time of the end; and so we find it. Witness the wars and the terrible famines and pestilences which have been and still continue to rage amongst all the nations of the earth.
Those who have had occasion to witness the scenes that have lately been transacted in France, in which men have been compelled to admit that the hand of God has been visibly stretched out in righteous judgment on the nation, cannot fail to have observed that the moral effect has been to harden the hearts of the people, and fill them with the desire for vengeance. This accords with what has been stated above. At the same time the trial has given occasion to the constant exhibition of God's grace, which produces a song of praise from the hearts of His children throughout the breadth of the land. It has also been a good and useful testing time for them, and the thoughts of many hearts have been revealed-circumstances pressing from without, and grace sustaining from within.
The war itself was marked by many attenuating circumstances; and having been carried on almost entirely in the winter, when the ground was covered with snow, the country sustained no material damage by the passage of the troops. The wheat was frozen in some places last autumn, and where that had occurred the fields required to be re-sown in the spring; that, however, was due to the cold, and not to the war. Here and there vineyards were damaged in making temporary military roads, but this, together with the few fruit trees cut down, chiefly by the French themselves, is hardly worth speaking of. And even though many individuals, through a concurrence of disadvantageous circumstances, have no doubt had to deplore considerable losses, the state of the country generally was but little affected. This year the weather has been most favorable, especially for garden produce, which is everywhere rich, and the crops very good. Even the battlefield of Gravelotte, where so many thousands found their graves last August, is now one vast field of oats-thanks to timely supplies from England of seed-grain, together with a steam-plow, which saved much valuable time. Around Sedan, in like manner, the fields present the smiling prospect of being white to harvest. Thus God lavishes His blessing upon an ungrateful world, sending His rain on the evil and on the good, and making His sun to shine upon the just and the unjust. But peace and plenty only lead men to forget their past troubles, and the lesson which those troubles were calculated to teach. Still, God has given His warning, and the earth ripens for yet more terrible judgment. Let us meanwhile count the Lord's long-suffering to be salvation. May it, indeed, be found to be so to many! And may the Lord grant us eyes to see and hearts in tune with His to judge divinely of His ways! Surely, then, shall we be able to say in reality, "In the midst of thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for thee, and the desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee."
For greater clearness, it is proposed to follow as much as possible the chronological order of events, whilst dividing the subject into Three Parts, under the several heads of "Special Deliverances", "Military Service" and "Heart Exercises."
The Editor has also added two short biographical sketches of brethren who played a part in the trials and testimony of their day in war-torn North West Europe. These will furnish you with some idea of the caliber of these Christians who sought to comfort and serve in such adverse circumstances.