BLOOD RIVER – THE DRAMA
Back in 2004, Mr. Alan Campbell from Northern Ireland called upon his audience in the Orange Street Congregational Church. Leicester Square. London to “Remember Blood River”.
When times are dark and a sense of hopeless desperation threatens our faith, we should remember that our great forebears, as King David, also trod the “Valley of the shadow of death”. Like him we too should fear no evil because He has promised to be with us an enduring and comforting divine affirmation in the present tense. The following is from the body of Mr. Campbell’s address:
“All the sections of our English speaking people and other related Scandinavian and Dutch people all have great dates in history that should be remembered.”
In Northern Ireland we remember the events from 1690 when God sent William of Orange to deliver us from the tyranny of the Stuart Monarchy.
At the tip of Southern Africa another segment of the Israel peoples had a defining experience in their history. That moment came on the 16th December 1838. It was the year of the Battle of Blood River.
Who were these Afrikaner pople, these Boer people who are so despised and ridiculed, especially today in the world media and world press? They were of course a section of the dispersed House of Israel living on the Southern tip of Africa. They had gathered there from a number of different backgrounds. The initial settlement in what is now the Cape Province had been by Holland-Dutch people. These folk settled in there at the same time as Scottish people settled in Northern Ireland, and the same time as the James Town settlement and the Pilgrim Fathers were planting the seed of Israel in the North American  Continent.
What did that mean?
It meant that God had reserved the very best parts of the earth, rich in agricultural potential and mineral wealth. The geographical and weather patterns were best suited to them. God had fixed the bounds of the nations rich with gold and diamonds and all manner of wealth in the wide-spread territories reserved for His Israel peoples.
So the Dutch went there in the early 1600’s. The Huguenot or Protestant French people fled from horrible persecution, some to London (this church – where Alan was preaching) – was a Huguenot church in its origin. At one time in the 1700s nearly one third of the population of London was made up of French Huguenot refugees. A few of them went to Germany, some to Holland and many of them went to the Cape Province, where there is a Huguenot monument in a place called Franschhoek. It depicts a woman with great wings fleeing from France to Southern Africa with the open Bible in her hand. In Revelation 12 the Israel woman was given wings of a great eagle wherewith she might fly to a place of safety.
The French Huguenots knew who they were, and one of the earliest books written on our Israel Identity was by a Huguenot clergyman, Dean Abbedie.
Later on came a small number of Germans. So this merger of Huguenot, Dutch and German people became known as Afrikaners. Their language is a compound of French and Dutch mainly. The tribal identity of this people is Zebulon – Dutch and French – Reuben.
During the Napoleonic Wars, Britain took over the Cape Province and Cape Town and there was conflict. There has always been inter – tribal conflict in Israel.
This conflict led to a group known as the Voortrekkers leaving the Cape Colony in the 1800’s. They moved into the interior of what today we call South Africa, and there toughened by their hard experience they established their own free states to protect their language, culture and way of life.
The land was not stolen from ‘native’ Blacks. There were no coloured or Black people in those regions at that time. The only non-White people in Southern Africa at that time were Bushmen and Hottentots. As the Boers moved outward and upward from the Cape, dark-skinned peoples were moving south away from their tribal conflicts.
The leader of the Voortrekkers Piet Retief, made a very foolish mistake, he made a peace treaty with Dingane the Zulu king. Treaties mean different things to different peoples. It resulted in cold-blooded murder to Piet Retief and his companions.
In his place Andries Pretorius a man of God a strict Calvinist, who knew God’s Word,  was  elected leader.
On the 16th of December 1838 the Voortrekkers were surrounded by tens of thousands of Zulus, bent on war and slaughter.
Less than five hundred Christian Afrikaners set their wagons in a D against a flowing river and prayed and made a Vow with the God of Israel, declaring that : “If His protection is with us we will give Him the honor and the glory and we will share this miracle with our children for generations to come and we will keep this day as a Holy Sabbath”.
The Zulus attacked and at the end 3,000 of them lay dead around the unbroken circle of wagons. The river ran red with their blood and became known as Blood River.
No Boer lost his or her life, only three were wounded. The God of Heaven and Earth had said: “Fear not for the Lord your God shall fight for you”.
After their capture the Zulus were interrogated. They said they saw an army of luminous white shining beings hovering on a cloud above the circle of wagons and they actually appeared to be shooting down at them.
I think it is marvelous that God would see fit to do such a mighty miracle.
The Voortrekkers were followed by many others; they opened up the interior, of what is now South Africa. They established the Orange Free State and the Transvaal – two Afrikaans speaking republics.
The Afrikaner, after 178 years continues to observe the Day of the Vow on December 16 each year. They have built the most beautiful monument to commemorate this unique event.
Unhappily whereas God keeps His word, we do not. We forget or ignore them when ease and plenty turn our attention away from realities to fiction and silly things.
We have turned away from God in Britain and the Afrikaner has turned away from God and forgotten His Laws, Statutes and Judgments. We are both under the dominion of our  adversaries.
Since the ANC took over more than 4,000 Boer Afrikaner farmers have been horribly tortured, mutilated and murdered on their farms. They need our help, they are our kinsfolk. Our people there who rejoiced in the victory that God gave them at Blood River have come on the hardest times of suffering.
South Africa is uniquely geographically identified in scripture. Zephaniah pin-points the region of settlement: “From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia My suppliants even the daughter of my dispersed shall bring mine offering. In that day shall thou bring mine offering. In that day shall thou not be ashamed for all thy doings, wherein thou hast transgressed against Me: for then I will take away out of the midst of thee them that rejoice in thy pride, and thou shall no more be be haughty because of My holy mountain. I will also leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people. and they shall trust in the name of the Lord. The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid.” (Zephaniah 3:10-13)
Four rivers cut off the southern portion of Africa – they are the Zambezi, the Cunene. the Cubango and the Cuando rivers. Therefore that is where peoples from the tribes of Reuben, Zebulon and English speaking people from the tribe of Ephraim had settled there. They are people of Christian background, and they are not in a very good way. They are suffering, they are in a bad, bad way. In fact Isaiah saw their present condition as ‘scattered and peeled, meted out and trodden  down.”
They have lost their power. They are ruled today under Black, Communist, ANC rule.
But God has not finished with them yet. The oath of their forefathers at Blood River is not forgotten . God took them at their word and honored and delivered them. The same God that delivered them will yet deliver them from their foolishness. They repeated the error of Piet Retief and negotiated terms with their foes. Terrible things might yet happen to them, but God Almighty will preserve His people. God will yet work a miracle. Remember Blood River!
