name Har–Magedon apparently denotes a world situation connected with that land.—Compare Joel 3:9-17.

36. War against Jehovah and his remnant of spiritual Israel means war also against whom else, and after what destruction does the war proceed against that one?

³⁶ The aggressive movement of Gog and his international hordes is not just against the land of Jehovah’s restored people but also against their King, whom Jehovah calls “my servant David.” (Ezekiel 34:23, 24; 37:22-25) He is the enthroned Jesus Christ, Jehovah’s Beloved One, the Messianic Descendant of King David. Inevitably, then, a war against Jehovah and his restored remnant of spiritual Israel means also war against Jehovah’s Messianic King, now installed as King in the heavens over the restored remnant of spiritual Israel. Revelation, chapter seventeen, portrays prophetically the order of events: before the political “image” that is now the United Nations (the Eighth World Power) “goes off into destruction,” member nations of it destroy the great religious “harlot,” Babylon the Great. All the political rulers are pictured by the ten horns of this beastly “image,” and regarding these Revelation 17:12-14 predicts:

37. In Revelation 17:12-14, how is the war of those political rulers pictured, and what is the outcome thereof?

³⁷ “And the ten horns that you saw mean ten kings, who have not yet received a kingdom, but they do receive authority as kings one hour with the wild beast [the Eighth World Power]. These have one thought, and so they give their power and authority to the wild beast. These will battle with the Lamb [the once-sacrificed Jesus Christ], but, because he is Lord of lords and King of kings, the Lamb will conquer them. Also, those called and chosen and faithful with him will do so.”—Compare Revelation 19:11-21.

HOW JEHOVAH DEFEATS GOG’S ATTACK

38. For what does Jesus Christ fight, and so failure to mention whom in Ezekiel’s account nicely fits in with this?

³⁸ Really, though, Jesus Christ fights, not primarily for his own heavenly throne, but for the vindication of Jehovah’s universal Sovereignty and for the glorification of Jehovah’s name. Nicely, then, in order that the glory may go to whom it primarily belongs, there is no mention made to Gog of the reigning king, “David my servant,” as Jehovah himself foretells what he will do when He is provoked to war by the God-defying attack made by Gog of Magog. He says:

39. In that day when he is provoked to speak in anger, what does Jehovah say will happen in the “land of Israel”?

³⁹ “‘And it must occur in that day, in the day when Gog comes in upon the soil of Israel,’ is the utterance of the Sovereign Lord Jehovah, ‘that my rage will come up into my nose. And in my ardor, in the fire of my fury, I shall have to speak. Surely in that day a great quaking will occur in the soil of Israel. And because of me the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and the wild beasts of the field and all the creeping things that are creeping on the ground and all mankind that are upon the surface of the ground will be bound to shiver, and the mountains will actually be thrown down and the steep ways will have to fall, and to the earth even every wall will fall.’”—Ezekiel 38:18-20.

40. What is it that provokes Jehovah to hot indignation, and the expressions that he then makes will bespeak what kind of control?

⁴⁰ The unjustified attack of Gog and his militarized hordes is made on a spiritually prosperous people who have a God-given right to a place on earth and full freedom for the worship of the living and true God. This fact provokes the Sovereign Lord Jehovah to a feeling of outrage, hot indignation. In rebuke to such devilish conduct he will speak with expressions that bespeak control by Him as Creator over the earth and all the forces of earth’s environment.

41. Where would the foretold earthquake have to occur, and what will indicate that Jehovah is causing it?

⁴¹ The quaking of the earth would be in that section of the land where Gog and his attack forces had penetrated. In the case of actual attack by Gog in the future, his predatory hordes will be all around the globe where Jehovah’s Christian witnesses are peacefully worshiping their God. For all of Gog’s hordes to feel it, the quaking of the earth would have to be global. For it to affect mountains, toppling them, it would have to be very bad, the worst in human history. Just how this universally terrifying earthquake will take place we confidently wait to see. The fact that it coincides with Gog’s invasion, just as divinely foretold, proves that Jehovah is causing it in his rage and fury!

