Basics of Dispensational Truth

The following notes are taken from handwritten notes in the back of my Bible that I have often used in teaching others about right division.

 

Keys to Bible Study:

1. Believe the scriptures (1Thess. 2:13)

2. Search the scriptures (Acts 17:11)

3. Compare the scriptures (1 Cor. 2:13)

4. Consider the scriptures written by Paul (2 Tim. 2:7)

5. Rightly divide the scriptures (2 Tim. 2:15)

 

God never changes in His person, principles, and promises (Mal. 3:6; Heb. 13:8) but He does change in His dealings with man. All scripture is profitable for us (2 Tim. 3:16) but in order to gain the profit from God’s word that He has placed in it for us, we must study it His way (2 Tim. 2:15). Notice three things in 2 Timothy 2:15:

1. What we are to do - STUDY

2. Why we are to do it - to shew thyself approved of God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed 

3. How we are to do it - rightly dividing the word of truth 

 

Note: The modern versions totally mess up this key verse. They change "study" to something like, "do your best" and "rightly dividing" to something like, "properly handling".

 

All the Bible is the word of truth but we must recognize and consistently maintain the divisions that God put in His word if we are going to understand it. What was truth for Israel under the law may not be truth for the Body of Christ under grace. This is the dispensational approach to Bible study.

 

A dispensation (biblical word, 1 Cor. 9:17; Eph. 1:10; 3:2; Col. 1:25) is basically a dealing out, distribution, or dispensing of something. It is an administration. Dispensations are not periods of time. Ages are periods of time but dispensations operate within ages. Each dispensation revealed in scripture is marked by 5 things:

1) Divine revelation (which bring clear changes in God’s dealings with men)

2) Human spokesman (such as Moses for the Law and Paul for the Mystery)

3) Human responsibility to the revelation (testing) 

4) Human failure (every dispensation ends in apostasy except the last one)

5) Divine judgment

 

Dispensations are not "cut and dried" time periods. There is some overlapping in dispensational truth. For example, the dispensation of human government will be in effect until the Kingdom Age. The following outline is an accurate overview of the dispensations revealed in scripture.

1. Innocence (Gen. 1-3)

2. Conscience (Gen. 4-8)

3. Human Government (Gen. 9-11)

4. Promise (Gen. 12-Ex. 19)

5. Law (Ex. 20-Acts)

6. Mystery (Rom. - Phile.)

7. Kingdom (Heb.-Rev.)

 

In the Bible seven is God's number of perfection and completion and eight is the number of new beginnings. I believe there are seven dispensations in human history and the eighth and final dispensation of which there will be no end is the "dispensation of the fulness of times" (Eph. 1:10).

 

The main division in the Bible concerns God's twofold purpose which is implied in the very first verse (Gen. 1:1).

1. Heaven - The Body of Christ was planned before the foundation of the world but was hid in God (Eph. 3:9) and kept secret since the world began (Rom. 16:25) until Christ from heaven revealed it through the apostle Paul. The Body of Christ will reign with Christ in heavenly places throughout the ages to come (Eph. 2:6-7).

2. Earth - Israel as a kingdom of priests ruling over the Gentile nations is the subject of prophecy. The Messianic Kingdom that God will establish on the earth has been spoken of by the prophets since the world began (Acts 3:21).

 

The major theme of the Bible is the King and His Kingdom:

1. OT - promised and prophesied

2. Gospels - proclaimed and rejected

3. Acts - offered and rejected (transition)

4. Pauline epistles - postponed (Body of Christ in spiritual kingdom, Col. 1:13)

5. Hebrew epistles - proclamation resumed

6. Revelation - established