A Case for Pauline Dispensationalism: Defining Paul's Gospel and Mission

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A Dispensational Hermeneutic

For some Christians, dispensational teaching is all they’ve known and how they understand the Bible. For many others, however, dispensationalism is either something they have not studied, or is understood to be the wrong way to read the Word of God. For so many, the word dispensationalism elicits a red flag. Before we can dive into Pauline Dispensationalism, then, we need to first explore the tenets of dispensationalism.

So, what is a dispensation? The word dispensation, as most often used in the Bible, is the Greek word oikonomia. It means economy or stewardship. Most dispensationalists would agree that a good definition of a dispensation is

a distinct economy, or stewardship, within the overall plan of God.

Dispensationalism, then, is

the systematization of those economies, such that we see God administering the affairs of the world according to His will in various stages, or dispensations, over time.

In identifying one dispensation from another, we must see two things: one, that God enters into a distinct relationship with man through which He governs the affairs of the world; and, two, that the responsibility of man in each dispensation is the result of that governing relationship.

In addition, there are certain distinctives that must be acknowledged; without these distinctives, we’ve lost the essence of dispensationalism. The first distinctive is a Biblical hermeneutic that applies a literal interpretation of the Bible unless the text is obviously allegorical or metaphorical (e.g., Song of Solomon). This hermeneutic results in the second distinctive, that Israel and the Church are, and must remain, two separate entities. The third distinctive is that the dispensationalist recognizes that God is glorifying Himself through all of His work, not just in the salvation of man.

So, if one is not a dispensationalist, what is he? There are at least two other ways of interpreting the Bible. One is employed by the covenantist; the other is employed by many today who, quite frankly, have no true systematic theology at all, but rather read verses at will and often apply them apart from their contexts. So, how does the covenantist differ from the dispensationalist? The covenant believer does acknowledge at least two, if not more, dispensations: Law and Grace. He basically sees the Law of God governing all of human history up until Christ, at which point Grace is instituted. However, the covenantist does not acknowledge any of the distinctives of dispensationalism. First, he often reads the Bible allegorically rather than literally. Second, this allegorizing leads to the notion that Israel and the Church are the same, with Israel being under the first covenant of Law and the Church then coming under a second covenant of Grace initiated at the first advent of Christ. In other words, Israel is spiritualized and becomes the Church in the New Testament. Third, the covenant believer does not readily perceive in the Bible God’s glorifying work apart from the salvation of man. The covenantist sees the salvation of man as the only purpose of God in the world, while the dispensationalist recognizes that the salvation of man is only one of God’s purposes among several that would bring Him glory. Because the covenant believer sees only the salvation of man as God’s purpose, he then sees the salvation of man in the New Testament as the starting point, the culmination of everything revealed in the Old Testament. From this starting point, the covenant believer typically then reads into the Old Testament those doctrines found in the New so that he interprets the Old by the New. For example, the typical covenant believer sees the Gospel given in the NT -- that Christ died for our sins, was buried, and was raised again three days later in a physical body – as the same Gospel given to all those living prior to the Cross. The dispensationalist, on the other hand, lets the progressive revelation of Scripture play out over time, from Genesis to Revelation, and sees distinct dispensations revealed by God over that course of time (although he is cognizant of the application of OT Scriptures as employed in the NT). In our example, the dispensationalist sees that even Yeshua’s disciples, pre-Cross, did not comprehend the NT Gospel, but were saved nonetheless because they believed what had been revealed to them.

The idea of dispensations is not new. Early believers, as far back as the first and second centuries, articulated a basic idea of dispensations, but as Roman Catholicism became prominent, those ideas faded. In the 1500s, the Reformers broke from Roman Catholicism in a few crucial ways, but one thing the vast majority of the Reformers continued to take with them from Catholicism was seeing the Bible as a mix of allegory and literal text. In the 1600s, a systematization of covenant theology was taking place among these Protestants. At about the same time, other men began putting dispensations to paper, systematizing the Bible according to what they saw as at least six, and as many as eight, dispensations. So, at the same time that men were defining the work of God through two broad covenants that applied to all people, other men were delineating the work of God through dispensations (which can include covenants made with distinct groups of people).

So, what are the dispensations? Here, I will present my list, not necessarily the most popular list, and I include man’s responsibility in each dispensation, along with the test, and the subsequent failure. In addition, I describe the nature of man in each.

