02.03. God's Covenant with David, or the Coming Kingdom
III GOD’S COVENANT WITH DAVID, OR THE COMING KINGDOM
I OUR first mountain peak of prophecy was the first promise of redemption, in the garden of Eden (Genesis 3:15). Approximately 2,000 years elapsed before the second came into view in the promise to, and the covenant with, Abraham in Canaan (Genesis 12:15). The promise and covenant were a divine means for the execution of the original promise in Eden. Another millennium has very nearly slipped away ere the third mountain peak appears in the history of David.
Abraham has now slept with his fathers. Isaac, his son and the heir of promise, has done likewise. The same is true of Jacob and Joseph, the other patriarchs. Their descendants, the Israelites--or the Hebrews, as they are now called--are a great multitude of people dwelling in Egypt. From their cruel bondage under Pharaoh they are delivered by the hand of Moses. They are settled in Canaan, the land of promise. Hundreds of years have passed in which they are ruled by Judges. But they have desired a king to be set over them like the nations roundabout; and at length David, the son of Jesse, a "man after God’s own heart" (1 Samuel 13:14), is strongly seated upon the throne. The Lord has given David rest from all his enemies, and one day, as he meditates upon it in his palace at Jerusalem, there comes into his heart the desire to build a magnificent temple there to the glory of Jehovah. But God will not have it so, and He sends Nathan, the prophet, to reveal His mind to the king. This is recorded in 2 Samuel 7:1-29. But it is at 2 Samuel 7:10, particularly, that the prophecy begins which attaches itself to the covenant God made with Abraham and which carries forward still further the plan for the redemption of the race.
II
Let us examine this prophecy. God will appoint a place for His people 1srael-" a place of their own," in which He will plant them, and from’ which they will move no more. "Neither shall the children of wickedness afflict them any more." God will cause them "to rest from all their enemies." Manifestly, the fulfillment of this is still future. They were in "a place of their own" when it was spoken to David, but not as yet were they planted there. They were moved soon afterwards and have been moving ever since. Their time of rest has not come, for "the children of wickedness," i.e.,the Gentile nations, have not ceased afflicting them to this day. But the Lord says further to David, "I will make thee an house." David will not be a builder just now, but God will be a builder, only the house that God will build for David is not a material one of wood and stone, but an earthly dynasty. "I will set up thy seed after thee . . . and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build an house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever." This suggests Solomon at first, but really "a greater than Solomon is here." Solomon’s kingdom was not established forever. Indeed, the next verse settles the prophecy as applying to Jesus Christ, the seed of the woman promised in Eden, and the seed of Abraham in whom" all the families of the earth shall be blessed. "In that verse, God says, "I will be his father and he shall be my son," and the inspired author of Hebrews quotes this as fulfilled ultimately in the Son of God (Hebrews 1:5).
III
Let us now look for the fulfillment of this prophecy; Solomon, the immediate successor of David, died. In the days of his son, Rehoboam, the kingdom is divided as a divine chastisement upon it for the sin of idolatry which had entered into it. There are two kingdoms now: Israel, or the Kingdom of the Ten Tribes, and Judah, or the kingdom of the two tribes. Three hundred and fifty years have rolled around since God’s covenant with David, and now the Assyrians have come down and carried Israel into captivity, never again to be restored to her own land as a separate kingdom. A century and a half later, or a little less, the same fate is visited upon Judah at the hands of Babylon. But since God had said that His Son should sit upon the throne of David, Judah as the kingdom of David must be restored again to make that true. Therefore in seventy years, according to the prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 29:10), she is permitted to return (2 Chronicles 36:22-23). And now more years pass away, half a millennium indeed, and the promised Son does not appear. Judah is still a vassal, first to Babylon, then to Persia, then to Greece and at length to Rome. But one day, when Caesar is at the head of that Empire and Herod, the usurper, represents him in Judea, the angel Gabriel is "sent from God unto a city of Galilee, named Nazareth; to a virgin, espoused to a man whose name is Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary.
