The Divine Outline of History
Preface
Before you begin your Bible study, be sure that, as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, you have named your known sins privately to God (1 John 1:9). You will then be in fellowship with God, under the control of the indwelling Holy Spirit, and ready to learn doctrine from the Word of God.
If you are an unbeliever,
the issue is not naming your sins. The issue is faith in Christ:
He who believes in the Son has eternal life;
but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides
on him. (John 3:36)
Contents
The Believer’s Place in Time
The Great Question
Dispensations Defined
Six Dispensations
The Reason for Dispensations
Times and Epochs
Ages and Administrations .
Dispensations as Taught by Paul
An Outline of Dispensations
Establishing a Framework
Respect for Divine Distinctions
The Theocentric Dispensations
The Age of the Gentiles
Positive Volition
Negative Volition
Jewish Patriarchs
The Dispensation of Israel
God’s Chosen Nation
Divine Covenants with Israel
Conditional and Unconditional Covenants
The Client Nation
The Christocentric Dispensations
The Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union
Hypostatic Union Defined . .
Interpreting the Teachings of Christ
Freedom of Choice Under God’s Plan
Accuracy in Interpretation
Different Messages for
Different Audiences
Teaching for Present and
Future Hearers
The Incarnation as a Separate Dispensation
Four Reasons
God Revealed in Christ
The Great Power Experiment
Giving Definition to Other
Dispensations
Christ the Cornerstone .
The Separation of Israel and the Church
Fulfillment of the Mosaic Law
The Law of Christ
Transition Between Divine
Administrations
Common Principles in Different
Codes
The Continuing Value of the
Mosaic Law The Dispensation of the Church
The Church in Biblical Perspective
The Epoch of the Royal Family of God
Gentile Client Nations .
Precanon and Postcanon Eras
The Eschatological Dispensations
The Tribulation
The Millennium
The Reign of Christ
The Conclusion of the Millennium
The Uniqueness of the Church Age
Continuity and Change
The Politeuma Metaphor
. .
The Baptism of the Holy Spirit
A New Spiritual Species in Christ
Conformed to the Image of Christ
Misconceptions of the Baptism of the Spirit
Sharing All Christ Has and Is
The Protocol Plan of God
Mystery Doctrine
The Portfolio of Invisible Assets
The Believer’s Wealth Taught by Analogy
Escrow Blessings
Inheritance Reserved in Heaven
Blessings for Time and
Eternity
Undistributed Blessings and
the Glory of God Computer Assets
A Modern Analogy
Divine Sovereignty and
Christian Freedom
Enlarging the Portfolio with Secondary Assets
Volitional Assets
Good Decisions from a Position
of Strength
The Visible and the Invisible
Changes in
Positive Volition
Volition
Remains Free .
The Role of
Encouragement
Production Assets . .
Assets for Undeserved Suffering
Personnel Assets in the Church Age Portfolio
The Equality Factor
Royal Commissions
The Indwelling of the Trinity
God Residing in the Believer
The Indwelling of the Father
The Indwelling of Jesus Christ
The Indwelling of the Holy Spirit
The Availability of Divine Power
The Absence of Prophecy
Invisible Heroes
After Salvation, What?
1
The Believers Place in Time
THE GREAT QUESTION
WHAT IS THE CHRISTIAN’S
PURPOSE on earth? Every believer in Jesus Christ should ask himself this
question. After salvation, what?
Eternal salvation becomes an accomplished fact at the moment
of faith in Christ. Heaven is absolutely guaranteed for anyone who has believed
in Christ as Savior (Rom. 8:38—39; I Pet. 1:4—5). But the quality of the
believer’s life on earth depends on his execution of God’s plan after salvation. Impact and blessings in
time and eternity depend on fulfilling God’s plan in time. The question becomes
emphatic. What is God’s plan for the believer following that initial instant
of personal faith in Christ? God freely gives “all things” after providing
salvation (Rom. 8:32). What are they? After salvation, what?
The
simplified answer is: Learn Bible doctrine. The Bible reveals God’s person and
plan. Only through knowledge of God can anyone appreciate, love, and worship
Him. As Christians we are commanded to “renovate [our] thinking” with divine
viewpoint thinking so God’s gracious purpose can be fulfilled in and through
our lives (Rom. 12:2; Eph. 1:18; 4:22—24).
God's purpose for the postsalvation life of the believer calls for spiritual growth (2 Pet. 3:18). The Christian is kept alive on earth to fulfill his destiny, which is to become a mature believer, a spiritual winner, a “mature person to the measure of the maturity which belongs to the fulness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13—16). Each believer's life becomes a unique expression of the glory of God in both time and eternity (Rom. 8:29—30; 9:23—24), but only the mature believer glorifies God by receiving the highest and best that God has prepared for him (Rom. 6:l—2a; I John l:5—2:6). Divine blessings that the Christian can understand and experience and the overt manifestations of the Christian way of life come as results of spiritual growth. The means of spiritual growth is the believer's consistent reception, retention, and recall of Bible doctrine through all the circumstances of his life.
Bible doctrine is teaching. It is the content of the Word of God, which God designed to be communicated to the believer so that it becomes the measure of his thinking (Rom. 12:3; 2 Tim. 3:16— 17) and the source of his mental attitude (Phil. 2:5; Heb. 4:16). Doctrine is the body of orthodox teaching, which is drawn from Scripture and which serves as the standard for truth. Pastors have a spiritual gift for teaching Bible doctrine to their congregations (Eph. 4:8, 11—13). The pastor is responsible before God to diligently study the Bible in order to accurately handle the word of truth (2 Tim. 2:15). Doctrine is determined by:
3.
Exegeting
the Scriptures in their original languages
4.
Interpreting
the text in its historical context, in terms of its author's
intent and its original audience, as well as in light of the times and places
in which it was written
5.
Comparing
all pertinent passages in categorizing biblical subjects.
The importance of Bible
doctrine can hardly be overestimated. Why does God go so far as to magnify His
Word above His person (Ps. 138:2)? His Word reveals His nature and essence.
Only the Scriptures allow us to glimpse God's absolute character and to love
the revealed member of the Godhead, who is Jesus Christ (John 1:18). Bible
doctrine is called the “mind of Christ” (1 Cor. 2:16). It is absolute truth,
the very thinking of Jesus Christ (Phil. 2:5). “Though [we] have not seen Him, [we] love Him” when we learn who
and what He is and begin to share His frame of reference (1 Pet. 1:8).
Understanding God’s Word is the root of all Christian virtues.
Transformation of the believer’s life occurs on the inside, in the inner
person, in the soul (Rom. 12:2). His persistent intake and application of Bible
doctrine enlarge his capacities for life, for love, for service, for blessings,
for happiness (2 Cor. 9:7—8). God’s “greater grace” fills up the mature
believer’s greater capacities “to all the fulness of God” (James 4:6; Eph.
3:19; cf. Rom. 8:32). In so blessing the believer, God is glorified (Eph. 1:3).
Since Bible doctrine is so vitally important, the believer
needs to understand an essential fact about the Word of God. Bible doctrine is dispensational. The concept of
dispensations, therefore, is a key to understanding the whole realm of Bible
doctrine.
DISPENSATIONS DEFINED
A dispensation is a period
of human history defined in terms of divine revelation. According to the Bible,
history is a sequence of divine administrations. These consecutive eras reflect
the unfolding of God’s plan for mankind. They constitute the divine viewpoint
of history and the theological interpretation of history. The doctrine of dispensations
is the vehicle by which believers living at a specific time can orient to God’s
will, plan, and purpose for their lives.
God never changes. In the essence of God there is “no variation, or shifting shadow” (James 1:17). Change, however, is an integral characteristic of His plan for creation. But God is never impulsive or arbitrary. The changes He incorporates into His plan are designed to attain His unchangeable purpose (Heb. 6:17).
In different periods of human history, the biblical answer to
“After salvation, what?” involves different mechanics and procedures. The
doctrine of dispensations recognizes these differences as well as the
continuities that run from one period to the next. This doctrine, therefore,
becomes essential for understanding the believer’s postsalvation experience.
Knowledge of dispensations enables the individual believer to handle the word
of truth accurately and to appreciate the magnificent grace of God both in its
particular provisions and in its overall objectives. In contrast, failure to
distinguish one biblical era from another creates apparent contradictions in
divine mandates, prevents the believer from understanding current divine
guidance, and thus retards his all-important spiritual growth.
Any study of the Bible must deal with the distinction between
Israel and the Church. This contrast, which is a recurring theme in the New
Testament (Acts 10:45; Rom. 11:25; Gal. 6:15; Eph. 2:11— 22; Heb. 3:5—6), is
the starting point in the doctrine of dispensations. What makes the separation
of Israel and the Church so significant? The phenomenon that divides these two
dispensations is the first advent of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ makes all
the difference. He is the key to the divine interpretation of history (Eph.
3:10—1; Rev. 1:8). The doctrine of dispensations spotlights Him, as we shall
see.
Theologians may debate the issue of where precisely to divide
the dispensations on the timeline of human history. Some disagree on how to
classify biblical distinctions, thus arriving at different numbers of
dispensations. Ministers may stress certain aspects of the doctrine while
neglecting others. Indeed, some theologians reject the entire doctrine of dispensations in order to perpetuate a
tradition or justify a particular emphasis. But standing firm amid human
controversies, the criterion for identifying the dispensations must always be
what the Bible says, the very text of Scripture. The recognition of historical
eras in the Bible unlocks the Scriptures, revealing profound truths with
tremendous positive impact on our lives. When biblical distinctions are
overlooked, particularly those between Israel and the Church, there are adverse
practical and theological repercussions.
SIX DISPENSATIONS
Human history may be classified into
six dispensations. These six can be grouped into three categories of two
dispensations each. The theocentric, or
pre-Incarnation, dispensations are the Age of the Gentiles and the Age of
Israel, which occurred “long ago” before God had “spoken to us in [His] Son”
(Heb. 1:1—2). The christocentric dispensations
begin with the first advent of Christ (also called the Dispensation of the
Hypostatic Union) and continue with the Church Age, which is the present
dispensation. The Church carries out to completion the precedent established in
our Lord’s first advent. Finally, eschatology is the study of the final destiny
of the human race, and the eschatological
dispensations that the Bible
prophesies and promises for the end of history are the Tribulation and
Millennium.
God’s unified, integrated, unchanging plan for human history
calls for many expressions of His grace. In every dispensation God has a
particular plan for the believer’s postsalvation way of life. He graciously provides
the means for executing that plan, and the Bible reveals these various
provisions. Salvation itself, however, is appropriated in only one way
throughout human history—by grace through faith (Gen. 15:6; Acts 16:31; Rom. 3:22, 30; Eph. 2:8—9). In every dispensation
there is only one Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, as He is revealed in that
dispensation (John 14:6). Faith in Christ secures an eternal relationship with
God.
And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men, by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:12, NASB)
The Savior’s name has
different forms in different languages. In Hebrew His name is JHWH, a word considered too sacred to
pronounce, so He is called Adonai. He
appeared in many forms before His incarnation, including the burning bush, the
cloud, the pillar of fire, and the Angel of Jehovah. He has many functional
titles as well, like Messiah, Son of David, Lord of the Armies, or Prince of
Peace. In the Greek of the New Testament, He is Christos or kurios or Iesous or any combination of the three.
We know Him in Modern English as the Lord Jesus Christ. The Gospel of Christ is
revealed to everyone who desires to know God.[1]
God reveals Christ in many ways throughout the ages, but faith in Him is
the only way of eternal salvation.
THE REASON FOR DISPENSATIONS
Many principles, policies, and procedures that God establishes remain constant throughout history. But no careful student of the Bible can overlook certain changes that distinguish one epoch of biblical history from another. Why does God alter His administration of human history? He does so to reveal His unchanging glory, wisdom, and power under different conditions. From God’s eternal perspective the ultimate in this long and varied demonstration of His character is the relationship between Christ and the Church, in which the believer is in union with Christ (Eph. 1:17—23; 3:10, 21). The explanation for this multifaceted divine revelation which unfolds throughout human history lies in an ancient conflict.
Before human history began,
Satan revolted against God (Isa. 14:13—14). Satan and the host of angels who
joined his revolution evidently were brought to trial and convicted (Ezek.
28:16—18), for their sentence is recorded in Scripture (Matt. 25:41). The
sentence of fallen angels to “eternal fire” was pronounced before mankind existed. Why, then, was the execution of the
sentence postponed until after human
history ends (Rev. 20:10)?
Satan objected to God’s verdict, just as he continues to
contend against God. Any objection to perfect divine judgment slanders the
character of God. In a momentous action, God convened an appeal trial in which
He would demonstrate His perfect character (Ps. 145:2 1; Zech. 3:1—10; Luke
2:14; Rom. 9:23; 11:25—36) while allowing Satan every opportunity to prove his
own case (Job 1:12; 2:6; Matt. 4:1-11). God created mankind to resolve the
angelic conflict. In human history, for our benefit and for the benefit of the
angels, God magnificently answers every aspect of Satan’s objection in the
prehistoric trial. Simultaneously, Satan is attempting to prove himself equal
with God (Isa. 14:14), but the devil displays only arrogance, incompetence, and
evil, which confirm his guilt.[2]
Human history is the appeal trial of the
angelic conflict. The “numerous and diverse aspects of God’s wisdom” are
revealed through mankind, and most dramatically through the Church, “to the
rulers and the authorities [fallen angels] in the heavenly places” (Eph. 3:10;
cf. 6:12). As the appeal trial of Satan unfolds, the grace of God and the
perfect justice of His verdict are proven again and again. God introduces
changes into His administration of human history in order to present His case,
disprove Satan’s case, and deliver a decisive closing argument. These changes
produce the dispensations.[3]
TIMES AND EPOCHS
Shortly before Christ ascended into
heaven, His disciples pressed Him regarding the timing of future events.
And
so when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, “Lord, is it at
this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them, “It is not
for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own
authority.” (Acts 1:6—7, NASB)[4]
The Greek word translated “times” is chronos. “Epochs” is kairos. Chronos regards time as a
succession of events, one following the other in chronological order.
Occasionally chronos is used in the
Bible for a segment of time and has a dispensational connotation (Rom. 16:25; 1
Pet. 1:20).
In
contrast, kairos denotes an era, a
system or order of chronology, a period of time characterized by a distinctive
development. This noun is frequently used for the organization of historical
events in their dispensational categories. In various passages kairos refers to the Church Age (Rom.
8:18; 11:5; 13:11), the Jewish Age (Eph. 2:11—12), and the “times of the
Gentiles,” which is not a single dispensation but a broader period encompassing
the Church Age and Tribulation (Luke 21:24).
Why
were the disciples not told about “the times or epochs”? Actually, they had
been told a great deal. Christ had taught them at length concerning
dispensations (Matt. 23:27—25:46; John 14— 17). Furthermore, the concept of
dispensations was already familiar to them: the anticipation of a messianic
kingdom of God on earth was part of their Old Testament heritage (Ps. 89:27—29;
Isa. 40:3— 5; 62:10—12; Micah 4:1—8; 5:2—4; Zech. 9:9—10). It was our Lord’s
extensive dispensational teaching that prompted their questions (Matt. 5:17;
cf. 24:3).
The
disciples did not doubt the existence of dispensations. But their idea of the
kingdom of God was distorted by anti-Roman sentiment. Like many others in
Judea, they resented Roman authority and accepted the popular opinion that the
Jews should have political autonomy. Would Jesus expel the Romans? They wanted
to know exact dates. They wanted the kingdom now! The political kingdom of God,
however, demanded a spiritual response first, which most of the Jews refused to
give (Matt. 23:37). Even though the disciples had believed in Christ as Savior,
their preconceived ideas about the kingdom of God had kept them from
comprehending Christ’s teaching. They also had missed the significance of His
rejection by Israel and, therefore, had failed to notice a major shift in His
message.
Christ presented Himself to the Jews as the Son of David, the
King of the Jews, the fulfillment of all God’s unconditional covenants with
Israel. When Israel refused to accept her rightful king, the
promised earthly kingdom of God was postponed until the Millennium, which God
will establish at His own perfect time regardless of human acceptance or
rejection (1 Thess. 5:1—2). The disciples were still thinking in terms of an
immediate Jewish kingdom on earth after Jesus had already shifted His focus
temporarily away from the Jews, who had rejected Him, to a new body of
believers, the Church. The Church consists of all individuals who believe in
Jesus Christ as personal Savior during the Church Age. God is forming the
Church to play a special role in the eternal glorification of Christ.
The
doctrine of dispensations itself helps to explain why the disciples were
perplexed. They were living in a period of momentous events that belonged to
neither the Age of Israel nor the Age of the Church. In the midst of
the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union, the disciples failed to notice the
end of Christ’s ministry to Israel and the beginning of His ministry to the
approaching Church. Many Christians today still overlook vital dispensational
distinctions and, like the disciples, keep occupying themselves with issues
that are not central to their spiritual growth and relationship with God.
Believers who confuse the dispensations cannot clearly understand God’s purpose
for their lives in the current age (Col. 2:16—3:3).
The
arrival of the Church Age enabled our Lord’s disciples to comprehend the “times
[and] epochs” (John 16:12—15; Acts 1:8). This new dispensation brought a new
teaching ministry of God the Holy Spirit and the complete revelation of the
doctrines of the Church, which Jesus had introduced. The Church also
has a better vantage point from which to see the dispensations. Now the Jewish
Age, the Incarnation, and the Church Age can be seen in succession. The Church
Age believer has a more complete perspective than Christ’s disciples had while
He lived in their presence.
The
apostle Paul became the chief advocate of dispensational teaching. Ironically,
he was still an unbeliever at the time of Christ’s ascension, when the
disciples asked their final question. Ultimately, Paul taught dispensations to
the disciples themselves (Gal. 2), and through his canonical epistles he
continues to communicate to believers in every generation of the Church (2 Pet.
3:1—16).
Our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things [dispensations, in context specifically the eschatological dispensations], in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. (2 Pet. 3:15b—16, NASB)
At the time of our Lord’s ascension, the disciples (including Peter, who later wrote the passage just quoted) had been well taught by the Lord Himself, but they were unstable in the political turmoil of the day, especially unstable after the shock of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection. Their outlook was impaired by their desire for an immediate kingdom of God on earth. They could not shed this narrow view of dispensations in the final moments before His ascension, and Jesus did not attempt to teach them beyond their capacity to understand. He answered their question only in brief. Time had run out, and a fuller explanation simply was “not for [them] to know” during His sojourn with them on earth (Acts 1:7). The Church Age was coming, whether they realized it or not. Appropriate to the new dispensation, Christ deemphasized their search for fulfillment of prophecy. He stated only that precise details of timing would not be revealed and left additional revelation concerning dispensations for later. Twenty-one years after Christ’s ascension, Paul would describe believers who were oriented to the times and epochs.
Now
as to the times and the epochs [chronos and kairos], brethren, you have no need of anything
to be written to you. For you yourselves know full well that the day of the
Lord [His second advent] will come just like a thief in the night. (1 Thess.
5:1—2, NASB)
Paul previously had taught the Thessalonians about that change of dispensations which the disciples had been so eager to see and which is still future today. The exact timing of our Lord’s return is not disclosed through Paul or any other writer of Scripture. But a study of Scripture reveals a great deal about the sequence of times and epochs from the beginning of human history to the end. This is the doctrine of dispensations. To know this doctrine “full well” makes the Christian alert to the plan of God for his life.
But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day should overtake you like a thief. (1 Thess. 5:4, NASB)
AGES AND ADMINISTRATIONS
Besides chronos and kairos, two
other Greek words complete the New Testament vocabulary for dispensations. The
noun aion, usually translated “age,”
refers to dispensations as categories of human history, just as in English we
say Age of Israel or Church Age (Rom. 16:25; Eph. 3:9; Col. 1:26).
Perhaps the most descriptive
term for dispensations, however, is oikonomia.
Four centuries before the New Testament was written, Xenophon and Plato
used oikonomia to mean household
administration, the authority of parents over their children, the policy and
provisions of parents for their children. In the Greek of the New Testament, oikonomia had come to mean the
management of a household, the administration of a business or estate. Oikonomia implies order (rather than
chaos), a plan (rather than confusion), an arrangement (rather than disarray). Oikonomia itself does not denote time.
However, the King James Version translates this ancient word as “dispensation,”
a term that legitimately has come to connote a period of time, because oikonomia describes divine
administration during a distinct historical era (1 Cor. 9:17; Eph. 1:8—10;
3:2—3, 8— 9; Col. 1:25—29; 1 Tim. 1:3—4). In these passages oikonomia identifies the Church Age,
during which God administers a set of divine policies and provisions unique to
the Church.
Administration becomes an important issue in distinguishing the
dispensations from one another. At decisive junctures in His overall plan for
mankind, God institutes changes in delegated authority, responsibility,
procedure, and available assets. These changes in the divine administration of
human history involve first one group of people, then another, and another.
Hence, nomenclature for the dispensations is derived from the people at the focus of divine revelation in a specific period of time. In the march of history, this focus passes from Gentiles to the nation of Israel, from Israel to Jesus Christ in His first advent, from Christ to the Church, from the Church to a besieged remnant of Israel in the Tribulation, and finally from those faithful of Israel to Christ the deliverer, conqueror, and ruler in the Millennium. Each administration involves new divine mandates accompanied by new divine resources for fulfilling those mandates. As a result, the postsalvation way of life for believers may be significantly different in the various eras of human history. Scripture reveals the believer's way of life most comprehensively in the dispensations of Israel and the Church. Less is revealed of God's postsalvation mandates for the other dispensations, but the details that are disclosed confirm the principle of change against a background of continuity.
DISPENSATIONS
AS TAUGHT BY PAUL
Dispensations are not an arbitrary classification
superimposed by man on the Bible. They
are an integral part of divine revelation. The Greek vocabulary establishes
that the subject of dispensations is presented in Scripture. Furthermore, as
noted, Jesus Christ affirmed the existence of distinct “times or epochs which
the Father has fixed by His own authority” (Acts 1:7). In presenting the unique
characteristics of our own dispensation, the Church Age, Paul repeatedly
teaches the doctrine of dispensations. He borrows a Greek term that everyone in
his day could understand. Musterion, “mystery,” referred to the secrets of an
exclusive religious sect. Numerous mystery cults flourished throughout the
ancient Mediterranean world, and although the secrets themselves were closely
guarded, everyone knew that these
secretive organizations existed. Everyone knew that there were certain
rituals, formulas, objects, and rites of the cult of Isis, for example, which
were “mysteries” never revealed to outsiders. Only initiates could learn the
mystery doctrines. Paul gave this pagan term a Christian meaning.
The
Church was entirely unknown prior to Christ’s announcement of the Church Age.
Never mentioned in Old Testament prophecy but fully developed in the New
Testament epistles, this body of doctrine sets the Church Age apart from the
other dispensations. The “mystery doctrine” of the Church unveils the
characteristics unique to the Christian way of life. The mystery pertains to
the Church alone.
Today
the English word “mystery” denotes something incomprehensible, an enigma, or a
puzzle. But that is not the meaning of the Greek word. In the ancient world a
“mystery” was well-known—although
only to the initiated. Likewise, Church Age doctrine should be thoroughly
familiar to each Church Age believer. Every Christian is an insider, an
initiate, a member of the Church Universal.
Why
was mystery doctrine concealed for so long? In the upper room on the night
before His crucifixion, Christ prophesied the coming of the Church Age (John
14—17). God gave Him the honor of first revealing Church Age doctrine for
several reasons.
First,
the Church exists to glorify Him to the maximum (John 16:14; Eph. 1:21—23; 5:25—27). The doctrines of the Church
depend on the glorification of Christ (John 7:39), which resulted from His work
on the cross. In the hour of His rejection by His people, He unveiled His
coming glorification. On the eve of His judgment by the Father, Christ
displayed His utter confidence in the Father’s plan by announcing its success:
the formation of the Church through which God would glorify Him forever (John
13:31—32).
Second,
Israel had been given every opportunity to accept the Messiah. Christ revealed
the Church only after Israel had
rejected Him. The Jewish kingdom of God on earth had been postponed until the
Millennium, and a new set of options for believers on earth now became
pertinent. If revealed sooner, Church Age doctrine would have confused the
issue for the Jews.
Third,
soon after prophesying the Church, Jesus Christ would become the victor of the
cross and resurrection. It was fitting that He be the one to announce the
dramatic change of dispensations that His victory would produce. Indeed, His
unprecedented prophecy of the Church was one of the most stunning moments in
the entire angelic conflict. This announcement was a brilliant, unexpected
revelation of God’s grace, revealed not only to man but also to Satan and his
fallen angels, who constantly observed our Lord (1 Tim. 3:16; 1 Pet. 1:10—12).[5]
Finally, Jesus Christ was personally passing along the dynamics
of His own life to be the Christian way of life for the Church (John 13:34;
15:10). Throughout His incarnation He had utilized the system of divine power
that the Father had designed to support His humanity. On the eve of His
crucifixion, Christ bequeathed this proven system of divine power to every
Church Age believer.[6]
This power system— the dynamics of the Christian way of life—lies at the
heart of mystery doctrine. Church Age doctrine was concealed until the
Christian way of life went into effect.
Making reference to the
mystery doctrine of the Church Age, two passages of Scripture (with expository
notes) illustrate Paul’s approach to the subject of dispensations.
For
this reason, I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles
[Paul now inserts a parenthetical explanation of the new dispensation that no
longer is administered through Israel]—since you have heard about the
dispensation of the grace of God [nomenclature for the Church Age, in which God
pours out grace more liberally than in any other dispensation] which was given
to me for your benefit, that through revelation the mystery [the doctrines of
the Church Age, which God revealed only to the Church] was made known to me, as
I have already written briefly [as in Romans 16:25—26 and Ephesians 1:9]. By
reading this [Ephesians] you ought to be able to understand my technical
knowledge about the mystery of Christ [unique and previously unrevealed
doctrines of the Church Age] which was not made known to other ages [believers
living in the dispensations prior to the Church Age] so that now [for the new
dispensation] it has been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets [the
apostles to the Church, who recorded the New Testament] by means of the Holy
Spirit. (Eph. 3:1—5)
This passage confirms that
the doctrine of dispensations is a biblical subject. In a second major passage
Paul again presents the doctrine of dispensations by contrasting with all
previous ages the special advantages, opportunities, and responsibilities of
the Church Age.
Of
which [Church] I have become a minister on the basis of this dispensation from
God, which has been given to me for your benefit, that I might implement your
deficiency of the Word of God, that is, the mystery [Church Age doctrine],
which has been hidden from past ages and generations [previous dispensations],
but now has been revealed to the saints [“saints” is a technical term for
Church Age believers],’3 to whom God has decreed to make known what
is the wealth of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles [in dramatic
contrast to the exclusive spiritual position of Jews in the now-suspended Age
of Israel] [which mystery is] Christ in you [the indwelling of Christ in every
believer, a characteristic unique to the Church Age],’4 the hope of glory
[the believer’s confidence of fulfilling the plan of God for this
dispensation]. (Col. 1:25—27)
God
remains the same. The way of salvation remains unchanged. But against a
background of immutability and continuity, the doctrines of the mystery reveal
the strategic changes that make this new dispensation unique. Church Age
believers are a new spiritual species (2 Cor. 5:17) with a totally new position
in Christ (Rom. 8:38—39; 1 Cor. 1:2, 30) and a magnificent array of privileges,
responsibilities, and opportunities never available to believers of earlier
ages (Eph. 1:3—14).
This
book will conclude with a survey of the Church’s unique advantages. Divine
assets currently available, along with the biblical mandates for using them,
answer the pressing question, “After
salvation, what?” But first
the Church Age must be presented in~ context with the other dispensations so
that its uniqueness may be properly understood.
2
An
Outline of Dispensations
ESTABLISHING A FRAMEWORK
AN OUTLINE WILL INTRODUCE the divine viewpoint of
human history. Again, there are three general classifications which include the
six dispensations and their subdivisions. After this framework is presented, a
descriptive summary of each dispensation will fill in the outline. Most of the
dates cited here are approximate.
I. THE
THEOCENTRIC DISPENSATIONS (from the creation of Adam to the virgin birth of
Christ)
A. The Dispensation of the Gentiles (from the creation of Adam to the Exodus, Genesis 1—Exodus 11)
1. The Age of Positive Volition (from the creation of Adam to the fall of man, Genesis 1:26—3:6)
2. The Age of Negative
Volition (from the fall of man to Abraham, Genesis 3:7—11:32)
3. The Age of the Jewish
Patriarchs (from Abraham to the Exodus under Moses, Genesis 12—Exodus 11)
B. The
Dispensation of the Jews (from the Exodus to the birth of Christ; 1441 —4
B.C.; Exodus 12—Malachi)
1. The Theocratic Kingdom
(from the Exodus to Samuel 1441—1020 B.C.)
2. The United Kingdom (from
Saul to Rehoboam; 1020 926 B.C.)
3. The Northern Kingdom
(from Jeroboam to Hoshea; 926—721 B.C.)
4. The Southern Kingdom
(from Rehoboam to Zedekiah; 926—586 B.C.)
5. The Restored Nation of
Judah (from Nehemiah to Christ; 5 16—4 B.C.)[7]
II. THE
CHRISTOCENTRJC DISPENSATIONS (from the birth o Christ to the yet future
resurrection, or Rapture, of the Church
A. The
Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union, which is the incarnation or first
advent of Jesus Christ (the era of the New Testament Gospels; 4 B.C.—A.D. 30)
B. The Church Age (from AD. 30 to the
resurrection, or Rapture, of the Church)
1. The Precanon Period (the
era commencing with the Book of Acts and continuing until John wrote
Revelation, completing the canon of Scripture; AD. 30—96)
2. The Postcanon Period (the
current era governed by Christ's Upper Room Discourse [John 14— 17], the New
Testament epistles, and Revelation 2—3; from AD. 96 to the Rapture)
III. THE
ESCHATOLOGJCAL DISPENSATIONS (from the Rapture to the end of human history)
A. The
Tribulation (approximately seven years from the Rapture of the Church to the
second advent of Christ; prophesied in the Old Testament, Christ's Olivet
Discourse [Matt. 24—25], and Revelation 6—19)
1. Satan's Failed Utopia
(from the Rapture until Satan's expulsion from heaven)
2. The Great Tribulation
(from Satan's expulsion until the second advent of Christ)
B. The Millennium (the thousand-year reign
of Christ on earth from His second advent to the end of human history,
prophesied throughout the Old Testament and in Revelation 20)
C. The Eternal State (following the final
dispensation of human history; Revelation 21—22)
Throughout
this study several descriptive terms will be used interchangeably in discussing
dispensations. Epoch, time, age, era, period—these synonyms indicate an extent
of time, a segment of history. Interchangeable forms of expression are used as
well. The Dispensation of Israel, for example, may be called the Age of Israel
or the Jewish Age. And the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union is also called
the Incarnation, the incarnation of Christ, or the first advent of Christ. The
particular period under discussion will be apparent from the context (with help
from the above outline). One final point of terminology: the word “Christian”
will be used only in connection with the Church Age. Hence, the Christian way
of life is the life mandated by God for believers living during the Church Age.