1. Innocence In the Garden, Adam and Eve lived in innocence (which is distinct from righteousness). Adam’s responsibility was to tend the Garden and to not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Adam and Eve were made perfect, yet they were not perfect in the same way God is perfect because they were created beings. They could have lived forever in the Garden, but God allowed Lucifer to deceive Eve through the serpent. Adam then knowingly sinned by disobeying God’s direct command to him to not eat of that tree. The deception here by the serpent was that man could be his own god by eating of the tree. Adam and Eve simply had to eat, and they did. They failed the test. God pronounced judgment, but He also promised a Redeemer. There were no specifics about the Redeemer except for a very cryptic verse (Genesis 3:15) in which God tells Satan that He will put enmity between Satan and Eve, and between Satan’s seed and Eve’s seed, and that Eve’s seed will bruise Satan’s head.

After Adam and Eve sinned, they made coverings of fig leaves, but God provided His own covering for them by shedding blood. We now see this as a pre-figure of what God would do at the Cross. God would not accept Adam’s work to cover himself but instead made the covering for Adam. God would later not accept Cain’s sacrifice made by his own hands, but accepted Abel’s blood sacrifice.

2. Conscience Adam and Eve were removed from the Garden. Although they were spiritually restored to God by His work of covering them through the animal blood sacrifice, they had lost the promise of governing the earth, they would die physically, and they were now sinners. In Adam, all human beings are declared sinners; furthermore, all commit sin due to a corrupt nature. Yet, there was knowledge passed from God to Adam and Eve, and on to their children, that there was an acceptable sacrifice to God. Man was to believe God by faith and provide the appropriate blood sacrifice. At the same time, however, God allowed man to live simply by conscience; there were no God-given laws, nor had man articulated any laws of his own. During this time, the world spiralled into utter sinfulness until God finally wiped it all out with the Flood. The Gospel in this dispensation was that there would be a Redeemer. Man’s responsibility was to believe God and to live by his conscience, providing the appropriate animal sacrifice when necessary. Noah lived by faith in that He believed God. His evidence of faith was that he built the ark simply because he was obedient to God’s command to build an ark (which would later be recognized as a type of baptism in the Spirit [1 Peter 3:18–22]). Noah and his family were the only ones who were spared from the Flood.

3. Human Government, or Noahic After the Flood, God instituted a couple laws, including the call to eat animals as well as plants, and capital punishment, both of which were to come alongside man’s conscience. Man now lived in a time of human government with the institution of capital punishment. Man was to multiply through procreation and have fellowship with God. Very quickly, though, the world once again plummeted, culminating in the Tower of Babel with Nimrod leading the way. Man had determined that he could live without God; in fact, he thought that perhaps he could be as God by his own efforts. Now the deception was that man could be his own god through collective self-effort. Maybe it would take more effort than eating a piece of fruit, but no matter how much work it took, the people were convinced that by their collective efforts, they could live in independence from God. After the Flood, God commanded men to scatter abroad and replenish the earth, but man, led by Nimrod, refused to scatter. God sent judgment by scattering the people through the confounding of their language, but He also was gracious and continued to prepare the way for the Redeemer through Noah and then Abraham; thus, the Gospel of the Redeemer was still active in this dispensation.

4. Israel God called a man named Abram from the land of Ur in the Chaldees of Mesopotamia. Abram, of course, was just like any of the pagans around him. They lived by conscience under human government but by now had come up with many laws on their own. For example, laws were instituted by Ur and later there were more rules codified by Hammurabi. These were essentially civil laws that men lived by and might be considered a neighborly set of rules. Out from this human government environment, God called Abram. God would change his name to Abraham, meaning father of multitudes, and through Abraham, God would bring forth the promised Redeemer. Through the line of Seth and on down to Noah, and then on to Abraham, God had preserved this lineage.

Up until Abraham, God had been dealing with the whole human race in the same way, but when God called out Abraham, He began a new relationship with a particular people through whom He would relate to the world.

