God disposes. Man may for a time set aside God's plan, but
through any series of contrary events God holds steadily to His own plan.
Temporary defeat is only adjournment, paving the way for later and greater
victory. Another surprise is for the church, that is, the church of later
generations, including our own. The old Jew saw only a triumphant king,
not a suffering king. He saw only a kingdom. There was no hint of any such
thing as a church. The church to-day, and since the day of Constantine,
sees only a church. The kingdom has merged into the church or slipped out
of view.

There seems to be a confused mixing of church and kingdom, but always with
the church the big thing, and the kingdom a sort of vague,
indefinite--folks don't seem to know just what--an ideal, a spiritual
conception, or something like that. The church is supposed to have taken
the place of the kingdom. Its mission seems to be supposed to be the doing
for the world what the kingdom was to do, but, being set aside, failed to
do.

In reading the old Book there is a handy sort of explanation largely in
use that applies all that can be fitted into the theory in hand, and
calmly ignores or conveniently adjusts the rest. The Old Testament
blessings for the Jewish kingdom are appropriated and applied to the
church. The curses there are handed over to the Jews or ignored. There
seems to be a plan of interpreting one part of the Bible one way and
another part in a different way. This part is to be taken literally. This
other not literally, spiritually, the only guiding principle being the
man's preconceived idea of what should be. The air seems quite a bit foggy
sometimes. A man has to go off for a bit of fresh air and get straightened
out with himself inside.

A whiff of keen, sharp air seems needed to clear the fog and bring out the
old outlines--a whiff?--a gale! Yet it must needs blow, like God's wind of
grace always blows, as a soft gentle breeze. The common law among folk in
all other matters for understanding any book or document is that some one
rule of interpretation be applied consistently to all its parts. If we
attempt to apply here the rule of first-flush, common sense meaning, as
would be done to a house lease or an insurance policy, it brings out this
surprising thing. The church is distinct from the kingdom. It came
through the kingdom failing to come. It fits into a gap in the kingdom
plan. It has a mission quite distinct from that of th