Chapter III.
"Verse 3: "They have cast lots for My people; and have given a
boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink." (See Rev. 18: 2.)
a. Thus the nations of strength agree beforehand to reduce God's people to slavery. "And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name." Rev. 13: 16, 17.
b. "They . . . cast lots." One was to give a boy for vice, and another to sell a girl for drunkenness. This is as it was in the days of Noah. (See Matt. 24: 37-39.)
c. Tyre and Sidon were to have the furniture,— the material things of God's buildings. (See verses 4 and 5.) We see here how highly prized by God were these institutions, that He would accept no recompense for their outrage.
d. Therefore, these blind Pharisees were forsaken, because they were filled with soothsayers from the East,— the peace and safety heralds. (See Isa. 2: 6.) They were permeated with Oriental negation higher criticism, modernism, and evolution.
e. Therefore, the three unclean spirits, the spirits of devils, went out to gather the kings of the earth to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. (See Rev. 16: 13, 14.) No wonder the prophet hurries us on to visualize this world-wide gathering of the clans—
"Proclaim Ye This Among the Gentiles: Prepare War!"
Verse 4: Those nearest to God's truth are the most resentful to it. As Tyre, Sidon, and Philistia were next to Jerusalem and the temple, so in the capital of the greatest Protestant nation in the world, at the center of the last message, the image to the beast will be legalized, and there will the mark of the beast be enforced.
Verse 5: God's temples were His lighthouses, His "goodly pleasant things," the salt of the earth. How Heaven-daring in impiety was it, (1) not only to refuse that glorious lead, but (2) to seek to destroy God's center, so as to obliterate from the earth the house of His name.
Verse 6: This bitterness extended to the people. God's elect were reported, not because they were injurious, but because of hatred to their religion.
Verse 7: "I will raise them out of the place whither ye have sold them." There is no history to fit this case. Therefore, it refers to the great future restoration. God could as easily have prevented the deportation of His people, as to bring them back; but they would not have been tested, nor the venom of their enemies displayed.
Verse 8: For this injustice, God would send Zion's enemies into distant captivity. (See Matt. 25: 41, 45.) Jehovah could have sold criminal nations direct to distant captivity without using Judah as an intermediary. But who were more fit to be associated in judgment than those who had undergone the malice of God's foes?"B.G.Wilkinson/1928
"Verse 3: "They have cast lots for My people; and have given a
a. Thus the nations of strength agree beforehand to reduce God's people to slavery. "And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name." Rev. 13: 16, 17.
b. "They . . . cast lots." One was to give a boy for vice, and another to sell a girl for drunkenness. This is as it was in the days of Noah. (See Matt. 24: 37-39.)
c. Tyre and Sidon were to have the furniture,— the material things of God's buildings. (See verses 4 and 5.) We see here how highly prized by God were these institutions, that He would accept no recompense for their outrage.
d. Therefore, these blind Pharisees were forsaken, because they were filled with soothsayers from the East,— the peace and safety heralds. (See Isa. 2: 6.) They were permeated with Oriental negation higher criticism, modernism, and evolution.
e. Therefore, the three unclean spirits, the spirits of devils, went out to gather the kings of the earth to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. (See Rev. 16: 13, 14.) No wonder the prophet hurries us on to visualize this world-wide gathering of the clans—
"Proclaim Ye This Among the Gentiles: Prepare War!"
Verse 4: Those nearest to God's truth are the most resentful to it. As Tyre, Sidon, and Philistia were next to Jerusalem and the temple, so in the capital of the greatest Protestant nation in the world, at the center of the last message, the image to the beast will be legalized, and there will the mark of the beast be enforced.
Verse 5: God's temples were His lighthouses, His "goodly pleasant things," the salt of the earth. How Heaven-daring in impiety was it, (1) not only to refuse that glorious lead, but (2) to seek to destroy God's center, so as to obliterate from the earth the house of His name.
Verse 6: This bitterness extended to the people. God's elect were reported, not because they were injurious, but because of hatred to their religion.
Verse 7: "I will raise them out of the place whither ye have sold them." There is no history to fit this case. Therefore, it refers to the great future restoration. God could as easily have prevented the deportation of His people, as to bring them back; but they would not have been tested, nor the venom of their enemies displayed.
Verse 8: For this injustice, God would send Zion's enemies into distant captivity. (See Matt. 25: 41, 45.) Jehovah could have sold criminal nations direct to distant captivity without using Judah as an intermediary. But who were more fit to be associated in judgment than those who had undergone the malice of God's foes?"B.G.Wilkinson/1928