God made a promise to Abraham that all the nations would be blessed through him. But God did something many might consider to be odd. He set Abraham apart through circumcision (long before the Law of Moses was given). He then promised Abraham a physical seed (through Isaac and then Jacob and then the tribes of Israel -- the Jewish race), a spiritual seed (all who believe God by faith -- Jew or Gentile), and the Seed (Christ Jesus, the Savior). But this is important: When this promise was made, Abraham knew nothing of the Cross. He did not know in detail how this Grace would be accomplished, although he had knowledge of a coming Redeemer and faith in a resurrection of the just. What Abraham believed that was accounted to him for righteousness was that he would have an heir whose family would dwell in the Promised Land. He also believed that through him all the nations would be blessed. Abraham’s evidence of faith was that he was willing to sacrifice his own son, Isaac, believing that God would still keep His promises to Abraham that depended on Isaac’s life (Genesis 22:1–18). Notice that Abraham did not show forth this faith unto anyone but God (and Isaac) as the two men were alone. This sacrifice, of course, was a type of Christ’s sacrifice as evidenced by God’s provision of the ram, but nowhere in the Bible does it indicate that Abraham understood the Cross.

From Abraham, God formed Israel. Imagine a river. At a point in the river, there is a divide so that a stream is formed parallel to the river. The river continues to run, but it now has a stream running alongside it. The river is all people; the stream is Israel. Abraham stands at the point where the river first splits. From Abraham, the stream of Israel -- Abraham’s physical seed -- splits off. Through Isaac comes the promise and it is reiterated to Jacob and to his twelve sons.

God later allowed the Hebrews to enter Egypt but they ended up under slavery. The Hebrews were responsible to believe the promises of God as given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. After over 400 years of sojourning and slavery, God raised up Moses to lead the Hebrews out of Egypt and into the Promised Land.

After the Exodus from Egypt, the Hebrews murmured and lived in unbelief, so God gave Moses the Law to give to the people. The Law came alongside the covenant promises to Abraham to show Israel their sin, to make sin exceedingly sinful, so they would see their need for a Redeemer. For some 1400 years, they lived without faith, for the most part, but there were always some who had faith. The Remnant understood that the Law was their tutor to show them how sinful and needful they were; these were the true, spiritual Israel, but by and large, Israel failed.

God was dealing with Israel while the Gentile world, although sustained certainly by God, was not directly receiving His mercy. The river -- the Gentiles -- were allowed to become Jews and worship the God of Israel through the covenant of circumcision and the Law, but not many did. In addition, there were those such as the Gentile Rahab who was accounted as faithful because she assisted Israel (Joshua 2, Hebrews 11:31; cf. Genesis 12:3). However, the vast majority of the Gentiles had no direct dealings with God. God was working with Israel alone and would use the Gentiles as instruments of chastisement upon Israel, or use Israel as a cleansing agent against the Gentiles. For the most part, Abraham’s spiritual seed from among the Gentiles would not spring to life until after the Resurrection of Christ and the calling of Saul of Tarsus.

The Gospel during this Dispensation of Israel was still that God would send a Redeemer. Those who had faith and believed God, such as David, delighted also in the Law, not because the Law had the power to save, but because it revealed the righteousness of God while pointing to the Savior; at the same time, it revealed sin, which would spur the sinner on to dependence upon God alone. The Law was not given to the Gentiles; only Israel was under the demands of the Law. No one could perfectly keep the Moral and Civil Law, but the Ceremonial Law was in place to make atonement (to cover over sins) until the Redeemer should come and once for all purge the sins of the elect. Israel, however, had vowed that they could, and would, keep the Law (Exodus 19:3–8). God, therefore, instituted a conditional covenant of blessings with Israel: When they kept God and His Law before their eyes and obeyed, they received blessings. But Israel hardly ever remained faithful and thus they suffered many trials. No matter how unfaithful they were, however, God’s promise to Abraham that his heir would inherit the Land would never be revoked. In addition, we know that the Redeemer would come through Abraham’s physical seed, Israel. The evidence of faith during this Dispensation of Law was belief in the promises of God. One could not rely simply on his Jewish lineage as the qualification for entrance into the promises of God; the Jew had to have faith in God, which resulted in his obedience to the Law. Those who failed to participate in the sacrificial system (the Ceremonial Law) were the sinners; publicans were traitors.

