INTRODUCTION

We are now on Day #4 of this 7-day series of war poems which will culminate on November 11th. On Day #1, I already gave a pithy intro to the series. You can still consult that intro if you would like to understand more about it. I also presented a double-sonnet entitled “Another Side of War” which examined the bellicose nature of the belligerent, divisive Left-Right paradigm in politics. On Day #2, I presented another double-sonnet, entitled “Make Yourself a No-One”. It opened up how to respond when your government wages war against its own population by introducing a digital “Bitte Ihre Unterlagen!” (“Papers, please!”) society. On Day #3, I presented a poem entitled “When Wars Become a Warcrime”, which deals with the terrible toll that warring takes on its combatants who so easily become dehumanized merely by being in a “theatre” in which anything goes, regardless of any conventions. Today, on Day #4, I present a poem entitled “The Cosmic Struggle”, which takes Matthew 24:6 as its starting point to show the place of war in the cosmos and the struggle which underlies it. However, before presenting the poem further below, here are some words of reference about it.

Just like with the Book of Revelation, there are those who teach that the 24th chapter of Matthew’s Gospel is only concerned with events in the first century — specifically with what happened in Jerusalem in AD 70. But that ignores completely the triple-question the disciples asked in verse 3 in response to what Jesus had said about the fine buildings of the temple being cast down. They said: “When will these things happen, and what will be the sign of Your coming and of the end of the age?” That triple-question takes in both what happened in AD 70 AND also the build-up to the time of the end AND also Jesus’s return. And this is the full subject matter of Matthew 24. To restrict Matthew 24 merely to the events in AD 70 is the cowards’ way out because it ignores the time of great tribulation which the saints will have to go through at the end of the age. That cowards’ way out suits the fantasists who believe in the modern novelty teaching on the so-called Rapture, but it is not the way of truth.

The image of a pregnant woman painfully giving birth shown in Matthew 24:8 represents the chaotic present age in a fallen world with all its upheavals of wars and national rivalries and famines and pandemics and earthquakes and so on. These are the birth-pains which must inevitably happen in such a blighted universe. “We know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until the present time” (Romans 8:22). It’s like a cosmic struggle of parturition. We have to see all these petty events on our planet from a cosmic perspective.

Jesus, in true prophetic style, weaves His responses to the disciples’ triple-question so that some elements in his sermon refer solely to the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple, while others refer solely to conditions at the end of the age, and some refer to both, because both those events are climactic of two consecutive ages — one the climax and fall of the Israel age, the other the climax and fall of the present Gospel age. In the former, the age was ‘pregnant’ with the Messiah (as shown in Revelation 12:1-2). In the latter, the age is ‘pregnant’ with the Messianic return and the age-to-come with its cosmic transformation and resurrection (as shown in Romans 8:18-25).

War plays a big part in the way that this age works itself out (Matthew 24:6-8). It is not a sign of the end in itself but it signifies an aspect of the “birth-pains” of this age as it gives way to the age to come. All the catastrophes that are happening now of a global and cosmic significance are portents of the end of this age and precursors to the new. The new is being birthed out of the old. The chaos is just the labour-pains for that. Anyway, I do think that I need to write a commentary on Matthew 24 in the same manner that I have written a commentary on the Book of Revelation. That is something that I have wanted to do for a long time. The poem below is based on a somewhat unusual, and perhaps even ugly, meter. That’s just the way it came out — maybe matching the inelegant elements of the upheaval birth-pains of the cosmos. Roughly speaking the poem follows an 11, 9, 10, 11, 9, 10 syllabic pattern for each verse. Here it is:

You’ll be hearing of wars and rumours of wars
throughout this wretched age.
Though those themselves are not signs of the end.
Nations will rise against nations
in regular war engaged —
with famines and earthquakes birth-pains portend.

“Birth-pains of what?” You may well ask.
They’re of the age to come.
There’s much that’s still to pass before they cease.
The whole creation groans,
awaiting that postpartum,
when the renewal of which Christ spoke will be released.

Before that, God’s folks will be hated and killed,
while the love of most will turn cold.
False prophets will arise, deceiving hordes.
So many will fall away from what’s good
and evil will then become bold;
unaware they will receive their just rewards.

My reason for sharing these salient points
is to show what is still yet to come,
There’ll be no global ‘move’ to surrender to Christ.
Veering from truth and from all that is good
is the only ‘move’ that in this way I can see,
as the world builds up to the Antichrist.

If you tell me that Matthew, chapter 24,
is only about what occurred
in Jerusalem in seventy AD,
I will say you must open your eyes
and carefully study the Word
for that time AND the End is what you will see.

For Jesus replied to three questions in one
in verse 3 of the chapter concerned:
The fall of the stones, His return and the End.
So confining this chapter to Titus’s fling
plays fast and plays loose — truth is spurned.
For wisdom is needed to full comprehend.

For this age has been framed by two mighty events
in which judgement does pertain —
each one denotes the ending of an age.
The destruction of Jerusalem is one such end
concluding old Israel’s reign.
The other is when “the lawless one” takes the stage.

Then war will be waged against all the saints
conquering, prevailing and banned.
For this is what is written in the Word.
The ‘camp of the saints’ will be surrounded;
they will be given into his hand.
Tribulation will then be incurred.

We haven’t been put here to avoid all travail;
that’s a fantasy made up by some.
Though we have it to strengthen our reserves.
For then we will thus persevere to the end —
that’s the sign that we’re God’s and His Son’s,
each one gets just what he deserves.

For war on the saints is a wonderful gift
a privilege given for free,
for God’s folks in this world receive ‘shade’.
Yet, as Satan’s been ‘bound’ for the Gospel Age
(comparatively-speaking, you see)
we’ve been able to wage our crusade.

When the serpent’s been loosed and in fetters no more,
and the ‘shade’ will then morph into hate
with a force never witnessed before.
Only those who will then persevere to the end
who aren’t merely churchly deadweight
will bear with great joy the brunt of that war.

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[Tomorrow, November 9th, Day #5 of the 7-day series, there will be a sonnet which shows that waging war goes much further than merely fighting on a battlefield with physical weapons. The title will be: “Another Way of Killing”].

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© Copyright, Alan Morrison, 2025
[The copyright on my works is merely to protect them from any wanton plagiarism which could result in undesirable changes (as has actually happened!). Readers are free to reproduce my work, so long as it is in the same format and with the exact same content and its origin is acknowledged]

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