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`... If those ordinances depart from before Me, saith the LORD, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being
A NATION before Me for ever' (Jer. 31:36).
`Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the
house of Israel and to the house of Judah ... David shall never want a man to sit upon the throne of the house of
Israel ... If I have not appointed the ordinances of heaven and earth; then will I cast away the seed of JACOB, and
DAVID My servant, so that I will not take any of his seed to be rulers over the seed of ABRAHAM, ISAAC, and
JACOB: for I will cause their captivity to return, and have mercy on them' (Jer 33:14-26).
Small wonder that the apostles said: `Lord, wilt Thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?'
Jeremiah's prophecy concludes with the transference of sovereignty from Israel to Nebuchadnezzar. As to this
transference and its outcome, Daniel is one of the chief spokesmen:
`In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah came Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon unto Jerusalem,
and besieged it. And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand' (Dan. 1:1,2).
Nebuchadnezzar was the divinely-appointed head of gold. What Israel's sovereignty covered and what the
restoration of that sovereignty will involve is shown by the words of Daniel in describing the extent of the authority
which had been transferred to Nebuchadnezzar:
`Thou, O king, art a king of kings' (Dan. 2:37).
When Israel's kingdom is restored, and great David's greater Son is King, His title will be:
`King of kings, and Lord of lords ... Prince of the kings of the earth' (Rev. 19:16; 1:5).
That such vast sway and majesty was included in the covenant with David, Psalm 89:27 testifies:
`Also I will make Him My Firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth'.
Daniel continued:
`For the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory' (Dan. 2:37).
The God of heaven gives this kingdom, and it can as well be called the kingdom of heaven as the kingdom of God.
When the Lord taught the disciples to pray, it was for the restoration of the kingdom and its ultimate blessing:
`Thy kingdom come ... in earth ... for Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory' (Matt. 6:10-13).
Compare these words with Daniel's to Nebuchadnezzar when he said `a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory'.
The words are echoed in the ascription of praise recorded in Revelation 4:11; 5:12,13. Nebuchadnezzar's dominion
extended beyond mere territory or human subjects.
But we must return to the examination of Acts 1, and take up the teaching of the whole of the book and period in
connection with the hope that was then before the believer.
CHAPTER 5
The hope of Acts and the Epistles of the Period
The question of the apostles in Acts 1:6 regarding the restoration of the kingdom to Israel, engenders other
questions, as, What is the hope dominating the Acts of the Apostles? or, Does the hope change at Pentecost, or
subsequently? and, most important for us who read, Is the hope of the Acts period the same as the hope of the
church as expressed in the epistles of Paul written during the same period? In other words, Can there be one hope in
Acts and another, different, hope in the epistles of the same period? The answer to this question is vital to our
understanding of the relation of the earlier epistles of Paul to his later epistles of the mystery. If the hope of Israel
persists throughout the Acts, and if it embraces all the churches that were called into existence during the Acts, then
1 Thessalonians 4 cannot express the hope of the church of the mystery, for that would bring the hope of that church