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Amazing Facts

Joe Crews

Quest for Peace

Since time began, only 10 generations have lived without war.

Violence seems to increase as civilization advances.

Stay tuned for the amazing facts about history's strangest paradox.

Music Hello, this is Joe Cruz with the Amazing Facts broadcast, facts which affect you.

You know, friends, for literally hundreds of years the greatest minds of the world have been seeking a solution to the problem of war.

Peace is just about the most elusive thing on the face of the earth today, and it always has been, of course.

At times the diplomats seem to be very near the answer.

Terms will be drawn up, treaties agreed on, truces arranged for, and then suddenly, bang, it all explodes in another violent conflict of hostilities.

Border incidents are smoldering on many frontiers of the world right now, and we know that open war is taking place on other scenes.

Teams of arbitrators appointed by the United Nations are trying to inspect the vast stretches of no-man's land that lie between some of these disputing countries.

After all, this is the most enlightened advanced age of world history, so they tell us, and yet the savagery, the brutality, the inhumanity of man to man is more ugly than ever before.

Year after year the League of Nations didn't change the picture at all, and then year after year the United Nations has seen the picture grow even darker and seemingly even more hopeless.

I read some time ago about the United Nations Disarmament Committee holding 81 sessions in a year and a half without reaching a single decision regarding disarmament.

You know, friends, if we should try to characterize the spirit of this age in just 1 word, we could make no better choice than the word fear.

And if we could read the heart's desire of all people in all the world, we could put it down in just 1 word, and that would be peace.

Now isn't it a strange contradiction for millions to be filled with perplexity and fear when they actually hunger for peace?

Today we are going to try to find the cause for this unseemly paradox.

Apparently something has happened in very recent years to aggravate this contagion of fear which is now written on the faces of individuals and nations alike.

And by the way, it's not just a localized condition of just 1 people, but it's gone out to the very corners of this planet of ours.

If you should go to any city in any country of the world and stand on the busiest street corner and look into the faces of the people as they go hurrying by, What do you think you would see there, friends?

The same thing, fear, frustration, anxiety, and very little peace which their hearts really crave.

Wherever the newspapers, radio, or voice of men is penetrated, the shadow of fear will also be found.

Small and great, rich and poor alike, they are all caught up together in this great pervading spirit of our age.

Some time ago 1 of the world's greatest scientists gave a lecture in the college from which I graduated, and his very first words were these.

He said, I am a frightened man, and all the scientists I know are frightened men.

Well perhaps the explanation for this lies in the dismal record of man's past achievements.

Many of you who listen to this broadcast can vividly remember the ravages of the 2 greatest wars in history.

You can still remember that those wars were supposed to be the last, and at the close of each struggle, honest, well-intentioned men gathered at the peace stable to sign an armistice or a truce, and hopes were built up that some treaty or alliance would guarantee to future generations that golden age of peace.

The lesson of history has never really been heeded at all.

The sad story has repeated itself again and again and again.

The years stretch out into decades, and then while the diplomats negotiate, the armies are usually out there on the battlefields fighting.

The ink is scarcely dry on the paper before there's still another violent war somewhere in the world.

I wonder if you realize that not 1 basic cause of war has yet been eliminated.

As we say, this certainly is the most enlightened age of all time.

Yes, that's what they tell us, and then why should peace be so elusive?

Sometimes it seems to be so near, right at our fingertips, and then suddenly it's gone, completely out of reach.

Perhaps there's never been a stronger instrument for peace in the United Nations organization.

We admire its objectives and we praise the work it's done, but you know, friends, the fact remains that peace today is just as far away and just as unlikely as it was when the United Nations was first started.

Peace is an uneasy truce today on dozens of borders across the land and around the world.

Now I'm not an alarmist, friend, but we need to be reminded that the greatest minds in the world are thinking on this subject that we're talking about today.

The scientists, the educators, the statesmen are planning for the future, but they don't know what to plan.

They don't even know whether there will be a future or not.

Now listen, friends, the tense atmosphere of this age should not cause us to be surprised in the least, because Jesus gave a very clear picture of this very hour of the world's history.

And Luke 21, verses 25 and 26, and this almost sounds like it's quoted out of the morning paper.

And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars.

And upon the earth distress of nations with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring, men's hearts failing them for fear and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of heaven shall be shaken." Now look at those words a moment.

There is an accurate description of conditions all over the world right now.

And then you add to this the words of another great prophet in Revelation 11, 18, and there John wrote, The nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged.

Are the nations angry, or men's hearts fearful?

If it carried a three-inch banner headline, the nations are angry.

It certainly would not be considered extreme by a single person listening to this program today.

Why can't we, a very wise and advanced civilization, why can't we settle these problems?

Naturally, everybody's ready to blame everybody else.

1 country blames another country, each political party blasts away at the other political party for causing all the world's ills.

But if we should ask the God of heaven, he would reveal the real cause, my friends, and that it lies deeper than either politics or religion.

In fact, Revelation 16, 15 and 16 reveals that evil spirits are involved in this present world conflict.

Satan delights to see war, hatred and destruction, and he is responsible for inflaming passions of fear and hate.

Now listen, guns and tanks may compete with a natural enemy, but it will take more than those and all that human power can produce to fight against the devil and spirits of evil.

Only God can keep us in these days from being influenced by these spirits of devils, and believe me, they are all over the world going forth to the kings of the earth and trying to pull people into this spirit of antagonism and conflict.

Years ago a Prime Minister of Great Britain made this statement, and it became quite a famous statement.

He said, It seems as if the nations are bewitched, that they are laboring under some doom imposed upon them by devils.

There's something devilish in all the operations now going on to increase armies, navies, and air forces.

Now that's the quotation, friends, and I can tell you that it's doubly true in this year in which we are now living.

There is something devilish about the whole thing.

But some sinister force seems to reach up from underneath and drive the nations on toward the abyss.

I don't think it's too hard for us to imagine the spirits of devils working on the hearts of men today and causing them to hate each other and destroy each other.

What else could keep this spirit of violence alive in such a far-advanced stage of civilization?

I don't find that men have lagged behind in the sciences or in the social arts or in the development of industries either.

It's only in the realm of spiritual knowledge that we have fallen short.

It's only in the practice of devotion to God that we have lagged behind.

And the great deceiver is trying to poison the atmosphere of this earth by his war plans so that our spirits will be soiled by hate and passion as well.

Isaiah correctly foresaw the picture when he prophesied in Isaiah 22, 2-4, And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it.

And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths.

For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people.

And they shall meet their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks.

Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." Now friends, notice something.

It says the people will say, according to this text, Let's learn war no more.

Now, have you heard anything like that that would fulfill such a prophecy?

Have you heard about disarmament plans in the world today?

Why meetings like that are probably taking place right now while this broadcast is taking place.

And while they are talking peace, what does God say they are actually doing?

He said, Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles, Prepare war, wake 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." Now here is a very strange paradox, the paradox, in fact, of modern times.

While delegates of many nations sing the hymn of peace, they actually ready their weapons of war for immediate use.

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Quest for Peace

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