RESPECT FOR
DIVINE DISTINCTIONS
The
panorama of dispensations reveals the majestic character of God through the
progression and Variety of His grace. Each dispensation has a divine purpose,
supported by the right divine provisions. The riches of grace available in the
Church Age, for example, correlate with God's special objective of glorifying
the resurrected Christ to the maximum. This purpose and these provisions
explain why the Christian way of life differs from the outpouring of God's
grace to believers during other periods of history. The Church Age believer
should be eager to understand and use what God has designed specifically for
him and thus allow the glory of God to be manifest in his life.
Still,
someone might ask, why not regard the Bible as a single whole? Isn't that
simpler? Why complicate things with all these distinctions? The primary reason
is that the Bible itself makes these divisions. Continuities and distinctions
established by sovereign God receive our complete respect, for they reveal
something about The unity of God's Word actually is embodied in this doctrine which
presents the relationships between the Bible's many parts.
A second
reason for recognizing distinctions in the Bible is that the believer needs to
know how to conduct his life. As he learns to utilize what God has given to
him, he becomes aware of divine policies and assets that are legitimate for
other dispensations but that do not directly govern the Christian way of life.
When there seem to be contradictions, which commands should he obey? When
questions arise, he needs answers. The doctrine of dispensations provides the
biblical system of interpretation for understanding why certain divine
provisions are currently nonoperational, as well as why others are currently
operational.
In no way
does this mean the believer can pick and choose which divine commands he wants
to obey. Each dispensation is God's administration, not man's, and God gives
firm and ample guidance for every period of history. Advancing believers are
not disobedient or in danger of lawlessness simply because they do not observe
the rules God set forth for another age. Indeed, their spiritual growth comes
from obedience to God's instructions for the current dispensation. The doctrine
of dispensations relieves the Christian's doubts about whether or not God holds
him responsible for observing certain practices. This gives his life direction,
frees him from a false sense of obligation or guilt, and by answering his
questions encourages him to delve deeper into the riches of the Word of God.
The
well-informed believer is able to compare and contrast the dispensations. He
understands the implications of many statements such as:
You are not under law [the
Mosaic Law, pertinent to Israel], but under grace [the plan of God for the
Church]. (Rom. 6:14b, NASB)
But now that faith [what is
believed, the mystery doctrine of the Church] has come, we are no longer under
a tutor [the Mosaic Law pointing the way to Christ]. (Gal. 3:25, NASB)
Therefore, let no one act as
your judge in regard to things [significant in Old Testament ritual] which are
a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ [who set
the precedent for the believer's life in the current dispensation]. (Col.
2:16—17, NASB)
The study
before us will provide a framework for understanding the Word of God. It also
will help protect the Christian from blurring biblical distinctions, from
distorting a true doctrinal sense o proportion, and from misapplying divine
commands. The doctrine of dispensations teaches what the Christian way of life
is—and what it is not.
3
THE AGE OF
THE GENTILES
POSITIVE VOLITION
THE DISPENSATION OF THE
GENTILES ENCOMPASSES three subdivisions: the age of positive volition, the age
of negative volition, and the age of the Jewish patriarchs.
The age of positive volition involved only
two individuals over an indeterminate length of time. Adam and the woman, whose
name was Ishah, were created perfect in body, soul, and spirit. They lived in
perfect environment in the Garden of Eden. They received direct revelation from
God because the deity of Christ, who is the revealed member of the Godhead
(John 1:1—4; Heb. 1:1—3), walked with them in the evenings (Gen. 3:8). No
written canon of Scripture was needed. Nor was there need of salvation because
man had not yet fallen. The historical record of this period is found in
Genesis 1—3:6, written retrospectively by Moses under the inspiration of God
the Holy Spirit, who insured the perfect accuracy of the record (1 Pet. 1:21).
This
period of positive volition, or perfection, or “innocence” as it sometimes is
called
because of the absence of
sin, was characterized by two divine institutions: volition and marriage. By planting the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil in the middle of the Garden and banning its fruit,
God made the volitional issue clear: obedience or disobedience to God.[8]
Precedence in marriage also was lucid. Just as God created Adam the ruler of
the world (Gen. 1:26—28; 2:19—20), God also gave him authority over Ishah (Gen.
2:18, 20, 23).
The
fall of man involved human failure in each divine institution. Both the man and
the woman ate the forbidden fruit, violating the volitional issue. By
succumbing to Satan, the woman also disregarded the authority of her husband.
And the man, in accepting the fruit from the hand of his wife, defaulted in the
exercise of his authority over her.
After
the Fall, God sustained the institution of volition by holding the man and
woman responsible for their own decisions (Gen. 3:11— 19). He upheld the
institution of marriage by reconfirming the husband’s role over the wife (Gen.
3:16). Even with the changes that resulted from the Fall, the perpetuation of the
divine institutions is an early example of continuity from one period of
biblical history to the next.
Neither
human perfection, perfect environment, divine warnings, nor the divine
institutions then in effect kept man from the original sin. Human volition is
truly free. Furthermore, vital lessons from ~ the age of positive volition
still apply to us today, for certain events in the Garden illustrate and
illuminate principles found in Church Age doctrine. For example, we see that
neither perfect environment nor the ideal marriage can solve man’s most basic
problems, which are solved by the grace of God (cf. Phil. 4:11—13; Eph.
5:22—33).
NEGATIVE
VOLITION
The
age of negative volition began with the fall of man. Adam and the woman were
now imperfect outside the Garden of Eden. Both were believers in the Lord Jesus
Christ, who revealed Himself as the Seed of the woman (Gen. 3:15). As a believer, the woman was called
Eve, “Living,” in recognition of woman’s role in the coming of the promised
Savior (Gen. 3:20; Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:20—23; 1 Tim. 2: l5a).
At the time of their original sins, Adam and Eve had lost the status of perfection. They had become spiritually dead—separated from God and totally incapable of a relationship with Him (Gen. 2:17; 3:8). Originally trichotomous (with body, soul, and spirit), Adam and Eve had become dichotomous (only body and soul). Faith in Christ brought regeneration, which restored the human spirit, making them trichotomous again. The human spirit has always been essential for a relationship with God (1 Cor. 2:12—14).
Throughout human history, with the humanity of Christ as the only exception, every descendant of Adam and Eve is born dichotomous and remains spiritually dead until he personally believes in Christ (John 3:18). In all dispensations, everyone who believes in Christ becomes at that moment regenerate and trichotomous, possessing body, soul, and human spirit (1 Thess. 5:23).
No canon of Scripture existed in the age
of negative volition. God revealed Himself to man through dreams, visions,
angelic appearances, and, as in the Garden of Eden, through direct, physical
manifestations in the form of theophanies (preincarnate appearances of Jesus
Christ). Spiritual authority was vested in the head of the family, who held the
family priesthood.’8 Through this system of authority, God’s
revealed truth was communicated to the human race orally and visually in
rituals that included holy days and animal sacrifices (Gen. 3:21; 4:4; 8:20).
The historical record of this period is found in Genesis 3:7—11:32, again
written retrospectively by Moses.
No human missionary agency was required apart from individual
believers carrying the Word of God to people in their periphery. The Gospel
existed in the form of promises of the coming Messiah (Gen. 3:15), who was
depicted in the animal sacrifices: the innocent judged in place of the guilty.
Since the fall of man, the means of salvation in every dispensation has always
been faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as
He is revealed in that era (Rom. 4:1—16; Gal. 3:6—9, 26).
The period of negative volition began with one language, one
race, and one culture, but none of these anthropological unities solved
problems in human relationships or in man's relationship with God. Furthermore,
a third divine institution, the family, was added to volition and marriage. But
neither parental authority nor familial bonds nor the family priesthood
prevented the first murder, in which Cain killed his brother Abel (Gen. 4:8).
Evil ran rampant during the age of negative volition (Gen. 6:1—7), and God took severe measures to prevent the human race from destroying itself. The universal flood spared only the family of Noah, the one family of believers that had remained true to God's plan.[9] After the flood God reiterated His blessing and encouragement, given in the Garden, to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen. 9:1; cf. 1:28), but with certain changes instituted concerning food (Gen. 9:3; cf. 1:29—30). Here was yet another early instance of change against a background of continuity. From Noah's sons sprang three groups of Gentiles, the descendants of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, which eventually became differentiated nations and races (Gen. 10:32).
Following the flood yet another evil
trend culminated at the tower of Babel (Gen. 11:1—9). There fallen man presumed
that he could “reach into heaven” through his own ability and concerted effort.
Human achievements often are admirable. They have an evil effect, however, when
man's apparent brilliance obscures the reality of his total separation from God
or supplants the grace of God as the one real solution to basic human problems.
At Babel, therefore, God restrained man's capacity for evil. God had promised
after the flood that never again would He “curse the ground on account of man”
(Gen. 8:20—22; 9:8—17), an unalterable covenant that remains in effect through
all generations as part of the continuity that runs through all the
dispensations. True to His own covenant God did not make widespread changes in
nature (as at the Fall and in the flood). This time He dealt with evil by
“confusing [mankind's] language,” effectively separating the human race into
groups that could not easily communicate with one another. Thus God established
the fourth divine institution: the national entity. He scattered mankind so
boundaries between peoples would limit the range of any expression of human
arrogance and would impede the spread of evil (Gen. 11:8). Even today,
internationalism, or the movement to unify the world under one government,
lends itself to evil on a grand scale and opposes the plan of God. Paul's
address to the Athenians establishes this principle for the Church Age,
allowing Christians to apply this ancient lesson from Babel to the current
dispensation. Paul emphasizes that God's purpose in separating the nations and
setting “the boundaries of their habitation” is “that they should seek God”
rather than be inordinately impressed with the achievements of human genius,
which Paul noted in the philosophy, sculpture, and poetry of the Greeks (Acts
17:26— 27; cf. 17:21, 23, 28).
JEWISH PATRIARCHS
The
age of the Jewish patriarchs was a transitional period from which would emerge
the Dispensation of Israel. In this period God founded the Jewish race; in the
Age of Israel He would establish the Jewish nation. Although no written
Scripture existed, God entered into a covenant, or sworn contract, with Abraham
(Heb. 6:13—18), a citizen of the highly cultivated third dynasty of Ur (Gen.
11:31). In a covenant, one party makes a favorable disposition toward another
party. God promised unconditionally to “make [Abraham] a great nation.” Abraham
believed God, and at age seventy-five he obeyed God’s instructions to leave his
home and migrate “to the land which Twill show you” (Gen. 12:1—4; Heb.
11:8—10). The fourth divine institution took on new significance as God
prepared to found a particular nation by forming a new race of people. His
purpose was not only to constrain evil in the world but also to create a model
for the protection of human life, freedom, privacy, and property within a
nation’s own borders. Israel would exemplify the divine laws of establishment.
In addition, the spiritual impact of this new race and new nation would
continue forever.
Abraham
was born a Gentile. He remained so until he reached spiritual maturity at
ninety-nine years old. Then with the act of circumcision he became the original
Jew, the father of the Jewish race (Gen. 17:1—21). Circumcision was the ritual
of confirmation and acknowledgment that the divine covenant required of him.
This ritual signified the blessings of restored sexual vigor through which God
would “multiply [Abraham’s] seed as the stars of the heavens” (Gen. 22:15—18;
Rom. 4:17—21; Heb. 11:11—12). Abraham’s obedience demonstrated his spiritually
mature confidence in God’s promises. The Jews were to be a unique demonstration
of God’s glory among all the nations of the earth.
God
confirmed His covenant to Abraham’s believing son, Isaac (Gen. 26:3—5), and
reconfirmed it to his believing grandson, Jacob (Gen. 28:13—15; 35:11—12). The
Jewish race, therefore, is spiritual in origin, descending from Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob, each of whom was a believer in the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ
(Gen. 15:6). The twelve sons of Jacob are the Jewish patriarchs, the founders
of the tribes of Israel.
God’s
unconditional covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is an everlasting
covenant. The Jewish race is permanent. Its existence depends on God alone.
Israel’s eternal heritage is both spiritual and ethnic, just as God promised.
He will preserve the regenerate Jewish race and the Jewish nation throughout
history and eternity (Gen. 13:15; Rev. 21:12).
Therefore,
one of the many blessings that come to the human race through the Jews is a
long-term demonstration of God’s faithfulness. He committed Himself to specific
promises that He will keep through all the vicissitudes of human history.
Herein lies encouragement for anyone who trusts in Him. The very existence of
the Jews is proof for all to see that God keeps His word. Even when the
majority of the Jews themselves reject Him, even when the nation slips into
degeneracy, even when He must severely discipline His people, the promise still
stands. God never ceases to care for His people. Israel has a future, precisely
as God swore to Abraham. In terms of continuity and change, God’s covenant with
Israel and its literal fulfillment are woven into the fabric of history that remains
intact no matter what other dispensations God establishes.
The
origin of the Jewish race anticipates an important difference between Israel
and the Church. God founded the Jews as a new racial species. In contrast, the Church is a “new [spiritual] species” (2 Cor. 5:17).
Regenerate Jews are God’s chosen people and nation, while the Church includes
believers of every race and nationality.
The
age of the patriarchs ended with the Jews as slaves in Egypt. Moses was born
during the age of the patriarchs, but the last forty years of his life belong
to the next dispensation, the Age of Israel.
Abraham is the father of the
Jewish race; Moses, the father of the Jewish nation.
As
the population of the earth grew and nations proliferated, God had begun to
deal with man in a new way through the covenants that heralded the founding of
the nation of Israel. Israel would be God’s client nation, His protected
representative on earth to whom He would entrust the human authorship and
custodianship of written divine revelation.
THE DISPENSATION OF ISRAEL
GOD’S CHOSEN NATION
The
Jewish Age is related to the nation of
Israel. The Jews became a nation when God led them out of Egypt, culminating
that transitional age of the patriarchs in which He established the Jewish race.
As in the age of the Jewish patriarchs, the human race still consisted of a
large population divided into many languages, cultures, and nations. As before,
all four divine institutions remained in effect, namely, volition, marriage,
the family, and the national entity. And as before, salvation throughout the
world continued to be by faith in Christ as He was revealed. But with the
Exodus God established one particular nation to represent Him as His missionary
agency on earth. The spiritual heritage of Israel continued, as it had begun
through the faith of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: the Jews expressed their faith
toward God as they offered the Passover lamb. This chosen nation would be given
a divine legacy in writing and would manifest God’s character as never before in history (Deut. 4:6—8,
32-40).
God chose Israel to be a
blessing to the entire human race (Gen. 12:2—3; Amos 11:12; cf. Acts 15:17). He made this nation the recipient,
custodian, and communicator of the written canon of Scripture. Not only would
Israel furnish the human authors of the Old Testament canon, but the history
and function of Israel herself would be recorded forever in Scripture. The God
of Israel, who is Jesus Christ, the second person1 of the Trinity
(Luke 1:68), personally ruled the theocratic kingdom. There was no division
between spiritual and civil. This was demonstrated to Moses before
the Exodus (Ex. 3—4), reiterated to Joshua upon entering the Land (Josh.
5:13—15), and lamented when the apostate people clamored for a human king (1
Sam. 8).
To
communicate His grace to mankind through His chosen nation, God gave Moses a
code of law for Israel. The Mosaic Law is a remarkable legal system that
defined freedom and civil responsibility in Israel for believers and unbelievers
alike. The Law also set forth the precise spiritual ceremonies by which the
Jews would worship God. Because their God was also their king, it was the
responsibility of everyone in Israel to observe the Mosaic Law as part of
Jewish national life, although the spiritual provisions were properly
meaningful for believers only. As a single, integrated whole, the Mosaic Law
focused on the Tabernacle (and later the Temple) where the presence of God
resided. Offerings, rituals, and holy day observances conducted there
anticipated the day when God would come in the flesh as the promised Messiah.
For the orderly conduct of these rituals and for the oral communication of
God’s written Word, the Law instituted the Levitical priesthood (Deut. 31:9—13;
33:10).
The Mosaic Law was a new
phenomenon, a thorough system of private and public duty in
Israel under the immediate rule of God. Many of its provisions echo divine
commandments given in the Dispensation of the Gentiles when no chosen nation
existed. This continuity exists because the ethnic heritage of Israel
originated in that preceding age and because divine guidance for each epoch of
human history comes from the same unchanging source, God Himself.
I
designate the way of life for citizens of Israel as the ritual plan of God, in contrast to the protocol plan of God for Church Age believers.[10]
The rituals prescribed by the Mosaic Law were a dramatic “shadow of what is to
come” (Col. 2:17; Heb. 8:5; 10:1). They were types and teaching aids portraying
Christ, salvation, and fellowship with God. The Levitical priesthood’s function
and every individual’s daily life included participation in ceremonies that
depicted these tremendous doctrines. When Christ later came in the flesh, the
reality fulfilled the shadows, making this magnificent heritage of rituals
suddenly obsolete (Heb. 8:13). A new code was required, and a new code was
provided.22
Now
in the Church Age the believer’s way of life manifests the all-powerful reality
rather than the shadow. The ritual plan of God remains part of Scripture,
documenting God’s faithfulness and describing Christ’s person and work.
Therefore, an in-depth study of the Age of Israel, found in Exodus 12 through
the book of Malachi, is an essential and highly instructive part of every
Christian’s knowledge of Bible doctrine.
Israel demonstrated and communicated the grace of God, the greatest expression of which was that she would be the nation through which the Savior would be born into the world. The sequence of promises that guarantee the coming of Christ, beginning with the “Seed” revealed to Adam and Eve (Gen. 3:15) and continuing with the promises made to Noah (Gen. 9:26), proceeded to become more specific. The Messiah would come from the race of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; from the nation of Israel; from the tribe of Judah; from the family of Jesse; from the royal lineage of King David. Since the founding of the Jewish race, the promises of the messianic line coincide with the covenants between God and His chosen people.
DIVINE
COVENANTS WITH ISRAEL
The nation of Israel is
defined by five divine covenants. The first two covenants, sworn during the age
of the patriarchs, prepared the way for founding the nation. God made the
remaining three after the Jewish race had become the Jewish nation.
1. The
Abrahamic Covenant (Gen. 12:1—3; 13:16; 22:15—18; 26:4; 28:14; 35:11; Ex.
6:2—8)
2. The
Palestinian Covenant (Gen. 13:15; 15:18—21; 26:3—5; 28:13— 15; 35:12; Ex.
6:4, 8; Num. 34:1—12; Deut. 30:1—9; Josh. 1:2—4; Jer. 32:36—44; Ezek. 11:16—21;
36:21—38)
3. The
Mosaic Law (Gen.—Deut.)
a. Codex I: The Freedom Code (the Decalogue, or
Ten Commandments)
b. Codex II: The Spiritual Code (including a
complete shadow presentation of Christ and His saving work [christology and
soteriology])
c. Codex III: The Establishment Code (civil
statutes for Israel)
4. The
Davidic Covenant (2 Sam. 7:8—17; Ps. 89:20—37)
5. The New
Covenant to Israel (Jer. 31:31—34; cf. Heb. 8:8—12;
10:15—17)
These
remarkable covenants are accurately interpreted and most clearly understood in
terms of Israel as a nation. They did not and never will belong to Gentiles
living throughout the world (Deut. 4:8; Rom. 2:12—14), although Israel was
founded to benefit all nations of the earth. Nor did God’s covenants with
Israel anticipate the Church, which transcends ethnic distinctions and national
boundaries, and which in Old Testament times remained an undisclosed mystery
(Acts 15:5, 24; Rom. 6:14; Gal. 2:19).
How
do these covenants define the nation of Israel? God’s covenants to Abraham
identify God’s elect people and the land He will give them. Designated the
Abrahamic Covenant and the Palestinian (or Real Estate) Covenant, these two
divine contracts were the basis for God’s deliverance of the Jews from Egyptian
slavery and for the founding of the nation in the promised land (Ex. 6:2— 9).
The Mosaic Law established policy for
ethical, spiritual, and civil life within the Old Testament nation. The Davidic
Covenant designates the ruling dynasty of
Israel. And the New Covenant promises restoration
for the nation under divine discipline and guarantees eventual fulfillment
of all unconditional covenants.
CONDITIONAL AND UNCONDITIONAL COVENANTS
Four
of these covenants are unconditional and eternal; one is conditional and
temporal. God will execute the Abrahamic, Palestinian, Davidic, and New
Covenants to Israel with no conditions attached. He promised to do certain
things, and He will. His immutable character guarantees His faithfulness. But
since the fulfillment of these covenants will last forever (Gen. 13:15; 2 Sam. 7:13, 16; Jer. 31:34), who could be the
beneficiaries? Only someone who personally possesses eternal life can be a
recipient of eternal blessings. Therefore, the original definition of God’s
elect people answers this question of beneficiaries: God established the Jews
as a regenerate race, founded through
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as believers in
Christ. Not all Israel is Israel (Rom. 9:6—8). Individuals who were
genetically, culturally, or religiously Jews were not party to the
unconditional covenants unless they personally believed in the promised
Messiah. His person and work are revealed in the one conditional covenant.
The
Mosaic Law alone contains conditional clauses. If the Jews would do their part, then God would do His part (Ex. 19:3—6; Josh. 1:7-8). The Mosaic
Law is a single whole, which can be studied under three categories: Codex 1, the freedom code; Codex II, the spiritual code; and Codex III,
the establishment code. Codex I protected the Jew’s ability to make decisions;
Codex II presented the most important decision he faced; and Codex III
prescribed the environment most conducive to making good decisions.
The
spiritual aspect of the Mosaic Law proclaims the grace of God as the way of
salvation and identifies faith as the nonmeritorious manner of entering into
the eternal blessings of all the unconditional covenants. Specifically, this codex
of the Law presents the Messiah and explains His role as Savior. He is depicted
in animal sacrifices, in the precise construction and furnishing of the
Tabernacle, in the ceremonial clothing of the Levitical priesthood, and in the
rituals that the priests performed.[11]
If any Jew believed in Christ, then God not only would grant salvation
to that individual but in the same instant would also make him party to the
four unconditional covenants.
Moral
and civil statutes supported the central spiritual thrust of the Jewish nation.
Codex I defined human freedom; Codex III revealed the divine laws of
establishment for Jewish government, jurisprudence, military service,
economics, diet, hygiene, soil conservation, quarantine, and for every other
significant aspect of life in Israel.[12]
If the citizens of Israel would
obey the mandates of Codices I and III, then
God would temporally bless them as individuals and the nation as a whole
(Deut. 28:1—14). With God as its source, this divine covenant far surpassed
contemporary systems of national law, such as the overpraised Babylonian Code
of Hamurabi.
All
divine covenants to Israel will be executed by the Lord Jesus Christ. At
present, only the Mosaic Law has been fulfilled completely. In His first advent
Christ fulfilled the entire Law, including all three codices,
by His sinless life and substitutionary death for the sins of mankind (Matt.
5:17;
Rom. 10:4). In His second advent He will fulfill the Abrahamic, Palestinian,
Davidic, and New Covenants when He returns to earth to restore Israel and rule
over her. Even at the peak of Israel’s glory under Solomon, the unconditional
covenants were not fulfilled. Israel has never occupied all of the vast lands
granted by the Palestinian Covenant. But God has not forgotten His people; He
will keep His promises (Gen. 28:14). Both in the Millennium and in eternity,
Israel will enjoy a glory she has never yet known.
THE CLIENT NATION
The
covenants that God made with Israel created a particular relationship of
blessing between God and the nation. Israel was and will be the unique client nation to God, His specially
protected representative on earth (Ex. 19:5—6; Hosea 4:6). Definite responsibilities belonged to the Old Testament
client nation under the Mosaic Law. Codices I and III protected human life,
freedom, privacy, and property. Codex II charged individual believers and
communicators of God’s Word with accurately presenting the Gospel and teaching
Bible doctrine within the nation. And missionaries from the client nation were
to carry the Gospel and Bible doctrine to nonclient nations (Deut. 4:6—8;
Jonah).
Client-nation Israel was answerable directly to God for the custodianship of His Word. Woe to any outsiders who dared to persecute the Jews. God committed this protective principle to writing in the anti-Semitism clause of the Abrahamic Covenant.
And
I will bless those who bless you,
And
the one who curses you I will curse. (Gen. 12:3a, NASB)
This solemn clause is part of an unconditional covenant and, therefore, remains in force to this day. God protects the Jewish people through every generation of history so that He can ultimately fulfill His covenants with them.
The
privileges enjoyed by client-nation Israel implied responsibility. Not only
were the blessings greater, but so was the potential for national divine
discipline if Israel refused to obey divine mandates (Lev. 26). Woe to the Jews
if they repudiated their trust as God’s representatives on earth (Hosea 4:6).
Israel’s
history is a panorama of successes and failures in relation to her
client-nation responsibilities. A series of five Jewish client nations evolved,
as presented in the categorical outline of the dispensations. This sequence
ended when the long-anticipated Messiah arrived in the flesh.
The
virgin birth of Christ marked the beginning of a new dispensation. By the time
of our Lord’s birth in 4 B.C., Israel no longer functioned as a client nation
to God. Instead, she had distorted the Law into a tyranny of religious
legalism. Petty, corrupt, and self-righteous, she had lost her spiritual vigor.
She could only chafe under the political and military domination of the Roman
Empire. This moralistic degeneracy in Israel continued throughout the
Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union and extended into the Church Age until
finally God placed the nation under maximum discipline in AD. 70.
Divine
discipline to Israel may be traced from 63 B.C. when the Roman general Pompey
captured Jerusalem and desecrated the Temple by entering the Holy of Holies. In
54 B.C. Crassus pillaged the Temple. During the Parthian invasion of Palestine
in 40 B.C., Herod escaped to Rome and was appointed King of Judea by the Roman
Senate. The Jews refused to recognize him as king, but after three years of
fighting he captured Jerusalem and purged the Sanhedrin. In 15 B.C. Agrippa
visited Palestine on an inspection tour for the Emperor Augustus to insure that
Rome’s interests were being served. Herod, who was not a Jew, rebuilt the
Temple, dedicating it in 10 B.C.
The
year in which Christ was born was an unsettling one in Jewish politics. The
Pharisees attempted a coup d’etat, Herod
died in a rage, and his son, Herod Archelaus, became the ethnarch under Rome,
inheriting the part of his father’s domains that included Samaria, Judea, and
Idumea. In A.D. 6, Rome deposed the inept and aggravating Archelaus. Judea was
then absorbed into the Roman Empire as part of a third class province with
Coponius as its first imperial procurator, or governor. The Jews bristled under
a succession of procurators, among them Pontius Pilate, whose administration
began in A.D. 26.
The
Roman province of Judea had long since ceased to function as a client nation to
God.[13]
Throughout the dispensation of Christ’s first advent, from approximately 4 B.C.
to A.D. 30, Judea was a dominated nation in spiritual degeneracy. She continued
to exist only to make a decision regarding Jesus Christ as Messiah. Having
rejected Christ, the spiritually and politically rebellious Jewish state
survived for forty years under the principle of grace before judgment. Then, in
A.D. 70, four Roman legions destroyed Jerusalem.
4
The Christocentric Dispensations
THE DISPENSATION OF THE HYPOSTATIC UNION
HYPOSTATIC UNION DEFINED
THE SIX DISPENSATIONS FALL
into three categories: theocentric, christocentric, and eschatological. We have
just described the two theocentric dispensations—the Age of the Gentiles and
the Age of the Jews—which occurred before Christ came in the flesh. With the
virgin birth of Christ, the christocentric ages began. The Dispensation of the
Hypostatic Union and the Dispensation of the Church are the hub of human
history because of who Christ is and the Church’s relationship to Him.
“Hypostatic
union” is the theological term for the incarnate person of Christ, the union of
God and man. At the virgin birth, God the Son took upon Himself true humanity
and became a new person— the God-Man, the unique person of the universe (John
1:1—14; Rom. 1:2—4; Phil. 2:5—11; 1 Tim. 3:16). The Greek word hupostasis means “substantial nature,
essence, actual being, reality.”[14]
Christ unites in Himself the essence of God and the essence of man,
forming a new hupostasis, a new
united essence, called the hypostatic union.
In
the person of the incarnate Christ, two natures are inseparably united but
without loss or mixture of separate identities, without loss or transfer of
properties or attributes. The union is both personal (the God-Man is one
person) and eternal (He will be the God-Man forever).[15]
Undiminished deity took upon Himself true humanity in order to be the Savior (Heb.
2: 14—15; Phil. 2:7—8), the mediator between God and man (Job 9:2, 32—33; 1
Tim. 2:5—6), the great high priest
representing man before God (Heb. 7:4—5, 14, 28; 10:5, 10—14), and the human
king of Israel in fulfillment of the Davidic Covenant (2 Sam. 7:8—16; Ps.
89:20—37). The hypostatic union will continue forever in resurrection body
(Heb. 1:8, 12), but I designate the approximately thirty-three-year period of
our Lord’s first advent the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union because this
period of history began at the resounding moment in which God became the
God-Man (Heb. 10:5).
The
Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union is the epoch recorded in the Gospels, the
first four books of the New Testament. This period began with the virgin birth
of Christ and terminated with His death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and
session at the right hand of the Father in heaven.
INTERPRETING THE TEACHINGS OF CHRIST
Scholars
have always found the Gospels exceedingly difficult to interpret. These four
books chronicle a unique era in God’s plan for human history. The Gospels
reveal our Lord’s sinless life and saving work, but the record of His earthly
ministry also includes His proclamation of the long-awaited kingdom of God in
Israel, His prophecy of Israel’s future persecution, and finally His
announcement of a divine administration significantly different from that of
Israel. These diverse teachings coalesce in a dispensational framework.
The
period of Christ’s first advent relates to both Israel and the Church but was
itself neither Israel nor Church. In fact, the Dispensation of the Hypostatic
Union separates Israel from the
Church. Consequently, an accurate interpretation of the Gospels
requires an understanding of dispensations.
With
absolute authority Jesus Christ presented Himself to Israel as the Son of
David, the King of Israel, the Messiah (Matt. 4:17). His presentation took many
forms, which Matthew in particular recorded. Christ fulfilled Old Testament
prophecy (Matt. 1:5—6; 2:17— 18;
4:14—16; etc.). He performed miracles which drew attention to Himself as the
Savior of mankind and King of the Jews (Matt. 4:23—25; etc.). He announced
policy for His kingdom (Matt. 5—7). He explained His identity from Scripture
(Matt. 11:25—30; 12:1—8). He described His own death on the cross as the “blood
of the covenant [the Mosaic Law]” (Matt. 26:28; cf. Matt. 5:17; Rom. 10:4; Heb.
