Restoration:
Coming Together?
by Darris McNeely
As the articles for this month's issue came to my computer, it became evident there was a thread running through them dealing with the enlargement of the European Union this May. The current union of 15 nations will see its largest single expansion when it adds 10 nations. The size of this union will be 450 million people, stretching from the Atlantic to the borders of Russia. It will be the largest political and economic union on the Continent since the days of the Roman Empire.
Many feel the EU is a sterling example of global "conflict resolution." For centuries the struggles of individual nations on the Continent resulted in wars that ravaged its people and lands and at times impacted the whole world. Now, 25 nations are coming together to form a union, which many hope will forever end the conflict.
The sheer size of this union will eventually cause it to assert its leadership in the world. Already the euro is challenging the U.S. dollar as the world's reserve currency. What will this mean to America's superpower status?
Many see this emerging giant's potential to supplant America's current role. Columnist Andrew Sullivan wrote that Europe's "rationale—now and for a long time—has been precisely to regain global power for Europe, lost in two world wars and the American century. If the European Union can achieve this, if it can slowly absorb its member states into a uniform and vast new entity, then it will represent a real challenge to U.S. influence in Africa, the Middle East, and every major international institution" (The New Republic, June 16, 2003).
Will this coming together, this attempt to resolve age-old conflicts, result in lasting peace? Bible prophecy, as quoted in this issue, shows that this union, in its final form, will be like "iron mixed with miry clay"—a mixture ultimately lacking in cohesion. It will survive only a short time and will help precipitate the crisis at the close of this age. By the time America and the world awake to this fact, it will be too late.
Meanwhile, in Iraq we see another "coming together." A governing coalition of clerics and civil administrators has signed a draft constitution, thereby taking a major step in rebuilding the country. Sadly, there are those who oppose this attempt at democratization and continue to wage guerrilla warfare against these efforts. Regular bombings and shootings attempt to disrupt this fragile state and plunge it back into the dark abyss of dictatorship. In this volatile region, peace continues to be elusive.
The Bible shows us that human efforts to come together without God will eventually end in failure. There may be temporary periods of calm and peace, but the reality of human nature and self-interest will eventually assert itself. Without God in the picture, it will end in human futility. Psalm 2 asks, "Why do the nations rage, and the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against His Anointed" (verses 1-2).
God's Anointed, Jesus Christ, is the key. Isaiah's prophecy tells us the only circumstances by which the world will be brought together to form the perfect union. After Christ's return, "Many people shall come and say, 'Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.' For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem" (Isaiah 2:3).
Only when the nations of the world unite under the direction and will of God will we finally see the restoration of all things.
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