The Bloudy Tenent of Persecution for Cause of Conscience...

Peace. Dear Truth, you have most lively set forth the unparalleled state of that typical land and people of the Jews in their peace and quiet government: let me now request you, in the last place, to glance at the difference of the wars of this people from the wars of other nations, and of their having no antitype but the churches of Christ Jesus.

[Truth.] First, all nations round about Israel, more or less, some time or other, had indignation against this people—Egyptians, Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites, Midians, Philistines, Assyrians, and Babylonians, &c., as appears in the history of Moses, Samuel, Judges, and Kings, and in all the prophets: you have an express catalogue of them, Ps. lxxxiii., sometimes many hundred thousand enemies in pitched field against them: of Ethiopians ten hundred thousand at once in the days of Asa, 2 Chron. xiv. [9,] and at other times as the sand upon the sea shore.

Such enemies the Lord Jesus foretold his Israel, The world shall hate you, John xv. [18, 19.] You shall be hated of all men for my name’s sake, Matt. xxiv. [9.] All that will live godly in Christ Jesus must be persecuted, or hunted, 2 Tim. iii. [12.] And not only by flesh and blood, but also by principalities, powers, spiritual wickedness in high places, Eph. vi. [12,] by the whole pagan world under the Roman emperors, and the whole anti-christian world under the Roman popes, Rev. xii. and xiii., by the kings of the earth, Rev. xvii. And Gog and Magog, like the sand upon the shore, (Rev. xx.)

Peace. Such enemies, such armies, no history, no experience proves ever to have come against one poor nation as against Israel in the type; and never was nor shall be known to come against any state or country now, but the Israel of God, the spiritual Jews, Christ’s true followers in all parts and quarters of the world.

[Truth.] Beside all these without, Israel is betrayed within her own bowels: bloody Sauls, Absaloms, Shebas, Adonijahs, Jeroboams, Athaliahs, raising insurrections, conspiracies, tumults, in the antitype and parallel, the spiritual state of the Christian church.

Secondly, consider we the famous and wonderful battles, victories, captivities, deliverances, which it pleased the God of Israel to dispense to that people and nation, and let us search if they can be paralleled by any state or people, but mystically and spiritually the true Christian Israel of God, Gal. vi. 16.

How famous was the bondage and slavery of that people and nation 430 years in the land of Egypt, and as famous, glorious, and miraculous was their return through the Red Sea, a figure of baptism, 1 Cor. x. [2,] and Egypt a figure of an Egypt now, Rev. xi. 8.

How famous was the seventy years’ captivity of the Jews in Babel, transported from the land of Canaan, and at the full period returned again to Jerusalem, a type of the captivity of God’s people now, spiritually captivated in spiritual Babel, Rev. xviii. 4.

Time would fail me to speak of Joshua’s conquest of literal Canaan, the slaughter of thirty-one kings, of the miraculous taking of Jericho and other cities: Gideon’s miraculous battle against the Midianites: Jonathan and his armour-bearer against the Philistines: David, by his five smooth stones against Goliah: Asa, Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah, their mighty and miraculous victories against so many hundred thousand enemies, and that sometimes without a blow given.

What state, what kingdom, what wars and combats, victories and deliverances, can parallel this people, but the spiritual and mystical Israel of God in every nation and country of the world, typed out by that small typical handful, in that little spot of ground, the land of Canaan?

The Israel of God now, men and women, fight under the great Lord General, the Lord Jesus Christ: their weapons, armour, and artillery, are like themselves, spiritual, set forth from top to toe, Eph. vi.; so mighty and so potent that they break down the strongest holds and castles, yea, in the very souls of men, and carry into captivity the very thoughts of men, subjecting them to Christ Jesus. They are spiritual conquerors, as in all the seven churches of Asia, He that overcometh: He that overcometh, Rev. ii. and iii.

Their victories and conquests in this country are contrary to those of this world, for when they are slain and slaughtered, yet then they conquer. So overcame they the devil in the Roman emperors, Rev. xii. [11,] By the blood of the Lamb: 2. By the word of their testimony: 3. The cheerful spilling of their own blood for Christ; for they loved not their lives unto the death: and in all this they are more than conquerors through him that loved them, Rom. viii. 37.

This glorious army of white troopers, horses and harness—Christ Jesus and his true Israel, Rev. xix.—gloriously conquer and overcome the beast, the false prophet, and the kings of the earth, up in arms against them, Rev. xix.; and, lastly, reigning with Christ a thousand years, they conquer the devil himself, and the numberless armies, like the sand on the sea shore, of Gog and Magog: and yet not a tittle of mention of any sword, helmet, breastplate, shield, or horse, but what is spiritual and of a heavenly nature. All which wars of Israel have been, may be, and shall be fulfilled mystically and spiritually.