10:1).[16]
In fact, Christ came to fulfill all five divine
covenants with Israel—conditional and unconditional alike (Matt. 8—9).
Our Lord’s sinless life and respect for human freedom fulfilled the commandments in Codex I of the Mosaic Law. His sinlessness and substitutionary death for the sins of mankind were the realities long anticipated by ceremonies in Codex II of the Law. His love for Israel demonstrates His fulfillment of the establishment laws in Codex III (Matt. 22:21). Only He could perfectly execute the entire Law. He came to fulfill every jot and tittle of the Law (Matt. 5:18) whether or not the Jews accepted Him as their king. He made salvation possible, and through His saving work provided entry for the Jews into the unconditional covenants. Any Jew who would believe in Christ as the Messiah became a beneficiary of all the covenants (John 1:12—13).
If
enough of the Jews had believed in Christ at that time, He would have executed
all the divine covenants with Israel, establishing then and there the promised
kingdom of God on earth. But Jewish rejection of the king postponed the kingdom
(Matt. 23:37—39). Christ therefore prophesied the future of Israel in His
magnificent Olivet Discourse (Matt. 24—25). In this discourse He painted a
vivid picture of Israel’s ultimate tribulation and His own return to deliver
His people and fulfill the remaining four unconditional covenants in His
millennial reign.
FREEDOM OF CHOICE UNDER GOD’S PLAN
Jesus
Christ stood at a fork in the road of history. He gave human volition an
option. He proclaimed that the kingdom of God was “at hand,” not that it had actually
arrived (Matt. 4:17). In other words, the king was present, but the kingdom’s
arrival was contingent on the attitude of Israel. Would the Jews accept or
reject their king? We know in hindsight which way history went, but at the time
it was an open question. After He offered the kingdom to Israel and purchased
salvation for all mankind, what would be the next dispensation? Would the
earthly reign of Christ commence, or would some other system of divine
administration begin?
Christ
presented the kingdom to Israel as a legitimate offer, even though omniscient
God knew in advance that Israel would reject Christ as Messiah (Isa. 8:14b—15; Rom. 9:33a). In eternity past God knew
that the Church Age would chronologically follow our Lord’s first advent. However,
God provides real options and opportunities so that man has genuine freedom of
choice.[17]
God’s veracity guarantees that any divine offer is legitimate. God is
truth. If He made an “offer” to the Jews and held them responsible for their
decision (Luke 13:34—35) when no genuine option existed, He would be violating
His veracity and justice. But God cannot compromise His own nature.
The
Gospels seem difficult to understand because they describe a real option
presented to Israel, which Israel rejected. But how could Christ have died for
sins yet still have established His earthly kingdom at the same time? Christ’s
death on the cross did not depend on Jewish rejection. The Romans alone could
have executed Him, and immediately after His resurrection He could have set up
His kingdom. This scenario, which in fact the disciples suggested in Acts 1:6,
is only one of numerous possibilities. But one is enough to answer the
question. Ironically, the nation did reject her king and even played a role in
His death. The self-serving antagonism of the Jewish leaders was representative
of negative volition in the overwhelming majority of Jewish citizens.
God’s
plan is never deterred by human negative volition. He remains sovereign while
man exercises genuinely free self-determination. By divine decree the
sovereignty of God and the free will of man coexist in human history. Sovereign
God extends His magnificent grace to man, and the opportunity to accept the
grace of God is real in every case. This truth is evident in the Gospel, in
which “whoever”—everyone—is invited to believe in Christ for salvation (John
3:16), but many refuse. Man’s refusal to accept what God offers and the
subsequent continuation of God’s plan do not imply that no option existed in
the first place. God genuinely offers His grace and desires that everyone
accept it (2 Pet. 3:9). But He is never threatened by man’s refusal. In fact,
human negative volition
may
elicit extraordinary demonstrations of divine power that glorify Him throughout
the earth (Ex. 9:16; Rom. 8:32; 9:17). In the workings of sovereign God even
“the wrath of man shall praise [Him]” (Ps. 76:10).
The issue of free will lies at the heart of
the angelic conflict. And here at the crux of human history—in the earthly
ministry of Jesus Christ—the Bible lucidly documents that God extends genuine
options to man. While divine sovereignty remains supreme, man’s responsibility
is real. The grace of God toward man not only expresses His love but also
forces Satan and the fallen angels to remember that God’s infinite goodness was
poured out to them as well. Human and angelic free will are comparable. Divine
grace and human responsibility remind Satan again and again that he bears the
full blame for his own revolt against God.
Human
history as the appeal trial of the angelic conflict reveals the essence of God.
He is gracious, but because He is also sovereign, His plan must go on.
Sovereignty implies that His patience toward
mankind in delaying judgment and His kindness in granting opportunity after opportunity
to accept His grace cannot go on
indefinitely. As powerfully illustrated in the
first advent of Christ, when Christ turned away from unbelieving Israel and
founded the Church, sovereign God must
ultimately proceed with His perfect plan. Satan
and his fallen angels and human unbelievers will ultimately suffer the full and
eternal consequences of revolution against
sovereign, omnipotent God, while this same God
proceeds to bless believers forever in the eternal state.
Given every opportunity to believe in
Christ as Savior, the Jews adamantly refused. Certainly there were remarkable
exceptions. The disciples, the three Marys, and even Nicodemus show that a
remnant of believers can be found in every generation of every dispensation.
But the remnant in Israel was too small to counterbalance the vast majority
(Matt. 13:10—16).
Israel’s rejection of her Messiah does not
mean that Jesus Christ’s mission on earth ended in failure. He postponed the
earthly kingdom of God and initiated a second ministry. As the prophet of the
Church, He was the first to announce the mystery doctrine (John 14—17). Thus,
in the Upper Room Discourse our Lord unveiled something entirely new: the
protocol plan of God for the Church Age. To a degree never before witnessed in
human history, the Church Age demonstrates God’s magnificent grace and infinite
power.
ACCURACY IN INTERPRETATION
DIFFERENT MESSAGES FOR DIFFERENT AUDIENCES. The
truth taught by Jesus Christ can apply to believers of any dispensation, but
there is a difference between a legitimate application
from a passage of Scripture and the precise interpretation of that passage. There may be many edifying
applications that greatly benefit believers in a devotional or practical way,
but the objective of rigorous scholarship is a precisely accurate
interpretation. Interpretation attempts to discover what the passage means.
Each passage must be interpreted in its context in terms of those to whom it is
addressed.
Who
is the audience to whom Christ speaks in the Gospels? The Gospels can be
accurately interpreted only when Christ’s ministry to Israel is understood and
distinguished from His ministry to the Church. Several illustrations will
emphasize the dispensational orientation required in analyzing the Gospels. In
both the Olivet and Upper Room Discourses, Jesus was speaking to the same
twelve men, His disciples. He delivered both of these great messages after
Israel had rejected Him as Messiah. And both are prophetic. But there are
significant differences.
The
immediate context of the Olivet Discourse deals with Christ’s prediction of the
destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. The Temple was the focal point of
Jewish worship, and the disciples, as Jews, were concerned about the promised
future of their nation. They asked Christ the same question they would ask Him
again just before His ascension: When would He establish His kingdom as the
completion and consummation of Jewish history (Matt. 24:3; Acts 1:6)? When
would He fulfill God’s unconditional covenants with Israel?
At
the time of the Olivet Discourse, the disciples knew little if anything about
the Church. They may not have known that there would even be an intervening
period between the first and second advents of Christ. The Olivet Discourse
answers a specific question about Israel and
guarantees a future for Israel by announcing the Tribulation and the
inauguration of the Millennium. The events Christ mentions fulfill Old
Testament prophecies of Israel’s future (Matt. 24:15, 29—31). They center in
Judea (Matt. 24:16). They recognize the Jewish Sabbath (Matt. 24:20b). And they anticipate false
applications of the distinctly Jewish hope for the Messiah (Matt. 24:23). In
fact, Jesus explicitly declares that the Jewish people will be preserved “until
all these things take place” (Matt. 24:34). The context and content of Christ’s
message point to Israel alone. Therefore, the Olivet Discourse is addressed
only to Israel in a context concerning divine discipline against the Jews for
rejecting the Messiah (Matt. 23).
In
contrast, Christ addressed the Upper Room Discourse to His disciples as the
nucleus of the approaching Church Age (John
17:20— 21). These same twelve Jewish men were now considered separate from the
nation of Israel, which Christ identifies with “the world” that rejected Him
(John 13:33—34; 15:18—16:4). In context He anticipated His betrayal and
announced His glorification (John 13:31—32). This message of His glorification
reveals unprecedented assets for the Church Age believer, which will indeed
glorify Him to the maximum.
The
content of this discourse is new. Nowhere in the entire national heritage of
Israel was any believer personally in union with the Messiah, indwelt by Him,
or indwelt by the Holy Spirit as described in this final discourse before the
cross (John 14:17, 20, 23; 17:21— 23, 26). An hour of momentous change had
arrived (John 16:1— 2, 32). Only the Church was in view.
This
sweeping change, fully presented in the New Testament epistles, departs from
God’s original covenants with Israel. By definition Israel was consecrated and
separate from other nations, but now Jews and Gentiles were to be
indistinguishable in Christ. God is not contradictory. The conclusion is that
Israel was no longer in the spotlight. She had rejected her Messiah. God
remained true to His word by not permanently rejecting her, but He was taking
the initiative by turning her refusal into an opportunity to demonstrate His
grace even more in the Church. As a result, His future entry into His kingdom
as the Son of David will be all the greater. In terms of divine administration,
God had shifted His historical focus to a new body of believers, the Church.
These
two famous prophetic discourses by our Lord differ significantly even though
they were presented only two days apart (Matt. 26:1—2). But they perfectly mesh
within a dispensational fire framework. Future Israel, not the Church, must be
alert for the me triumphant second advent of Christ (Matt. 24:42—25:13). The on
Church, not Israel, is responsible for utilizing the new outpouring in] of
grace that glorifies the physically absent but indwelling Christ (Matt.
14:13—15; 15:7; 16:23; cf. 14:19—23).
TEACHING FOR PRESENT AND FUTURE HEARERS. Our
Lord’s Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5—7) further illustrates the need for careful
interpretation. This was not a private discourse with the twelve disciples,
although some of them were present. To whom was this sermon addressed? To
Israel? To the Church? To both or neither?
Jesus
was speaking to the large crowd of believers gathered around Him on the
mountainside (Matt. 5:1; 7:28). His ministry to Israel was underway because He
had not yet been rejected by His people (Matt. 12). He was sitting before true,
regenerate Israel clarifying the character of God’s kingdom and righteousness and
contrasting the Mosaic Law’s real purpose with the legalism of the Pharisees.
Christ was not presenting a way of salvation. His message concerned the
believer’s postsalvation way of life, which alters from age to age. His
teaching differed from the Mosaic Law which was instituted for Israel. The
question is: To whom do these instructions pertain?
First
of all, the Sermon on the Mount was addressed to the Jewish followers of Jesus
who heard Him deliver it.[18]
But certain aspects of the message anticipated a future fulfillment—perhaps
near future, perhaps distant future, depending on whether or not Israel would
accept her king. The hearers realized that all the beatitudes in the opening
lines of the sermon had not yet been accomplished even though the Messiah had
arrived (Matt. 5:3—11). But if the Messiah spoke these “blessings,” the
listeners could take comfort, fully confident that all would be accomplished.
Little
did the crowd realize that Christ would be rejected and that the complete
fulfillment of His words would not occur in His first advent or in the yet
undisclosed Church Age. Even now the meek have not yet “inherited the earth,”
nor is God’s will “done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10). His will is done on earth in the sense that
believers can and do accomplish His purpose for their lives, but His will
cannot be done “as it is in heaven” until Christ deposes Satan and establishes
His own regime. The meek will inherit the earth only under His gracious,
all-powerful administration in that future dispensation, the Millennium.
Christ
was announcing policy for His kingdom. But He was speaking to His current
audience concerning not only the promised kingdom but the immediate present as
well, before the kingdom would be established. This is why He needed to mention
persecution for righteousness (Matt. 5:12), deliverance from evil (Matt. 5:37,
39), and false prophets (Matt. 7:15). These caveats do not describe the perfect
environment of the Millennium. For His then-present audience, Christ clarified
the believer’s way of life at a time when the Mosaic Law was so greatly
distorted by the scribes and Pharisees. Such instructions offered encouragement
and hope to those who witnessed His earthly ministry yet never saw the reality
of His announced blessings. He cared for His hearers in their current state,
even while proclaiming the kingdom that He would establish for them if enough
of the Jews would accept Him as Messiah.
Christ
taught His followers to pray “Thy kingdom come” (Matt. 6:9—13), a prayer which
was relevant at a time when sufficient positive volition in Israel would have
ushered in the kingdom. But this petition ceased to be pertinent when in fact
that “evil generation” refused Him (Matt. 12:45).
Nor will it apply after the Millennium is actually established. Prayer is
not needed for what has already come to pass.
Because
the Church had not been announced and did not yet exist when Christ spoke on
the mountainside, no part of our
Lord’s sermon is addressed specifically to the Church. The correct conclusion
is that the Sermon on the Mount belongs to the Dispensation of the Hypostatic
Union and to the Millennium, but not to the Church Age.
Church
Age believers can learn much from the Sermon on the Mount, however. God is the source
of every portion of Scripture, none of which should be ignored as a repository
of principles for
application. Many points in
Christ’s message to Israel are also given
to Christians. For example, epistles addressed to the Church contain
comparable instructions about judging (Rom. 14:10—13; cf. Matt. 7:1—5),
logistical grace (1 Pet. 5:7; cf.
Matt. 6:25—34), faith-rest (Heb.
4:1—10; cf. Matt. 6:31—34), and the pivot of mature believers, which ha is the
invisible, stabilizing influence within a nation (Eph. 1:21—23; cf. Matt.
5:13—16).
Passages
that directly address the Church establish Church Age H’ doctrine. This basic
principle of biblical interpretation is derived of from the very existence of
dispensational distinctions in Scripture. This principle respects those
distinctions, balanced by an equal respect for continuities that relate the
dispensations to one another. Church Age doctrine is often illuminated by the
ways in which God reveals Himself to other audiences in other passages on the
same subject. Indeed, when the epistles present a doctrine to the Church, all
other biblical passages on that subject must be studied under the principle of
comparing Scripture with Scripture.
For
example, the Sermon on the Mount offers extensive ethical guidance but with no
mention of the ministry of God the Holy Spirit. This does not mean that
believers today can exclude the filling of the Spirit from their Christian
lives. There are two principal reasons:
first, the New Testament
epistles command Church Age believers to walk in the Spirit; and second, the
Sermon on the Mount was not addressed to the Church but to believers in an era
when the filling of the Spirit was not available. Still, the Sermon’s
description of the way in which a believer should treat other people sheds
light on mandates in the epistles concerning Christian love.
The
Olivet and Upper Room Discourses and the Sermon on the Mount illustrate
difficulties in interpreting the Gospels that are resolved by the doctrine of
dispensations. This doctrine is the biblical system of interpretation that
makes the various teachings of Christ lucid through understanding the different
dispensations to which His messages pertain. The uniqueness of our Lord’s
ministry also supports the view that the incarnation of Christ was a separate
dispensation.
THE INCARNATION AS A SEPARATE DISPENSATION
FOUR REASONS. The Incarnation, though brief, is a dispensation
in itself. The presence of the hypostatic union is too significant to be merely
part of another age. From God’s overall perspective of human history, something
momentous was happening on earth.
At
least four approaches lead to the conclusion that these thirty-three years
constitute a separate dispensation. First, God revealed Himself to mankind as
never before in history—in the person of Christ. In the Scriptures the life of
Christ is recorded four times over, from four perspectives, unlike any other
period of history.
THE INCARNATION AS A DISPENSATION
Second,
God designed the incarnation of Jesus Christ to purchase salvation for all
mankind in every dispensation. From God’s viewpoint this extraordinary period
throws light across all of history and is not hidden away as part of another
dispensation. God’s design for the incarnation of Christ also included an
unprecedented system of power that enabled the humanity of Christ to accomplish
His mission.
Third,
our Lord’s incarnation is a separate dispensation because it plays a major role
in defining other dispensations. One of its characteristics—resurrection
becomes a distinguishing mark of the completion of each subsequent
dispensation.
And
fourth, this approximately thirty-three-year dispensation is like a cornerstone
or hinge that connects, yet divides, two very different dispensations. Israel
and the Church are different from one another because of the Incarnation, which itself belongs to neither of
these dispensations. We will briefly present each of these four approaches.
GOD REVEALED IN CHRIST Dramatic change is the
opening theme of the book of Hebrews. At the announced place and time, God
fulfilled His promises to send the Messiah. Divine revelation now came to
mankind in the form of Christ Himself.
God,
after He spoke long ago [in previous dispensations] to the fathers in the
prophets in many portions [of the written canon of Scripture] and in many ways
[divine communication to the prophets], in these last days [the Dispensation of
the Hypostatic Union] has spoken to us in His Son... [who] is the flashing forth
of His glory and the exact representation of His essence. (Heb. 1:1—3)
This
long-awaited period of history, called “these last days” in Hebrews 1:2, is
also called the dispensation of “the fulness of time.” This term is used for
each of the two christocentric dispensations the Age of the Hypostatic Union
(Gal. 4:4) and the Church Age (Eph. 1:10), indicating the close relationship
between these two dispensations.
But
when the fulness of the time came [a new dispensation], God sent forth His
Son, born of a woman, born under the [Mosaic] Law, in order that He might
redeem those who were under the Law [by living a sinless life so that He was a
qualified substitute to receive divine judgment for man’s sins], that we [who
believe in Him] might receive the adoption as sons. (Gal. 4:4—5, NASB)
The
uniqueness of the dispensation of our Lord’s first advent is also the subject
of the first chapter of the Gospel of John. In terms of divine revelation, the written Word of the Old Testament passed
the baton to the Living Word in the
person of the God-Man, Jesus Christ.
In
the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God...
And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us, and we beheld His glory, glory
as of the uniquely born One from the Father, full of grace and truth.. . No man
has seen God at any time; the uniquely born God who is in the bosom of the
Father, He has explained Him. (John 1:1, 14, 18)
THE GREAT POWER EXPERIMENT God became man and purchased
salvation for all mankind of all dispensations—past, present, and future. The
incomparable influence of Christ’s first advent supports the conclusion that
this period is not contained within any other dispensation but must be treated
separately and defined in its own terms. During these thirty-three years, the
Gospel became an accomplished reality for all dispensations.
The
Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union was also distinguished from previous
dispensations by the system of power that God the Father designed to sustain
the humanity of Christ in accomplishing man’s salvation. I have coined a term
for this unprecedented sphere of power: the divine
dynasphere.[19]
According
to the Father’s plan, Christ did not use the omnipotence of His own deity to support
His humanity (Phil. 2:7-8). Instead, God the Holy Spirit constantly empowered
and sustained the humanity of Christ amid the hostility of the devil’s world
(Matt. 4:1; 12:18, 28; Luke 4:1, 14-15, 18; John 3:34; Rom. 1:4; Heb. 9:14). In
addition to the ministry of the Holy Spirit, the divine dynasphere also
included powerful assets for the humanity of Christ to master and utilize by
His own human volition. Our Lord used these divine problem-solving devices in
executing the salvation plan of the Father.
Because
of the divine dynasphere, the period of the incarnation of Christ may be called
the great power experiment of the
hypostatic union. An experiment in this sense is a demonstration of a known
truth. The known truth is that the omnipotence of God the Holy Spirit and the
perfect efficacy of divine problem-solving devices were fully able to sustain
the humanity of Christ. In the power of the divine dynasphere, Christ perfectly
fulfilled every demand of the Mosaic Law throughout His life and death. The divine
dynasphere proved effective even under the maximum pressure of being judged for
all the sins of mankind. The Holy Spirit constantly sustained Him on the cross
(Heb. 9:14), and the problem-solving device that I call “sharing the happiness
of God” enabled Him to endure the judgment of all human sins (Heb. 12:2).
To
anticipate our description of the next dispensation, the great power experiment
of the hypostatic union has been extended as the great power experiment of the Church Age. Christ bequeathed to
every Church Age believer the very system of power that sustained His humanity
during the Age of the Hypostatic Union (John 7:37-39; 15:10-11). Our Lord’s
proven source of power is now available to the Church Age believer for
executing the postsalvation plan of God.
The
Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union establishes the precedent for the Church
Age. Christ lived in the prototype divine dynasphere; the Christian can live in
the operational divine dynasphere. The 2 Church Age believer has the privilege
of living by the system of divine dynamics under which Christ lived, not by the
ritual system of Israel which Christ totally fulfilled and abrogated (Rom.
10:4; Eph. 2:15). We will discuss this precedent later.[20]
Obviously, the “known truth” in the Church Age power experiment is that
divine power and problem-solving devices are capable of handling any situation
that could possibly confront us.
GIVING DEFINITION TO OTHER DISPENSATIONS. We
have noted two reasons for regarding
our Lord’s incarnation as a separate dispensation. This unique period revealed
God in His Son and
purchased salvation for
people of all dispensations. Now a third reason: The incarnation of Christ
helps to identify the other dispensations. This period of time, which is the
central focus of human history and which defines the dispensations, is itself a
dispensation.
As
already noted, a major purpose of Old Testament Israel was to anticipate the
coming Messiah. Israel was custodian of a shadow Christology. Like the shadow
of a person that appears around a corner before he does, Israel’s spiritual
life took its shape from the reality of Christ who had yet to appear on the
scene of history. Other dispensations also are patterned after the first advent
of Christ. God took upon Himself true humanity to win the victory of the cross,
to be the substitute for man’s sins. Because God is forming the Church in honor
of that victory, the glorified Christ is called the Head of the Church (Eph. 4:15; 5:23; Col. 1:18). Also, Christ became true humanity in order to
fulfill the Davidic Covenant to Israel, on which the Millennium is based.
Because He will rule in the Millennium, Christ is called the Son of David
(Matt. 1:1; 12:23; 22:41—46). Each of these dispensations—the Age of Israel,
the Church Age, and the Millennium—is defined in terms of the first advent of
Christ.
From
another perspective, each dispensation beginning with the incarnation of Christ
terminates with a resurrection. This repetition treats the first advent of
Christ as a pattern for dispensations, hence equivalent to a dispensation
itself. The resurrection of Christ is the first and, so far, the only
resurrection in history (1 Tim. 6:16). Other individuals have come back from
the dead, but they were resuscitated, not resurrected (John 11:43—44).
Resuscitation restores an individual to his mortal body, but he subsequently
dies again (John 12:10). Resurrection gives the believer his resurrection body
so that never again will he die (1 Cor. 15:54).
The
sequence of resurrections is introduced by the phrase “all shall be made alive,
but each in his own order” (1 Cor. 15:22-23). The “orders” are dispensations.
The resurrection of believers is dispensational. After this introduction, four
phrases correspond to the final four dispensations beginning with the
Incarnation. The Dispensation of the
Hypostatic Union culminated with the resurrection of Christ, the “first
fruits of those who are asleep” (1 Cor. 15:20, 23; Rev. 1:5). The Church Age will end with the Rapture, or
resurrection of the royal family—”those who are Christ’s”—who are next in line
to receive resurrection bodies (1 Cor. 15:23). The Tribulation will
conclude with the second advent of Christ—”when He delivers up the kingdom” (1
Cor. 15:24; cf. Rev. 20:4), at which time the Old Testament believers and
tribulational martyrs receive resurrection bodies (Job 19:25-26). Finally, this
progression of resurrections will culminate with the resurrection of all
believers of the Millennium —“when He
has abolished all rule and all authority and power” of Satan’s final revolution
(1 Cor. 15:24; cf. Rev. 20:5, 7-10).
CHRIST THE CORNERSTONE. A biblical analogy
illustrates what has been said already about the Incarnation as a separate
dispensation. This illustration also depicts the separation of Israel and the
Church, a vital truth which gives such importance to realizing that the
Incarnation stands as a distinct dispensation between these two ages.
The
Bible describes our Lord’s relationship to Israel and to the Church in several
ways, but one example will suffice in this general study of dispensations.
Jesus Christ is frequently described as “the chief cornerstone” (Ps. 118: 22;
Isa. 28:16; Matt. 21:42; Mark 12:10; Luke 20:17; Acts 4:10-12; 1 Cor. 3:11; 1
Pet. 2:4-7). This expression must be interpreted in light of the times in which
it was written.
What
was a cornerstone in the ancient world? Two definitions come down to us, one
regarding a building’s foundation, the other t pertaining to structure above the foundation. A cornerstone was t
a stone laid at one corner of a foundation as the normal starting c point for
construction. A stone at the intersection of two walls, uniting them, was also
called a cornerstone. Both meanings illustrate Christ’s relationship with
Israel and the Church, although this analogy by itself does not prove the
relationship. Christ can be compared to both the foundation and the
superstructure in a process of construction. According to this analogy, what is
being built? And what is the construction schedule?
As
Paul declared to the Athenians, God “does not dwell in temples made with hands”
(Acts 17:24-25). He transcends the “world and all things in it” but has chosen
to dwell among men (John 1:14) and in men (John 14:20). Jesus Christ, the
God-Man, is the foundation for two invisible, spiritual “temples” designed for
worship of God throughout eternity. These two figurative buildings are Israel
(Acts 4:10—12) and the Church (Matt. 16:18). Each structure is built of
individual believers, not of the stone, brick, and timber normally associated
with temple construction. This explains why no temple building will exist in
heaven (Rev. 21:22). Church Age believers, for instance, are described as
“living stones being constructed into a spiritual house for a holy priesthood”
(1 Pet. 2:5). This also sheds light on the fact that the Tabernacle in Israel
was only a “copy and shadow” of the reality which is in heaven (Heb. 8:1-2, 5).
The
two “temples” built of believers will be complete when all members possess
resurrection bodies. The Church will become a spiritual temple forever at the
moment of the resurrection, or Rapture, of the Church. Israel, on the other
hand, will be resurrected in two stages. Believers from the Old Testament Age
of Israel and believers who die during the Tribulation will be resurrected at
Christ’s second advent (Job 19:25-26; Rev. 20:4), and millennial believers will
be resurrected at the end of the Millennium (Rev. 20:5). With all members in
resurrection bodies, Israel will then be a completed spiritual temple forever.
These
living temples are built through evangelism and the communication of Bible
doctrine. We are “constructed on the foundation [Christ] by means of the
apostles and prophets [writers and communicators of Bible doctrine]” (Eph.
2:20). We might speculate that large stones are mature believers whereas small
stones are the believers who never learn doctrine, never grow to spiritual
adulthood on earth, but who are eternally saved nonetheless.
In
contrast to believers who form these temples, unbelievers stumble over the
foundation stone (Rom. 9:30-33). The Jewish leaders in the Age of the
Hypostatic Union are depicted as builders (Acts 4:10-12), but they rejected
Jesus Christ, their foundation. Therefore, work on Israel ceased, postponed
until later dispensations (Matt. 21:42-43). In the meantime, construction of
the second building, the Church, began upon that same shared foundation stone.
The current situation finds the Church under construction while Israel remains
a foundation with its superstructure incomplete. The building up of Israel came
to a temporary halt while the Church is formed on earth. When the Church is
completed, then construction of Israel will resume.
The
superstructure aspect of the analogy depicts Christ as the chief cornerstone.
He not only connects two walls but divides them as well, separating the Age of
Israel from the Age of the Church. As the corner, the Age of the Hypostatic
Union ends one wall and sets the standard for another. Israel and the Church
share certain features, but one is not merely the continuation of the other.
God’s administration of human history turns a corner in the life of Christ.
Israel
and the Church are separate dispensations even though numerous continuities
exist. The way of salvation remains the same in both dispensations, after the
pattern of Abraham’s faith. God loves both groups of believers, gives them
eternal life, watches over
them, and illustrates His relationship
with each group by an analogy to
marriage. Both are elect; both are called to grow up spiritually; and both
represent God in the world. But fulfillment of divine covenants to Israel is
not found in the Church. God does not renege es on His promises. Divine
covenants guarantee that Israel, as a distinct and permanent nation, will be a
blessing forever to all mankind (Gen. 12:3). In contrast, Jews who believe in
Christ during the Church Age are included in the Church through the baptism of
the Holy Spirit, equal with all gentile believers and not distinct from them to
(Eph. 2:11-22).
The
dispensations of Israel and the Church are separated by the Dispensation of the
Hypostatic Union. Israel does not set the precedent for the postsalvation life
of the Church Age believer.
Christians must “concentrate
on Jesus, the prince-ruler, even the One who brings [believers] to the
attainment [of spiritual maturity] by means of doctrine” (Heb. 12:2). He is the
cornerstone. He, not effect the Law that governed Israel, is the pattern for
the Church Age believer, In the power of the prototype divine dynasphere,
Christ life ii fulfilled the Mosaic Law, rendering it obsolete (Rom. 8:2-3;
Heb. demo 8:13; 9:15; 10:9). In the power of the operational divine dynasphere,
the Church Age believer advances spiritually and acquires the virtues of the
humanity of Christ (Phil. 4:8; 2 Pet. 1:2-4). Virtue from executing the protocol plan of God meets and exceeds
any demand for morality found in the
Law (Rom. 8:4).[21]
THE SEPARATION OF ISRAEL AND THE CHURCH
FULFILLMENT OF THE MOSAIC LAW The Dispensation of the
Hypostatic Union stands as a line of demarcation between Israel and the Church.
Christ fulfilled the Mosaic Law on one hand and set the precedent for Church
Age protocol on the other. This division is confirmed by numerous passages
which state that the Mosaic Law does not define the Christian’s way of life
(John 1:16-17; Acts 15:5-11, 24; Rom.
6:14; 7:4-6; 2 Cor. 3:7-13; Gal. 2:9; 3:19-25; 5:18; Eph. 2:15; Col. 2:14).
At
the Exodus God founded Israel as a theocracy ruled personally by the second
person of the Trinity. The whole thrust of the Jewish way of life
was spiritual. Because God ruled Israel, every aspect of life in the nation had
spiritual significance, and the Mosaic Law did not distinguish between
spiritual and secular issues. Obedience to divine establishment was part of the
spiritual life of Jewish believers, and observance of holy days and animal
sacrifices was required of all citizens, including unbelievers (although these
rituals were fully meaningful to believers only). We distinguish the freedom
code, the spiritual code, and the establishment code as a categorical approach
to communicating the wide scope of the Mosaic Law. But all aspects of the Law
add up to one code for a unique political entity with a spiritual origin, a
spiritual destiny, and a king who is God Himself.
