Dispensationalism: Is It Biblical?

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History of Dispensation

The ideology of dispensation is one of the most significant aspects when it comes to religion. By definition, it is considered as a range of time where God tests human beings with regards to the respect and compliance to revelation or guidance of God’s will.

In other words, it is a time when God seeks to test the extent to which man obeys the revelation given to him in respect to God’s wills and intentions. From this definition, it is evident that dispensation has three critical and distinct aspects that define it.

First, dispensation embodies a revelation which seeks to provide knowledge about God’s will. In that regard, therefore, it implies that God provide insight concerning his intention for man to make decision in respect to whether he will obey or not.

The second aspects, which is portrayed in the definition, relates to the fact that God has allowed man the power of choice.

As such, the man is responsible of making the decision as to whether he will obey or neglect the revelation. Indeed, the idea of allowing man to make decision dates back to the time of creation when God permitted Adam to choose between good and bad deeds.

Thirdly, the definition of dispensation encompasses a period of time in which the revelation and the test prevails.

As such, during this period, God sustains the revelation in order to test whether man is prepared to act in accordance to God’s will. Indeed, the ideology of dispensation has evoked heated debates worldwide due to the differing perspectives in respect to its definition and components.

In addition, the clear difference between dispensation and covenant theology has evoked critical controversy bearing in mind the near similarity. With regards to these debates, this paper seeks to discuss some of the issues revolving around dispensation, including its history, biblical support, and biblical contravention among others.

The history of dispensation is quite deep and extensive in terms of scope and period. In this regard, dispensation dates back to 110-165 A.D during the reign of Justin Martyr (Couch 2000, 72). This was a strong believer who was persecuted in 165 A.D in Rome following his stringent and outspoken faith.

Justin displayed the ideals of dispensation because he believed in premillennialism. As such, he believed that Jesus will come back after one thousand literal years to pass judgment to the world. This implies that God will be evaluating humankind for the next 1000 years in order to test their obedience.

Indeed, if Jesus will come after the specified period to pass judgment, it means that the martyr believed in dispensation. This implication is based on the fact that the judgment cannot be passed without conducting a prior test.

In fact, it is evident that Justin used the bible as the basis of supporting and propagating the ideology of dispensation. He supported it by quoting the words of Isaiah because the prophet promised Israelites of the endless happiness in heaven.

This shows that Justin believed in the ideology of judgment where obedient people will be rewarded in heaven and the rest punished in hell.

Similarly, Irenaeus, who lived between 130 and 200, A.D, acknowledged the ideology of dispensation. However, the author did not acknowledge this aspect in direct terms or instilled the ideology of obedience. Instead, he made a clear distinction between the three covenants provided by God.

In this case, the acknowledgement of these covenants can be viewed as the revelation of God’s will. This is based on the fact the covenants were meant to provide instructions in respect to God’s will. Importantly, he acknowledged the new and old testaments as different as well as separate period of where God sought to intervene in human life.

As such, the acknowledgment of separate periods and revelation of God’s will is a characteristic of dispensation.

Clement of Alexandria furthered the ideology of dispensationalism in fairly specific and clear terms. In his work, the author sought to classify dispensation in terms of four phases of human activities. According to him, the first was Adamic dispensation where God tested the obedience of Adam in the garden of Aden (Dunn 2009, 87).

The second dispensation was manifested during the time of Noah when God decided to destroy the people due to extreme commitment of sins. The third dispensation was found during Abraham’s phase when the people of Israel were tested severally to determine their commitment to God.

Augustine closed this early age since he reigned between the 354 and 530 A.D. In his views, Augustine believed that the changes in the economy were part of God’s successive epochs (Hunt 1997, 143). Indeed, this was a perfect ideology of dispensation.

During the middle ages, Pierre was probably the earliest emerging dispensationalist in theology. In his case, however, the author did not approach dispensation from the previous Calvinistic perspective or the pre-millennial approach.

Instead, he focused on the various stages of human development, such as childhood, adulthood, and adolescence, as some of the dispensations set by God to reveal and test the obedience of human beings at different ages (Jecks 2007, 154).

