Dispensations: The Big Picture

The bible is God's inspired or God-breathed word for man. It's contents show the greatness of God and failures of man over the last 6,000 years. The most important thing it shows man is that despite his failures and miserable existence, hope lies within these pages as fallen man can be reconciled to God The Father through the person and work of God The Son, Jesus Christ!

Since the beginning of creation, God has dispensed instructions for man to follow. God did this for mankind's well-being, prosperity and most importantly, to assure that His relationship would never be broken with man. However, since man's rebellion in the Garden of Eden, he continually disobeys God to his own destruction as well as to the destruction of others!

Because of God's grace, love and mercy, the bible shows us that God gives man repeated opportunities to respond to Him. Man, in turn, responds with disobedience. God judges man and then counters man's rebellion with the ushering in of a new set of dispensed instructions called dispensations. Since the beginning, the bible can be broken into roughly eight (8) of God's dispensations that in essence, all have the same conclusion through the first seven:

Today as of this writing and since Jesus Christ revealed it to the apostle Paul over 2,000 years ago, the gospel of the grace of God (also called the revelation of the mystery) is our latest instructions by God to man in this present evil age in which we live. The doctrine for Christian living today is found in Paul's letters exclusively from Romans to Philemon! This of course does not imply that the rest of the bible has no value (as we have been wrongly accused) for 2 Timothy 3:16 tells us that "all scripture is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works".

I) The Dispensing of Innocence - Genesis 2:7 to Genesis 3:22

Man (Adam) was created innocently by God and placed in a perfect environment. In addition he was:

Given stewardship of the Garden of Eden and told what was acceptable to God and what was not acceptable to God.
Man was clearly warned of the consequences of not taking God at His word.
Woman (Eve) sinned in her pride while man (Adam) sinned in knowing rebellion against God.
God clothed Adam & Eve with animal skins (through the shedding of blood) and restored them. However, death had now entered the human race (Romans 5:12).

JUDGMENT: EXPULSION FROM THE GARDEN

II) The Dispensing of Conscience - Genesis 3:22 to Genesis 7:23

Rather than destroy man physically on the spot, God chose to expel man from the perfection of Eden which resulted in man's spiritual separation (or death) from God . In His love, grace and mercy God ushered in a new dispensing.
Because of disobedience, man came to a personal and experiential knowledge of good and evil - of good as obedience, of evil as disobedience towards the known will of God. It was this knowledge that God warned Adam about which brought about the birth of conscience!
The Cheribums and a flaming sword which turned every way to keep the way of the tree of life (Genesis 3:24) were a grim reminder of mankind's fall through Adam until the close of the second dispensation.
The continued downward spiral of man was evident as Cain killed his brother Abel (Genesis 4:8) and Lamech made a sport of murder by killing a man as recorded in Genesis 4:23. In addition, Lamech was the first recorded polygamist (Genesis 4:19).
Lastly, the depravity of mankind reached its pinnacle in Genesis 6. Here we read about God's warning, His long-suffering and His judgment (Genesis 6:5-7).
After roughly 120 years of warning through Noah (who built the ark in plain sight of rebellious men), God destroyed the earth (Genesis 7:12-23). Out of all of the earth's inhabitants, only eight people were saved (1 Peter 1:20).

JUDGMENT: THE FLOOD

III) The Dispensing of Human Government - (Genesis 8:20 to Genesis 11:9)

The third set of dispensed instructions by God to man (dispensation) was Human Government. Although man demonstrated his utter failure to govern the world in righteousness for God, components such as marriage as well as the principal of human government still exist today!
This particular set of instructions gave man the opportunity to judge and rule on behalf of God for the first time with explicit instructions given to Noah and his sons by God (Genesis 9:1-6). Man is held responsible to govern the world for God with the highest function of this leadership culminating in the judicial requirement to take life for the taking of life (Genesis 9:5-6).
Noah and his sons are told on two recorded occasions "to be fruitful and multiply" (Genesis 9:1; 9:7). The human race was overspread across the whole earth through Shem, Ham and Japheth. (Genesis 9:19). God said in His heart that He would not again smite everything living as He had done nor curse the ground because of the wickedness of man (Genesis 8:21).
The earthly seasons are established as we know it today (Genesis 8:22).
Mankind was told to replenish the earth but instead gathered together under one language in one structure against the will of God (Genesis 11:1-6).
God judged man through the confounding of languages so that mankind could not understand one another. They left the Tower of Babel as the Lord scattered them abroad upon the face of the earth (Genesis 11:5-9).

JUDGMENT: CONFUSION OF TONGUES

IV) The Dispensing of Promise - (Genesis 12:1 to Exodus 19:8)

The fourth set of dispensed instructions by God to man involved an individual by the name of Abram who would later become Abraham. Up until this point, man was an utter failure and demonstrated as such! He had failed in the garden, failed in establishing dominion over the earth to the extent that God judged the planet due to his gross and exceeding sin (Genesis 6:5-7).
Notes from the Scofield study bible tell us that Genesis 11 and 12 mark an important distinction in how God dealt with mankind. Man's existence had come as a direct result of Adam's offspring. Further, God "paired down" man via the flood due to his rebellion and re-kindled the human race through Noah, a descendent of Adam. Noah was the patriarch God used to replenish the earth once again!
There is no national distinction, no Jew or Gentile; only the human race as a whole. As noted above, man would again grow into self-dependency while growing further from God. God had called out Adam who failed. The sons of Noah grew into the nations who would respond to God's calling by constructing the Tower of Babel. God told man to scatter and replenish the earth, man stayed in one place in the land of Shinar in order to establish the world's first church and religion (Genesis 11).
Abraham and his descendents became distinctive heirs to the land. God called Abraham out of his country, his kindred and his father's house which were steeped in idolatry (Joshua 24:2,3). God promised Abraham and his descendents a land of their own and they were to abide there in order to inherit the blessings of God despite the testing they would have to endure.
Israel left the land and went into Egypt and became slaves for 450 years.