The
Law is an integrated whole (Matt. 5:18; Gal. 5:14). The entire Mosaic Law is a
particular expression of God’s eternal and holy character (Ex. 19). He gave the
Law to a distinctly defined group of people (Ex. 19:3; Lev. 26:46; Rom. 2:17-20;
3:19; 9:4). It was effective for a limited period of time (Gal. 3:23-25). And
it was designed for several explicit purposes. The Mosaic Law regulated life in
God’s unique client nation, exposed man’s sinfulness, and demonstrated his need
of a Savior, but the primary purpose of the Law was to anticipate the coming of
Christ.
Do not think that I came to
abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did
not come to abolish, but to fulfill. (Matt. 5:17, NASB)
The Law was far more than simply a rule
of behavior. Although superior to contemporary codes in its moral instruction,
the Law was not primarily ethical but messianic. Therein lies its true greatness.
Its mandates depicted the person and work of Christ and protected the line of
Christ until He would arrive in the flesh. The centuries-old purpose of the
Mosaic Law was achieved by the incarnate Jesus Christ. Anticipation was
replaced by reality. This perfect fulfillment is a tribute to the faithfulness
of God. Because all parts of the Law functioned together as one code, the Law
has been abrogated as a whole. The entirety of the Law is no longer pertinent
and no longer governs any people or nation (Matt. 5:17-19; Rom. 10:4; Gal. 3:23-25; 5:3-4, cf. 18; Heb. 8:13;
10:9). The regime of the Mosaic Law has ended. The Church is “not under Law,
but under grace” (Rom. 6:14).
THE LAW OF CHRIST. The end of the Mosaic Law does not leave
believers or unbelievers lawless (Rom. 6:15; 13:1-7). A new code of divine
mandates, which also expresses the essence of God, now defines the believer’s
way of life. Like the Law, this new code is also an integrated whole. But God’s
protocol plan for the Church has a different objective: to glorify the
victorious Christ to the maximum. The protocol plan accompanies a different
array of divine blessings for the believer: surveyed in the second half of this
book. And the protocol plan of God has a different thrust: greater responsibility
placed upon each believer to think and apply Bible doctrine for himself in the
privacy of his own priesthood. Still, many principles found in the Mosaic Law
also appear in the protocol plan. The reason is that both codes come from the
same source, from God Himself.
The
character of God remains unchanged even as He makes dispensational changes in
human history. God was perfect before He gave the Law to Moses, perfect during
the tenure of the Law, and perfect when He fulfilled and rescinded the Law in
Christ. In fact, the succession of dispensations reveals His changeless essence
to man and angels. God expressed His absolute holiness to man in legal terms
long before the Mosaic Law existed, and He continues to provide ethical norms
and spiritual instruction now that the Law has ceased to govern. Indeed before,
during, and after the time in which the Mosaic Law was in effect in Israel,
other expressions of divine law functioned among Gentiles to whom the Mosaic
Law never applied (Gen. 26:5; Ex. 19:5b; Rom. 2:14-16; 1 Cor. 7:19; 9:20-2 1).
In
the Church Age the operative divine law is not the Mosaic Law but “the law of
Christ” (1 Cor. 9:20-21; Gal. 6:2). This also is called “the law of the Spirit
of life in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:2), which I designate the protocol plan of God
or life in the divine dynasphere. Christ fulfilled the entire Mosaic Law in the
power of the Holy Spirit in the prototype divine dynasphere. The Church Age
believer obeys the new “law of Christ” by following His precedent: filled with
the Spirit in the operational divine dynasphere (Rom. 8:2-4).
Because
Christ fulfilled and abrogated the Mosaic Law (Heb. 8:13; 10:9), practices
instituted for the nation of Israel are not included in the postsalvation plan
of God for the Church Age. They do not contribute to the Christian way of life.
The Church, for example, does not offer animal sacrifices, observe holy days or
the Sabbath, maintain the Levitical priesthood, worship in a sacred building,
offer tithes, or have minute details of civic life prescribed by spiritual
ordinances. There is now a new, universal priesthood of all believers (1 Pet.
2:9; Heb. 7:12; 8:1), a greater emphasis on individual responsibility (Gal.
5:1), and a separation of church and
state (Rom. 13:1-7; cf. Matt. 22:15-22).
TRANSITION BETWEEN DIVJNE ADMINISTRATIONS. Three
separate dispensations converge in the Age of the Hypostatic Union. This
pivotal era is, therefore, a challenge to accurately interpret.
1. Christ
fulfilled the Old Testament Law and taught His current followers to live
apart from legalism.
2. He
proclaimed His ruling platform for the millennial kingdom.
3. He
unveiled the plan of God for the Church.
These
closely juxtaposed divine administrations—as well as the
presence of Christ
Himself—exhibit the grace and wisdom of God
to in unparalleled depth and variety. The period of our Lord’s first advent,
then, is an extraordinary presentation of God’s perfect character.
Each
dispensation fulfills its own purpose in the overall plan of God. Although
similarities exist, differences in divine mandates distinguish the Incarnation,
the Church, and the Millennium, and divine policy for each of these periods
differs significantly from the Law given through Moses to Israel. For example,
the Sermon on the Mount represented a shift in divine policy. Again and
again Jesus declared, “You have heard
that it was said [in the Mosaic As Law]. . . but I say... (Matt. 5:21-48). He proclaimed the kingdom of God to the
Jews in terms of their Mosaic frame of reference. for He used the Law as the
foundation or point of departure for explaining the way of life in the promised
kingdom under His personal rule.
Christ
also ministered to the current needs of His hearers. Amplifying and clarifying
the true meaning of the Law, He taught them how to live free from the
legalistic degeneracy that was so pervasive in the nation. Never was the Law
intended to be a means of salvation (Matt. 5:20) or a breeding ground for
self-righteousness (Matt. 6:1-18). The Law revealed the necessity for grace and
the source of that grace, Jesus Christ Himself.
After
Christ was rejected by Israel, He retracted His offer of the kingdom. Instead
of continuing to present His kingdom platform, He announced yet a different
divine system, the mystery doctrine of the Church Age (John 14-17). During the
Church Age, church and state are separate entities. Divine mandates for the
Church Age believer cannot be imposed upon the unbeliever, unlike the Mosaic
Law which regulated believers and unbelievers in Israel. In the Millennium the
spiritual and the civil will also come under one aegis as Christ again reigns,
not as God ruling over one nation but as the God-Man over both Israel and the
entire world. Rather than institute another legal system that directly governs
all people, Christ now controls history in a manner that gives individual
Church Age believers tremendous opportunity (and responsibility) for having invisible impact.40 In the Upper Room
Discourse Jesus bequeathed to the Church this new system of dynamics by which
He Himself had lived throughout His first advent.
COMMON PRINCIPLES IN DIFFERENT CODES. The similarities
between the Mosaic Law and Church Age protocol reveal God’s immutable
consistency, but the differences reflect the magnitude of Christ’s achievement
during His first advent. The utterly superlative quality of His saving work not
only is a stated fact of doctrine (Heb. 2:3) but is also indicated by the
dispensational changes that followed the victory of the cross and resurrection
(John 7:39). Astounding privileges belong to the “new spiritual species” of
believers—the Church—who are chosen to glorify His victory forever.
In
establishing the way of life for believers of the Church Age, God manifested
His character in many individual commands, some of which He had also included
in the Mosaic Law. For example, with the full unveiling of mystery doctrine in
the New Testament epistles, every one of the Ten Commandments, except Sabbath
observance, has also been given to the Church. Even with these similarities,
Church Age protocol is not the Mosaic Law. These are entirely different codes,
just as the United States Constitution is not the same as England’s Magna
Carta, even though they share certain concepts. Continuities between Israel and
the Church exist because all divine law reflects the unchangeable essence of
God, not because all or part of the Mosaic Law carries over into subsequent
dispensations.
Despite
numerous continuities, the new policy for the Church Age is not the old Mosaic
Law itself. If precepts found in the Mosaic Law pertain to the Church, they do
so because they appear in the New Testament epistles, which define the
Christian way of life. These common principles belong to the Church because
they are part of the law of Christ, not because
they belong to the Mosaic Law.
Adherence
to divine establishment had a different meaning under the Mosaic Law than it
does under God’s plan for the Church Age. Because Israel was God’s unique
client nation, obedience to the
establishment aspect of the
Mosaic Law was an integral part of
the spiritual life of Jewish believers. As part of the Law, divine
establishment not only preserved the line of the Messiah but also or stabilized
Jewish society so that over many centuries the Jews would retain the specific
national functions that foreshadowed Christ. In the Church Age these special
purposes for divine establishment does not exist. The separation of church and
state means that the Christian’s responsibility to obey establishment is an application of his spiritual life rather
than an integral part of it. This explains why the Romans considered the early
Christians to be deficient in are patriotism, not because Christians disobeyed
civil law or were irresponsible as citizens but because Christianity did not
make civil duty part of one’s religion. Again, whereas the Law of Moses
pertained to all residents of the nation—believers and unbelievers alike—the
law of Christ governs believers only.
THE
CONTINUING VALUE OF THE MOSAIC LAW. The Mosaic Law belongs to
the Word of God and still has value for the Church Age believer. In Codex I the
Ten Commandments define human freedom. Many people assume the Ten Commandments
define sin, but this short list of prohibitions does not begin to cover the
doctrine of hamartiology. Clearly, these mandates have another purpose. The
identified sins destroy the component elements of freedom—which are life,
liberty, property, privacy, and divinely delegated authority. In every
dispensation believers and unbelievers alike can protect pro freedom by
avoiding these destructive sins. This explains why every provision of the
Decalogue, except Sabbath observance, is also found in the law of Christ.
Codex II presents the
purpose for which God gave man free will: to come to a knowledge of Jesus
Christ. The ritual provisions of the Law still have value because they reveal
the Messiah as the only Savior. In
ceremonies prescribed by Codex II, the sacrificial animal received the judgment due to the sinner, providing forgiveness and
personal cleansing. The New Testament reveals that the actual source of
forgiveness of sins is the substitutionary death of Christ on the cross (Rom.
5:8-10). Fulfilled in the person of Christ, these details of ceremonial worship
in Israel can teach the royal family to appreciate the Lord. The Church Age
believer can see Jesus Christ in the
Law.[22]
New Testament phrases like “the Lamb of God” and “the blood of Christ”
dramatically declare that Christ’s saving work on the cross is the reality that
the Mosaic Law foreshadowed (John 1:29; 1 Pet. 1:18-19).
Codex
III contains practical instructions in many fields that were especially
pertinent to Israel. For example, agricultural practices or precautions in
dealing with disease or sanitation addressed problems that exist throughout
human history. The specific provisions of the Mosaic Law may or may not have
value in other nations, but they are concrete examples of how establishment
concepts apply to particular situations. Above all, these statutes testify to
the care and faithfulness of God in guiding His people in specific
circumstances that often were difficult.
Many
particulars of divine establishment in Codex III of the Mosaic Law are neither
reconfirmed nor clearly excluded from Church Age practice. These precepts still
reveal the character of God as expressed in governing His client nation, but
they do not bear the force of law for any nation but Old Testament Israel. For
instance, the principle of capital punishment is given to the Church Age (Rom.
13:4), but its specific application in cases of adultery (Lev. 20:10),
homosexuality (Lev. 20:13), or juvenile recalcitrance (Lev. 20:9) is not
reconfirmed.
God
has given the Church Age believer general guidance concerning divine
establishment, in contrast to the hundreds of exact laws that precisely defined
life in ancient Israel. Each believer has a responsibility to his community and
nation, but the separation of church and state during the Church Age entrusts
the specific application of establishment principles to each generation. God
encourages the Christian to think and
apply the basic truths of divine establishment according to the legitimate
processes of human government in his own nation. Government is “a minister of
God to you for good” (Rom. 13:4). An astute political leader in the Church Age
who wishes his nation to prosper can learn much from the Mosaic Law without
blindly superimposing its exact provisions where they may not apply. Instead,
he will adapt establishment principles to the circumstances, objectives, and
heritage of his own country.
Because
Jesus Christ fulfilled the Mosaic Law, His Church is free from the Law (Gal.
5:1). Freedom from the Mosaic Law is not lawlessness or lack of direction.
Instead, this royal liberty exists within the framework of God’s protocol for
the Church Age (John 15:10-12; 1 Cor. 9:19-21; Gal. 5:13). The Christian lives
under a new law initially announced by Christ and executed in the power of the
Holy Spirit (Rom. 8:2-4). Just as the humanity of Christ matured under this
powerful system of divine assets (Luke 2:40, 52), Church Age believers also
have an extraordinary opportunity to advance spiritually. Among the many
continuing uses of the Mosaic Law, this portion of Scripture teaches by
contrast that the Church Age is an epoch of spiritual freedom. The advantages
of being in union with Christ give believers unprecedented freedom to apply
doctrine and grow in the experience of their unique relationship with God.
THE
DISPENSATION OF THE CHURCH
THE CHURCH IN BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE
The
Church Age is a brilliant advance in biblical history. For perspective, notice
the progress of the dispensations. At the founding of Israel, Moses wrote:
Indeed,
ask now concerning the former days which were
before
you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and inquire from one end
of the heavens to the other. Has anything been done like this great thing
[establishing the nation of Israel], or has anything been heard like it? (Deut.
4:32, NASB)
Magnificent though God’s
client nation was, when the Age of Israel ended with the advent of Christ, a
far greater thing had come to pass.
God,
after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in
many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed
heir of all things, through whom also He made the world. (Heb. 1:1-2, NASB)
Following
this incomparable revelation of God, the Church still arrived on the scene as
an amazing expression of God’s power and grace. The Church is a breathtaking
phenomenon. Never before has the believer held such a position in relation to
the Godhead. Scripture presents the Church as yet another dramatic new
departure in human history.
Truly,
truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do shall he do
also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go to the Father [the
absent Christ is represented on earth by many believers over a long period,
rather than by Himself alone over the brief span of the Incarnation]. (John
14:12, NASB)
As a unique body of
believers, the Church is united with Christ, imitates Him, glorifies Him,
accompanies Him, and will rule with Him forever. Never before in history have
all these privileges been extended to mankind.
THE EPOCH OF THE ROYAL FAMILY OF GOD
The Church Age began circa AD. 30 on the day of Pentecost, ten days after our Lord’s ascension, and will terminate with the resurrection, or Rapture, of the
Church. An overview of the broad, historical characteristics of the
Church Age will be presented here. Later we will summarize the privileges of
the individual Church Age believer. There we will discover why the Church Age
offers the greatest challenge to the individual believer in all of human
history. The Church Age believer’s unique status, power system, privileges,
and responsibilities will answer the question, “After salvation, what?”
The Dispensation
of the Church is the era of the royal family of God. Every Church Age believer
belongs to Christ’s royal family, founded as a consequence of His strategic
victory at the cross and His rejection by Israel (1 Pet. 2:9). During the
Church Age God is forming this body of believers for the maximum glorification
of the Lord Jesus Christ. God gives each Church Age believer the new royal
status of the resurrected Christ and extends the great power experiment of the
hypostatic union into the great power experiment of the Church Age. The
position, assets, and opportunities given to the Church Age believer place the
royal family of God in contrast to the family, nation, or kingdom of God in
other dispensations.
Christ
now holds three titles of royalty, each with a royal family. As God, He has
always been divine royalty (Rom. 1:4;
Heb. 13:8). His first royal title is Son of God, and His royal family includes
the other two members of the Trinity—God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. As a man, Jesus became Jewish royalty at the virgin birth (Rom. 1:3). His Jewish royal
title is Son of David and His royal family is the Davidic dynasty. As the
God-Man, He won the victory over Satan at the cross (1 Cor. 15:57) and was granted a new royal title that
may be considered His battlefield royalty
(Heb. 1:3b-4, 13). This third
royal title is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the Bright Morning Star (1 Tim.
6:15; Rev. 19:16; 22:16). But when the Father conferred this new title upon our
Lord, no accompanying royal family yet existed. The plan of God for the Church
Age brings to a majestic culmination the honors presented to the victorious
Christ.
When
Jesus Christ ascended in triumph to heaven (Eph. 4:8), God the Father invested
Him with the glories of battlefield royalty and seated Him at the right hand of
the throne of God (Ps. 110:1). Then the Father inaugurated the Church Age to
establish a royal family for the glorified Lord Jesus Christ.. Everyone who
believes in Christ during the Church Age is a member of the royal family of
God, also known as the Body of Christ or the Church Universal (Gal. 3:28; Eph.
1:22-23).
The
very presence of spiritual royalty on earth makes the Church Age unique in
human history. During the Church Age every believer can live in the operational
divine dynasphere, just as during the Dispensation of the Hypo static Union the
humanity of Christ resided in the prototype divine dynasphere. Every member of
the royal family can utilize the divine power and the divine problem-solving
devices that enabled the humanity of Christ to win His strategic victory over
Satan, sin, and death.
We
depend entirely upon Christ. By extending the great power experiment, He
equipped us to exploit His strategic victory and win tactical victories in our
own lives. As we grow spiritually, the positive influence of spiritual royalty
on earth spreads invisibly from the individual believer to other people, to
organizations, to nations, to future generations, and to the angels. The
personal dynamics of the Christian way of life will be discussed later, but
this powerful collective impact of believers is one of the broad, historical
characteristics of the Church Age. During this dispensation God maintains a
spiritual presence, not a political presence, among mankind.
GENTILE CLIENT NATIONS
Client
nations exist in the Church Age but with a significant difference from the Age
of Israel. As before, believers reside in all the nations of the earth, but
instead of dealing with mankind through a Jewish client nation, God now works
through gentile client nations. He entrusts Christians in these nations with
the preservation and communication of the written canon of Scripture. He
blesses and protects the gentile client nation as long as the nation upholds
its client responsibilities.
Israel is the only nation with which God has sworn an eternal
covenant. He will honor His unconditional covenants at the second advent of
Christ (Rom. 11:25-29), but Israelis under divine discipline throughout the
Church Age and is restricted from her client—nation functions. These are “the
times of the Gentiles” (Luke 21:24), which will continue until Christ returns.
God now extends client privileges to non-Jewish nations. This divine policy is
implied by both Christ and Paul who mandate civic duty toward the Roman Empire
(Luke 20:21-25; Rom. 13:1-7).
During the Church Age any gentile
nation can serve as a client nation by practicing the following principles.
1. Protect
human ljfe, freedom, privacy, and property according to the divine laws of
establishment
2. Allow evangelism and Bible teaching
3. Serve
as a base for missionary activity to nonclient nations
4. Afford
a haven of toleration for the dispersed Jews
The first of these principles creates the environment
in which the remaining principles can fully operate. The first is the chief
concern of a nation’s government, while the remaining three express the
spiritual life of the nation ‘s people.
God deals with the client nation in
keeping with the spiritual condition of its believers. Blessings to growing
believers overflow to the nation; divine discipline of believers who do not
advance also affects the nation. This ultimately explains the nation’s historical
rise or fall (Ps. 34:15-16). Therefore, a thriving client nation that enjoys
special divine blessing must maintain a strong pivot of growing and mature
believers. Although invisible, the spiritual impact of mature believers
residing in a gentile client nation gives the nation its vigor.
The gentile client nation is God’s
principal missionary agency during the Church Age. As part of the client
nation’s collective impact, every individual believer as a member of the Church
Universal has a personal responsibility to evangelize those in his periphery
(Acts 1:8; Rom. 1:14; 1 Cor. 9:16; 2 Cor. 4:5b; 2 Tim. 4:5).[23]
He is likewise responsible for supporting the domestic and foreign spread of
the Gospel and accurate doctrinal teaching. This support may include prayer,
financial contributions, service, or some other form of aid and encouragement.
In
sharp contrast to Israel, no specific race of people is elect in the Church
Age. Different from the election of Israel, the election of the
Church includes every individual believer—Jew and Gentile— of any race, culture, or nationality. Strictly
speaking, there is no such thing as a “Christian nation.” The royal family of
God on earth exists in every nation, and, unlike the theocracy of Israel,
church and state are separate.
This
separation is illustrated by the Roman Empire, which was the first gentile
client nation. Although Rome was pagan in its official religion, the Church
thrived under her protection and toleration during the reigns of the Antonine
Caesars (AD. 96-192). New Testament doctrine never advocates a union of church
and state, the interference of Christian organizations into the affairs of
state, or the overthrow of pagan government. Rather, government is a blessing
(Rom. 13:1-7). Actually, God ordained the benefit to be reciprocal. While the
Roman Empire served as “a minister of God to you for good” (Rom. 13:4), the
invisible spiritual pivot of mature believers brought divine blessing to the
Empire. This unheralded nucleus of Christians existed in the congregations of
the Roman province of Asia, located in what is today western Turkey (Eph.;
Col.; l-3 John; Rev. 2-3).
PRECANON AND POSTCANON ERAS
The
Church Age is divided into two categories: the relatively brief precanon period
in which the New Testament canon was being formed, and the predominant
postcanon period following the completion of the written Word of God. The
precanon era is documented in the Book of Acts, which preserves the historical
record of the early Church but does not attempt a comprehensive presentation of
Church Age doctrines. In fact, certain phenomena found in Acts were required in
initiating the Church Age but were no longer pertinent after their purpose was
achieved and Church Age doctrines were permanently and authoritatively recorded
in the New Testament epistles.
Thus,
the precanon period was characterized by temporary spiritual gifts such as
apostleship, prophecy, knowledge, tongues, interpretation of tongues, miracles,
and healing (1 Cor. 12-14). These temporary gifts were designed to propagate
the doctrine of the mystery, to gain a hearing for communicators of this newly
revealed doctrine, to organize and administer local churches, and to warn
Israel of impending national discipline from God. As these purposes were
fulfilled, the temporary gifts were no longer necessary and were gradually
removed (1 Cor. 13:8).
Paul,
for example, gained credibility with his hearers through the temporary gifts of
miracles and healing (Acts 13:8-12; 14:3; 19:1112), but as his reputation
became established, these gifts no longer had a purpose. By AD. 61 he could not command the healing of
even his dear friend Epaphroditus (Phil. 2:27).
Likewise,
the temporary gift of tongues was designed to evangelize Jews in gentile
languages unknown to the speakers themselves.[24]
This miraculous gift was a dramatic sign of Israel’s failure as a client
nation to carry the truth to gentile nations. Prophesied by Isaiah, the
temporary gift of tongues was a warning to Israel of imminent divine discipline
(Isa. 28:11; cf. I Cor. 14:21). When Jerusalem did indeed fall to the Romans in
AD. 70, the gift of tongues had no
further purpose and ceased to exist. The so-called gift of tongues claimed
today is an emotional or demonic counterfeit that distracts from Bible
doctrine, divides the Church, and debases Christianity. The precanon period
came to a close with the death of John, the last apostle, sometime after he
wrote Revelation in approximately AD. 96.
The
postcanon period, in which we now live, is the era of permanent spiritual
gifts. Gifts like pastor-teacher, evangelism, administration, and
helps are designed to communicate the doctrines of the written Word of God and
carry out the functions of the local church (Eph. 4:11-13). These gifts sustain
the royal family of God on earth and operate throughout all generations of the
Church Age.
Gone
are the spectacular displays of divine power typical of the precanon period.
Gone are the dramatic rituals and ceremonies of previous dispensations. The
postcanon period of the Church Age emphasizes doctrinal thought and personal application
of doctrine. The Christian lives by divine truth in his own soul rather
than depending on the emotional stimulation of overt rites, divine appearances,
direct revelation from God, or miraculous deeds performed by a few highly
visible Christians. Even in the precanon period the emphasis on doctrine is
characteristic of the Church Age (1 Cor. 14:19). The Church is the most
concentrated and sustained presentation of God’s grace in all of human history
(Eph. 3:2).
Continual
spiritual growth is the believer’s objective in every dispensation, but in the
Church Age the means to this end are more powerful than in any other age.
Mystery doctrine teaches that God gives each member of the royal family access
to divine power in his inner life (Phil. 3:10) while providing the
problem-solving devices designed originally for the humanity of Christ (John
15:10; 1 John 2:6). Spiritual victory lies in using these assets. The result is
the progressive attainment of spiritual maturity—with all the mental and emotional
richness that maturity brings.
5
The Eschatological
THE TRIBULATION
TO REVIEW, THE SIX DISPENSATIONS FORM three
categories: theocentric, christocentric, and eschatological. We have just
described the two magnificent christocentric
dispensations: the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union and the Church Age. Now
we turn our attention to the future.
Eschatology is the biblical study of future or final events. Prophecies
yet unfulfilled anticipate history’s concluding two dispensations, which are
designated the Tribulation and the Millennium. The eschatological dispensations
are defined as those after the resurrection, or Rapture, of the Church. In
other words, they will occur after the royal family of God is completely formed
and transferred to heaven. The eschatological dispensations are separate from
the Church because they are presented in the Old Testament, whereas the Church
remained an undisclosed mystery throughout Old Testament times.
For
the Jews the Tribulation immediately precedes the founding of God’s promised
kingdom on earth. Thus, this approximately seven-year period of history (Dan.
9:27; Rev. 11:3; 12:6) is the end of divine discipline against Israel. The
Tribulation is prophesied in the Old Testament (Isa. 34:1-6; 63:1-6; Jer. 30:4-8;
Ezek. 38-39; Dan. 11:40-45; Zech. 12:1-3; 14:1-2), in our Lord’s Olivet
Discourse, and in Revelation 6—19. This short, dramatic era will commence
immediately after the Rapture of the Church and will terminate with the second
advent of Christ. It is the “time of Jacob’s trouble” (Jer. 30:7) and Daniel’s
seventieth week (or seventieth seven) based on the famous timetable prophecy of
Daniel 9:24-27. The Tribulation might also be called the time of Satan’s
desperation because of the violent power struggle that will occur (Rev. 12:12).
The
first half of the Tribulation will be a time of relative prosperity and overt
world peace. Satan will make this one last attempt to establish a “Millennium”
of his own to prove that he is equal with God (Isa. 14:14). But the devil has
only his own interests at heart. He cares nothing for mankind but merely wants
to use man to prove himself justified in revolting against God. Behind the
scenes Satan will be clamping the human race in tyranny through power politics and religious manipulation.
Tyranny always flows into the vacuum created by the absence of divine
establishment.
Evil will be unrestrained in the Tribulation
because the royal family, which is indwelt by the Holy Spirit, will have been
removed at the Rapture (2 Thess. 2:7). The outbreak of evil will reveal,
through contrast, the historical importance of mature believers as channels for
divine blessing. At the beginning of the Tribulation, there will be no
believers on earth. The Church’s invisible restraining influence will be gone
from the devil’s world. In this sudden absence of a spiritual pivot, Satan will
have his freest hand. But when Satan is left virtually to his own devices, the
world situation will turn grim—characterized by an initial false prosperity
that deteriorates into horrible
disaster. Satan’s arrogance will be ultimately revealed in his incompetence.
Given every chance, he cannot rule the kingdom he usurped from Adam.
Human failures will multiply under Satan’s
administration through a contagion of bad decisions, a shockingly large portion
of the earth’s population will destroy itself (Rev. 6:1-11). Except for Eden
and the millennial reign of Jesus Christ, utopias are masks for coercion,
slavery, and violence. Neither man nor Satan (who is far more capable than man)
can create the politically and social perfect state.
In the middle of the Tribulation, God will
eject arrogant scheming, belligerent Satan from the courtroom of heaven where
he has enjoyed free access as defense counsel throughout the appeal trial of the
angelic conflict (Rev. 12:7-9; cf. Job 1:6; 2:1; Zech. 3:1). With Satan cast
down to earth, the second half of the Tribulation will witness unprecedented
violence as Satan machinations unravel and he desperately struggles to retain
hi rule over the world.
This latter part of the dispensation is the
period actually call~ the Great Tribulation (Matt. 24:21; Rev. 7:14). Satan
will commit all his forces to exterminating the Jews (Rev. 12:17). His purpose
will be to eliminate all potential beneficiaries of God’s unconditional
covenants to Israel. The devil will pursue this heinous policy in an attempt to
prove God unfaithful to His promises. Satan will know from Scripture that the
fulfillment of God’s covenants Israel is imminent. The Millennium will be only
months away. But, reasons Satan, if no regenerate Jew remains alive, God would
be unable to keep His promises and fulfill His prophecies. There would be no
one to receive the promised blessings. And if Go could not fulfill His
unconditional covenants (a blasphemous a unthinkable presumption), His
character would be flawed, an Satan would have grounds for demanding dismissal
of all charges against himself and the fallen angels. But Satan’s ploy will n
succeed.
In spite of a deceptive peace followed by
horrible violence, the Gospel of salvation will be presented more intensively
during Tribulation than in any other dispensation. With the Church
removed and with Israel remaining under divine
discipline until Christ’s second advent, no client nation will be operating on
earth. Instead of a client nation, God’s principal missionary agency will be
144,000 Jewish evangelists (Rev. 7:4—8). They will risk martyrdom to present
the Gospel throughout the world. Supporting and supplementing the function of
these evangelists, angels will also join in the presentation of the Gospel
(Rev. 14:6-7). Furthermore, two Old Testament prophets—Moses and Elijah-will
be resuscitated for a brief but powerful ministry in Jerusalem (Rev. 11:3-13). By
all these diverse means, the entire earth will be evangelized thoroughly in the
brief span of the Tribulation. Principle: Grace precedes judgment.
An unprecedented world war will break out in
the last half of the Tribulation. Watching his utopian kingdom
fragment and collapse into chaos, a desperate Satan will set vast human and
demonic forces into motion. The ensuing war will culminate in the Armageddon
Campaign, in which the forces of four great political powers will converge on
Palestine. In Jerusalem a remnant of Jewish believers will refuse to surrender.
Brilliantly commanded by aggressive, spiritually mature generals (Zech. 12:5-6),
these besieged few will fight for their lives against overwhelming odds. The
situation will appear utterly hopeless. The last chance of survival will
collapse. Then, suddenly, the Lord Jesus Christ will return to earth and join
the battle.
THE MILLENNIUM
THE REIGN OF CHRIST
The Lord Jesus Christ will return to deliver the
Jews (Isa. 5:26-30; 10:20-23; 11:11-16; 14:1-3; 63:1-6; Joel 2:16-3:21; Zech.
10:6-12). He will come to establish His kingdom in fulfillment of the
unconditional covenants to Israel (Dan. 9:24; Zech. 14:9). As King of Kings and
Lord of Lords, Jesus Christ, the Son of David, will destroy the forces of Satan
and depose the devil as the ruler of the earth. The Lamb of God will regather
dispersed Israel and rule the earth for one thousand years under the
magnificent policies He declared in His Sermon on the Mount. Then will the
wonderful prophecy be fulfilled, which describes “many peoples and mighty
nations” of Gentiles coming to Jerusalem “to entreat the favor of the Lord”
(Zech. 8:22-23).