42. To what weapon does Gog resort, how does Jehovah meet him, and why do not Jehovah’s witnesses take any action?

⁴² Gog desperately resorts to the “sword” of warfare against Jehovah’s restored remnant of spiritual Israel and the “great crowd” of their fellow worshipers, and so Jehovah meets him with like for like. Jehovah’s peace-keeping witnesses on earth do not take up the “sword” against Gog’s hordes, but Jehovah does. This is His fight! And now at last the nations of this scientifically advanced world will see Him fight—no mistaking of it! And how He can fight! Listen, as He describes his war tactics and operations:

43. How will Jehovah deal with the swords of Gog’s hordes, with what natural forces will he bring himself into judgment with Gog, and thus what will he do in his own behalf?

⁴³ “‘And I will call forth against him throughout all my mountainous region a sword,’ is the utterance of the Sovereign Lord Jehovah. ‘Against his own brother the sword of each one will come to be. And I will bring myself into judgment with him, with pestilence and with blood; and a flooding downpour and hailstones, fire and sulphur I shall rain down upon him and upon his bands and upon the many peoples that will be with him. And I shall certainly magnify myself and sanctify myself and make myself known before the eyes of many nations; and they will have to know that I am Jehovah.’”—Ezekiel 38:21-23.

44. Jehovah will thus outdo what modern means of warfare by all the militarized nations?

⁴⁴ At that point the battlefield of Har–Magedon is reached. The “war of the great day of God the Almighty” is on! (Revelation 16:14, 16; 19:11-16, 20, 21) As weapons of warfare Jehovah wields the forces of creation, flooding cloudbursts of rain, hailstones of undeclared size, downpours of streaking fire and sulphur—all of which will release more destructive energy than all the atomic and nuclear energy that the nations hold in reserve in the oversupply of bombs that they have stockpiled for World War III. All their scientific devices for germ warfare and chemical warfare will be surpassed by the raging pestilence with which he can plague them, a pestilence that could kill off 185,000 in a single night in a given locality. (2 Kings 19:35, 36) The blood of Jehovah’s Christian witnesses they are anxious to spill, but it will be their own blood that they will drink by the violent loss of their own lives.

45. Where will panic occur, how will it affect those seized by it, and what will Jehovah judicially do?

⁴⁵ Panic—world panic outside the ranks of Jehovah’s Christian witnesses! Gog’s hordes will be thrown into confusion. Instead of keeping united to strike down Jehovah’s worshipers as their victims, they will turn their swords against their own ranks, brother warrior against brother warrior, not religionist against religionist, but radical against radical, Communist against Communist, anarchist against anarchist, nihilist against nihilist. Those whom this suicidal warfare among themselves does not kill off, Jehovah will execute as if going into a judicial court against them with all his supernatural means of wiping all opponents of His universal sovereignty out of existence. He must be vindicated at Court.

46. So the “great tribulation” comes to its culmination in what way and on what scale?

⁴⁶ Almighty God thus becomes very much alive to all the nations and peoples under Gog’s woeful control. The God of the global flood in Noah’s day again goes into action on a global scale on this his “day of judgment and of destruction of the ungodly men.” (2 Peter 2:5; 3:6, 7, 10-12) The “great tribulation” upon this worldwide system of things reaches its culmination, and the last vestiges of this ungodly system of things are destroyed as the entire human society of God-ignoring people is annihilated.

47. In what sense will Jehovah sanctify himself before the eyes of all the nations, and before their destruction what will they know?

⁴⁷ Before the eyes of all the nations under Gog of Magog Jehovah will thus magnify himself, displaying himself as the Greatest in all the realm of the living. He will sanctify himself, proving that He is holy and not in sympathy with any part of this unholy system of things. He will make himself known otherwise than just on the pages of the Holy Bible. The stubborn-minded nations under Gog will be forced to see that such a world catastrophe could come from only the One who foretold it and warned of doing it. Facing destruction at His hand, they will, just before they go down into it, know what He said, “know that I am Jehovah.”

Chapter 20

Land of Magog No More to Threaten Mankind

1. After the defeat of Gog’s attack on Jehovah’s worshipers, what “land” must come in for attention, and what might persons who could get sucked in with that attack well do now?

THE unseen base of operations from which Gog launches his attack upon the spiritual “Israel of God” is the “land of Magog.” This “land” must come in for attention after Gog’s militant forces on earth have been crushed in defeat. Thus the unseen inhabitants of the “land of Magog” must witness first the disastrous defeat of the devilish campaign against the spiritually prosperous worshipers of Jehovah. The nations