If you want to understand dispensationalism, buy a Scofield reference Bible. I had one. I gave it away. I didn't care much for the notes.
Consider this, since dispensation is a Bible word. This fact cannot be denied. It was written first in the Greek language but was translated into English exactly as God wanted it translated. The word appears 7 times in the New Testament. It is a wonderful truth that God uses this number 7 for completeness. He breaks this number down into 4+3, or 3+4. I am not going to prove this right now with examples from the Bible But I can and the careful student of the word of God will know this. Even the Bible itself is divided into old and new testaments. There are four thousand years in the OT and 3 thousand years in the new testament and when time will be no more there will have been 7000 years to complete what God is doing in it.
3622 οἰκονομία oikonomia [oy-kon-om-ee’-ah]
from 3623; n f; TDNT-5:151,674; [{See TDNT 539 }]
AV-dispensation 4, stewardship 3; 7
Take a look at this:
Lu 16:2 And he called him, and said unto him, How is it that I hear this of thee? give an account of thy stewardship <3622>; for thou mayest be no longer steward.
Lu 16:3 Then the steward said within himself, What shall I do? for my lord taketh away from me the stewardship <3622>: I cannot dig; to beg I am ashamed.
Lu 16:4 I am resolved what to do, that, when I am put out of the stewardship <3622>, they may receive me into their houses.
1Co 9:17 For if I do this thing willingly, I have a reward: but if against my will, a dispensation <3622> of the gospel is committed unto me.
Eph 1:10 That in the dispensation <3622> of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him: (this is the 5th time the word appears - the #5 is God's number for grace - This gathering of the saints denotes what is commonly referred to as the rapture of the body to meet the head, the Lord, in the air, and completes the dispensation of grace as an operative principle of divine dealing with men on the earth )
Eph 3:2 If ye have heard of the dispensation <3622> of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward: (gentile-ward)
Col 1:25 Whereof I am made a minister, according to the dispensation <3622> of God which is given to me for you, to fulfil the word of God;
Here is a good meaning of the word dispensation. I have given it before;
1) An exemption from a rule or usual requirement
2) A a system of order, government, or organization of a nation, community, etc., especially as existing at a particular time
3) The action of distributing or supplying something.
Now, the Law of Moses, the operative principle of divine dealing under which Jesus Christ ministered to Israel during his incarnation was done away at his death. (Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one which believeth Ro 10:4). This law would be a hindrance to the purpose of God for this age, which is to create one new man from all Jewish and all gentile believers in Christ and baptize them into one body by the Spirit and govern them in this age, while it is being formed, with spiritual laws, Christ himself being the inward power of each individual in the body, as well as the corporate whole, to obey those laws.
Now I could write a lot about this because I know this subject, but I do not want this post to get too long. Therefore I will present the following few verses for the reader to ponder in light of the meaning of the word dispensation.
Pay attention that Paul is addressing gentiles to whom the door of faith was opened 10 years after the Jews were beginning to get saved in Acts 2. Before God opened the door he wanted to be sure Peter was separated from the ceremonial law the Jews had practiced under the mosaic law for 1500 years, that is the law of eating unclean animals. God gave some unclean animals to Peter to eat, for those who know Acts 10. (see #1) in the definition above).
11 Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands;
12 That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:
13 But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.
14 ¶ For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us;
15 Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace;
16 And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:
17 And came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh.
The Jews were enjoying the benefits of the New Covenant because it had been promised to them while they were living under the dictates of the old covenant. The promise to them was that the outward law they were observing, and doing a poor job at, was by their own conscious and power but God would send his Spirit in them and they would have the law written on the fleshly tables of their hearts. This is what began to happen in Acts 2 at Pentecost when they began to receive the Spirit of God into their bodies. But this was not the mystery of Ephesians. The gentiles had no such promises and yet in Acts 10 and the year 40 AD God created the environment for the gentiles to be the recipients of this same Spirit to live in our bodies when we believe the gospel of Jesus Christ and to be sons of God by this new birth and equal with the Jews who had been born again. The mystery is the new man who was created from the infusion of both these people groups into a new body, the body of Christ as equal and as one.
This is an entrance into the body by the Jews under the divine principle of "promise." Since the gentiles had no promise from God and it was the idea of God to accept them into the body, he did so under the divine principle of grace and at a later time than with the Jews. The man God chose to explain all this grace doctrine, Saul of Tarsus, did not even get saved until AD 37/38.
When the Roman general Titus in AD 70 attacked Jerusalem and destroyed their temple and worship system and drove them out of their land into the nations, they lost their national identity and were considered by God as gentiles. At this time the church took on a distinct gentile character as typified by eight Jewish men who took gentiles wives in the OT. Jesus will have a gentile bride.
If one makes his approach to the scriptures in any fashion but by a dispensational view, he will have little success in arriving at sound doctrine. God is a dispensationalist. He created them.