... In those days ten men from the nations of every language [Gentiles]
will grasp the garment of a Jew saying, “Let us go with you, for we have heard
that God is with you.” (Zech. 8:23, NASB)
The Millennium, Latin for “one thousand years,” will commence with the
second advent of Christ and terminate with the Last Judgment and the destruction
of the present universe, including
planet Earth. This ~ final dispensation prior to the eternal state is
documented in numerous passages of Scripture, with major statements in Psalm
72; Isaiah 11, 35, 62, 65; Zechariah 14:4-9; and Revelation 20.
When Jesus Christ returns, He will be
accompanied by His royal family, the Church, who will reign with Him (Rom. 5:17; Rev. 1:16, 20). Also, the moment of His second advent will mark
the resurrection of all Old Testament believers and tribulational martyrs (1
Cor. 15:24). Along with the Church, these Jewish and gentile believers in their
resurrection bodies will participate in our Lord’s thousand-year reign over the
earth (Job 19:25-26).
With Christ’s second advent and the restoration
of client-nation Israel, the general outline of the Millennium includes the
imprisonment of Satan and his fallen angels (Rev. 20:1-3), the removal of all
unbelievers from the earth in the Baptism of Fire (Ezek. 20:34-38 for Jews;
Matt. 25:31-46 for Gentiles), and the coronation of Christ. The Millennium will
begin with a cadre of believers only, delivered through the Tribulation. In
succeeding generations, however, some of their sons and daughters will reject
Christ as Savior despite His personal presence and regardless of the wisdom and
justice of His rule.
Under the administration of Christ, the earth
will enjoy perfect environment (Isa. 35:1-7; 11:6-9; 65:25; Rom. 8:19-21).
Universal peace will exist for the first time since the fall of man (Ps. 46:9; Isa.
2:4; Hosea 2:18; Micah 4:3). Prosperity will spread to all nations (Ps. 72:7,
16). Infant mortality will be reduced to zero, and human longevity will
increase dramatically (Isa. 65:20). A population explosion will result,
repopulating the earth after the decimations of the Tribulation and the divine
judgments that initially establish Christ’s reign.
Throughout the Millennium there will be universal knowledge of God (Isa. 11:9; Jer. 31:33-34). Israel will rejoice as God’s client nation ruled by Christ personally. The believer’s postsalvation way of life will again include the ministry of God the Holy Spirit, but unlike the Spirit’s invisible ministry during the Church Age, the filling of the Spirit in the Millennium will stimulate the believer’s emotions (Joel 2:28-29).
With Christ present, the Holy Spirit’s ministry
of revealing and glorifying Christ can include ecstatics as a genuine spiritual
experience, which is not characteristic of the filling of the Spirit in the
Church Age. In Christ’s absence from the earth during the Church Age, ecstatics
would only distract from the true emphasis of the Dispensation of the Church:
to demonstrate the sufficiency and tremendous impact of Bible doctrine in the
soul of the believer.
In the present dispensation the filling of the
Spirit does not stimulate emotion. Emotion is not a barometer of spirituality.
Instead, emotion responds normally to the mentality of the soul, where truth
resides as a result of learning Bible doctrine. God set aside the spectacular
rituals and miracles of previous dispensations (1 Cor. l:22a; Heb. 10:1) so
that during the postcanon Church Age His manifold wisdom and power are
displayed in doctrine-the object of faith-which emphasizes the believer’s
thoughts and decisions rather than his emotions (Rom. 16:17-18; 1 Cor. 1:23-25;
Eph. 3:10). In the Millennium, however, the Living Word will be present along
with the written Word, sight will complement faith, and under our Lord’s
control ecstatics can be a genuine spiritual phenomenon on a more widespread
basis than in any other dispensation.
THE CONCLUSION OF THE
MILLENNIUM
After one thousand years of perfect
environment, Satan will be released from captivity (Rev. 20:7-9). The devil will
lead rebellious elements of the human race and his own fallen angels in a
desperate conspiracy against our Lord’s perfect government. Called the Gog and
Magog Revolution, this final outburst of satanic violence will be suppressed
immediately. With Satan’s argument for the defense reduced to frantic violence
and with God’s demonstration of grace completed, this will terminate the appeal
trial of Satan. Its purpose achieved, human history will end.
At that time all millennial believers will
receive their resurrection bodies. This final resurrection of believers will
complete the sequence of resurrections, which marks the termination of each
dispensation since the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union (1 Cor. 15:23-24).
At the same time God will resurrect all
unbelievers separately from believers (Rev. 20:11-15). The purpose of this
resurrection will be to judge all who never accepted salvation. They will be
judged not for their sins, for which Christ paid in full, but for rejecting
Christ.[25]
Unbelievers will be resurrected in one group regardless of the
dispensation in which they lived. Here is a final instance of continuity, in
contrast to dispensational changes. Unlike the resurrections of Christ and
believers in their dispensational order, the common resurrection of unbelievers
indicates that salvation by grace through faith in Christ is the same in every
dispensation. All unbelievers alike, of every dispensation, will have refused
the same Savior. Presiding in terrible majesty from the great white throne of
the Last Judgment, our Lord Jesus Christ will sentence them to join fallen
angels in the Lake of Fire, separated from God forever (Rev. 20:14-15).
Finally will come the destruction of the
universe, the creation of a new universe, and the commencement of the eternal
state (2 Pet. 3:7, 10-13; Rev. 21-22:5). Mankind
will be divided into two categories for eternity: unbelievers and believers
(John 3:18, 36). Because they refused to accept Christ as their Savior,
unbelievers will remain condemned and will suffer eternal judgment (Rev. 20:15;
21:8). Because of the saving work of Christ, all who believed in Him during
their lives on earth will enjoy eternal life in fellowship with God (Rev. 21:3-4;
22:4-5).
6
The Uniqueness of the Church
Age
CONTINUITY AND CHANGE
GOD HAS A PURPOSE for every
believer. What is His plan for you? After salvation, what?
Dispensations
are an essential frame of reference. The biblical answer to “After salvation,
what?” lies in the assets God has given specifically to the royal family and in
His mandates for utilizing those assets. The Christian way of life is
clarified, therefore, by understanding how the Church Age is unique while being
related to the other dispensations. Dispensations orient the believer to God’s
plan for history. They unlock the Scriptures for accurate personal application.
Today,
many Christians suffer from ignorance of God’s plan for the Church. Some live
under the erroneous impression that Christianity is a blend of the Ten
Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, and a few contemporary social mores,
with no accurate idea of how these diverse standards coalesce in the doctrine
of dispensations. Unable to base their lives on a cohesive understanding of
Scripture, many believers exaggerate the place of emotion in worship, another
problem which dispensations help explain.
Even
some theologians integrate Scripture in an unsatisfactory manner. They assume
that God’s unconditional covenants with the Jews have transferred to the Church
and that “Israel” has become a spiritual entity
with no national future. They sincerely but incorrectly believe that Israel and
the Church are one people, that “true spiritual Israel” is now the Church. But
the Old and New Testaments clearly declare that true Israel, the recipient of
God’s promises, is not only spiritually regenerate but ethnically Jewish. God’s
magnificent faithfulness to the flesh-and-blood nation of Israel cannot be
reduced to a spiritual or figurative dimension only.
Strong
continuity does indeed run through the divine view of history. God perceives
all events as one indivisible system, every part of which is essential to the
integrity of the whole. But the parts of the whole are still distinct parts.
While some theologians look at the whole and see the consistencies, others look
at the same whole and see the distinctions. The doctrine of dispensations
thoroughly integrates both consistency and distinction, both continuity and
change.
Those
who think that Israel was merely a foreshadowing of Christ and the Church, or
conversely that the Church is a fulfillment of divine covenants with Israel,
overemphasize continuity in the plan of God. They underestimate the
implications of the changes God has instituted. Striving for an interpretation
of the Bible that makes God’s plan organic and consistent, they make God’s
character inconsistent. Now that the Church exists, these believers wish to
dissolve the ethnic definition of Israel and release God from His sworn
obligation to honor His promises to His chosen nation. But God keeps His promises. He is true to
Himself, true to His word, and true to all who trust in Him. Dispensational
shifts do not undermine the integrity of God or the stability of His plan.
Indeed, these changes achieve His unchanging purpose for human history.
Those
who give preference to continuity are predisposed to look for correlations
among biblical phenomena. They develop their theological systems on their
approach to the language of Scripture. The Bible is progressive revelation and
is rich in figurative expressions, symbolism, allusion, metaphor, analogy,
poetic overtone, and typology. There is continuity
in Scripture as the language of the New Testament echoes the Old Testament, but
this resonance between the Testaments does not justify the assumption that the
people being addressed in the New Testament totally replace those addressed in
the Old Testament. When, for example, the Church is called the “seed of
Abraham,” a comparison is established with Israel. Both Israel and the Church
are the regenerate people of God. Both center upon the person of Christ. But
the two are not necessarily the same. Indeed, the differences deserve our
respect. The distinction between Israel and the Church profoundly exhibits the
character of God. This distinction reveals both His faithfulness to His chosen
nation and His justice in answering Israel’s refusal by creating an even
greater demonstration of grace in the Church. When these truths are glossed
over, much of value is ignored.
On
the other hand, theologians who overemphasize distinctions may be too ready to
assign concrete definitions and impose rigid structures on the Scriptures. They
may remove passages from their full historical context, deny clear comparisons,
and ignore important lessons by refusing to admit the value of the entire Bible
as a source of applications to Christian experience.
This
is not simply a matter of emphasis. It is not a dry, academic argument. The
idea that the Church is “spiritual Israel,” for example, has harmful
implications. It questions God’s intention to keep His covenant promises to
Israel and, further, casts doubt on the Old Testament believer’s ability to
understand God’s promises. But God does not play with words. God is truth and
veracity, and He intends to communicate (Num. 23:19; Ps. 33:4). Also, the
organic unification of biblical eras tends to diminish the scriptural emphasis
on Church Age doctrine (Eph. 5:32), making
believers less appreciative of God’s special role for the royal family in the
glorification of Christ. To the Christian’s enormous disadvantage, the false
view muddles the doctrine of the mystery. The blending of Israel and the Church
tends to tolerate the legalism of preserving obsolete forms of worship rather than encouraging among Christians a
vigorous love for the truth of Bible doctrine.
The
assertion that the Church is “Israel” also can generate a potentially
disastrous political activism as believers work to establish the kingdom of God
on earth. Only Jesus Christ, not fallible Christians (nor Satan), can bring
about the Millennium. Christ will do so in God’s own perfect timing and not
according to any human schedule (Acts 1:6-7; 1 Thess. 5:1-2). This remains the
devil’s world until the second advent of Christ, when our Lord will depose
Satan. During the Church Age, believers can live in the confidence that the
future rests in God’s powerful hands, as outlined in biblical eschatology,
while turning their primary attention to His plan for glorifying Christ in this
present dispensation.
The
plan of God for the Church Age must not be shunted aside by the fruitless (and
arrogant) ambition of many Christians to reform or remake the devil’s world.
Christians must not instigate or join crusades to whitewash the world.
Certainly the Christian is responsible for being an exemplary citizen under the
divine institution of the national entity, but church and state remain
separate. Christianity is not a political movement but a personal relationship
with God through Christ. Whatever may be the participation of believers in
their communities or in the legitimate political processes of their nations,
Christians must not neglect their essential calling, which is to attain
spiritual maturity. Spiritual maturity itself makes the believer an invisible
hero with a powerful, unheralded, positive impact on his nation and on human
history.
Confusion
about dispensations obscures the grace of God expressed in every age,
particularly His grace extended to believers of the current age. As a remedy,
therefore, the following survey will present the characteristics that make the
Church Age unique against the background of trends and consistencies that run
through all the dispensations.
THE POLITEUMA METAPHOR
When
a word appears only once in the Bible, we sit up and take note. Such a word is politeuma, “the status, rights, and
privileges of citizenship.” Paul uses this loaded word in Philippians 3:20.
Considering the city of Philippi at the time Paul wrote his epistle, this word
creates a brilliant metaphor for the privileges of the Church Age believer.
“For our politeuma,” writes Paul, “is
in heaven.” The politeuma metaphor
illustrates advantages that stagger the imagination (Eph. 1:18; 3:20).
A
chain of well-known historical events gives tremendous force to Paul’s use of
the word politeuma. The assassination
of Julius Caesar on the Ides of March, 44 B.C., rekindled a smoldering civil
war in Rome. The renewed conflict would profoundly affect the future of
Philippi, a small city in Macedonia.
When
Caesar’s murderers failed to restore the old Roman Republic, two of them fled
Rome to consolidate support in the eastern provinces. Marcus Brutus took over
the Roman province of Macedonia, while Gaius Cassius Longinus, the leader of
the conspiracy and an experienced general, seized control of the province of
Syria. Meanwhile, in opposition to the assassins, Caesar’s grandnephew Octavian
allied himself with Mark Antony (and Lepidus) to form the Second Triumvirate.
Two powerful Roman armies formed—one in Italy, the other in the East. Each
numbered nearly one hundred thousand men. A sequence of strategic maneuvers
brought these massive forces into contact just west of Philippi.
The
Republican army, commanded by Cassius and Brutus, held tactical and strategic
advantages over the Triumvirate army of Octavian and Antony. But rashness
doomed Cassius and Brutus to decisive defeat. The two battles of Philippi,
fought during a rainy three-week period in October of 42 B.C., snuffed out the
last hope of the Roman Republic. The victorious Octavian, who would become the
unrivaled Emperor Augustus after defeating Mark Antony in a later battle,
commemorated the victory by establishing a Roman colony at Philippi. He honored
the city as Colonia Augusta Julia
(Victrix) Phihppensium.
Philippi
flourished after the famous victory. A Roman colony was a living extension of
Rome herself. A Roman citizen residing in Philippi enjoyed the same status held
by a citizen within the walls of Rome. The rights, privileges, and protection
guaranteed by Roman law elevated Roman citizens far above their neighbors.
Roman citizens in a colony were exempt, for example, from local taxes.
The
Bible and many other ancient sources document the superior standing of Roman
citizens. Paul was unique among the twelve apostles. He alone was a Roman
citizen, and the mere mention of his citizenship brought deferential treatment
(Acts 16:27-34; 22:24-29). He was spared beatings, given hearings, and granted
access to Caesar himself (Acts 24-26). Even his enemies respected his
citizenship. Indeed, so coveted was Roman citizenship that the commander of the
Roman garrison in Jerusalem, not a citizen by birth as Paul was, had paid a
“large sum of money” to acquire it (Acts 22:28). In Paul’s day the Greek term
for a privileged colony of Roman citizens, implying the source of all the
advantages they enjoyed, was politeuma.
The
older Greek usage of the word politeuma implies
privilege and protection for citizens of a powerful state who reside in a
distant colony. In 507 B.C., the Athenians defeated the Boeotians and their
Chalcidian allies. Athens took possession of the most fertile part of Chalcis,
called the Lelantine plain, where the Chalcidian aristocrats had built their
estates. To establish Athenian influence in captured territory, the Athenian
ruler Cleisthenes divided this beautiful valley into four thousand parcels
called kleroi, “lots, portions, or
shares,” and settled a corresponding number of Athenian citizens there. This
was an entirely new concept of colonization. These settlers, or kleruchs, retained all the privileges of
Athens although they resided in Chalcis. The body of citizens resident in a
foreign country became known as a politeuma.
Specifically the word came to mean the rights and privileges of their citizenship
extended from and protected by their home city—state.
Cleisthenes’ Greek system of colonization, as adopted by the
Romans, set up the politeuma metaphor
in Paul’s epistle to the Philippians. By Paul’s day Philippi was a favorite
retirement city for Roman soldiers. Some of the Christians there were probably
Roman citizens (Acts 16:27-34). Perhaps some were descendants of veterans of
the famous battles. Certainly every Christian in Philippi knew the full
significance of politeuma. They lived
with this system of privilege. Paul’s use of this word immediately created a
vivid image in the minds of his hearers—an image of highly coveted position and
superior opportunity.
We
belong to a politeuma. We are the
nobility of heaven residing on earth. Roman politeuma
privileges were impressive, but they only begin to suggest the unfathomable
politeuma privileges of the royal
family of God. Every individual Church Age believer holds the rights and
privileges of heaven while living on earth. God has magnificently provisioned
us and has thoroughly instructed us so we might “walk worthy of [our] station
in life” (Eph. 4:1). The conclusion of this study of dispensations, therefore,
is an introduction to the privileges of our heavenly citizenship. Altogether these
privileges are unique to the Church Age and determine our Christian way of
life.
We
will briefly describe ten characteristics.
1. The
baptism of the Holy Spirit
2. The
protocol plan of God
3. Mystery
doctrine
4. The
portfolio of invisible assets
5. The equality factor
6. Royal commissions
7. The
indwelling of the Trinity
8. The
availability of divine power
9. The
absence of prophecy
10. Invisible
heroes
Some
of these politeuma privileges require
more explanation than others. Some have been mentioned already. A short
discussion does not indicate less importance.
All
these privileges form a single, balanced whole. Each complements the others. As
the believer learns what his assets are and how to use them, they begin to
function together as an integrated system. Awareness and consistent use of
these assets keeps the believer moving forward in the Christian way of life.
Indeed, these privileges constitute the
unique life of meaning, purpose, and definition that God designed for the
Church Age.
THE BAPTISM OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
A NEW SPIRITUAL SPECIES IN CHRIST
At
the moment of salvation, God the Holy Spirit places every Church Age believer into
union with Christ (Gal. 3:1-5, 14, 26-27; Eph. 4:4-5; 2 Thess. 2:13-14). This
instantaneous ministry of the Spirit is called the baptism of the Holy Spirit
(1 Cor. 12:13), and it occurs only in the Church Age. “If any man is in Christ, he is a new [spiritual]
species” (2 Cor. 5:17, italics added). In this verse the Greek word kainos does not mean “new” as in recent,
current, or new in time, like a new coat that replaces an old one of the same
type. Kainos means new in kind, new
in species, describing something remarkable that has never existed before—a
totally unprecedented relationship with God (Eph. 1:22-23; 5:22-32). The new spiritual species is the royal family of God.
By
placing the Church Age believer “in Christ,” the baptism of the Spirit also
links the great power experiment of the hypostatic union and the great power
experiment of the Church Age. In union with Christ, the believer can utilize
the power system designed for the humanity of Christ. In fact, so great is the
divine dynasphere that union with Christ is absolutely a prerequisite for its
use.
Jesus
Christ prophesied the baptism of the Spirit during the Dispensation of the
Hypostatic Union (John 14:20; Acts 1:5). The fulfillment of this prophecy
marked the beginning of the Church Age (Acts 2:1-4; cf. 11:15-17). Throughout
the Church Age, the baptism of the Spirit forms the royal family of God, the
Church Universal, also called the Body of Christ.
For
even as the [human] body is one and yet has many members, and all the members
of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one
Spirit [God the Holy Spirit performs the action] we were all baptized into one
body, whether Jews or Greeks [Gentiles], whether slaves or free. (1 Cor. 12:12-13,
NASB)
The baptism
of the Holy Spirit sets the Church Age believer apart from unbelievers and apart from believers of all other
dispensations. Every Church Age believer is “sanctified in Christ” (1 Cor. 1:2,
30) for the “glory of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Thess. 2:13—14). The Greek verb hagiazo means “to set apart, to make holy, to consecrate, to
sanctify.” When applied to the Church, sanctification means that T God has
created a new species of spiritual royalty, set apart for the maximum
glorification of Jesus Christ: Each believer is in union with the King of Kings
forever.
CONFORMED TO THE IMAGE OF CHRIST
The doctrine of sanctification teaches
that God’s purpose is to make each Church Age believer like the humanity of
Christ. Each is “conformed to the image of His Son,” the glorified Lord Jesus
Christ (Rom. 8:29). God accomplishes the Church Age believer’s sanctification
in three stages: positional, experiential, and ultimate.
Positional sanctification is
the Church Age believer’s union with Christ, accomplished by the baptism of the
Holy Spirit. Permanently identified with Christ from the moment of faith in
Him, the Christian retroactively shares
in the victory of our Lord’s spiritual death on the cross (Rom. 6:3; Col.
2:12a) and currently shares His exalted
position in heaven “crowned with glory and honor” (Ps. 110:1; Rom. 6:4-5; Col.
2:l2b; Heb. 1:13; 2:9-11; 10:12).[26]
The phrase “in Christ,” found throughout
the New Testament epistles, is a technical term for the Church Age believer’s
astounding, absolutely unprecedented union with Christ (John 14:20). In Christ
each Church Age believer is positionally superior to all angels, including the
chief fallen angel, Satan (Heb. 1:4, 13-14; 2:9-11). This fact of mystery
doctrine signals the defeat of Satan, which is why Christ’s unexpected
announcement of the Church, just prior to the cross, had such a powerful impact
on the angels. Also, union with Christ gives equal position and privilege to
every Church Age believer, eliminating any basis for prejudice, antagonism, or
racial discrimination among Christians (James 1:9-10). Obtained at the moment
of salvation, positional sanctification defines the nature of the Christian’s
way of life after salvation as he
walks “in newness of life” (Rom. 6:4).
Experiential sanctjfication is
residence, function, and spiritual momentum in the divine dynasphere during the
believer’s life on earth. Living in the divine dynasphere, which the Holy
Spirit energizes, fulfills the protocol plan of God (John 17:17; 2 Tim. 2:21;
Heb. 9:13-14).
Because we are in union with Christ, we now are able to be sustained, nourished, and empowered by the postsalvation ministry of the Spirit (John 7:37—39; 14:15-17; 16:13-14). Thus we become “partakers of the divine nature” in experience just as we are in position (2 Pet. 1:4). The Holy Spirit’s postsalvation ministry is called the filling of the Spirit (Eph. 5:18), which enables us to “walk by means of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:16) in a manner “worthy of [our] station in life” (Eph. 4:1).[27]
United
with Christ and granted the same power system in which His humanity constantly
lived, we are equipped to be “imitators of God and [to] walk . . . just as
Christ [walked]” (Eph. 5:1-2; Gal.
5:16; 1 John 2:6). He functioned in
the prototype divine dynasphere; we can function in the operational divine
dynasphere (John 14:11-12). In the divine dynasphere we live “through the
Spirit, by faith [what is believed—Bible doctrine]” (Gal. 5:5). The mind of
Christ, or Bible doctrine in the soul, is the material the Spirit uses to
manufacture the virtues of Christ in our lives (Rom. 13:14). In a different
metaphor, doctrine is the nutrient that the Holy Spirit uses to produce the “fruit
of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22-23).
Therefore,
experiential sanctification has both absolute and progressive aspects. The
filling of the Spirit is an absolute status.
At any given time, the believer is either one hundred percent filled with the
Spirit or he is not filled with the Spirit at all. Either he is in fellowship
with God, or he is out of fellowship. If he has confessed his sins to God, the
believer is entirely inside the divine dynasphere (1 John 1:9), but when he
sins, and as long as he does not confess to God, he is entirely outside the
divine dynasphere. Outside the divine dynasphere he “grieves” or “quenches” the
Holy Spirit (Eph. 4:30; 1 Thess. 5:19) and resides instead in Satan’s cosmic
system.[28]
This
absolute but invisible status—in or out—has a cumulative effect, which is the progressive aspect of experiential
sanctification. The power of the divine dynasphere is essential for spiritual
growth. Only in the divine dynasphere can the believer learn Bible doctrine or
accurately apply spiritual truth. What is the dominant trend of his decisions
at any given time? Has he been consistently obedient to God’s mandates that
comprise the divine dynasphere, or has he neglected these divine commands? Is
he more often in or out of fellowship with God? Spiritual growth comes from
consistency, and as the believer grows, this consistency in executing God’s
protocol plan becomes a stronger and stronger impetus in his life. Every day he
learns and applies doctrine; his inner person is renewed day by day (2 Cor.
4:16). His thinking is renovated according to the pattern of divine thinking in
Bible doctrine (Rom. 12:2; Eph. 4:23). He gradually acquires the virtues of
Christ.
As
growth continues, the filling of the Spirit produces more of the fruit of the
Spirit whenever the believer is in the divine dynasphere. For example, a novice
believer can be just as filled with the Spirit as the mature believer. But the
mature believer understands a great deal more Bible doctrine. When the mature
Christian is filled with the Spirit, he manifests the “newness of life” more
than the beginner who is equally filled with the Spirit but understands less
doctrine. A greater understanding and application of doctrine in the believer’s
thinking causes greater manifestations of the filling of the Spirit in the
believer’s life. Add to this the fact that as a Christian grows, he spends a
greater proportion of his time filled with the Spirit. In other words, both
quantity and quality improve: more time is spent in the divine dynasphere with
a greater depth of doctrinal resources for the Spirit to use. This explains the
increasing effect of divine dynamics within a Christian’s life.
Experiential
sanctification is called “godliness” (1 Tim. 3:16; 4:7-8; 2 Pet. 1:3; 3:11).
True godliness runs far deeper than the shallow legalisms that so many Christians
practice. Genuine godliness is abiding in the sphere of Christ’s love, which He
equated with obedience to His commandments (John 15:10; Eph. 5:2). The sphere
of Christ’s love is the divine
dynasphere. The commandments of the Christian way of life coalesce as one
consistent system, a single complex of interrelated and mutually supporting
elements, an integrated sphere of divine power. This divine system of love and
power is the place of godliness. The Christian way of life is life in the
divine dynasphere. Here, in principle, is the answer to the question, “After
salvation, what?”
Experiential
sanctification is potential for the believer, commanded but not guaranteed. God
provides the resources, opportunities, instructions, encouragement, and even the
divine discipline, but the believer himself chooses to execute the protocol
plan of God or not. Volition remains a central issue in the Church Age, as in
every dispensation throughout the angelic conflict. But God’s faithfulness is
also a consistent theme. The believer’s failure to live by the mandates of
experiential sanctification never cancels positional or ultimate
sanctification, which are guaranteed
by the very essence of God (2 Tim. 2:13).
After
our postsalvation lives on earth have ended, God will achieve our ultimate sanchfication at the
resurrection, or Rapture, of the Church. In that future moment He will provide
the resurrection body, making us physically like Christ (1 Cor. 1:8; Eph. 1:4;
Phil. 3:21; 1 Thess. 5:23; 1 John 3:2).
MISCONCEPTIONS OF THE BAPTISM OF THE SPIRIT
The
doctrine of the baptism of the Holy Spirit is widely distorted today. We must
state what the baptism of the Spirit is not.
The baptism of the Spirit is not the same as the filling of the Spirit, as
just noted. The baptism of the Holy Spirit also is not an experience or a
“second work of grace” after salvation. It is not, and never was, speaking in
tongues.[29]
The
idea that Spirit baptism involves speaking in tongues fails to distinguish the
doctrine of the baptism of the Holy Spirit from the doctrine of spiritual
gifts. The baptism of the Spirit occurs at the instant of salvation for all
Church Age believers; the gift of tongues formerly operated only in the
postsalvation experience of a few first-century Christians. The phenomenon of
tongues was a temporary spiritual gift designed, as Isaiah prophesied, to warn
Israel of impending national judgment (Isa. 28:11; 1 Cor. l4:21—22a). Jews
were evangelized in gentile
languages understood by the listeners •1 but not the speakers. This ironic gift
exercised by certain early
Christians dramatized the
Jews’ failure to evangelize the Gentiles. Because the gift of tongues was a
miraculous sign to alert Israel to her decadence, no one has legitimately
spoken in tongues since A.D. 70, when Jerusalem fell and the purpose for this
temporary gift expired.
If
there are tongues, they will cease. (1 Cor. 13:8b, NASB)
The
dramatic gift of tongues ceased long ago, but the baptism of the Spirit occurs
in every generation of the Church Age. And never does this instantaneous work
of the Spirit involve ecstatics or emotion. Indeed, the baptism of the Holy
Spirit has absolutely no relation to feelings. The believer may be elated or
feel nothing at the moment of salvation. He may even feel horrible, but
regardless of how he feels, in that initial instant of faith in Christ, the
Holy Spirit unites him with Christ.
No
one senses or detects the baptism of the Spirit in any way. Neither sight,
hearing, smell, taste, nor touch confirms this doctrine. Nor does any so-called
sixth sense or intuition. The Spirit’s ministry at salvation is known only
through Bible doctrine, which the believer learns after salvation.
The
baptism of the Spirit is never earned nor deserved by the believer. God gives this
fabulous gift by grace, totally without regard for human merit or human works.
Union with Christ is complete at the instant of salvation, accomplished
entirely by the grace of God before any believer has a chance to achieve
spiritual growth, perform any Christian service, or even learn about these
things. The baptism of the Spirit is not progressive and cannot be improved.
Furthermore, this instantaneous work of God the Holy Spirit for every Church
Age believer is permanent. Never in all eternity can it be undone, lost, or
canceled, and never does it need to be repeated (Rom. 8:38—39).
SHARING ALL CHRIST HAS AND IS
As
the mechanics of positional sanctification, the baptism of the Holy Spirit
causes the Christian to share in all Christ has and is. Every member of the
royal family of God shares Christ’s election (Eph. 1:4), His destiny (Eph. 1:5; Rom. 8:28, 30), His sonship (Gal. 3:26;
1 John 3:1-2), His heirship (Rom. 8:16-17), His priesthood (Heb. 10:10-14; 1
Pet. 2:9), His sanctification (1 Cor. 1:2, 30), His royalty (2 Pet. 1:11), His
righteousness (2 Cor. 5:21), and His
eternal life (1 John 5:11-12).
Divine righteousness and
eternal life are necessary for a relationship with God. To live with perfect God forever, man needs God’s own righteousness and God’s own life.
These blessings, therefore, are inherent in salvation in every dispensation.
Old Testament believers were given the righteousness of God and eternal life
through imputation rather than through union with Christ (Gen. 15:6; Ps. 23:6).
In the Church Age every believer receives divine righteousness and eternal life
by imputation and by union with
Christ (2 Cor. 5:21; 1 John 5:11). This double portion belongs to spiritual
royalty
alone.[30]
One vivid description of the baptism of the Holy Spirit
contrasts the Church and Israel. To teach the Church Age believer's position in
Christ, Paul draws an analogy to the custom of "adoption" practiced
by the Roman aristocracy. Roman adoption officially designated someone as an
heir, whether or not that person was related by blood. The caesars usually
adopted successors who were not their sons. Often, however, a father would
adopt his own son, granting him the full privileges and responsibilities of the
family name. The ceremony also marked the boy's transition into adulthood,
traditionally at age fourteen. Paul depicts Israel as an immature son (Gal.
