Man’s Best Hope for Peace

WHAT do you think is man’s best hope for peace? Recently the American public was asked that question. The results of the poll showed that “73 per cent of the people in the United States feel their best hopes for peace rest in the United Nations.” (New York Times, December 15, 1953) Now if we are willing to be plainly frank about the matter, we must admit that under the supervision of “man’s best hope” the war talk grows louder, the cold war grows hotter and the atomic weapons grow deadlier than ever. True, there is also much talk of peace, many promises of peace and conferences for peace. But the trouble is that all this is only talk. In reality there is no peace. Why, since the United Nations’ sixty nations agreed to outlaw war in 1945, there have been hot wars in Greece, Malaya, Korea and Indo-China. Since actions speak louder than words, man’s best hope for peace, if it has to be the United Nations, is not a very bright hope, is it?

But did you ever stop to think that the present race to build deadly weapons is exactly as foretold by Almighty God? Through his prophet he said at Joel 3:9, 10 (AS): “Proclaim ye this among the nations; prepare war; stir up the mighty men; let all the men of war draw near, let them come up. Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong.” That is exactly what the “mighty men” of the earth are doing, preparing for war. So nations today spend fantastic amounts of money and use the cream of scientific brain power to turn out weapons, in effect, “beating plowshares into swords.” For were it not for war, the steel and other raw material and money could be used for agricultural purposes, feeding mankind, clothing mankind, housing mankind.

Now we see the greatest arms race in all history. So the future would be horrible for mankind if it were not for the fact that all this “beating plowshares into swords” is going to be completely halted during this generation, and peace will be enforced thereafter for a thousand years. It is certainly heart-cheering to know that permanent peace will soon come to this earth and that mankind will not even learn war any more. Now God did not say that the United Nations would bring about this peaceful condition. You may wonder how it will be accomplished then. Jehovah God tells us at Revelation 11:18 (NW) that he will “bring to ruin those ruining the earth.”

Are not even tests of atomic weapons “ruining the earth” for the Japanese people? Japan’s fear of atomic weapons is not imaginary; they had firsthand experience. They can well imagine how frightful an H-bomb, one 500 to 700 times as powerful as the bomb dropped on Hiroshima and which killed 60,000 people, would be in a full-fledged war! And scientists admit that it is now possible to wipe out all life on earth. Four hundred cobalt bombs, they say, could do just that. So it is fortunate for us that Almighty God is going to step in and “bring to ruin those ruining the earth.” Just what does this mean? That the end of all kingdoms on this earth, as we know them today, is at hand. Not that these governments will be destroyed by man, for Daniel 2:44 (AS) tells us: “And in the days of those kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, nor shall the sovereignty thereof be left to another people; but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.”

So, then, when we pray the Lord’s prayer “Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven,” we are actually praying for God’s kingdom by Christ to smash all these kingdoms and set up a world-wide, righteous government. At Armageddon God will crush out of existence Satan and his evil world. After Armageddon and throughout all eternity, this earth will be a paradise, forever free from war as Psalm 46:9 (AS) shows: “He [Jehovah, not the United Nations] maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariots in the fire.”

All this means that not only 73 per cent of the American people but the vast majority of people must be wrong in their belief regarding man’s best hope for peace. If you desire to live in perfect health on a paradise earth where there will be no more bullets, no more bombs, no more tanks, no more cannons and no more fear of war, you will want to learn more about Jehovah’s new world of righteousness—man’s best hope, really, his only hope for peace.