which the Son of God can deliver up to the Father, that God may be all in

all.  We must, therefore, revise the diagram given on p. 323 thus:

The 'Firmament' stretched out as a tent.

Gen. 1:1

The former

The new

1 Cor.

heaven and

heaven and

The First or

The Second

Former Adam.

Man and the

Last Adam.

End

Gen. 3.

Rev. 22.

Gen. 1:3

Rev. 21,22

While the Greek word used for 'heaven' occurs dozens of times as a plural, it

is a fact to be reckoned with that although ouranos 'heaven' occurs 53 times

in the book of the Revelation, it is written as a plural only Once (Rev.

12:12) where the inhabitants of the heavens are called upon to rejoice.  The

war of Revelation 12:7 is in heaven, not in the heavens.  Satan was not cast

out of the heavens, but his place was not found any more in heaven

(singular).  So, while 2 Peter 3:13 looks forward to new heavens and a new

earth wherein dwelleth righteousness, and employs the plural 'heavens', and

Christ when He ascended 'passed through the heavens' and was made 'higher

than the heavens' (Heb. 4:14; 7:26; Eph. 4:10), John, in writing the

Revelation uses the word in the singular.  We are fully aware that Luke, John

and the Acts use the singular freely, the change to the plural being most

evident, when we come to the epistles.  The new 'heaven' of Revelation 21:1

takes the place of the temporary 'heaven' of Genesis 1:6-8, and not the

heaven of Genesis 1:1.  We have not reached 'the end' either in Revelation 21

or in Isaiah 65 and 66.  In the Old Testament the word translated heaven or

heavens or air is the Hebrew shamayim, and no distinction is made between

plural and singular.

'Groaning' is not a word that comes immediately to mind when we speak

of living in a tent, yet 2 Corinthians 5:2 and 4 describes our condition in

this transient life as 'groaning'.  Romans 8:23 tells us that we ourselves

groan within ourselves, while waiting for our house which is from heaven, and

then assures us that the Spirit itself shares these groanings which cannot be

uttered (Rom. 8:26).  'Distress', 'strait' and 'sigh' are translations of

stenazo and its derivatives.  The groan of creation is shared not only by the

believer on his pilgrimage, but by the Lord Himself.

While the presence of tent and tabernacle in Dispensation, Doctrine and

Practice calls for fuller treatment than we have given in these pages,

perhaps enough has been set forth to enable the reader to accept more readily

the position of a pilgrim and tent dweller, seeing that God Himself, together

with the present heaven and earth, occupy the same position.  This position,

however, is more than justified by reason of the goal, 'the building of God',

the realization of the great Redemptive purpose during which and to ensure

which end, since the creation of Adam, 'the tabernacle of God' has in some

form or another kept this basic idea before the mind.  We turn aside,