3:23), the Church as an adult son and heir (Gal. 3:25-26). At a dramatic moment
in the Roman ceremony of adoption, the new heir is clothed with the magnificent
toga virilis, the garment of manhood.
For all of you who were baptized into Christ [the baptism
of the Holy Spirit] have clothed yourselves with Christ.
(Gal. 3:27, NASB)
Christians wear the
spiritual equivalent of the toga virilis from the moment of salvation, when the
baptism of the Spirit occurs. Through the merits of Christ, Church Age
believers are adopted as adult sons of God and joint heirs with Christ at the
first instant of faith in Him (Rom. 8:16-17; Eph. 1:5). Although a spiritual
infant in experience, every Church Age believer is a spiritual adult in
position. He is granted the full privileges and responsibilities of an adult
son of God because he is in union with the Lord Jesus Christ.
THE PROTOCOL PLAN OF GOD
Union
with Christ opens the door to an extraordinary postsalvation way of life for
the royal family. I call this the protocol
plan of God. Royalty lives by protocol—spiritual royalty no less so than
temporal royalty. The refined behavior and high standards of conduct in a
vigorous aristocracy are supported by a system of protocol. Each individual is
thoroughly familiar with the manner in which various activities are conducted.
He knows his place in these activities. Protocol enables everyone to know what
to do in a given situation and thus creates an environment of poise and
graciousness. Protocol resolves routine questions and frees the individual to
devote his energies to substantial issues or to enjoying the event at hand.
The
Church Age believer need never wonder what the Christian life requires of him.
He need not stumble or feel awkward in any aspect of his relationship with God.
The entire royal protocol is available for him to learn and master. He belongs
to a spiritual dynasty founded by the Lord Jesus Christ in which the standard
of conduct follows the precedent clearly established by the humanity of Christ
on earth. In the Church Age, the protocol
plan of God for the Church supersedes the ritual plan of God for Israel.
Protocol
is defined as a “rigid long-established code prescribing complete deference to
superior rank and strict adherence to due order of precedence and precisely
correct procedure.”[31]
The several phrases of this definition illustrate God’s plan for the
royal family on earth.
Although
new to history at the beginning of the Church Age, the protocol plan is
“long-established” in the mind of omniscient God. He has always known the way
of life He would unveil for the Church Age. He has known the mystery doctrines
from eternity past (Eph. 3:9), and in historical terms these doctrines have
been in force now for nearly two thousand years.
The
exactness of God’s code for spiritual royalty expresses His own perfection: He
decreed one way of doing something, and that way is the right way. We cannot
define the Christian way of life in any way we please. God “prescribes complete
deference” to the ends and the means of His
plan. The very concept of protocol means that even a right thing becomes
wrong when done in a wrong way. And a wrong thing is still wrong though done in
a right way. Obviously a wrong thing done wrongly is wrong. Only a right thing
done in a right way is right. This is “precisely correct procedure.”
The right thing is the protocol plan of God.
The right way demanded by protocol is
life in the divine dynasphere. Therefore, the most basic concept of the
Christian way of life is residence, function, and momentum inside the divine
dynasphere. The divine dynasphere is the royal believer’s personal, invisible
palace.
God
is eternally and infinitely perfect. Perfect God can devise only a perfect
plan. However, the protocol plan of God, like His postsalvation plans for other
dispensations, is designed for imperfect believers. Because the Christian
retains his old sin nature throughout his mortal life on earth (1 John 1:8—10),
his contribution to the plan of God would only corrupt the plan. The believer
cannot execute God’s protocol plan through human ability, human dynamics, human
personality, human intelligence, human talent, or human works. If the plan of
God depended on man’s merit for a single instant, the plan would immediately
become imperfect. God allows no weak links in the chain. He guards the
integrity of His plan. This is grace. Man enters
God’s perfect plan exclusively on the merits of Christ, and the principle
of grace remains in force after salvation
as well. The believer lives the Christian life on divine resources only (Eph.
4:20—24).
Perfect
God has provided His perfect truth (Eph. 4:21b, 24—25, 29) and His own power (Eph. 4:30a) for the execution of His
protocol plan. Truth and falsehood do not mix without becoming false.
Therefore, divine viewpoint from Bible doctrine must replace human viewpoint.
Likewise, divine power and human power are mutually exclusive. Observing divine
protocol must take precedence over the expression of human abilities (1 Cor.
2:4-5). Human innovation must remain
within bounds of the system God has ordained. The truth and the power of the
Holy Spirit, on which the humanity of Christ relied during the great power
experiment of the hypostatic union, define the only correct approach to life
for every believer during the great power experiment of the Church Age.
Contradictions
cannot exist in the protocol plan of God. Either a believer will utilize the
available omnipotence of God and execute the protocol plan, or he will use
human energy in an attempt to execute an inferior plan of his own. Many people
presumptuously call their own plans the plan of God or the will of God, when in
fact these schemes may be satanic counterfeits designed to entangle believers
in the evils of religion (I Tim. 4:1).58 Faithful intake and application of
Bible doctrine protect the believer from such contradictions.
The
Christian who is ignorant of Church Age doctrine, however, lacks discernment.
He is incapable of grace orientation. He cannot be true to his spiritual
heritage. Ignorance mixed with negligence cannot avoid the trap of arrogance.
He assumes he is doing God’s will even as he falls into Satan’s cosmic system
and becomes a loser in the great power experiment of the Church Age. Losers do
not lose their salvation, but in failing to execute the postsalvation protocol
plan of God, they lose blessing and impact in time and eternity.
At
physical birth man is born ignorant of life. Likewise, at spiritual birth59
believers are “born again” ignorant of the protocol plan of God. Human
opinion or philosophy, despite its occasional brilliance, never determines the
Christian way of life (1 Cor. 1:20-31). What matters is what God has revealed
in the mystery doctrine of the Church Age. No believer can execute the protocol
plan without learning and applying Bible doctrine.
58. Christianity is not a religion. Christianity is a personal
relationship with God established by the work of Christ. Religion is man’s
futile attempt through his own efforts to achieve a relationship with God. See Christian Integrity, 158—70, for a
presentation of Satan’s cosmic system, which includes religion.
59. Spiritual birth is
regeneration at the moment of faith in Christ. See Integrity of God, 105, 121-26.
MYSTERY DOCTRINE
We
have noted already that the Greek noun musterion
originally referred to the secret doctrines of ancient religious
organizations. Only those persons initiated into the cult of Dionysus, for
example, knew its mysteries. Nothing was disclosed to outsiders. Paul borrowed
this well-known pagan term to communicate the divine truths of the royal family
of God. In Paul’s usage of musterion, the
initiates are Church Age believers, and the doctrines are those concerned with
the Church. God did not disclose Church doctrine to the writers of Old
Testament Scripture, but these marvelous truths now are revealed throughout the
New Testament epistles (Rom. 16:25—26; Eph. 3:1-9; Col. 1:25-28).
But we
communicate God’s wisdom in a mystery, [which communicates] the hidden
[assets], which God predestined60 before the ages [in eternity
past, before the dispensations of human history] to our glory [the Church Age
believer’s utilization of divine assets, which glorifies God in the great power
experiment of the Church Age]. (1 Cor. 2:7)
With
a pure conscience, keep holding the mystery, even doctrine. (1 Tim. 3:9)
Mystery
doctrine reveals all the politeuma privileges
of the Church Age believer, which set the Church Age apart from other dispensations.
The mandate to “keep holding the mystery” identifies the most vital function of
the royal family: to continually learn, retain, and apply the doctrines of the
Church. Hearing doctrine, meditating on doctrine, living by doctrine—this is
the highest form of worship. The royal family of God has a unique potential to
worship God because of the unprecedented extent of divine revelation in the
mystery doctrine (Eph. 3:18).
THE PORTFOLIO OF INVISIBLE ASSETS
THE BELIEVER’S WEALTH TAUGHT BY ANALOGY
We
have discussed three politeuma privileges.
The baptism of the Holy Spirit places the Church Age believer into union with
Christ. The protocol plan of God sets forth the royal way of life that God
expects of the Christian because of his exalted position in Christ.
60. Predestination is explained beginning on page 110, below.
And mystery doctrine unveils
the Church Age with all of its divine assets and mandates which define the
Christian’s way of life.
These
three tremendous benefits of our heavenly citizenship are parts of a larger
picture. They belong to a portfolio of
invisible assets that God the Father designed in eternity past for every
Church Age believer. “Portfolio” is a term for the holdings of an investor, a
synonym for his riches. God has lavished upon us the riches of His grace (Eph.
1:6—8, 18; 3:8, 16; Phil. 4:19; Col. 1:27; 2:2). Every Church Age believer is
fabulously wealthy.
Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who [the Father] has blessed us
with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. (Eph. 1:3,
NASB)
Not
only is the Church Age believer a citizen of heaven but that citizenship
implies extreme wealth. “Our politeuma is
in heaven” (Phil. 3:20), and our portfolio is described as including “every
spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” (Eph. 1:3). Ephesians 1:3 emphasizes
the source of these blessings (God the Father) and the mechanics of receiving
them (from Christ). We will explain these mechanics shortly.
The
believer’s portfolio of invisible assets can be categorized. Ephesians 1:3—6
identifies the primary assets; the secondary and personnel assets will be
identified from other passages of Scripture.
1. Primary assets
a. Escrow blessings
b. Computer assets
2. Secondary assets
a. Volitional assets
b. Production assets
c. Assets for undeserved suffering
3. Personnel assets Spiritual gifts
I
have adopted two analogies to help communicate the Christian’s primary assets.
I call them his escrow blessings and
his computer assets. In Ephesians
1:3, the phrase “every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ”
describes escrow blessings. In verses 4 through 6, election and predestination
constitute the computer assets.
The
Church Age believer’s exalted destiny and vast riches are “exceeding abundantly
beyond all that we ask or think” (Eph. 3:20). The Bible reveals them in many
glimpses and increments; they must be explained in numerous ways and from
various points of view. Therefore, analogy plays an important role in teaching
the Christian way of life. Already we have approached the subject from the
standpoint of citizenship, Roman adoption, parts of the body, aristocratic
protocol, the secret doctrines of an exclusive religion, and an investment
portfolio. Now add the perspectives of an escrow contract and an electronic
computer.
The
analogies I devise are teaching aids and are not intended to perfectly mesh
with one another. Each serves to communicate a specific aspect of the truth.
The truth itself is what perfectly meshes.
ESCROW BLESSINGS
INHERITANCE RESERVED IN HEAVEN. Three parties are identified
in Ephesians 1:3. The relationships between God the Father, Jesus Christ, and
the Church Age believer in this passage suggest the functions of a grantor, a
depositary, and a grantee in an escrow contract. What is an escrow contract? It
is a binding agreement in which one party gives another party something
valuable. Instead of giving it directly, however, the grantor places the item
in the custody of a third party, called the depositary or the escrow officer.
The escrow officer keeps the item secure and distributes it to the grantee only
after certain conditions are met, which have been set forth in the escrow
agreement.
The very
definition of escrow means there are conditions to be fulfilled by the grantee
before the item will be conveyed to him. An escrow agreement gives us a clear
picture of our situation before God and our purpose in life.
In
eternity past God the Father prepared special blessings for each Church Age
believer. He deposited those blessings with Christ “before the foundation of
the world” (Eph. 1:4). Just as an escrow contract is irrevocable from the date
of the contract, so also the believer’s blessings belong to him irrevocably
from eternity past. God has given every Church Age believer a private account
in heaven, which He cannot cancel or close. God cannot take back His blessings.
This account is filled with exceptional blessings—some for time, some for eternity.
God designed escrow blessings exclusively for each individual believer, an
“inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away,
reserved in heaven for [him]” (1 Pet. 1:4).
Escrow
blessings far exceed everyday logistical blessings like food, shelter,
clothing, protection, transportation, and a source of Bible teaching.[32]
God supplies logistical grace constantly and unconditionally to every
believer—positive or negative, winner or loser (Matt. 6:25-34; Phil. 4:19; cf.
4:2-3). Escrow blessings, however, are reserved for spiritual maturity.
So
extraordinary are these “greater grace” blessings (James 4:6) that every
recipient must possess a mature capacity to appreciate them and benefit from
them. Without sufficient capacity of soul, a believer would not know what to do
with these divine bounties. If he received delivery of his escrow blessings
while still spiritually immature, he would distort them, misuse them, and make
himself miserable. Here, then, we find the condition set forth in the escrow
contract: before Jesus Christ will distribute escrow blessings, the believer
must attain spiritual maturity. Again, maturity comes through perception and
application of Bible doctrine as part of living consistently inside the divine
dynasphere.
A
mature relationship with God is by far the most valuable escrow blessing for
the Christian’s life on earth. Awe and gratitude toward God animate the mature
believer’s attitude in everything he does. In his soul he has capacity to be
happy, capacity to understand and benefit from divine blessings, capacity to
endure suffering, capacity to maintain the initiative in his own life. He has a
personal sense of destiny. Worship becomes a profound responsiveness in a soul
inculcated with truth and filled with the Spirit (John 7:38). Personal love for
God becomes occupation with the person of Christ (Gal. 2:20; Phil. 1:21). But
“every spiritual blessing” involves more than even these marvelous, intangible
benefits. “Spiritual” in Ephesians 1:3 points to God as the source of escrow
blessings, which also include many tangible and material blessings, tailor-made
for the individual.
BLESSINGS FOR TIME AND ETERNITY Every believer has escrow
blessings for time and escrow blessings for eternity. Examples of these blessings
are presented in The Integrity of God.
As the escrow officer Jesus Christ will begin to distribute escrow blessings for time when the
believer reaches spiritual maturity. Our Lord will award escrow blessings for eternity at the Judgment Seat of Christ, which
will occur immediately after the Rapture of the Church (1 Cor. 4:5; 2 Cor.
5:10).
Believers
who fail to reach spiritual maturity and do not receive their escrow blessings
for time also will not receive their escrow blessings for eternity (1 Cor. 3:12-15).
The criterion is human volition—each believer’s consistent positive or negative
response to God’s plan for the Christian life. After salvation, what? The great
question has eternal repercussions. In the escrow contract, the precondition
for receiving escrow blessings for eternity is that the believer must have
received escrow blessings in time.
Now
if anyone really competes in the athletic games [an analogy to the Christian
way of life], he does not receive a winner’s wreath [escrow blessings for eternity]
unless he trains according to the rules [adheres to the protocol plan of God].
(2 Tim. 2:5)
I
have fought that honorable fight [advanced through the stages of spiritual
growth], I have finished the course [attained maturity], I have guarded the doctrine
[as first priority in the soul]. In the future a wreath of righteousness
[escrow blessings for eternity] is reserved for me [on deposit since eternity
past], which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award me on that day [at the
Judgment Seat of Christ] and not only to me but to all those who love His
appearing [mature believers, whose thorough understanding of doctrine enables
them to be occupied with Christ]. (2 Tim. 4:7-8)
Blessed
[happy] is the man who perseveres under testing [successfully passes the tests
that accelerate spiritual growth];[33]
he will receive the wreath of life [escrow blessings for eternity] which
God has promised to those constantly loving Him [mature believers]. (James
1:12)
These
passages describe desire for truth, love for God, strength of character,
remarkable stability, perseverance, motivation, momentum, and happiness. Such
qualities of the inner person are escrow blessings for time. They are escrow
blessings supported by the basic capacities of soul developed on the way to
maturity. Invariably these traits—these escrow blessings for time—belong to the
believers whom Scripture identifies as recipients of eternal rewards or
“crowns”— their escrow blessings for eternity (1 Cor. 9:24-27; Phil. 4:1; 1
Thess. 2:19-20; 1 Pet. 5:1-4; Rev. 2:10). Distribution of both categories of
escrow blessings—for time and for eternity—depends on the believer’s execution
of the protocol plan of God in time. The precondition for receiving escrow blessings
dramatizes God’s objective for the Church Age believer on earth: Learn Bible
doctrine, gain spiritual momentum, grow up, attain maturity! In other words,
come to love and glorify Christ.
UNDISTRIBUTED BLESSINGS AND
THE GLORY OF GOD.
At this moment each believer
has an escrow account in heaven with his name on it. But not every believer
takes distribution of those blessings. Ignorance of Bible doctrine means
ignorance of divine assets, which guarantees failure to use those assets.
Failure to consistently utilize divine assets constitutes failure to execute
the protocol plan of God, which means the believer cannot reach spiritual
maturity. No maturity, no capacity for blessings. Therefore, no escrow
blessings for time, and no escrow blessings for eternity (1 Cor. 3:11-15). This does not affect his salvation, but
his neglect or rejection of Bible doctrine makes him a spiritual loser.
There is no excuse for failure to execute the protocol plan of God. God faithfully supplies logistical grace to winner and loser alike, providing more than ample
opportunity for the loser to recover his momentum and renew his advance. Equal privilege and equal opportunity are facts of the Christian way of life, and the escrow blessings themselves are irrevocable and imperishable realities. If a believer is a spiritual loser, he is so by his own volition. A loser stops being a loser when he starts using rebound and begins to learn, or relearn, Bible doctrine. Recovery of spiritual momentum is not easy, but it will never be easier than at present. Recovery can begin in any spiritual condition in which the loser finds himself. There is no reason to wait. There is nothing to wait for and much to lose.
If
the loser does not recover, his personal inheritance of escrow blessings will
remain undistributed, unreceived, on deposit in heaven forever. At the
resurrection of the Church, the loser will receive his resurrection body and
will enjoy perfect happiness in heaven, but he will not receive his escrow
blessings for eternity (1 Cor. 3:15). They will remain on deposit forever as a
monument to lost opportunity and as undeniable evidence of God’s grace in spite
of man’s negative volition (Eph. 1:3; 3:10; 1 Pet. 1:3-4).
God
was glorified by irrevocably giving escrow blessings to each believer “before
the foundation of the world” (Eph. 1:4; Col. 3:24; 1 Pet. 1:4). God is
glorified to the maximum by the distribution of these escrow blessings to the
spiritual winner in time and eternity. Describing God at the beginning of
Ephesians 1:3, the Greek adjective eulogetos
is translated “blessed,” but this word actually means “worthy of praise and
glorification.” In the same verse the verb is eulogeo, “to bless.” Furthermore, the cognate noun eulogia is used for the believer’s
“blessings.” Blessed, bless, blessings: this dramatic use of Greek cognate
words indicates an essential interconnection. These blessings are the means of
God’s glorification. He is glorified by blessing us. Principle: The first thing
God did for us—placing special blessings in escrow—established the means of
glorifying Him. God’s desire that we receive our escrow blessings could not be
expressed more emphatically.
What
do we conclude? Obviously, asceticism is not
the Christian way of life (Col. 2:20—23). But neither is aimless, undisciplined
lawlessness (2 Tim. 2:5). The Church Age believer has a destiny.
He glorifies God by utilizing divine assets so that he grows spiritually and
acquires capacity to enjoy his escrow blessings.
God
created escrow blessings for every believer of every dispensation, but the
greater extent of the Church Age believer’s portfolio makes even his escrow
blessings unique. We come now to an exceedingly valuable item in the royal
believer’s portfolio that sets his blessings apart from those of all other dispensations.
COMPUTER ASSETS
A MODERN ANALOGY. Again, the Christian’s portfolio of invisible
assets includes two categories of primary assets. We have described escrow
blessings; we now turn our attention to computer
assets.
I use this term to describe the
Church Age believer’s election and predestination.
He
[God the Father] chose us in Him [in
union with Christ] before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy
and blameless before Him [God’s purpose in election includes positional and
experiential sanctification on earth and ultimate sanctification in heaven]. In
love He predestined us to adoption as
sons through Jesus Christ to Himself [as in the Roman custom of adoption],
according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His
grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved [in union with Christ].
(Eph. 1:4-6, NASB, italics added)
What
are “election” and “predestination”? How do they affect us? In brief, God has
established a plan and has supplied us with all assets needed to execute that
plan.
Computers
are becoming a familiar part of daily life. A simple analogy to a computer
might help to make this passage clear. Scientific breakthroughs have
dramatically reduced the size of computers. Complex functions can now occur in
tiny electrical circuits built into a microchip of silicon no larger than the
head of a pin.
Different
microchips perform specialized functions in the computer. Two common types of
these powerful chips illustrate how liberally sovereign God has blessed Church
Age believers without nullifying their volition. In fact, this computer analogy
helps explain how God Himself establishes human free will.[34]
A
computer has a certain number of microchips in it. Some chips are completely
programmed at the factory, others are designed at the factory to be programmed
by the user—according to what he wants his computer to be able to do. Both the
ROM chips (Read-Only Memory, programmed at the factory) and the PROM chips
(Programmable Read-Only Memory, built at the factory to be programmed by the
user himself) cannot be altered once they are programmed. And both are
necessary for the effective function of the computer.
Like
the computer, the believer’s life involves both divine sovereignty (comparable
to the ROM chips programmed in advance at the factory) and human volition
(comparable to the PROM chips that are programmed by the user’s own decisions).
Just as a particular computer would not operate without both types of
programmed microchips, so also human thought and action cannot occur without
the function of both divine sovereignty and human volition.
Indeed,
God is the One who makes our volition free. He gave man free will, just as the
factory designs the computer’s PROM chips specifically to let the user
determine how the computer will function. The user’s programming of his own
PROM chip works only because of the designer’s plan: the factory design of the
PROM chip takes the user’s programming and makes it effective. In a similar
way, God sovereignly makes man’s free choices real, certain, and unalterable
once they are made.
According
to the analogy, each person is like a computer. His ROM chip (programmed
entirely by the sovereignty of God) is programmed with his “computer assets.”
He has no choice in this matter. Long before human history began, God
unilaterally chose to give the Church Age believer certain characteristics. He
chose to make the Christian spiritual royalty—as it were, to make him the most
powerful computer ever created. This means that the computer assets of election
and predestination include tremendous benefits, which God gave in eternity
past. We are now studying these benefits as the unique characteristics of the
Church Age.
The
ROM chip contains God’s plan and gives every Church Age believer the status and
assets required to carry out this demanding protocol. The PROM chip (programmed
the way human volition chooses) gives us the freedom to use those powerful
assets if we so desire. The PROM chip makes us spiritual winners or losers,
according to our decisions to use divine assets and fulfill God’s plan— or to
ignore our spiritual destiny in Christ.
DIVINE SOVEREIGNTYAND CHRISTIAN FREEDOM. The
computer analogy helps us understand what the sovereignty and omniscience of
God accomplished in eternity past in behalf of the Church Age believer. The
blessings mentioned in Ephesians 1:5—6 are
some of the unique characteristics of the Church Age that we have already
discussed. In eternity past God determined that sanctification and adoption would
be given to the royal family through union with Christ. As also noted, we have
no choice in this matter: at the moment of faith in Christ, these blessings are
ours and we are new creatures in Christ, a new spiritual species. The mechanics
by which God established these and other characteristics of the Church Age
believer involved election and predestination.
Election
expresses the sovereign right of God over His creation. Election can be
described in terms of individuals and in terms of historical categories of believers.
God elected for salvation every human being who would ever believe in Jesus
Christ. Election is not the cause of salvation. Instead, God sovereignly chose
to accomplish all the work for man’s salvation and to institute non-meritorious
faith in Jesus Christ as the sole remaining criterion for obtaining salvation.
Because divine omniscience is not limited by time, God knew in eternity past
who would believe in Christ and in eternity past chose each believer to be the recipient of eternal
salvation. In other words, He chose to make salvation a reality in the soul of
anyone who actually would believe in Christ. Therefore, every believer of every
dispensation can be described as elect in regard to salvation.
Election
is also a biblical term that carries additional significance for particular
bodies of believers. Here is yet another category of doctrine that reflects
dispensational distinctions. Election to salvation gives every believer the
necessities for living with God forever— including eternal life and divine
righteousness. But added to these identical provisions, further blessings are
bestowed upon specified groups of believers at the moment of salvation. These
are designed to fulfill God’s purpose beyond salvation.
The
position and assets bestowed at the moment of salvation upon members of the
royal family are more extensive than the blessings given to believers of other
dispensations. God elected Church Age believers for a unique,
corporate purpose beyond salvation. The special destiny of the royal family in
both time and eternity is to glorify God to the maximum in union with Jesus
Christ.
The
election of the Church is one of several corporate divine elections, three of
which are pertinent to our study.[35]
1. The
election of Israel (Deut. 4:37; 7:6; Isa. 45:4; Matt. 24:22,
24, 31; Rom. 11:5-7)
2. The
election of Christ (Isa. 42:1; Eph. 4:1; 1 Pet. 2:6)
3. The
election of the Church (Eph. 4:1; 1 Thess. 1:4; 2 Thess.
2:13; 2 Pet. 1:3)
A thread of continuity runs through these three expressions of divine sovereignty, but the differences also are real and significant. These three unique elections express God’s purpose in three distinct dispensations. The election of Israel: God called out the Jews as a new racial species to bless all the nations of the earth. The election of Christ: God called out Christ as the Savior to purchase the salvation of the entire human race and to be exalted above all creation. The election of the Church: God called out a royal family as a new spiritual species to glorify the newly-won royalty of Jesus Christ forever.
As
part of our politeuma privileges,
therefore, election is the sovereign expression in eternity past of God’s will
for the Church Age believer. Under election, God the Father willed His highest
and best for every Church Age believer, having previously deposited His highest
and best for us with Christ. In short, God’s will for our lives is that we
receive what belongs to the glorified Christ.
[I
pray that] the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you may know what
is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance
in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power [the divine
dynasphere] toward us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of
the strength of His might which He brought about in Christ, when He raised Him
from the dead, and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places
[investing Christ with “battlefield” royalty for His victory at the cross], far
above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is
named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come [the permanent
resolution of the angelic conflict]. And He put all things in subjection under
His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His
body, the fulness of Him who fills all in all. (Eph. 1:18-23, NASB)
This
is the purpose for which God called us out and set us apart: to exalt the
royalty of Christ to the maximum. Our election creates the special privileges
and opportunities necessary for us to receive the blessings of spiritual
royalty which glorify Christ.
Election
and predestination are two sides of the same coin. God chose us to glorify
Christ to the maximum and chose to accomplish this purpose according to a
definite plan. The election of the Church is the expression of the sovereign will of God for every believer of the
Church Age; predestination is the provision
of His sovereign will. In time this divine provision is classified as “the
protocol plan of God,” but when discussed in the context of eternity past, this
provision is called “predestination.”
Long
before human history began. God sovereignly established a supernatural way of
life for the Church Age believer and provided the supernatural means of
execution. Predestination implies that the only way to fulfill the plan of God
for our lives is to properly utilize the assets He has given us. We are free to
make good use of the computer or to ignore its great potential, but the
computer works in a particular manner. We must learn how to use it and then
must use it properly. A principle summarizes the Church Age believer’s computer
assets: The Christian is designed to live the Christian way of life. From the
believer’s functional perspective this means that a right thing must be done in
a right way.
ENLARGING THE PORTFOLIO WITH SECONDARY ASSETS
The
believer’s use of his computer assets actually enlarges his portfolio. In
eternity past God the Father established the Church Age believer’s primary assets
(escrow blessings and computer assets). Then God added secondary assets to the
portfolio corresponding to the positive response of the believer in time.
How
does this work? In eternity past omniscient God looked down the corridors of
time, as it were, and saw how each believer would use his volition: positive or
negative, for or against the protocol plan of God. Without interfering with
human freewill (in fact, because of
free will), God included secondary assets in the positive believer’s portfolio based
on his use of his primary assets.
“Secondary
assets” are not second in importance or quality. They simply come after primary
assets in the sequence in which man understands them, and they involve human
volition. But they are blessings from God just as certainly as the primary
assets.
In
terms of our analogy that compares a believer with a computer, primary assets
are on ROM chips, and secondary assets are on PROM chips. Primary assets
originate from the sovereignty of God and represent His design for the
believer’s life. Secondary assets also originate from the sovereignty of God,
but rather than representing God’s will alone they reflect the individual
believer’s own consistent positive response to the grace of God. The
sovereignty of God and the free will of the believer coexist in the dynamics of
the Christian way of life. The secondary assets, which we are about to study,
exist because God saw to it in eternity past that the powerful computer of the
Church Age believer would work. He programmed it exactly as decided by both His
divine sovereignty and the believer’s free will.
Only
the advancing believer receives secondary assets, which are God’s response to
his positive volition. For the indifferent or recalcitrant believer, the
counterpart to secondary assets is divine discipline, which is God’s response
to his negative volition.
By
giving us freedom of choice, God has also given us the effects and consequences
of our decisions. If our decisions had no effect, we would not be free. But God
did indeed decree that the results of our decisions actually would take place.
He made our volition efficacious. He made us responsible for our own lives.
This means that a positive response to the plan of God has a real effect. He
made the consistently positive believer a winner. A negative response also has
a real effect, but God will allow a believer to be a loser only to a certain
degree, for he cannot lose his salvation. This is grace, the efficacy of
Christ’s work on the cross.
Two
important lessons are found in the very existence of secondary assets. First,
no matter how hopeless a believer’s situation may seem, making good decisions
is never an exercise in futility. Learning and relying upon Bible doctrine and
consistently residing in the divine dynasphere do make a difference, a difference that God established in eternity
past in the form of secondary assets.
There
is yet another lesson. By giving the mandates of the protocol plan of God—and
thus directing our free will along the lines of His sovereign purpose—God makes
it possible for our lives to accomplish His will. Our obedience to His plan has
the real effect of achieving His objective. God in His infinite superiority
does not simply go about His affairs without us. The effects and consequences
of our decisions can be magnificent, eternally rewardable demonstrations of
His glory. This gives our lives genuine meaning, purpose, and definition.
God
knows all things at once. Omniscient and eternal, He knows the end from the
beginning, the causes and results as a single whole. He knows about time and
the progression of events, but time does not restrict His knowledge. He
comprehends all things as one complete and total picture. The logic of all
things is in Him; He needs no time in which to deliberate. Before He created
time, God established the future reality of both primary and secondary assets
in one all-comprehensive decree.[36]
Limited
human faculties require believers to think of primary and secondary assets in
increments, as a succession of cause and effect. For us something becomes real
when we experience it or do it, but for God all things became certain in
eternity past when He decreed them to be reality. Thus infinite God knew each
of us and worked in our behalf long before we existed. This means we belong to
a plan that extends far beyond the circumstances of the moment. Not only is God
near—an ever-present help in time of need—but He has woven His help into the
very fabric of our lives as we unfold our lives in time.
God
provided all categories of assets in eternity past, but they are delivered at
various points in time. The Christian receives his computer assets at
salvation. He takes delivery of escrow blessings as he moves into spiritual
maturity. Between these two points he begins to receive secondary assets as he
grows spiritually. Three kinds of secondary assets should be noted.
