The Great Second Advent Movement: Its Rise and Progress

Jesus to Remain in Heaven until the Restitution

Now that the Saviour had left them, and they had indeed seen him “ascend up where he was before,” they had the assurance that the Holy Spirit would teach them concerning the time when the kingdom will come. So, Peter in his instructions to the people, after the reception of the Spirit, said, “He shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you: whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.” ⁵¹ GSAM 71.2

To the apostle Peter were given also by the Holy Spirit the facts concerning the three worlds: First, the one before the flood, which was destroyed by water; second, the present world reserved unto fire,—fire with which the earth is stored, as the Revised Version reads,—that fire which shall prove the perdition, ruin, and destruction of ungodly men; third the new earth, “wherein dwelleth righteousness;” or, as some translate, “wherein the righteous shall dwell.” ⁵² GSAM 71.3

The apostle Paul set forth the resurrection of God’s people, and the change of all his saints from mortal to immortal, “in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump.” He stated to the Corinthians that Christ is now upon his Father’s throne, and will there remain till all his enemies are subjected to him. That is, till he shall have the kingdom—his kingdom—given unto his hands by the Father, as prophesied in Daniel 7:13, 14; Psalm 2:8, 9. To the church in Thessalonica he presented the coming of Christ and the resurrection as their only hope, and as containing the true consolation when their loved ones were separated from them by the hand of death. ⁵³ GSAM 72.1