JUDGMENT:

1) ISRAEL'S PHYSICAL SLAVERY IN EGYPT FOR 450 YEARS.

2) ISRAEL'S SPIRITUAL SLAVERY THROUGH BELIEVING THAT THE LAW WAS THEIR RIGHTEOUSNESS RATHER THAN TRUSTING IN GOD AS THEIR RIGHTEOUSNESS.

Moses & The Law

The Prophets

Jesus Christ & His Earthly Ministry

V) The Dispensing of Law - (Exodus 19:8 to Acts 9:17,18)

This dispensing starts at Mt. Sinai and ends at Calvary through the redemptive work of Jesus Christ although the full knowledge of His accomplishments are not yet revealed but instead kept secret until Paul is ordained as the apostle of the Gentiles!
- Jesus Himself fulfilled or completed the law as stated in Matthew 5:17: Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill.
- For the law was given by Moses, [but] grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. - John 1:7
Israel's charter as a nation was to to bring the holy law of God to the unbelieving, heathen Gentiles who were steeped in idolatry since Genesis 11. Israel's history of self-righteousness, unbelief and violation against the law of God that was entrusted to them eventually led to their captivity as noted in 2 Kings 7:17
The apostle Paul writes a stinging account against God's Holy Nation for their failure to take the "God of Israel" to the Gentiles:
- 17 Behold, thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, 18 And knowest his will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law; 19 And art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness, 20 An instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law. 21 Thou therefore which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? 22 Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? 23 Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God? 24 For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written. - Romans 2:17-23
The Kingdom Church prospers initially as the "Little Flock" (led by Peter and the 12) continues to carry out the earthly message that Jesus Christ is the Messiah and the very Son of God.
Israel as a nation STRIKES OUT!!
- STRIKE ONE: They reject God The Father through the beheading of John the Baptist.
- STRIKE TWO: They reject God The Son through the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
- STRIKE THREE: They reject God The Holy Spirit through the stoning of Stephen.

JUDGMENT:

1) PHYSICAL REMOVAL FROM THEIR LAND AS THE PROPHECIES OF CHRIST ARE FULFILLED IN LUKE 21:21-24 (TITUS SIEGE IN A.D. 70 IS BUT A PRELUDE TO THE GREAT TRIBULATION...).

2) ISRAEL ALREADY DIVORCED FROM GOD LOSES NATIONAL DISTINCTION AND HER PROGRAM IS PUT ON HOLD AS HER KING, JESUS CHRIST REMAINS IN EXILE.

3) GENTILES GIVEN EQUAL STATUS WITH ISRAEL

The unbelief of Israel and God's postponement of her program......

ACTS	ROMANS	1 CORINTHIANS	2 CORINTHIANS	GALATIANS	EPHESIANS	PHILIPPIANS
COLOSSIANS	1 THESSALONIANS	2 THESSALONIANS	1 TIMOTHY	2 TIMOTHY	TITUS	PHILEMON

Paul preaches GRACE to the Gentiles and of Jesus Christ & His Heavenly Ministry!

"Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might shew forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting." - 1 Timothy 1:16

The Church, The Body of Christ has but a remnant preaching grace: 5 Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace. 6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work - Romans 11:5,6

As glorious as leaving this planet will be to abide with our Lord Jesus Christ, we can also find comfort in the scriptures knowing that this present evil age will seem like we have awoke from a bad dream. 13 But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. 14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. 15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. 16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. 18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words. - 1 Thessalonians 4:14-18

But there is a warning that we should heed to as noted in the scriptures because as we depart from this planet through the veil of death or via the gathering of saints to meet Jesus Christ in the air, loved ones will be left behind and fall into deception from The Adversary.

JUDGMENT: THE DEPARTURE OF THE BODY OF CHRIST ALSO KNOWN AS THE RAPTURE AND AS A RESULT THOSE UNBELIEVERS THAT ARE LEFT BEHIND 13 For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office: 14 If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them. 15 For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead? 16 For if the firstfruit be holy, the lump is also holy: and if the root be holy, so are the branches. 17 And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree; 18 Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee. 19 Thou wilt say then, The branches were broken off, that I might be graffed in. 20 Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear: 21 For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee. 22 Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off. - Romans 11:13-20

1 Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, 2 That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. 3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God. 5 Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? 6 And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. 7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. 8 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: 9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. - 2 Thessalonians 2:1-12

VII) The Dispensing of The Kingdom - to the Dispensation of the Fullness of Times

JUDGMENT: The Great Tribulation, The Great White Throne Judgment, The death of Satan and His Angels