1. Volitional
assets
2. Production
assets
3. Assets
for undeserved suffering
How
are secondary assets different from other divine blessings? One outstanding difference
is that secondary assets are tangible. Many advantages in the Christian way of
life are intangible. Some lie beyond human perception (like union with Christ
or the filling of the Spirit). Some are abstract (like doctrinal concepts).
Others are reserved for the future (like dying grace, perhaps, or escrow
blessings for eternity). All these invisible blessings are nonetheless real.
The
believer’s secondary assets are also real, but these blessings related to
volition, production, and suffering are advantages that the advancing believer
begins to experience in his everyday life. These are the assets that James has
in mind when he encourages believers to grow up—to be “doers of the Word and
not merely hearers who delude themselves” (James 1:22). In other words,
intangible advantages mixed with positive volition produce tangible results.
VOLITIONAL ASSETS
GOOD DECISIONS FROM A POSITION OF STRENGTH. Positive
volition is an active desire to know God. It is love for truth, which expresses
itself in persistently learning the Word of God and consistently living by its
precepts. All secondary assets result from the believer’s positive volition
toward Bible doctrine, and one of these secondary assets is the strengthening
of positive volition itself. Knowledge builds on knowledge. The more Bible
doctrine a believer knows, the greater his frame of reference for comprehending
additional doctrine. Thus, good decisions to learn the Word of God create
options for further good decisions to keep learning. As the believer’s capacity
for doctrine expands, his love for Bible doctrine increases because truth and
wisdom are intrinsically worthy of love (Prov. 8:30-31).
This
sharpened receptivity to truth rests upon an invisible foundation. The growing
believer’s keener discernment and stronger desire for doctrine may seem to be
only a natural result of broadening his doctrinal frame of reference. However,
the Christian should appreciate the invisible work of God and recognize that
even the maturing of his own positive volition is from God. Spiritual growth
itself is a gift of grace.
Advancement
to spiritual maturity requires a consistent pattern of good decisions made from
a position of strength. “Good decisions” are those that obey the mandates of
divine protocol—for example, decisions to listen to Bible teaching or to
utilize divine problem-solving devices. This is the tangible, or conscious, aspect of the believer’s positive volition.
The “position of strength” is the divine dynasphere, in which the Holy Spirit
makes Bible doctrine understandable and uses the believer’s store of doctrine
to fuel his spiritual momentum. The Holy Spirit supplies the intangible, unfelt effectiveness of the
believer’s positive volition. This invisible dimension, which the Christian
does not experience, is disclosed only in the content of doctrine. Knowledge of
the Spirit’s unseen role gives the Christian a sense of gratitude for increases
in his desire for truth, comprehension of doctrine, and personal love for God,
all of which he does experience.
THE VISIBLE AND THE INVISIBLE. This duality stands out
dramatically in salvation and continues after
salvation in God’s grace policy for dealing with the royal family (1 Cor.
2:4—5; cf. 2:10). Man gains salvation through faith in Christ. However, the one
who believes in Christ for salvation is spiritually dead (Eph. 2:1). He is
totally depraved, totally separated from God, and totally helpless to establish
a relationship with God. Faith originating from a spiritually dead person has
no power in itself to produce so great a result as salvation. The apparent
cause (nonmeritorious faith) and the actual effect (eternal salvation) are
completely out of proportion with one another. Obviously, an invisible factor
is at work. God Himself—not a spiritually dead man’s momentary act of faith— is
the real cause of salvation.
The
entire Trinity was involved in Christ’s death and resurrection,[37]
and God the Holy Spirit specifically is the agent of salvation. He reveals the
Gospel (Gen. 6:3) and makes man’s faith in Christ effectual (Eph. 1:13) so that
the believer’s “faith should not rest on the wisdom of men but on the power of
God” (1 Cor. 2:5). Thus the believer is saved “by grace.., through faith” (Eph.
2:8—9). His faith is made effective by the power of God the Holy Spirit.
After
salvation, the believer is no longer spiritually dead, depraved, or separated
from God (Eph. 2:4-5). The Church Age believer possesses
fabulous advantages, but his positive volition still lacks the power in itself
to advance him spiritually (Gal. 3:3; Eph. 4:20, 23, 30). Spiritual growth is a
marvelous divine achievement. Simply
desiring to grow does not produce growth, nor does slavish adherence to some
religious formula—including rigid, unthinking, legalistic attendance to hear
Bible teaching. Growth comes not by hoping or striving but as a result of
learning, thinking, and solving problems with Bible doctrine, which is the
power of God (Rom. 1:16; Heb. 4:12). But even the keenest human intellect
cannot penetrate the mystery doctrine (1 Cor. 2:6-9). How, then, can we grow?
Once again the grace of God meets the helplessness of man. He places us in an
invisible position of strength.
The
power of God the Holy Spirit operates after salvation in the divine dynasphere.
The Spirit’s communication ministry aids in comprehension, assimilation, and
application of the truth.
1. The
Christian chooses to reside in the divine dynasphere and listen to Bible
teaching. The Holy Spirit makes true doctrine comprehensible (I Cor. 2:12).
2. The Christian chooses to think about
doctrine, to believe the doctrine he hears, to integrate new information with
the truth he already knows. The Holy Spirit converts academic knowledge of
doctrine into genuine understanding (1 Cor. 2:13).
3. The Christian chooses to apply doctrine
in the circumstances of his life. The Holy Spirit aids in the recall of the
truth so that the believer “walks by means of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:16).
In
every stage of learning, meditating upon, and using doctrine, the believer
provides the nonmeritorious positive volition, but God the Holy Spirit provides
the unseen power—the spiritual IQ—for comprehending, assimilating, and applying
Bible doctrine.
CHANGES IN POSITIVE VOLITION. The Holy Spirit’s
communication ministry is powerful but deliberately invisible. The teaching is
spotlighted, not the Teacher. He operates in silent support of the normal,
human learning process (Rom. 12:2; 2 Tim. 2:15). As far as conscious experience
is concerned, the believer listens to Bible teaching, thinks about it, mulls it
over, accepts what he believes is true, and lives by the truth. He recognizes
the importance the Bible gives to remaining filled with the Spirit (Gal. 5:16-26;
Eph. 4:30; 5:18; 1 Thess. 5:19), so
he obeys this mandate by faith. The Holy Spirit’s indispensable aid operates
below the surface. The Spirit glorifies Christ rather than Himself (John 16:13-14).
He illuminates the “mind of Christ” (1 Cor. 2:10-16). The Church Age believer
“knows” the Spirit but “beholds” Christ, in contrast to the world which neither
beholds nor knows the Holy Spirit (John 14:16-19).
Intellectually
aware that this invisible power animates the Christian way of life, the
believer can all the more appreciate the facets of positive volition which are perceptible. As he grows, his
positive volition itself changes. Beyond simply opting to hear, accept, or
apply Bible doctrine, positive volition becomes an expression of his own
spiritual autonomy. Firmly grounded in truth, his doctrinal thinking becomes
his outlook on life. He acquires a scale of values in which his relationship
with God has first priority. Confidence in God enables him to squarely and
honestly face his own questions as an essential part of being receptive to
truth. Doctrine fills all the compartments of his soul, including his
subconscious, so that he develops the instincts of grace, of gratitude, of true
worship. “Because of practice” in learning and applying doctrine, he has his
“senses trained to discern good and evil” (Heb. 5:14). He stretches forward,
extending his stride like a runner with the goal in sight (Phil. 3:14). He
loves and desires truth. In other words, positive volition becomes an asset in
itself, a secondary asset in the believer’s now-enlarged portfolio, an asset
that becomes the driving force in his life.
The
increasing desire to know and worship God propels the potential winner toward
his spiritual destiny. He is still free; he still has his old sin nature; he
can still turn aside into error or indifference. But after his positive
volition strengthens into a functioning secondary asset, his frame of reference
and his conscience operate in favor of truth. He has forward momentum. Negative
volition would go against his own grain.
VOLITION REMAINS FREE. Positive volition is never
automatic, however. Any believer can become “dull of hearing” (Heb. 5:11).
Emphasizing the Christian’s responsibility to be diligent, Hebrews 6:1-6 warns
against departing from Bible doctrine after having built a foundation of
elementary knowledge. This passage is especially pertinent because here
advancing believers lose their own momentum by ignoring dispensational
distinctions. Their initial, accurate frame of reference, or “foundation,” is
depicted in this context as a list of basic doctrines that begins with
“repentance from dead works” and continues through the doctrine of “eternal
judgment” (Heb. 6:1b-2).
At
some point the Christians to whom this epistle was addressed began to neglect
the basics they had learned. They found themselves attracted to the traditional
Jewish forms of worship that anticipated Christ. Old Testament ritual was
legitimate in previous dispensations but was made obsolete by the cross. It has
no place in Church Age worship. These Christians “again crucified] to
themselves the Son of God” by offering animal sacrifices. Their participation
in these ceremonies obscured Church Age doctrine and halted their spiritual
growth. As long as they practiced this outmoded ritual, subscribing to the
false doctrines involved, it was “impossible to renew them again to repentance”
(Heb. 6:6).
This
does not mean they could never recover. “Repentance is the first word from the
list of basic doctrines in verse 1. Here, in ancient writing style that
conserved valuable space, this initial word represents the entire list. It is
impossible to return to basic doctrine and regain spiritual momentum while
trusting in dead religious works. Continuing in the wrong direction hardens
negative volition,[38]
just as consistency in the right direction strengthens positive volition.
THE ROLE OF ENCOURAGEMENT Yet another factor plays a
discernible role in transforming the believer’s positive volition. This factor
is encouragement (Phil. 2:1). The invisible resources that God provides for the
Church Age believer surpass the imagination. As the Christian establishes a
trend of making right decisions, these unseen, primary assets produce their
powerful results. He grows up spiritually. Pressures only accelerate his
advance. He achieves spiritual self-esteem, spiritual autonomy, and spiritual
maturity.[39] The results
of executing the protocol plan of God encourage him. His confidence in God
continues to grow. This confidence from his own cumulative experience of God’s
grace strengthens his determination—his positive volition—to keep on fulfilling
God’s purpose (Phil. 3:12-14).
PRODUCTION ASSETS
The
next category of secondary assets concerns Christian service. As a result of spiritual
progress, the believer is motivated to do something for the Lord. This desire
begins in spiritual childhood and takes definite shape as the believer grows.
Genuine Christian service is a privilege, an asset acquired as a result of
faithfully adhering to the protocol plan of God. Service is not the first
priority for the new believer; doctrine is. And not everything touted as
“Christian service actually is effective
Christian service. Discernment in this matter comes from doctrine. Furthermore,
even legitimate fields of service can be neutralized by false motivation or the
intrusion of human dynamics.
The
plan of God operates on divine power, not human power. The believer is
completely helpless to make his earthly endeavors count for God. Therefore, God
has made His own strength available to each Church Age believer. This power is
accessible through the believer’s use of his primary assets, which include
logistical grace and the divine dynasphere. In eternity past omniscient God
knew which believers would utilize their primary assets. He therefore provided
effective Christian service in their portfolios as a secondary asset (Eph.
2:10; Phil. 2:13—16; Titus 2:14). True production comes from spiritual growth.
Unfortunately, many Christians confuse cause and effect, means and result,
vainly attempting to grow up spiritually through the works they perform.
For
we are His creation [the new spiritual species created by the baptism of the
Spirit] having been created in Christ Jesus [union with Christ] for good
achievements [agathos in the Greek, good of intrinsic
value] which God [the Father] has prepared in advance [before creation He
designed His protocol plan] that we should walk by means of them. (Eph. 2:10)
This
passage mentions 1) union with Christ, 2) intrinsically good achievements, and
3) walking (living) by means of those good achievements. As previously noted,
union with Christ enables the Church Age believer to utilize God’s power in the
divine dynasphere. The power of God executes the plan of God so that He Himself
is responsible for the spiritual “achievements” in the Christian’s life. In
eternity past God “prepared in advance” His protocol plan and the divine
dynasphere as the means of executing the plan. The believer makes good
decisions, but God gets all the credit for the supernatural results.
The
believer’s consistent positive volition in obeying the mandates of the divine
dynasphere becomes spiritual momentum. Momentum includes understanding and
using invisible assets, gaining a grace perspective, attaining successive
stages of spiritual adulthood. All of these are “intrinsically good
achievements,” first, because God ordained them as integral parts of His
protocol plan for the individual believer and, second, because divine power
achieves them.
Christian
service is one expression of this spiritual momentum. Christian service itself
cannot be called “intrinsically good,” because believers can perform acts of
Christian service from true or false motives. Service can come from genuine
love for God or through legalism or coercion. It can even come from arrogance
and self-promotion. This passage emphasizes that true service does not occur in
a vacuum. It is not evaluated solely as overt, visible activity but is part of
“walking,” or living the Christian way of life. The believer lives the
Christian life in or, more precisely, “by means of’ the stages of spiritual
growth that God’s power achieves.
Gaining
spiritual momentum, which becomes a steady, vigorous Christian walk, implies a
sequence that will not work in reverse order. A believer who attempts to
advance himself spiritually through the works he performs is wasting his time
and squandering his life. He is ignorant of God’s protocol, and ignorance
breeds arrogance. His motivation is misdirected. He may sincerely want divine
approbation, but Jesus is the only human being who ever deserves God’s complete
approval. Man’s only entree to God is through Christ, according to the protocol
God has set forth.
The
arrogant Christian’s power is merely human and, therefore, cannot produce
growth. Spiritual progress does not occur. He runs in vain and toils in vain
(Phil. 2:16). He may impress himself and other Christians with his production,
but at the Judgment Seat of Christ this believer’s “Christian service” will be
condemned and destroyed as “dead works” (Heb. 6:1; 9:14; cf. 1 Cor. 3:11-15).[40]
Jesus Christ as the escrow officer will eternally reward only believers whose
service reflects spiritual growth, which is
an intrinsically good achievement. Genuine Christian service is a result of
growth and a chance to apply Bible doctrine already assimilated.
Christian
production covers a wide range of activities. A partial list shows that
different opportunities for legitimate service can appeal to different believers
as they advance. Not all Christian service is alike.
1. Witnessing to unbelievers, a
responsibility of every believer in the course of performing all other
categories of Christian service.[41]
2. Work in the local church, involving many
kinds of service
3.
Work
in Christian service organizations
4.
Foreign
missionary service
5. Work
ordained by the laws of divine establishment, such
as military or government service
6. Service
to the needy of the community
7. Specialized functions, such
as working with youth or the handicapped or volunteering in a hospital
8. The function of one’s spiritual gift, which
will be mentioned separately under the Church Age believer’s “personnel assets”
ASSETS FOR UNDESERVED SUFFERING
The final
category of secondary assets in the believer’s portfolio is suffering for
blessing.[42] This
asset, like certain aspects of positive volition and service, is an example of
continuity in the midst of change. In every
dispensation God uses suffering as a means of blessing the spiritually
adult believer. In His marvelous grace God designed pressures for each stage of
a believer’s advance in spiritual adulthood. The objective is accelerated
spiritual growth.
Christianity
is not a religion of suffering, regardless
of ascetic distortions that have cropped up throughout Church history.
Suffering is part of life. We are mortals living in the devil’s world among
other mortals, all possessing a sin nature. God first of all enables the
believer to eliminate self-induced misery from his own life, then He carries
out the greatest coup of all. God has incorporated human suffering into His
plan. Hence, suffering poses no threat to the plan of God. He uses suffering to
advance the believer spiritually. As the believer learns to use the assets God
has given him, suffering loses much of its dread.
God
uses the right kind and degree of suffering to stretch the believer beyond his
human resources, compelling him to rely utterly upon the grace of God. This
undeserved suffering is designed to teach the all-sufficiency of God. The
believer might fail a test and collapse under pressure, but never is the
pressure greater than he can bear if he uses the doctrinal resources in his
soul, including the problem-solving devices (1 Cor. 10:13). And if a believer
fails, recovery is as near as the rebound technique, which itself is a basic
problem-solving device (Job 42:6; Ps. 32:5; 1 John l:9).[43]
Suffering
has different purposes in each successive stage of spiritual growth. Note some
of these purposes in the course of spiritual adulthood, which begins when the
believer gains spiritual self-esteem, followed by spiritual autonomy and
spiritual maturity.[44]
When a believer attains spiritual self-esteem, God consolidates his
strength and protects him from self-righteousness by sending providential preventive suffering (2
Cor. 12:7). The believer who perseveres in utilizing his divine assets and
succeeds under providential preventive suffering advances to spiritual
autonomy. In spiritual autonomy he receives momentum
testing so that he may appreciate Christ more fully and utilize the
resources on which He Himself relied (Phil. 3:10). If the believer passes
momentum testing, he moves into spiritual maturity. As a mature believer he has
the capacity to handle the most challenging suffering in the Christian life. I
designate this evidence testing, in
which God calls him—as it were—to the witness stand as evidence for God’s case
in the appeal trial of Satan (Job 1:6-11; 2:1-6; cf. Matt. 4:1-11). Evidence testing
is Satan’s cross-examination of the witness. Under the rigors of evidence
testing, the supreme efficacy of God’s grace glorifies Him to the maximum on
earth.
God
does not administer any of these categories of suffering until the believer can
handle the pressure and benefit from the experience (1 Cor. 10:13). Suffering
for blessing is never designed to destroy the growing believer. God’s purpose
is to replace the Christian’s futile confidence in human resources with
increased confidence in God. The pain is real, but always the purpose is
blessing. Indeed, in eternity past God graciously included suffering in the
advancing believer’s portfolio. Suffering for blessing is necessary to
intensify his use of all other assets in his portfolio.
The
believer who fails to reach spiritual self-esteem does not receive suffering
assets. He still suffers, but his pain is not designed by God for blessing.
Instead, his own bad decisions cause him to suffer under the law of volitional
responsibility. And in the midst of self-induced misery, he may also incur
divine discipline. God disciplines the believer to alert him to his failure and
to motivate his return to the only solution: the protocol plan of God.
PERSONNEL ASSETS IN THE CHURCH AGE PORTFOLIO
Having
discussed primary and secondary assets in the Christian’s portfolio, we turn
now to the special category of assets that sustains the operation of the local
church. I call them personnel assets because
they relate the individual believer to an organization or group of believers in
which he plays an important part.
Every
Church Age believer possesses at least one spiritual gift (1 Cor. 12:7).
Spiritual gifts are God-given talents or abilities related to the function of
the royal family of God on earth. From His sovereign bounty the victorious Lord
Jesus Christ initially distributed spiritual gifts to celebrate His triumph
(Eph. 4:7-13). Shortly after the Church Age began, the Holy Spirit took over
the distribution of spiritual gifts as part of His ministry of glorifying Christ
(John 16:14). Throughout the Church Age, God the Holy Spirit sovereignly
bestows spiritual gifts at the moment of salvation (1 Cor. 12:11; Heb. 2:4).
Totally
apart from human merit, ability, or talent, spiritual gifts operate on divine
power, not on human energy. Therefore, the spiritual gift remains unexploited
until the believer has begun to grow. When he reaches spiritual adulthood, his
gift functions fully and effectively, even if he is unaware that his activities
involve a spiritual gift. The only gifts that demand special preparation in
order to function properly are the communication gifts, particularly the gift
of pastor-teacher, and certain gifts of administration.
All
believers have equal privilege and equal opportunity to execute the protocol
plan of God, but equality ends where the secondary assets begin. These assets
accrue with spiritual growth, which depends on volition. Some believers choose
to advance; most do not. Furthermore, equality does not extend into the realm
of personnel assets, or spiritual gifts. Spiritual gifts create differences in
function within the Body of Christ (Rom. 12:4-8; 1 Cor. 12-14). The
individual’s spiritual gift is part of what gives him a personal destiny within
the royal family of God. The fulfillment of this destiny is a Christian’s
unique contribution to resolving the angelic conflict.
This
completes our discussion of the Church Age believer’s portfolio of invisible
assets. So far we have seen four characteristics that make the Church Age unique.
These have been the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the protocol plan of God,
mystery doctrine, and the portfolio. We now turn to a fifth characteristic.
THE EQUALITY FACTOR
Election
and predestination are tremendous advantages to the Church Age believer. They
deserve special attention because they are the equality factor. Every member of the royal family of God has equal
privilege and equal opportunity to execute the protocol plan of God. At the
moment of salvation, no one is superior; no one is inferior. No one has a
higher position than any other, and no one is disadvantaged. All the human
standards of superiority and inferiority are set aside by the election and
predestination of each Church Age believer in eternity past. Race, sex,
intelligence, nationality, economic situation, social standing—none of these
help or hinder the believer in fulfilling the protocol plan of God. Help lies entirely in divine assets, and
the only hindrance is the believer’s
own refusal to learn Bible doctrine and utilize his invisible divine assets.
Specific
aspects of election and predestination provide equal privilege and opportunity
to execute the plan of God. Under the computer asset of election, the universal
priesthood gives the believer equal privilege with every other Church Age
believer (Eph. 1:4). Every member of the royal family represents himself before
God. Also under election, logistical grace gives every Christian equal
opportunity through life support, personal security, and the provisions
necessary to learn Bible doctrine. Winners and losers alike are blessed with
logistical grace.
Under
the computer asset of predestination, union with Christ gives every believer
equal privilege at the moment of salvation (Eph. 1:5). All Church Age believers
have the same position in Christ through the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Also
under predestination, the divine dynasphere gives every believer equal
opportunity to advance by executing the protocol plan of God. Each Church Age
believer possesses his own operational divine dynasphere. The divine dynasphere
is the believer’s royal palace, his magnificent but invisible seat of power.
Note
well that equal privilege and equal opportunity for every Church Age believer
in time means inequality in the
eternal state. Each believer’s volition accepts or rejects the provisions of
divine sovereignty. The ROM chips (sovereignty of God) provide equality, but
the PROM chips (free will of man) also function in the computer and express
individuality. Some believers respond to Bible doctrine, advance spiritually,
and become spiritual winners. Others reject doctrine and become spiritual
losers. A Roman maxim applies to the loser: Qui
non proficit deficit. “He who does not advance retrogresses.” But another
maxim pertains to the winner: Vincit qui
pat itur. “He is a winner who perseveres.” The Christian winner keeps on
using his privileges and opportunities.
ROYAL
COMMISSIONS
Among
the many benefits of spiritual royalty, two divine commissions have been
granted to every Church Age believer. Each Christian is a royal priest and a
royal ambassador.
A
priest is a human being who represents some segment of the human race before
God. In the Dispensation of the Gentiles, the head of the family represented
the family in matters of worship. The family priest’s duties included
presenting revealed doctrine and officiating in rituals and animal sacrifices
(Gen. 4:3-5; 8:20; 14:18; 22:13). In the Dispensation of Israel, God ordained
the Levitical priesthood to serve on behalf of the nation (Num. 3:5—10; Lev.
8). This specialized priesthood taught Bible doctrine verbally and ceremonially
through the rituals authorized in the Mosaic Law. The Levitical priesthood
included only unblemished adult males from the family of Aaron in the tribe of
Levi (Lev. 21:17-21).
In
previous dispensations, membership in the priesthood was severely restricted.
Priests were a small minority among believers. The Church Age is unique in that
the priesthood has been extended to include every
believer (1 Pet. 2:5, 9; Rev. 1:6; 5:10). In union with Christ, every
Church Age believer belongs to the most exalted of all priestly orders under
the high priesthood of the resurrected Jesus Christ (Heb. 9:11-14).
As a
royal priest, each Church Age believer represents himself before God (Rom.
12:1; Eph. 6:7-8; Heb. 13:15-16). This is the basis for the believer’s
spiritual privacy, in which he lives his own life before the Lord (Rom. 14:4,
10; 2 Thess. 3:11-12). The believer’s priesthood is also grounds for offering
effective prayer.[45]
Furthermore, the faithful intake of Bible doctrine, which is the basis
for spiritual growth and the attainment of spiritual adulthood, is a priestly
function. Spiritual growth is a result of
the believer-priest’s protocol function before God. The setting for the royal
priest’s duties is inside the divine dynasphere, in contrast to the service of
earlier priesthoods at physical altars or in material temples. Although the
believer is a fully ordained priest at the moment of salvation, his
priesthood becomes more effective
as he attains successive stages of spiritual growth.
The
universal priesthood of the Church does not imply total independence of
believers from one another. The priesthood and spiritual gifts create a
balance. The priesthood emphasizes the individual; spiritual gifts emphasize
the group. Spiritual gifts are divinely given abilities that support the many
necessary functions within the local congregation, as well as outside the local
church in propagating the Gospel. Believers as priests have responsibilities
both before God and among other believers.
Every
Christian is a priest, but not every priest has the same spiritual gifts. The
gift of pastor-teacher, for example, enables a believer to accurately study and
teach the Word of God. These functions belonged to the priesthoods of earlier
dispensations, but in the Church Age not every priest has a gift of
communicating the truth to assembled groups. All believers are royal priests,
but only some royal priests are pastors. Pastors depend on the attendance of
hearers. Those who are not pastors remain dependent on a pastor’s exposition of
the Scriptures. Although autonomous before God, believers do not live in
isolation from one another.
The
Christian service of individual believer-priests also brings them into contact
with other Christians. Here the privacy of the priesthood treats each
individual with respect and precludes sins like gossip, judging, and
intolerance. This respect for the individual permits relationships to develop
on a solid foundation of personal virtue. In other words, privacy contributes
to rewarding relationships with other people; it is not a barrier that excludes
others from the believer’s life.
Each
believer-priest is responsible for residing in the divine dynasphere, learning
Bible doctrine, and living his own life before the Lord, but he does not have
to eliminate or distort human relationships to do so. The local church is a
place where believers meet to hear Bible doctrine, and wonderful human
relationships can develop on the common ground of love for the Word of God.
Privacy allows each person in the congregation to choose his own activities—
within and outside the church—and to pursue or decline relationships on his own
initiative.
The Christian’s
second royal warrant operates not toward God but toward man. As a royal
ambassador every Church Age believer represents the Lord Jesus Christ to
mankind on earth (2 Cor. 5:20; Eph. 6:20; Philemon 9).
A
close analogy exists between a nation’s senior diplomat to a foreign country
and the Church Age believer as God’s royal ambassador to man. A nation’s
ambassador does not appoint himself; likewise, God appoints the royal
ambassador to be His representative on earth. An ambassador does not support himself;
similarly, God supplies all the logistical grace necessary to perpetuate the
believer’s physical and spiritual life in the devil’s world. An ambassador’s
instructions are given to him in writing; the royal ambassador operates
according to the written mystery doctrines of the New Testament. An ambassador
is not a citizen of the country in which he serves; the ambassador of Jesus
Christ has his citizenship in heaven (Phil. 3:20). An ambassador does not
reside in his assigned country to advance his own personal interests; the royal
ambassador lives to glorify Christ and personally benefits not by following his
own agenda but through fulfilling his royal warrant. An ambassador does not
take insults personally; the believer does not regard the negative volition of
mankind as a personal insult but continues to faithfully represent Christ
regardless of insulting treatment by others. The recall of an ambassador
accompanies a declaration of war; when the royal family is removed from the
earth at the Rapture, the violent Tribulation will commence as the next
dispensation.
THE INDWELLING OF THE
TRINITY
GOD RESIDING IN THE BELIEVER
Never
before the Church Age and never afterward does God indwell every believer’s
body. At the moment of salvation, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit take
up residence in the body of the Church Age believer. God’s indwelling continues
uninterrupted throughout the believer’s life. Scripture documents this
unprecedented indwelling:
1. The
indwelling of God the Father (John 14:23; Eph. 4:6; 2 John 9)
2. The
indwelling of God the Son (John 14:20; 17:22-23, 26; Rom. 8:10; 2 Cor. 13:5; Gal. 2:20; Col. 1:27; 1 John 2:23-24)
3. The
indwelling of God the Holy Spirit (Rom. 8:11; 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19-20; 2 Cor.
6:16)
How can
God indwell a believer’s body? God is omnipresent, which involves His immanence
and His transcendence (Deut. 4:39; 1 Kings 8:27; Ps. 139:7-8; Prov. 15:3; Isa. 57:5). Immanence means His entire essence is always present everywhere so
that the whole of God is in every place (Jer. 23:23-24; Acts 17:27-28). Transcendence means He is independent of
the created universe so that no particular place exclusively contains Him (Ps.
113:5—6; Isa. 55:8—9; John 8:23).
Immanence and transcendence exist in balance, so that “the whole earth is full
of His glory” (He is wholly in every point in the universe), while at the same
time He is “holy” and “lofty and exalted” infinitely beyond the universe (Isa.
6:1-3). If God is everywhere, what is the meaning of His special indwelling of
the Church Age believer’s body?
The
combination of immanence and transcendence means that God is free to be local,
to have a presence at a particular location (Ex. 19:20; 24:9-18; 40:34; Lev.
16:2; John 1:14). And since He is not restricted to time and space, He can
decide how He wants to dwell in these
temporal and physical dimensions. He does not always have to be present in the
same sense. When He dwells within creation, therefore, He dwells by His own
choice and in a manner of His own choosing. His sovereign decision in this
matter is a striking expression of His love and His eternal purpose.
The
indwelling of the Church Age believer’s body is God’s local presence in a more
intimate relationship with the believer than has ever existed prior to this
dispensation. God’s personal, indwelling presence within the Christian’s body
is an astounding fact and the basis for blessings beyond imagination.
THE INDWELLING OF THE FATHER
Each
member of the Trinity has a purpose for residing in the believer’s body. The
indwelling of the Father is related to the glorification of His protocol plan
(Eph. 1:3, 6, 12). The Father is the author of our portfolio of invisible
assets. He is the grantor of our escrow blessings for time and eternity. He is
the mastermind of the protocol plan for the Church Age. He is the designer of
the divine dynasphere, the invisible sphere of power in which the protocol plan
is executed.
The
Father is not the revealed member of the Trinity; the Lord Jesus Christ is. The
Father is not the divine agent in the believer’s execution of the Christian way
of life; the Holy Spirit is. Because God the Father is revealed
indirectly—through Christ by the power of the Spirit—little appears in
Scripture concerning His personal indwelling. The Bible presents only the
arresting fact that He does indeed indwell every Church Age believer. His
indwelling guarantees His personal ministry to every believer.
THE INDWELLING OF JESUS CHRIST
Shekinah Glory was
originally a Jewish theological term for the presence of God made manifest. Shekinah comes from the Hebrew word
meaning “to dwell.” The Son is the revealed member of the Godhead (John 1:18),
the special divine presence, or Shekinah,
who is glorified among men. The
Lord Jesus Christ is the Shekinah Glory.
