nature was taken upon me that I might fulfil the law, and shed my blood, and intercede for my people, but, except in a spiritual sense, I shall never rule over Israel." Did he say this? No, he rebuked them for overlooking the prophecies which spoke of his sufferings, but he did not question the correctness of their views concerning his kingdom. He said, "Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." Surely, if their understanding of the prophecies concerning the reign of Christ were wrong, so copious and infallible an explanation of them would now set them right! But it does not appear to have altered their minds on this subject; for, though they hastened to Jerusalem to inform the eleven apostles of all they had witnessed, they told the apostles nothing to change their notions of the personal reign of the Messiah. Nay, though Jesus himself afterward appeared to the apostles, and "opened their understandings that they might understand the Scriptures" (Luke xxiv. 45), they still continued to believe that he would sit upon David's throne; for they asked him when he appeared to them at a later time, "Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to

Israel?" (Acts i. 6, 7.) Our Lord did not reply by telling them there would never be such a kingdom as they supposed; still less did he rebuke them for their forgetfulness of his explanation of the things "in all the Scriptures concerning himself," but he said, "It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the Father hath put in his own power." This answer plainly implies that they were right in expecting that he would restore the kingdom to Israel (that is, sit upon the throne of David), though it checks their inquiring into the time of his coming to take his throne.

With this expectation, Christ left the apostles when he ascended, and with this expectation they remained after the Holy Ghost descended on the day of Pentecost. Hence, we find the Apostle Peter on that very day quoting a Psalm of David (Psalm xvi.), with observations such as these (Acts ii. 29), “Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the Patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto this day. Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that OF THE FRUIT OF HIS LOINS, ACCORDING TO THE FLESH, HE WOULD RAISE UP (avaoтησelv) CHRIST TO SIT UPON HIS THRONE; he, seeing this before, spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left

in hell, neither did his flesh see corruption. This Jesus, therefore, hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. Therefore, being by the right hand of God exalted [or, rather, being exalted to the right hand of God], and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this which ye now see and hear. For David is not ascended into the heavens; but he saith himself, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand until I make thy foes thy footstool." In other words, "The Lord made an everlasting covenant with David; Christ has been raised from the dead to fulfil it, and is now sitting at the right hand of the Father, waiting for the time and the season (which the Father hath put in his own power) to restore the kingdom to Israel."

(See also Acts iii. 19-22, and Heb. x. 12, 13.)

In like manner, the Apostle Paul, preaching to the children of the stock of Abraham at Antioch (Acts xiii. 32), says, "We declare unto you glad tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers, God hath fulfilled the same unto us their children, in that he hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second Psalm, "Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee." And as concerning that he raised

him up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption, he said on this wise, "I WILL GIVE YOU THE SURE MERCIES OF DAVID." In other words, I will fulfil by this risen Jesus the covenant "ordered in all things and sure," and place him on David's throne, and "set my King upon my holy hill of Zion.” (Ps. ii. 6.)

Hear, again, the Apostle James interpreting the Prophet Amos. He refers to Christ the words which his hearers had familiarly applied to their Messiah as a temporal prince. A question arose on the circumcision of converts, which Jewish jealousy and prejudice led some to desire. But James shows them that the admission of converts into the visible Church of Christ from among the Gentiles, did not interfere with their peculiar interest in Jesus to fulfil the covenant with David. On the contrary, it was needful that first a people should be gathered from the Gentiles before their expected king came to "reign in righteousness." (Isa. xxxii. 1.) He says that God did first visit the Gentiles to "take out of them a people for his name," and then adds, in the language of the prophet, "AFTER THIS I WILL RETURN AND BUILD AGAIN THE TABERNACLE OF DAVID WHICH IS FALLEN DOWN, AND WILL BUILD AGAIN THE

RUINS THEREOF, AND I WILL SET IT UP." (Acts xv. 16.)

So harmonious and so consistent were the views of the apostles upon the everlasting covenant," ordered in all things, and sure." The apostles, after the resurrection, as well as before, agreed in understanding the language of the prophets and the words of the angel, as literal promises that the Lord God would give unto Jesus THE THRONE OF HIS FATHer David.

And such, my brethren, is the expectation which Scripture still holds out to the Jews. They have never had their promised King reigning on the throne of David. The words of the angel have never been fulfilled.

It ill agrees with the language of either prophets or apostles, or that of the covenant with David, to say that the reign of Christ on the throne of David is fulfilled in his reign in the hearts of believers. When did David reign in the hearts of believers? How can David's throne be the same as the hearts of believers? David never reigned spiritually. David never reigned in heaven. Yet there are some who suppose that the present exaltation of Jesus to the right hand of God, is the "accomplishment of the promise to David of Messiah's succession to his throne." Certainly men's minds must have been differently constituted from what they are now, if, in the days of Peter, when that