The Kingdom Under the Abrahamic Covenant.

To accomplish this, Jesus the Christ, the "Repairer" and "Restorer" must return to Jerusalem; the land of Israel must be wrested from the Gentiles; the Twelve Tribes must be settled in Jehovah's domain to be expelled no more; and the kings and priests elected for the kingdom must be raised from the dead that they may enter upon the administration of its affairs. The Kingdom cannot be re-established before the resurrection of the saints,^† because from the nature of the priesthood and the ordinances connected with it, none can discharge the functions of it before God who are not constituted priests "after the power of an endless life" as the Lord Jesus was before them. The kingdom under the Mosaic Covenant was inherited by flesh and blood; its kings and priests, were all mortal men, men who died and saw corruption. It was "left to other people." Aaron and his sons, and David, and Solomon, and all who possessed the honour, glory, and power of the kingdom, died, and left them to successors. The flesh profited them nothing. For though descended from Israel according to the flesh, though circumcised the eighth day, though priests and kings by hereditary descent, these advantages gave them no page 31 right to the eternal Priesthood and Royalty of the kingdom under the New Covenant which has been dedicated by the precious blood of its immortal High Priest and King. The Kingdom under this Covenant partakes of the nature of its King, whose blood^* has purified its constitution. It is incorruption—a kingdom which can "never be destroyed" "an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away." Hence the saying of the Apostle, "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption." It is a physical impossibility. Can mortal men possess an everlasting kingdom, the priesthood and royalty of which are not to be left to successors. Now, the offices of the kingdom under the New Covenant are inheritable for not less than 1,000 years, and some of them for ever, and they who are promoted to them at the "Regeneration," or Restoration, will possess them always, for the priesthood and royalty are unchangeable, are nontransferable—cannot be left to other people.

This being the nature of things, the immortality of the heirs of the kingdom is necessitated. The kingdom cannot exist, the administration of its internal and foreign affairs cannot be carried on, its ecclesiastical and civil ordinances will continue a theory, an unaccomplished prediction, so long as the Christ sits at the right hand of God, and his "fellows," the "joint heirs" of His glory and power, and the co-partners of "His joy," are sleeping in the sides of the pit, the unconscious and undreaming tenants of the tomb. So long as they continue thus they cannot possess the kingdom. "Corruption cannot inherit incorruption," and none but those alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them would declare it.

Immortality is life manifested through a corporeal incorruptibility, for all those and those only, who should by faith and practice be accounted worthy of an indestructible kingdom in the land of Israel that should not be left to successors:—this is the Doctrine of the Kingdom of God.