“He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more”— Isaiah 2:4.
A comparison of Micah 4:1-5 and this duplicate passage in Isaiah 2:2-4 with many other passages in the prophetic Scriptures will make it plain that the blessed and idealistic conditions therein depicted will never be attained so long as Christ Jesus, the Prince of Peace, is rejected. “The last days” refer, not to the climax of the Christian dispensation, but to the closing period of God’s dealings with Israel and the nations after the rapture of the Church. Following the time of trouble predicted in both Testaments (Jer. 30:6,7; Dan. 12:1; Matt. 24:21,22), which comes after, not before, the rapture of the Church (1 Thess. 4:13-17), the Lord Jesus will appear in glory as the Son of Man from heaven (Matt. 24:29,30); and after the judgment of the living nations (Matt. 25:31-46) He will take over the government of the world, and the kingdoms of this world will “become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ” (Rev. 11:15).
“HOSANNA to the King of kings!
The great incarnate Word!
Ten thousand songs and glories wait
The coming of our Lord!
Thy vict’ries and Thine endless fame
Through the wide world shall run,
And everlasting ages sing
The triumphs Thou hast won.”
—Isaac Watts.