Indeed, the stages were viewed as classification of specific biblical periods which essentially amounted to the millennial approach. After Pierre, John Edwards took over from 1637 to 1716 as the next dispensationalist. In his work, Edward adopted an extensive approach with respect to the issues of dispensation.

There are two interesting things that strengthen the ideology of dispensation in Edward’s work. First, he acknowledges that God has provided a finite limit to life. This implies that life will exit for a certain period of time. During this time, the author provides a step-by-step description of God’s plan for human kind.

Secondly, the author acknowledges the end of the world and earthly living. As such, however, the end of living on earth does not mean that the life of man will stop. Whereas the life of man will continue, it will be subjected to critical scrutiny. From a critical point of view, this evaluation will be based on the period lived on earth.

As such, the author includes all the aspects portrayed in the ideology of dispensation. In this case, it has a period during which God evaluates human kind in respect to whether they obey or disobey the Lord.

In addition, they will be evaluated on the basis of their own choices because, under dispensation, man has the stewardship to make decisions that inform God’s view.

During the same period and later, Isaac Watts envisaged dispensation from 1674 to 1748. Indeed, the author was more defined as to what dispensation encompassed. Although a close review of his outline shows that his views resemble the approaches of Scofield, he tried to provide an individual perspective.

In fact, the only difference between Scofield’s perspective and Isaac’s approach was the exclusion of millennialism as component of dispensation (Karnowski 2010, 75). In particular, his outline of dispensation included the Adamical period, Noahical era, the Abrahamical experience, the Mosaical factor as well as Christianity.

Inaddition, dispensation was manifested in the works of people such as John Nelson, Lewis Sperry, Charles Rayrie, Dwight Pentecost as well as John Walvoord. All these people supported the ideology of dispensation by portraying certain beliefs.

As such, it is evident that the history of dispensation if far-reaching in nature bearing in mind that it started as early as A.D 110. In fact, there have been arguments that the ideology of dispensation is very recent in the history of the world. However, this analysis shows that dispensation is an extensive and deeply rooted aspect in theology.

As such, the problem with some analysts lies in their incapability to analyze behavior appropriately in order to determine whether it manifests dispensation or not. Indeed, it is understandable that author may not have talked about it directly.

As such, their close and critical review of their behaviors is necessary in order to notice the portrayal of dispensation.

Biblical Support for Dispensation

The bible shows vast and extensive support for the ideology of dispensation both in the old and new testaments. First, portrayal of dispensation in the bible appears in the story of creation. In this chapter, God created man in his own image in order to protect the garden of Aden and to cultivate it.

However, God put a restriction which was essentially intentional in nature (Paley 2006, 98). As such, the direct instructions from God to Adam can be taken as the revelation of God’s will to man. In that regard, he expected the man to obey the instructions and keep away from the tree at the center of the garden.

However, the Satan in form of a snake misled Adam on the basis that he could become more knowledgeable if he ate the fruits. This was a real test directed to Adam to decide and choose whether he could obey God or go against his will. However, Adam chose the adversary so that he was forced to work in order to eat.

The story of Abraham was a very important and direct portrayal of dispensation in the bible. Indeed, the nature of Abraham’s test is a straightforward indication that God tests man to determine their obedience. In this case, Abraham was required to make a sacrifice for God at far place from home.

God instructed him to sacrifice his only son who was born after many years of struggle. Indeed, it could be hard for a typical human being to agree. However, Abraham took Isaac, a bunch of firewood, and started the journey to the place of sacrifice. When Isaac questioned of the sheep of sacrifice, his father told him that God would provide later.

Once they reached the destination, Abraham and Isaac prepared the altar for sacrifice. When he laid Isaac on the altar, God stopped him and provided a sheep. This was a clear indication that God engages in dispensation where he reveals the will and tests mankind’s obedience.

Another important and critical story which supports the ideology of dispensation is the experience and the test of Job. Indeed, this is another direct indication that God tests people in order to determine their faithfulness to him. In his experience, Satan approached God and claimed that Job was not essentially faithful to God.

As part of challenge, Satan asked for permission to test the faith and obedience of Job. As such, God allowed Satan to test Job by inflicting pain and suffering.

