Chapter 2 — The Plan of Salvation Unfolded

“HOPE deferred maketh the heart sick: but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.” ^{1Proverbs 13:12.} “For thus saith the Lord of hosts: Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will shake all nations, and the Desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts.” ^{2Haggai 2:6, 7.}GSAM 38.1

From the time that Adam was driven from the garden of Eden and the tree of life, the words addressed to Satan respecting the seed of the woman—“It shall bruise thy head,”—has given hope of the final defeat of the devil, the overthrow of his wily schemes, and a restoration to the tree of life. The expected One—the promised Seed—thus became the “Desire of all nations.”GSAM 38.2

In the above quotation from Haggai it appears that the coming of this Desired One is connected with the time when the Lord shall shake both the heavens and the earth. Paul, in writing to the Hebrews, placed that shaking in the future, saying, “Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven. And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear.” ^{3Hebrews 12:26-28.} This language concerning the one shaking, yet to come, seems to place it in close connection with the final setting up of God’s kingdom, under Christ, the promised Seed, “the Desire of all nations.”GSAM 38.3

The restoration to be accomplished through Christ can be clearly viewed in these last days by all who have the whole Bible open before them. It was not so with the ancients. The word of the Lord came to them, “precept upon precept, precept upon precept: line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little.” ^{4Isaiah 28:13.} So in the revelation to them of the plan of salvation, it was like the path of the just, “as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.” ^{5Proverbs 4:18.} Thus it becomes a matter of much interest to trace briefly the gradual unfolding of that plan to his ancient people.GSAM 39.1