One may ask the meaning of water covering water, but it can be understood when we interpret it of the earthly

kingdom age when the living waters issuing from Jerusalem flow down to the Dead Sea, cover it, and blot out its

intense saltness and `heal' it so that it can abound with fish and vegetation. Wherever these waters flow they bring

life, and this is a picture of what the knowledge of the Lord will do to the inhabitants of the earth, bringing life in the

place of spiritual death.

There are other features of God's kingdom which may be mentioned. The promised land will experience

increased fertility and productivity. The many Scriptures that teach this may be summed up in the statement in

Amos 9:13. Then the plowman will overtake the reaper because of the rich response of the land. The Lord will

restore the early (spring) and latter (autumn) rains upon which this country depends so much. Irrigation will not be a

problem any longer. Health will increase and because of this life will be lengthened:

`No babe shall die there any more in infancy, nor any old man who has not lived out his years of life; he who

dies youngest lives a hundred years; anyone dying under a hundred years must be accursed by God' (Isa. 65:20

It was not for nothing that so many of the evidential miracles which the Lord performed in His earthly ministry

were ones of bodily and mental healing and Hebrews 6:5 calls them `powers (miracles) of the world (age) to come',

that is the millennium.

And so we might go on bringing out from the prophetic Scriptures the characteristics of the time when the Lord

Jesus as King of kings will return to this earth, take it under His divine control and at last bring peace, justice, and

lasting prosperity both spiritually and materially. However, we feel enough has been considered to show that the

1000 year reign of Christ is not one of complete perfection (that awaits the creation of a new heaven and earth in the

ages that follow) for in the millennium sin and death are still there. Yet one can say with truth that it is the most

favoured time the world will have known since the fall of Adam.

The words of G.H.N. Peters in his Theocratic Kingdom are to the point here:

`The prophets, with one voice, describe this one kingdom, thus restored, in terms expressive of the most glorious

additions. They predict from the Psalmist down to Malachi, a restoration of the identical overthrown kingdom,

linked with the most astounding events which shall produce a blessedness and glory unexampled in the history of

the world ... since the overthrow of the Theocratic Davidic kingdom, these predicted events have not taken place

as delineated, and therefore the predicted covenanted kingdom has not yet appeared ... It is the same kingdom

overthrown that receives those additions, and not another kingdom that obtains them, hence no professed

kingdom, however loudly proclaimed or learnedly presented, should, lacking these, be accepted by us ... Those

additions are so great in their nature, so striking in their characteristics, so manifesting the interference of the

Supernatural, that no one can possibly mistake them when the kingdom is restored ... After the downfall of the

Davidic kingdom, the prophets predict this kingdom as future (The Theocratic Kingdom 1:248).

While more can be said concerning the presentation and character of God's kingdom on earth as portrayed in the Old

Testament we feel enough has been brought forward to show its majesty and the great blessings, spiritual and

material, that will flow from the return of the Lord Jesus Christ and the inauguration of His righteous rule and

control followed by the world-wide witness of a restored and saved Israel. The fact of the long period of waiting

since the first Advent causes no problems when one remembers the astounding patience and long suffering of God,

`not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance' (2 Peter 3:9). This was the reason given

by Peter to his critics who sarcastically asked, `Where is the promise of His coming? for ... all things continue as

they were from the beginning of the creation?' (verse 4).

And another reason is the Lord's great work in the calling out, saving and completing the church, the Body of

Christ which is the great divine feature of the present time covering the period of Israel's blindness and rejection.

We shall be dealing with this when we come to the New Testament. Meanwhile we can rejoice in the One Who

continues to `work all things after the counsel of His own will' (Eph. 1:11) in spite of the opposition of Satan and

The kingdom of God is sure and certain. His triumph will be complete and when this is realised, every problem

of man will be solved and every barrier to God removed and the long awaited kingdom will prevail for ever.