However, despite the bodily suffering and the disappearance of wealth, Job remained faithful to God and his will. In fact, his wife advised him to insult this God because she thought that the Lord had forsaken Job. However, Job remained steadfast and focused all through the period of suffering (Penney 2001, 167).

As such, his obedience led to the doubling of his wealth and reinstatement of his earlier position as far as health and other factors were concerned. This story shows that God provides tests to human beings in order to test their faithfulness. In the story of Job, it is evident that Job was conversant with the will of God.

As such, he was mandated to make a choice to either abandon it or obey him. In this case, Job obeyed the will of God as opposed to Adam who agreed to eat the forbidden fruit despite the instruction from God.

The experience of the Israelites in the wilderness is yet another illustration that shows the bible supporting dispensation from a critical point of view. In this experience, Moses was given a chance to take them from Egypt to Canaan. However, the journey was too long and difficult in nature.

At a point, Moses was called by God at the mountain to get the commandments. However, he stayed for a considerable amount of time without coming back to the Israelites (Sanders 2001, 57). Due to the lengthy period that Moses stayed at the mountain, the people of Israel decided to make a god with the resemblance of a calf.

Indeed, the people of Israel knew that God had saved them from many challenges. He provided manna from heaven during the time of hunger and enabled them to pass through the red sea. In addition, he helped them to escape the wrath of the Egyptian soldiers when they fled the land of slavery.

As such, they basically knew that God was their savior and because the entire deeds of God were meant to act as a revelation to them. In addition, they were allowed to choose between patience and the use of other Gods. However, they chose the wrong path because they decided to make a god against the well of God.

In the same script, Moses was subjected to a critical test which determined his fate as far as the Israelites were concerned. In this case, Moses was given the Ten Commandments by God written on a tablet. However, when he reached at the bottom of the mountain, he was shocked at the Israelites’ decision to pray the artificial god.

This irritated him until he decided to break the tablet provided to him by God. Moses actions did not please God because he went against the will of the Lord and broke the commandments which should have been relayed to the Israelites.

As such, he was subjected to a test in which he failed and God punished him by ensuring that he did not reach Canaan.

Lastly, the Bible’s story of Noah was a portrayal of how the bible supports the ideology of dispensation.

During this time, the people had sinned against the will of God and chose to go against the Ten Commandments. Indeed, God gave them a chance to either worship idles or stand by him but they chose to continue with the sinful acts (Wilkinson 2003, 43).

As a result, they were destroyed using water and that only a few animals were allowed to enter the Noah. This is manifestation of dispensation in the sense that God passed a judgment based on at test which was failed by the people.

Biblical Support against Dispensation

The New Testament seems to break the ideology of dispensation in various direct and indirect ways. Indeed, the teaching of Christ changed the perception of dispensation and replaced it with other philosophies. First, Jesus advanced the ideology of forgiveness with a view to change the Christian’s mentality.

In this case, Christ imparted the idea that God is forgiving in nature (Beach 2007, 87). This implies that God does not cling to punish his people for the mistakes they do. Instead, he seeks to bring Christians closer to him. As such, this philosophy invalidates the entire idea of God’s tendency to test humanity.

Understandably, if God is forgiving, he will tend to reveal more about himself to the human race. Indeed, the idea of forgiveness also prevents the extensive thought that God keeps of tempting human kind. In this regard, Jesus taught the disciple how to pray.

In the prayer, Christians pray to God not to put them into temptations but deliver them from sins.

Secondly, the coming of Christ was a fundamental undertaking that invalidated the idea of dispensation. In this case, it is evident that Jesus was sent to die on the cross and save human kind. In this sense, therefore, God sent his son to liberate the human race from earthly sins.

This implies that God has the will to save his people rather than punishing them. It shows that God understand the weaknesses of human beings and considers them as sinners. It is for that reason he sent his only begotten son to liberate the entire humankind from sins.

As such, it implies that God is not a testing God. Instead, he is a God who is prepared to save his people from darkness and sins. In fact, it is an indication that God understands the inability of human being to make perfect decisions.

As such, it is not within his best interest or priority to test people and punish them based on their decisions.

Fundamentally, the seven sacraments also contravene the ideology of dispensation in critical ways. As stated before dispensation concentrates on testing and allowing people to make their decisions in order to reward or punish people.