For 1400 years, Israel had been under the Law when John the Baptizer was sent with a message of repentance and water baptism. Although Israel was to continue keeping the Law, they were to now repent of their sins and be baptized in preparation for the King and the Kingdom. When Yeshua begins His public ministry, He preaches the Gospel of the Kingdom – repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. So, during the Messiah’s ministry, and prior to the Cross, the Jew was required to keep the Law and believe that Yeshua was the promised Redeemer and Son of God (Matthew 16:16, John 11:27; cf. Luke 1:32). Those who believed and obeyed John’s message knew nothing of the Cross to come; yet, if they had died pre-Cross, they were saved.

5. Church, or Grace After the Resurrection, God turned from Israel due to their unbelief (as evidenced by their rejection of the Messiah), blinding Israel for the most part (although, as always, there is a faithful Remnant), and has now turned to the Gentiles in mercy. This is now the Church age, the Dispensation of Grace, in which man’s responsibility is to believe the Gospel. And it is at this point that the stream and the river have formed a lake, the Body of Christ. In this Body, there is no longer distinction between Jew and Gentile. The river of Gentiles continues on, with rivulets being driven forth into the lake. At the same time, the stream of Israel continues on, but underground. There are very few springs that bubble forth into the lake from this stream. The stream is all but dried up.

In the Body of Christ, the believer is under Grace, not Law; and, he is ruled by the Spirit acting through the new nature, his mind being transformed by the Spirit. The Gospel during this Dispensation of Grace is that Christ, the Redeemer, died on the Cross for sins, was buried, rose again the third day, and was seen in the flesh by hundreds of people. The Law ended at the Cross. Our sanctification is not through the Law (which had never been given to the Gentiles) but by the Holy Spirit. We are simply to believe, by faith, the Gospel of Grace, without adding Law to it. Our evidence of faith during this Dispensation of Grace is, primarily, the indwelling Holy Spirit who bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God; and, to a greater or lesser extent (dependent upon the yieldedness of the believer), the fruit of the Spirit which is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. These are not works that we do, but are characteristics formed in us by the Holy Spirit. The Christian also is a new creation with new desires, called upon to be obedient to the Holy Spirit. Because the Body is not of the world, its evidence of faith is vertical, not horizontal. This evidence is acknowledged by God but is not understood by the world. Christians are hated by the world (John 17:14, 2 Timothy 3:12).

6. Tribulation Dispensations 6 and 7, Tribulation and Millennial Kingdom, respectively, make up the Day of the Lord. The Day of the Lord begins when His judgment and wrath are poured out on the earth during the Tribulation and ends with the Great White Throne judgment a thousand years later. Before Tribulation can begin, the Church must be removed. Once the lake -- the Body of Christ -- is full according to God’s determination, it will be removed via the Rapture and the Dispensation of Grace will have ended. The stream will resurface because the Tribulation is a time of Jacob’s trouble. Some would say that the stream and the river rejoin at this point because Jews and Gentiles will both be hearing the Gospel of the Kingdom with the responsibility to repent and believe, and to not take the mark of the beast. However, I would keep the stream and the river separate because the program of God during this time is mainly to bring judgment and then redemption to Israel. God will protect Israel during the latter half of the Tribulation and they will be responsible to believe that Yeshua is Messiah.

On the other hand, the Gentiles are not necessarily to be supernaturally protected during the Tribulation. They will be responsible to believe the Gospel of the Kingdom and, in addition, they (like Rahab in the Dispensation of Israel) will be judged on how they treat the Jews during the Tribulation. It is this judgment that determines whether the surviving Gentiles enter the Millennial Kingdom or go away to await the final judgment of the wicked. There will be millions of Gentiles who will be saved if they live by faith as evidenced by the keeping of the Law specified in Matthew 25. However, half of the world’s population will die during the Tribulation, either due to the wrath of God or as martyrs as demonstrated by their refusal to worship the Antichrist and take his mark. The restraining influence of the Holy Spirit will have been removed at the pre-Tribulation Rapture so that all evil will be allowed to exist on the earth during the Tribulation. How will people respond under extreme pressure and the wrath of God being poured out on the earth? The Bible says that many men will curse God and not believe.

7. Millennial Kingdom The Millennial Kingdom will begin on earth with the Second Coming of Christ at the end of the Tribulation period. Yeshua will return as King of kings and Lord of lords. He will put an end to all opposition and begin His rule in Jerusalem. The Antichrist and his False Prophet will be thrown into the Lake of Fire and Satan will be bound in the Bottomless Pit. The Sheep and Goat Judgment will take place, such that people in their natural bodies who survive the Tribulation and are judged as sheep will enter the Kingdom (Matthew 25). Then there is Israel, the Remnant who believe. They, too, will enter into the Kingdom and serve as priests unto Yeshua.