"And the angel said unto her, fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favour with God. And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called, the Son of the Highest. And the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David. And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end" (Luke 1:26-33).
Surely the hour has struck! But alas! "He came unto his own and his own received him not" (John 1:11). Instead of the crown they offered Him the cross. "He is despised and rejected of men." And they hid, as it were, their faces from Him (Isaiah 53:3). He now becomes the nobleman who must go into a far country to receive his kingdom and to return (Luke 19:11). He is crucified, dead and buried and the mourners go about the streets. Two of His disciples on the way to Emmaus are moaning because they "trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel" (Luke 24:21). But lo! He has risen from the dead and has appeared to His disciples, going in and out among them for forty days. It must be His purpose, now, to take to Himself the reins of government and set up the promised kingdom. One day they put the question to Him, saying, "Lord, wilt thou atthistime restore again the kingdom to Israel?" (Acts 1:6). But once more there is disappointment and waiting. "It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father has put in his own power. But ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
"And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight.
"And while they looked steadfastly towards heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner, as ye have seen him go into heaven" (Acts 1:7-11).
IV Were the disciples mystified? If so, the mystery was deepened afterwards. At first, they went about their business of witnessing, when the Holy Ghost had come upon them, confining their witness to the Jews only. It was to them--the descendants of Abraham--that the kingdom had been promised, and to none other was the Gospel preached. But a great persecution arose, driving them out of Jerusalem, and they went everywhere preaching the Word (Acts 8:1-4). The Gentiles began to hear it, and with the same results as in the case of the Jews at Pentecost (Acts 11:15).
What could this mean, Was the privilege of the kingdom for them, as well as for the Jews’ A council of the church must be called to consider it (Acts 15:1-41). Peter at this council relates his experience in the household of Cornelius, the centurion, and Paul and Barnabas also declare" what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them." When lo! the Holy Spirit comes upon James, the presiding officer, and reveals in outline the whole plan of God in the premises for this age and that which is to come. The mystery at length is solved.
"Men and brethren, hearken unto me," said James. "Simeon (i.e., Peter) hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. And to this agree the words of the prophets, as it is written: After this I will return and will build again the tabernacle of David which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up; that the residue of men may seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, said the Lord who doeth all these things" (Acts 15:13-17).
Study this programme, and see that God is not now, and in this age, setting up the kingdom promised to David, but doing something else. What He is really doing is taking out from among the Gentiles "a people for his name." Or, as collateral Scriptures explain, He is building up His Church which is called the Body of Christ (Ephesians 1:22-23). The time will come, and may be very near, when this Body will be complete, and the Church will be taken out of the earth, caught up "to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18). "And to this agree the words of the prophets," as James says; namely, that“after this," or in other words, after the Church has been translated, Christ will return to the earth, and in Him God will set up the kingdom of David which is fallen down. That is to say, God’s covenant with David standeth true, as recorded in 2 Samuel 7:1-29, but the time is not yet. The Church must be translated first, and Christ must come again. The next chapter will make this clearer to us, bringing before us as it will the converging line of Gentile history.
QUESTIONS ON THE LESSON 1.About how much time" elapsed between the great event of Genesis 3:15 and that of Genesis 12:15?
2. Give the history of the chosen people between the death of Abraham and the Kingship of David.
3. What Scripture contains God’s covenant with David?
4. Name the promises in this covenant.
5. Prove that Jesus Christ rather than Solomon is in mind here.
6. Read carefully Hebrews 1:1-14.
7. Trace the history of Israel from Solomon to the Babylonian captivity.
8. Trace the history of Judah from the return to the birth of Jesus.
9. What hindered the fulfillment of Luke 1:33 at that time?
10. Can you recite the parable of the nobleman?
11. What is the promise of Acts 1:11?
12. Give the history of the Church from the ascension of Christ to the first council at Jerusalem.
13. Analyze the divine program as revealed to James.