assembly', or as Stephen says `the church in the wilderness' (Acts 7: 38), and has no

connection with the question of number.

While the promise was made to Abraham that his seed should be like the stars, the

dust and the sand that cannot be numbered, we know that the Lord had said of them "Ye

were the fewest of all people" (Deut. 7: 7) although from being `three score and ten

persons' they had become by the time of Moses wrote `as the stars of heaven for

multitude' (Deut. 10: 22). At the time of the end of the Millennium the evil seed are so

numerous that they are likened in number to `the sand of the sea', and went up on `the

breadth of the earth' (Rev. 20: 8, 9). At last, however, the nations of the earth will

become so decimated by war, famine and self destruction that Zechariah speaks of `every

one THAT IS LEFT of all the nations which come against Jerusalem' (Zech. 14: 16)! It

is thus that Israel, as the vehicle of the true seed on earth, come into their own, for then

"Israel shall blossom, and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit" (Isa. 27: 6); it

is then that they `enlarge the place of their tent' and their seed `shall inherit the Gentiles'

(Isa. 54: 3) even as their fathers in small yet typical measure `inherited' the land held by

the Amorite (Deut. 2: 31).

Coming back from this survey to the time of Adam, and supposing, for the sake of

argument, that Adam did not fall, that neither sin nor death were factors in the purpose,

and that consequently redemption by the shedding of blood would be unknown and

unnecessary, let us think further along this line.  Heb. 2: 14 makes it clear that the

Saviour took part in flesh and blood in order that He might be the Kinsman-Redeemer of

all the seed, but John 1: 14 reveals that He was made flesh so that of His fullness we all

might receive, and that as the Word made flesh revealed to man the Father (John 1: 18).

It is something that is impossible of belief that, had there been no sin, even then God

would still have been manifest in the flesh? Was the Virgin Birth that took place about

4,000 years after the creation of man, but the postponement of a most glorious and

miraculous event, that had it not been for sin, would have taken place in the garden of

Eden before any other children were born? Was it this that lies behind the mystery of the

Temptation and the Fall, with its close connection with the two seeds, the immediate

reference to childbirth, and the birth of Cain who turned out to be `of the wicked one'?

We ask these questions, we may entertain our theories, but questions and theories they

must remain.

Had the coming in of death not made the successive generations follow the death of

those that preceded them, the full tale of those chosen either before or since the

overthrow of the world would have been early reached, and the translation from Adam to

Christ effected and the different spheres of predestined glory entered. As it is, the evil

seed jostle the true heirs for room and many times overrun them and keep them down

both in number and in possessions. The very character of this age turns the true heirs into

pilgrims and strangers, yet it still stands written "The meek shall inherit the earth" and

that not only in the Sermon on the Mount, but in Psa. 37: where the believer is told

to fret not because of evil doers . . . . . for yet a little while and the wicked shall not be

(Psa. 37: 9, 10). As a consequence of what actually occurred in Gen. 3:, Christ, the

true Seed, is revealed as the Kinsman-Redeemer, and resurrection now becomes the gate