The
Shekinah Glory appears in numerous dispensations, establishing a continuity
from age to age. But the change of residence of the Shekinah Glory is yet
another example of the dramatic differences between the dispensations. In the
Dispensation of Israel, the preincarnate Christ took the form of a pillar of
fire and smoke that led and defended the Jews (Ex. 13:21-22; 14:19; 16:7, 10;
24:16-17). The Shekinah Glory also dwelt between the golden cherubs in the
Tabernacle and later in Solomon’s Temple as a sign of blessing for the nation
of Israel (Lev. 26:11-12; cf. Ex. 25:22; 33:9-10; 40:34-38; Lev. 9:23; Num.
16:42; 1 Kings 8:11; 2 Chron. 5:13b-14).
In
the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union, the revealed member of the Godhead
“became flesh and tabernacled among us and we beheld His glory [the Shekinah
Glory]... full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). In this well-known statement
John refers to the Transfiguration (Matt. 17:1-8; Mark 9:2-8; Luke 9:28-56), in which he witnessed the glory of Christ’s deity briefly
revealed. During the
Transfiguration the Voice
declared that Christ is the revelation of the Father (cf. John 6:46; 14:9-10),
the very Shekinah Glory that appeared in Isaiah’s vision of the enthroned Lord
“lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple” (Isa. 6:1;
John 12:37-41). The Old Testament Shekinah Glory in the Temple and the
lncarnate Christ are the same person. Earlier our Lord had referred to His body
as a temple (John 2:18-22), the new dwelling place of the Shekinah Glory. The
Shekinah Glory had changed residence from the Temple to the body of Jesus
Christ. The incarnate Christ is the “flashing forth of [God’s] glory” (Heb.
1:3).
In
the Church Age, the body of each believer is a temple in which Jesus Christ, the
Shekinah Glory, dwells (2 Cor. 6:16; cf. Lev. 26:12). This change of residence
of the Shekinah Glory indicates the transition between the Dispensation of the
Hypostatic Union and the Dispensation of the Church. The indwelling of God the
Son in the body of the Church Age believer is the escutcheon or badge of the
royal family.
The
Shekinah Glory has fulfilled different purposes in God’s plan for different
dispensations. Under the ritual plan of God in Israel, the Shekinah Glory dwelt
in the Tabernacle and Temple to be the focal point of worship in the nation.
The Shekinah Glory resided among His
people but not in them. The
indwelling of the Shekinah Glory within individual believers was a concept
totally unknown to the Jews. Under the incarnation plan of God, the purpose of
the Shekinah Glory in human body was to provide salvation. Jesus Christ came in
the flesh to bear man ‘s sins in His body on the cross (1 Pet. 2:24). Under the
protocol plan for the Church, the Shekinah Glory indwells every believer’s body
for the purpose of fellowship with the glorified Christ. As the Church Age
believer advances to spiritual maturity, he glorifies Christ in his body (1
Cor. 6:19-20).
Every
member of the royal family is a new spiritual species permanently indwelt by
Christ. The indwelling Christ never leaves the Church Age believer (Col. 1:27),
unlike the Shekinah Glory’s poignant, reluctant departure from apostate Israel
(1 Sam. 4:2 1; Ezek. 9:3; 10:4,18; 11:22-23). This permanent status, alongwith
the ministry of God the Holy Spirit, gives the Church Age believer
unprecedented opportunity for spiritual impact.
Now
the Lord is the Spirit [deity of the Holy Spirit], and where the Spirit of the
Lord is, there is freedom [freedom to mature]. Now we all, with an unveiled face
[the filling of the Spirit gives spiritual perception] looking into a mirror
[Bible doctrine, the mind of Christ] to produce a reflection [a reflection of
Christ, who indwells us], namely, the glory of the Lord [the Shekinah Glory
revealed to us by the Holy Spirit, who illuminates Bible doctrine (John 16:13-14)],
are being transformed into the same image [the execution of the protocol plan
of God manifests in us the glory of Christ] from glory to glory [from the
source, the indwelling Shekinah Glory, to the manifestation of the Shekinah
Glory in the Church Age believer who follows the protocol plan], as it were,
from the Spirit of the Lord [the power of the Holy Spirit which executes the
protocol plan]. (2 Cor. 3:17-18)
As
in previous dispensations, the Shekinah Glory is both a sign and a guarantee of
blessing. Jesus Christ’s presence in the Church Age believer assures him that
his portfolio of invisible assets is now available. The indwelling Jesus Christ
is the escrow officer. He Himself is the depositary with whom the Father
entrusted escrow blessings for time and eternity (Eph. 1:3). His presence in
the believer’s body guarantees that these irrevocable blessings will be distributed if he attains
spiritual maturity through execution of the protocol plan.
Christ’s
indwelling of the body is also an assurance of eternal life in the presence of
God. At death the believer departs from the body and comes “face-to-face with
the Lord” in heaven (2 Cor. 5:8). Christ is personally invisible while
indwelling the believer’s mortal body (1 Pet. 1:8). He becomes visible in the
moment of death. The doctrine of the indwelling of Christ takes the fear out of
death, for the Lord, who even now indwells the believer, will be the first
person he will see.
These
guarantees and assurances encourage the believer while he remains on earth to
execute the protocol plan of God. The Church Age believer’s confidence can
surpass even the confidence of David who wrote, “Even though I walk through the
valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for Thou art with me” (Ps.
23:4). The same Lord who was with the
heroes of the Old Testament dwells in every
Church Age believer (John 14:17-20).
While
instilling confidence, the indwelling Lord Jesus Christ simultaneously becomes
the object of the believer’s love. The personal, indwelling presence of Christ
is a compelling reason for giving priority to relationship with God over
relationships with people or things. First priority goes to assimilating Bible
doctrine, called the “mind of Christ”(1 Cor. 2:16), so that the believer can
experience occupation with Christ. Occupation with Christ is the mature
believer’s constant awareness of the One he loves.
THE INDWELLING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
Like
the Father and the Son, God the Holy Spirit also indwells the body of every
Church Age believer. The Spirit indwells to make the Christian’s body a temple
worthy of Christ, the Shekinah Glory (1 Cor. 3:16; 2 Cor. 6:16). The believer
himself is incapable of providing an acceptable dwelling place for Christ. The
old sin nature inherited from fallen Adam contaminates the body throughout the
believer’s temporal life. Only the “washing of regeneration and renewing by the
Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5) make the “temple” fit for Christ to occupy. The
existence of this inner sanctuary for Christ makes it possible (in fact, makes
it even conceivable) for the believer to obey the command to “glorify God in
your body” (1 Cor. 6:19—20).
This
command is fulfilled by the Holy Spirit. He executes the plan of the Father in
the life of the positive believer, the believer who adheres to divine protocol.
Two postsalvation ministries of the Spirit are involved: indwelling and
filling. The Spirit indwells the body
so Christ may take up royal residence there, while the filling of the Spirit enables the believer to reflect the glory of
the resident Christ (John 16:14; 2 Cor. 3:18). Indwelling puts the Spirit’s help near at hand, in fact, within the
Christian himself; filling actually
delivers the Spirit’s help as He invisibly energizes the divine dynasphere. Indwelling is permanent; filling is
intermittent. Scripture never commands the Church Age believer to be indwelt by
the Spirit but rather regards His indwelling as a constant reality. The Bible
does, however, command the believer to “be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18;
cf. Gal. 5:16).
The
Christian cannot change the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, but the filling of
the Spirit is a matter of choice. The believer loses the filling of the Spirit by
committing sin. He restores the filling of the Spirit by confessing, or
acknowledging, his sin to the Father (1 John 1:9). The principle of rebound
remains the same in all dispensations as the only means of recovering
fellowship with God, but fellowship with God does not include the filling of
the Spirit in every dispensation.[46]
At
the moment of salvation, when the Spirit takes up residence in the body, a
perpetual inner conflict begins which will continue throughout the believer’s
life on earth.[47] The
Holy Spirit and the old sin nature compete for control of the soul (Eph. 3:16-17;
cf. Rom. 7:15-8:13; Gal. 5:17-26). The believer’s volition decides the issue:
to sin or to resist temptation, to remain in a state of carnality after
committing a sin or to rebound back into the divine dynasphere.
The
Holy Spirit is the power source in the divine dynasphere. Living outside the
divine dynasphere, under the power of the old sin nature, is “grieving” or
“quenching” the Spirit (Eph. 4:30; 1 Thess. 5:19). For the Christian, living in
the divine dynasphere always implies being filled with the Holy Spirit. When
the believer concentrates on Bible doctrine when it is taught, reflects upon
it, or applies it in solving problems, the Holy Spirit illuminates the truth (1
Cor. 2:9-16). But this indispensable ministry of the indwelling Spirit operates
only when the believer is filled with the Spirit.
THE AVAILABILITY OF DIVINE
POWER
During
Old Testament dispensations the power of God was available to a few believers.
The temporary enduement of the Holy Spirit empowered particular Old Testament
believers who held positions of unusual responsibility. God gave these
prominent believers access to His power to carry out their particular functions
(Num. 11:16-17;27:8-20;Judges3:10;6:34; 11:29; 13:25; 14:6; 15:14; 1 Sam. 10:6-10;
11:6; 16:13; Ezek. 2:2; 3:24; Micah 3:8; Zech. 7:12). In dramatic contrast to
previous dispensations, the protocol plan of God is executed through a power
structure available to every Church
Age believer. The indwelling and filling of the Spirit are extended to every
member of the royal family. The “ordinary believer” is extraordinary in this
dispensation.
The
omnipotence of God the Holy Spirit enables the individual believer to execute
the protocol plan of God. Operating the divine dynasphere, the Spirit supplies
the power necessary for perception and application of Bible doctrine by which
the believer advances to spiritual maturity (John 14:16-17; 16:12-14; 1 Cor.
2:9-16).
Each
Church Age believer also has available to him the power of God the Father and
God the Son. Each person of the Trinity exercises His absolute power in behalf
of the Church Age believer. How does this magnificent resource become
operational in the believer’s life? It does so according to the mandates of
divine protocol.
The
omnipotence of God the Father is related to the portfolio of invisible assets.
As the believer learns and obeys the Father’s plan, he begins to experience the
“riches of His grace” (Eph. 1:7-9). The omnipotence of God the Son preserves
the universe and perpetuates the human race (Col. 1:17; Heb. 1:3). He controls
human history by blessing nations that have a large enough pivot of positive
believers and by judging nations with too large a spin-off of negative
believers. The final two characteristics of the Church Age— concerning prophecy
and invisible heroes—explain how the Son’s power operates uniquely toward the
Church.
THE ABSENCE OF PROPHECY
Unlike
all other dispensations, the postcanon Church Age is the only era in which no
biblical prophecy will be fulfilled. The only prophetic events concerning the
Church Age are its beginning, which was prophesied by Christ (John 14:16-17;
16:7-15; Acts 1:5), and its termination at the resurrection, or Rapture (1 Cor.
15:51-55; Phil. 3:21; 1 Thess.
4:13-18). And the only prophecies fulfilled in th4 the precanon Church Age deal
not with the Church but with Israel, Hi whose national discipline culminated in
A.D. 70.
Jesus Christ is the key to
the divine interpretation of history, including past, present, and future (or
prophetic) history (Eph. 3:10). In His timeless deity He knows the future as
clearly as the past or present. The Bible, as the mind of Christ, is not a
complete “history book” of the future. The relatively few future events it
describes st~ are selected to reveal Christ, for “the testimony of Jesus is the
spirit of prophecy” (Rev. 19:10). Many prophecies have been fulfilled in the
past, just as others will be in the future. For example, the doctrines of
Christ as Savior (Christology) and of His saving work (soteriology) were
prophetic during the Age of the Gentiles and the Age of Israel. They were
fulfilled during the Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union. Now, during the
Church Age, we look back upon historical facts at~ in connection with these
doctrines. Like prophecies already fulfilled, those concerning the future
reveal Christ—and the events surrounding His second advent, His reign on earth,
and His eternal glorification.
The Church Age stands
between two periods rich in prophecy. The Dispensation of the Hypostatic Union
fulfilled many Old Testament prophecies, and the two eschatological
dispensations, that is, the Tribulation and Millennium, are described
throughout the Old and New Testaments. But the Church Age itself is a period of
prophetic silence. No events of this dispensation are found in in. prophecy,
except for its termini.
The next scheduled prophetic
events, following the Rapture, concern the Tribulation. But none of the
geopolitical alignments prophesied for the Tribulation need to exist prior to
the Rapture of the Church. If world conditions during the Church Age seem to
parallel biblical descriptions of the Tribulation, this does not indicate that
the Rapture is near. Throughout the
Church Age the doctrine of the imminence of the Rapture holds true (James 5:8;
Rev. 22:7, 12, 20). This means the resurrection of the Church is the next
prophetic event, but the time is simply not announced. The Rapture could have
occurred in Paul’s day or yesterday or may take place a thousand years from
now. Speculation by Christians has no biblical foundation and only hinders
spiritual momentum. Naturally, the growing believer’s love for Christ creates
eager anticipation of His appearance (1 Cor. 1:4-8; Titus 2:13), but that
enthusiasm must be tempered by patience (James 5:7-8) and redirected toward
fulfilling God’s purpose in this present dispensation.
When
one acknowledges that the Church Age is a mystery dispensation, absent from Old
Testament prophecy, he recognizes that God’s yet-unfulfilled prophecies and
promises concerning Israel still belong to Israel. In other words, the Church
does not usurp the position of Israel in God’s plan for the ages. God will keep His promises to the Jews. In
the meantime, the fulfillment of divine prophecy will not be seen again until
the Church departs and the Tribulation begins.
Why
this absence of prophecy in the Church Age? Why the dramatic silence? Jesus
Christ controls history, but rather than fixing our attention on particular prophesied
events, He directs us to concentrate on the tremendous doctrines of the
mystery. The “testimony of Jesus” during this dispensation is manifested not
through prophecy but through the Church Age believer. The Church is the Body of
Christ. The Church is in union with Christ. The Church has access to the same
divine assets that sustained the humanity of Christ. The Church possesses the
completed canon of Scripture, given to sustain spiritual growth which glorifies
Christ. The Church is meant to be inculcated with the mind of Christ. God
excluded prophetic events from the postcanon Church Age to emphasize the
dynamics of Bible doctrine in the soul. Believers should learn the whole realm
of Bible doctrine rather than specialize in prophecy.
We
do study prophecy. In fact, the final two dispensations are entirely
eschatological. But our Lord controls history in the Church Age not through His
immediate rule in a theocracy, not by a succession of prophesied events, but
according to historical trends. This is illustrated by Christ’s evaluation of
local churches in Revelation 2—3, in which He comments on various tendencies in
the congregations and warns of their consequences. The Church Age may even be
called the dispensation of historical trends: As go believers, so go gentile
client nations; and as go client nations, so goes human history.
The
absence of prophecy about historical developments during the Church Age is
consistent with the separation of church and state. The influence of Church Age
believers is invisible and generally indirect, whereas the Bible’s yet
unfulfilled prophecies frequently describe the political stage and events in
the public spotlight.
Believers
create the trends of history—anonymously. And in the Church Age the scope of
the Christian’s invisible impact is not restricted within a prophetic outline.
The atmosphere of encouraging believers to take the initiative, advance
spiritually, and pursue their spiritual destinies in the glorification of
Christ continues to exist throughout the Church Age. From the beginning, this
was the tenor of Christ’s repeated encouragement to the disciples in the Upper
Room Discourse. Christ kept urging them to “ask Me anything in My name” (John 14:13—14; 15:16; 16:23—24; italics added), because the extent and manner of the
glorification of His name in the Church is not announced in advance but is left
to the positive volition of the individual believer. In other words, the scope
of the Christian’s influence is virtually unlimited.
The
absence of prophecy emphasizes the individual believer’s potential impact. Each
believer influences history to an unprecedented degree, for good or ill, and
consequently the Christian has a profound responsibility to grow up
spiritually. This theme is in accord with the rest of Church Age doctrine: the
fabulous divine resources at the command of the royal family—just waiting for
positive volition— turn a brighter spotlight upon the free will of each
believer than in any other dispensation.
Knowledge
of doctrine helps the believer interpret events and historical trends as they
occur in his own generation of the Church Age. The absence of prophecy from the
Church Age, however, and the impact of the believer’s decisions stress his need
to grow up spiritually to the point that he can think for himself within a
biblical frame of reference.
INVISIBLE HEROES
The
doctrine of dispensations shows the Church Age believer where he stands in the
panorama of human history, but this doctrine also teaches him how to have an influence
on history. When a Church Age believer advances to maturity, he has a positive
impact.
In
Old Testament dispensations God worked through visible heroes like Abraham,
Moses, David, and Daniel. In the Church Age God works through invisible heroes.
The difference is that every Church
Age believer has equal privilege and equal opportunity to become an invisible
hero. The positive impact of the royal family comes from the individual
believer’s personal execution of the protocol plan of God. As Christ distributes
blessings to the mature believer, those blessings benefit the believer’s
periphery and his nation. The reverse also is true. God may protect and bless
the nation as a means of blessing the mature believer. Therefore, the vigor of
a generation and the divine blessing it enjoys spring from those believers who
thrive under God’s plan, not from political, social, or religious crusades to
change the world.
The
negative impact of the royal family also comes from the individual believer.
The believer who rejects the plan of God brings suffering and divine discipline
upon himself and becomes a source of adversity in his periphery and nation.
Therefore, every individual Christian has a major role to play in his
generation of the Church Age. Believers can be invisible heroes or invisible
villains, but there are no ordinary Christians in the royal family of God.
The
great power experiment of the Church Age was designed to create invisible
heroes. An invisible hero is any Christian who advances to spiritual maturity.
In maturity he has fivefold impact.
1. Personal impact. Individuals in the
mature believer’s periphery, including family, loved ones, and the
organizations to which he belongs, receive blessing by their association with
him.
2. Historical impact. The client nation
receives blessing through the mature believers who reside within its borders.
The vigor, prosperity, and survival of the client nation revolve around mature
believers. This is the principle of the pivot (1 Kings 19:18; Matt. 5:13-16;
Rom. 11:2-5; Eph. 1:21-23). A
pivot of anonymous, unsung, invisible heroes is the spiritual solution to
national degeneracy. Beyond a certain level of national decline, the spiritual
pivot is the only solution and a
nation’s only hope. Blessing to the nation is an escrow blessing our Lord
distributes to the mature believer. In this way Jesus Christ earns all the
glory, and His reputation is not obscured by the questionable judgment of
over-zealous Christians attempting to play power politics in His name. Those
who vainly strive to establish the kingdom of God on earth during the Church
Age overlook this principle of invisible historical impact. As a good citizen
(made better by his Christianity) the believer contributes positively to his
nation; he does not crusade in the name
of Christianity to remake his nation in the image of his personal faith
(Rom. 13:1-7).
3. International impact. Non-client nations
are blessed by association with mature believers who come as missionaries from
a client nation. This is one of the responsibilities of the client nation.
Unfortunately, not all missionaries are mature believers, but the missionary
who is an invisible hero is a source
of blessing to two nations: the nation in which he serves and the nation from
which he is sent.
4. Angelic impact. God summons the
invisible hero to the witness stand, as it were, to provide testimony in the
appeal trial of Satan. Angels constantly observe the human race (1 Cor. 4:9;
Eph. 3:10; 1 Tim. 5:21; cf. 1 Pet. 1:12), and mature believers are strong
evidence of the grace of God. The devil cross-examines the mature believer
through suffering (Job 1:6-12; 2:1-6; cf. Matt. 4:1-11; Eph. 6:11-12). By using
divine resources to pass evidence testing, the invisible hero has far-reaching,
unseen impact among the angels (1 Cor. 4:9; Eph. 3:10).[48]
5. Heritage impact. The loved ones and
close friends of the mature believer receive blessing after his death. David
presents this encouraging principle, making this blessing an example of continuity
through the dispensations (Ps. 37:25). The mature Christian can face death with
complete assurance that God will care for those he leaves behind. His survivors
are blessed not necessarily because they are spiritual winners themselves but
because of God’s high regard for the departed mature believer. Indeed,
spiritual losers and even unbelievers can receive heritage impact just as they
can receive personal impact during the mature Christian’s lifetime.
Today
the Christian’s privilege of having impact as an invisible hero is being
infringed. Many ministers neglect their responsibility to teach their listeners
Bible doctrine but instead goad them to become involved in emotionalism,
personality cults, church programs, social work, or political activism. Trends
in Protestant Christianity show signs of an imbalance that emphasizes the
visible at the expense of the invisible, the material at the expense of the
spiritual, the believer’s overt image at the expense of the inner dynamics of
Bible doctrine in the soul.
This
problem takes root in ignorance of dispensations. The overwhelming majority of
Christians do not know what God has provided for them or why He has given them
so much. After salvation, what? What does God desire the Christian to do? If
believers do not realize that they belong to the royal family, how can they
fulfill their destinies? How can they execute the protocol plan of God for the
Church Age if they do not know such a plan exists? Ignorance undercuts every
good intention. No matter how a Christian desires to make his life count for
God, if he is ignorant of God’s plan, he fails to glorify God. At best, the
impact of his life is fleeting, no sooner achieved than dissipated. At worst,
his impact is for evil as he inadvertently struggles in Satan’s cause to
improve the devil’s world.
7
Epilogue
AFTER SALVATION, WHAT?
THE PROTESTANT REFORMERS
DISSENTED from the Roman Catholic Church over several essential points of
doctrine. The Reformation clarified the issue of justification by faith, but
none of the Reformers—not Luther, Calvin, nor Zwingli—gave a lucid description
of the believer’s postsalvation way of life. Salvation is by faith in Christ;
but after salvation, what?
The
mechanics of the Christian way of life are no clearer to Christians today than
in the darkness of late medieval Roman Catholicism. Emotionalism and empty
ritualism dominate many churches. Mysticism supplants objective knowledge of
Bible doctrine. Good deeds are touted as an approach to God. Morality is
distorted into legalistic asceticism and is preached as a substitute for
Christian virtue. Christian service is enforced through guilt, fear, penance,
doubt concerning one’s eternal status, or false hope of divine blessings.
Political activism precludes divine viewpoint thinking. And there are endless
schemes to raise money.
These
age-old practices—which the Reformation did not eradicate—squander the riches
that God has given to every Church Age believer. The legalism that emerged from
the Reformation may differ in specifics from Roman Catholic legalism, but it is
just as ineffective in defining postsalvation Christian experience.
The
doctrine of dispensations is among the basic doctrines that every believer must
comprehend. This doctrine enables us to recognize the biblical mechanics of the
Christian way of life. Dispensations clarify the truth that the humanity of
Christ established the pattern for us. Jesus is the “author and perfecter of
our doctrine” (Heb. 12:2). He pioneered the protocol plan of God. He tested and
proved the prototype of the divine dynasphere.
Christ
was able to fulfill His destiny because He utilized the enabling power of God
the Holy Spirit: “through the eternal Spirit [He] offered Himself without
blemish to God” (Heb. 9:14). Christ persevered and succeeded because He applied
divine problem-solving devices, illustrated by sharing the happiness of God:
“because of the previously demonstrated happiness [He] endured the cross” (Heb.
12:2b). The assets used by Jesus
Christ belonged to the prototype divine dynasphere.
Designed
by the Father (John 15:10) and energized by the Holy Spirit (John 3:34), the
prototype divine dynasphere was tested and proved under the most extreme
pressure when Jesus Christ endured divine judgment on behalf of us all. After
our Lord’s death, the same infinite power of God that designed and energized
the divine dynasphere demolished all satanic and human opposition by raising
Christ from the dead and seating Him at the right hand of God (Eph. 1:19-21).
Both the omnipotence of God the Father (Acts 2:24; Rom. 6:4; Eph. 1:20; Col.
2:12; 1 Thess. 1:10; 1 Pet. 1:21) and the omnipotence of God the Holy Spirit
(Rom. 1:4; 8:11; 1 Pet. 3:18) were agents of Christ’s resurrection.
Now we can live in “the power of His resurrection” (Phil. 3:10). Divine omnipotence and divine problem-solving devices are now found in the operational divine dynasphere, which belongs to every Church Age believer (John 14:15-17; 16:13-14; 1 Cor. 6:19-20). We are commanded to “put on the Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 13:14), to have “Christ... formed” in us (Gal. 4:19), to have “Christ at home” in our hearts (Eph. 3:16-17), to “exalt [Christ]” in our bodies (Phil. 1:20-21). The plan of God for the Church Age believer is a supernatural plan that demands a supernatural means of execution. The infinite power of God, therefore, goes silently into effect in our lives when we follow the mandates of His protocol plan. This system of divine power, available only to the Church, can handle any difficulty in our lives and will glorify Christ as in no other dispensation.
WE ARE UNITED FOREVER with
Christ. The Trinity indwells our bodies. Reverent in the face of these
astonishing truths, we ask again: After salvation, what?
We
must learn Bible doctrine. Church Age doctrine sets forth the protocol of
Christ’s royal family. In mystery doctrine we learn of the portfolio God
established personally for each of us in eternity past. The portfolio contains
outright gifts from God that define the scope of our freedom and responsibility.
We are the aristocrats of heaven residing on earth. We are royal priests. We
are royal ambassadors. We have an unprecedented opportunity to utilize divine
power, and God stands ready to enlarge our already vast resources.
If we learn, understand, and
apply His Word, He will stimulate our own desire to know Him, lead us into
eternally meaningful service, and lift us above our sufferings. He will create
an impact with our lives that will resound throughout time and eternity. Our
royal destiny is to become invisible heroes in the most intense and challenging
dispensation in human history.
[1] See R. B. Thieme, Jr., Heathenism. 2nd ed. (Houston: R. B. Thieme, Jr., Bible Ministries, 1979). Hereafter cross-references to my books will cite only title, date of publication (in the first reference), and page.
[2] See Christian Integrity (1984), 158—70.
[3] For a description of the angelic conflict in terms of dispensations, see Christian Suffering (1987), 140—52.
[4] Scripture is my translation of the Hebrew or Greek text, unless indicated as from the New American Standard Bible (NASH). Bracketed commentary correlates the quotation with the topic at hand or reflects Bible class lectures, available on request.
[5] See Victorious Proclamation, 2nd ed. (1977), for a second decisive announcement of Christ’s victory to angels.
[6] See Christian Integrity, 10—12.
[7] Conquered and enslaved, the Jews suffered the Babylonian Captivity (586—51 B.C.) after a long period of unchecked national degeneration and unheeded divine warnings (Jer. 17; cf. Lev. 26). A second period of warnings to Israel extended fro approximately 63 B.C. to the destruction of Jerusalem in AD. 70. The dispersion Israel is the second administration of maximum divine discipline, which continue throughout the Church Age and Tribulation.
[8] See The Integrity of God, 2nd ed. (1988), 48—54.
[9] See Victorious Proclamation.
[10] See Levitical Offerings (1973).
[11] See Levitical Offerings, 1-5.
[12] See The Ten Commandments (1971) and Divine Establishment, 3rd ed. (1988).
[13] This is corroborated by the divine warning which preceded the destruction of Israel. Her failure as a client nation to believe in the Messiah, to teach true doctrine, and to send missionaries to the Gentiles was dramatized in the first generation of the Church Age. Like a mirror showing the Jews their own apostasy, yet simultaneously revealing God’s grace, the gift of tongues miraculously presented the Gospel to Jews in gentile languages. See Tongues (1974) and pages 70, 92, below.
[14] Walter Bauer, William F. Arndt, F. Wilbur Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 4th ed., s.v. “hupostas is.”
[15] See Christian Integrity, 193—96.
[16] See The Blood of Christ, 5th ed. (1989).
[17] See Integrity of God, Appendix B, The Doctrine of Divine Decrees, 258—59.
[18] Many Gentiles also were
present in the crowd, especially from Syria and Decapolis (Matt. 4:24—25). As
in the Old
Testament, Gentiles were
blessed through Israel (Gen. 12:3) and definitely had access to the kingdom of
God promised to
the Jews (Ex. 12:38; Zech.
8:22—23; Matt. 8:11). The presence of Gentiles does not change
the fact that Christ was addressing Israel.
[19] See Christian Integrity, which is a detailed presentation of the divine dynasphere.
[20] Biblical “problem-solving devices” apply at all times but are especially valuable under pressure when clear-cut approaches are urgently needed. Problem-solving devices for Church Age believers include rebound, the filling of the Holy Spirit, faith-rest, grace orientation, doctrinal orientation, personal love for God, impersonal love for mankind, sharing the happiness of God, a personal sense of destiny, and occupation with Christ. All but rebound were used by the humanity of Christ, and for Him occupation with Christ was spiritual self-esteem. These terms are explained in Christian Suffering, 9-13.
[21] See Christian Integrity, 112-38.
[22] See Blood of Christ and Levitical Offerings.
[23] See Witnessing (1975).
[24] See Tongues.
[25] See Slave Market of Sin, 3rd ed. (1989), 18—23.
[26] See Integrity of God, 105—12, and Blood of Christ, 10—13.
[27] See Old Sin Nature vs. Holy Spirit. 4th ed. (1988).
[28] See Christian Integrity, 158—70.
[29] See Tongues.
[30] See Integrity of God, 86—126.
[32] See Integrity of God, 32, 102—103.
[33] For a description of momentum testing, see Christian Suffering, 95—131.
[34] I also use a computer analogy to illustrate the doctrine of divine decrees (see Integrity of God, Appendix B). The “computer assets in the believer’s portfolio, however, are a different analogy. They describe the individual Church Age believer rather than the whole of God’s decree in eternity past. The computer that contains everything should not be confused with the computer that illustrates one believer’s life.
[35] Other corporate elections include the Levites and the family of Aaron (Num. 17—18) and the 144,000 Jewish evangelists of the Tribulation (Rev. 7:4—8).
[36] See Integrity of God, Appendix B, The Doctrine of Divine Decrees, 257—81.
[37] See Christian Suffering, 117—19.
[38] See Demonism, 2nd ed. (1974), 84—89, which outlines the doctrine of reversionism.
[39] Spiritual self-esteem, spiritual autonomy, and spiritual maturity represent successive stages of spiritual adulthood. See Christian Suffering.
[40] See Levitical Offerings, 46—47; Integrity of God, 50, 110; and Christian Integrity, 166.
[41] See Witnessing.
[42] See Christian Suffering.
[43] See Rebound and Keep Moving, 2nd ed. (1973).
[44] The categories of suffering that follow are discussed in Christian Suffering.
[45] See Prayer, 2nd ed. (1975).
[46] See Rebound and Keep Moving and Isolation of Sin, 3rd ed. (1976).
[47] See Old Sin Nature vs. Holy Spirit.
[48] See Christian Suffering, 140—76.