On the other hand, the seven sacraments present God in manner that portrays his willingness to guide and save human race. For example, baptism is one of the sacraments that seek to cleanse the original sins committed by Adam during creation when he ate the forbidden fruit.

This implies that God sets out to cleanse the human sin rather than to tempt Christians. The Eucharist seeks to form a direct connection between Christians and the God. This implies that God has opened his doors to human race and made the more capable.

Indeed, the human race has become more empowered due to the Eucharistic connection with God. Importantly, the coming of Christ was an evangelical factor of theology which weakened the ideology of dispensation.

In this case, God enabled his only son to preach to people in order to increase human understanding about God. In addition, he left his disciples to propagate his word across the world and redeem the human understanding about God.

Discussion of Effects on Premillennialists, Postmillennialists and Amillennialists

The ideology of dispensation supports the perspective of premillennialists in an extensive way. In essence, it is evident that premillennialists believe that Jesus will come before 1000 years in order to pass judgment to human race based on the choices and decisions they made in life (Booke 2009, 48).

In that line of thought, therefore, dispensation supports the perspective of premillennialists because it shares the idea that God tests people over a given period of time. As such, dispensation strengthens the premillennialists’ ideology in terms of testing, judgment and time limit.

The same case happens when it comes to the postmillennialists because they also believe in the coming of Jesus and the passing of Judgment. It follows, therefore, that Jesus will come to pass his judgment to humankind based on the decisions that people made during the time of test.

On the other hand, amillennialists hold an essentially different view as compared to the premillennialists and postmillennialists. In this case, amillennialists consider the 1000 years that were mentioned in the book of revelation to symbolize a given time which is not necessarily literal.

Whereas the amillennialists differ from the other two, they agree that Jesus will come to judge humankind (Brown 2003, 124). As such, it implies that the dispensation strengthens the ideology of amillennialists too.

Conclusion

It is evident that the Old Testament supports the ideology of dispensation where God tests human beings based on whether they obey his will in accordance to his revelation.

In this case, it is evident that the Moses, Abraham, Job, and Adam were put under tests by God in order to determine whether they obeyed him. In this case, Abraham, and Job passed the test of obedience and they were awarded accordingly.

On the other hand, Moses and Adam failed the test of God and they were punished for the decision they made. In particular, Adam was punished by putting him under a condition where he must work and sweat in order to eat. Moses was punished when he was denied the opportunity to reach Canaan which was the Promised Land.

In addition, it was noted that the ideology of dispensation has a deeps and extensive history. This finding was contrary to many believes which indicated that this is a new theological aspect. In this case, it was noted that the aspect of dispensation date back to the A.D 110 during the reign of Justin.

In that regard, therefore, Justin and other early believers made the framework of the modern and post-modern dispensation. Lastly, dispensation has strengthened the ideologies of premillennialists, amillennialists, and post-millennialists. Dispensation and these ideologies converge on the basis of judgment.

In this regard, they believe that Christ will come after or before 1000 years to pass judgment to human beings.

Bibliography

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Booke, Paula. Politics of the Apocalypse: The Effect of Premillennial Eschatology on American Political Behavior. Los Angeles: SAGE, 2009.

Brown, Alan. Christianity. London: Chrysalis Education, 2003.

Couch, Mal. An Introduction to Classical Evangelical Hermeneutics: A Guide to the History and Practice of Biblical Interpretation. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 2000.

Dunn, Craig. The Dispensation of the Fulness of Times: A Discussion of the Last Days for Latter-day Saints. Orem, Utah: Granite Publisher, 2009.

Hunt, Julian. Points to Ponder: Premillennialists Who Teach Things That Are Not Taught by Other Premillennialists. Jeffersonville, Ind.: Julian Publishers, 1997.

Jecks, Michael. Dispensation of Death. London: Headline, 2007.

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Paley, William. Natural Theology Or, Evidence of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity, Collected from the Appearances of Nature. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.

Penney, Sue. Christianity. Chicago, Ill.: Heinemann Library, 2001.

Sanders, Carl. The Premillennial Faith of James Brookes: Reexamining the Roots of American Dispensationalism. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 2001.

Wilkinson, Philip. Christianity. New York: DK Publisher, 2003.

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