Only Terror Will Make Them Understand

A loving father not only provides for his children but also seeks to protect them. He would naturally try to rescue them if they were in danger. One brother remembers a specific incident that occurred when he was just a young boy. He and his father were returning home from the field service when their path took them across a stream. A heavy downpour that morning had caused the brook to flood. The only way to cross the water was to jump from one large stone to another. Going ahead of his father, the boy lost his footing on one of the stones, tumbled into the flooding water, and went under twice. How grateful the boy was that his father quickly grabbed him firmly by the shoulder and saved him from drowning! Our heavenly Father delivers us from what might be viewed as raging torrents of this wicked world and from its ruler, Satan. Jehovah is certainly the best Protector anyone could ever hope to have.

COMMENTARY

It is ironic that the Watchtower chose to relate an experience involving “flooding water,” because that is the symbolism employed in prophecy to depict the means that Jehovah will use to enter into judgment with his people.

Most notable in this regard is the 28th chapter of Isaiah. Verse two reads:

“Look! Jehovah has someone strong and mighty.

Like a thundering hailstorm, a destructive windstorm,

Like a thunderstorm of powerful floodwaters,

He will forcefully hurl it down to the earth.”

Several questions ought to come to mind. First, who is this “someone strong and mighty” that Jehovah has at his disposal?

Second, what form will the metaphoric “destructive windstorm” and “powerful flooding waters” take in reality?

Thirdly, who is it that is forcefully hurled down to the earth?

The answer to the first question is, the agent whom God employs is the last king, known variously as the eighth king, as well as the king of the north, who in his final campaign against the king of the south will “sweep through like a flood.”

How do we know the prophecy has a greater fulfillment than what occurred in the 8th century B.C.E., when the Assyrian empire swept Ephraim away? Because verse 16 relates the event to the coming of Christ. That verse reads: “Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord Jehovah says: ‘Here I am laying as a foundation in Zion a tested stone, the precious cornerstone of a sure foundation. No one exercising faith will panic.”

Of course, Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that the Kingdom came to power in heavenly Mount Zion in 1914. And that is precisely why God has determined to use the last earthly king to sweep away the refuge of a lie the Watchtower has created. Verses 17 thru 19 relate to that very judgment: “And I will make justice the measuring line and righteousness the leveling tool. The hail will sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters will flood out the hiding place. Your covenant with Death will be dissolved, and your agreement with the Grave will not stand. When the raging flash flood passes through, you will be crushed by it. As often as it passes through, it will sweep you away; for it will pass through morning after morning, during the day and during the night. Only terror will make them understand what was heard.”

In answer to the second question, the coming “flash flood” that will occur concurrent with the coming of Christ will take the form of a tyrannical onslaught — a dictatorial regime that will flood away the democratic system that has served to protect Jehovah’s Witnesses up until now. The mere outbreak of global war will dissolve the Watchtower’s agreement with death, which is an appropriate way of describing the way the leadership of the organization depict themselves. They have wrapped themselves in falsehood by claiming that the judgment of the house of God is mere theocratic history. They have even made the evil slave disappear by their interpretive legerdemain.

Truly, no mere mortal can reason with any within the leadership of Bethel as regards their error. They are above all that. “Only terror will make them understand.”