Stuart Robinson's book The Church of God as an Essential Element of the Gospel is a rich treasure that needs to be more well known. Dr. Craig Troxel has edited a recent edition, but you can find a free PDF from the 19th century here.
This quote shows what awaits you when you read Robinson:
It is set forth as a distinguishing feature of the purpose of redemption, that it is to save not merely myriads of men as individual men, but myriads of sinners, as composing a Mediatorial body, of which the Mediator shall be the head; a Mediatorial Kingdom, whose government shall be upon His shoulders forever; a Church, the Lamb's Bride, of which He shall be the Husband; a bride whose beautiful portrait was graven upon the palms of his hands, and whose walls were continually before him, when in the counsels of eternity he undertook her redemption.
The mission of Messiah, undertaken in the covenant of eternity, was not merely that of a
teaching Prophet and an atoning Priest, but of a ruling King as well. His work was not to enunciate simply a doctrine concerning God and man's relations to God, as some Socrates, for the founding of a school; nor even merely to atone for sinners as a ministering priest at the altar: it was, as the result of all, and the reward of all, to found a community, to organize a government, and administer therein as a perpetual king.
May the Lord grant His people to see the glories of the church as an essential element of the gospel plan of salvation!