Because those who enter into the Kingdom are in their natural bodies, they will continue to procreate. Their offspring will have sin natures just as their parents. However, there are three things that will keep sin all but non-existent in the Kingdom. First, Yeshua will be on the throne and will rule with a rod of iron. Second, Satan will be bound, unable to influence anyone. And third, the earth will be restored so that the animals and plants will live in harmony with the people -- no more dangerous or poisonous animals or plants. Life will be tranquil, but we cannot underestimate the sin nature. This is why Yeshua will need to rule with a rod of iron.

So, we see here yet another environment in which man is tested and God is glorified. Man is nowhere near as good as God even in a perfect environment. The Gospel during the Dispensation of the Kingdom is that the King is reigning from His holy mountain, Jerusalem. Israel will be priests unto the King. All people will be responsible to keep the Feast of Tabernacles and to obey the Kingdom Law (Ezekiel 40–46; Zechariah 14:17–21).

During the Millennial Kingdom, the Old Testament saints, and those who are martyred during the Tribulation, will live in their resurrected bodies. The exact nature of their inter-relationship with the Kingdom dwellers in their natural bodies is not explicitly stated in Scripture (although Job speaks of being resurrected unto an earthly life). The Church will also be living in resurrected bodies, ruling and reigning with Christ, but it is not clear how much of our existence will be on earth, if any. For those in resurrected, glorified bodies, there is no more sin nature and no more sin.

At the end of the Millennium, Satan will be loosed from the Bottomless Pit. He will influence the people on earth so that many of them will join with Satan in rebellion against God and His reign from Jerusalem. Yeshua will then destroy the rebellion, sending Satan into the Lake of Fire forever. Then will come the Great White Throne Judgment in which all the wicked dead will be resurrected and judged according to their works. The reason the wicked dead are wicked and will face this judgment is because they never believed God during any dispensation. They will, at the end of the Millennium, be raised up to face judgment (sentencing). Their works will be used against them. All unbelievers will be thrown into the Lake of Fire forever, at which point the eternal state begins.

We have seen man in the Garden, in a perfect environment with an innocent nature. Man failed there because, although he did not have a sin nature, he was not perfect in the sense that God is perfect, and so he gave in to Satan’s temptation. Outside of the Garden, in a fallen world with sin natures, man failed even though he had a conscience and could have fellowship with God. After the Flood, even though God began with Noah who was pleasing to God, Noah and his family had sin natures and soon even God’s revelation of Himself, man’s conscience, and man’s civil laws could not restrain evil. Man failed yet again. Then, God called Abraham and set apart Israel. The Jews had sin natures, of course, but they had the oracles of God. They had the Moral Law (the Ten Commandments), which was instituted to show them their sin and point them toward dependence on God for righteous standing. They had the Civil Law that would create a more perfect environment where sins were punished immediately and thoroughly. And they had the Ceremonial Law that would provide a sacrificial system to atone for sins and to restore fellowship with God in His mercy. They had the Tabernacle in which the Ceremonial Law was carried out, and which pointed to the coming Redeemer. In addition, they had the Prophets who continually pointed the people to God. Israel was a theocracy, but they failed.

The biggest failure of Israel was their rejection of the promised Messiah. They sent Him to the Cross. But God has now turned to the Gentiles with the sacrifice of Christ as the basis for salvation. The OT atonement was only a covering-over of sin; animal sacrifices could not take away sin. All sacrifices in accordance with God’s stipulations atoned for the sinner until the sacrifice of Yeshua, God the Son, Who once for all paid the price. Christ’s sacrifice gave value to all of the previous animal sacrifices of all dispensations. There is now no Law requirement. God is saving people by His Grace through faith, plus nothing. Man simply has to believe the Gospel of Christ, but God is showing yet again that, because of sin, man cannot believe apart from God’s Grace. Man is dead in his sins. God, however, is gracious in that He is saving men according to His will. Any man who believes by faith that Christ died for his sins, was buried, and rose from the dead on the third day, will be saved. Yet even with such a simple responsibility, man is failing and will continue to fail. The world hates the Cross. The