Dividing the word of truth

Dividing the Word of truth

2Ti 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

I doubted that this word ‘dividing’ could really mean to separate. I did not like the idea of the Word of truth being separated. In my studies I found that the word dividing is used seven times in the Bible, without exception it means to separate, to distinguish between, even to disunite. So I was left with trying to understand, in what way does God want us to disunite or separate His Word?

The thought of dividing lends itself to the idea of dispensations. Again I doubted that there was such a concept in the Bible. I was not aware of this appearing in the Bible. I had only heard that there were people with the ‘erroneous’ idea that certain parts of the Bible did not apply to them and they believed this in the name of dispensations! In my mind this automatically meant that these people were trying to get out of obeying certain of God’s commands and I wanted no part of it. Since the time that I was saved I have always wanted to obey God in everything. There was no way I would trade that desire for an understanding of the Bible that would lessen my responsibility before God! I think there are many that could identify with what I am saying.

All of this has lead to this study. I would like to present my findings on ‘dividing the Word of truth’, or dispensations in the Bible.

I looked at every time the word dispensation is used in the Word of God, and found that it is only used four times, and always by the Apostle Paul. So then I looked to see how else this same Greek word was translated into English, this lead me to an understanding of the biblical definition of this word. I also looked at the1828 Webster’s Dictionary, and that is where this definition stems from.

Dispensation ;, an administration, a stewardship, ..That which is dispensed or bestowed; a system of principles and rites enjoined.

With that in mind I considered the Word of God. Could it be that there are different systems of principles and rites enjoined given to men in the Word of God? I found that there most assuredly are! There are many people that have written upon this subject and much more could be said than what I will be getting into, but hopefully this will lay a foundation for some. What I now believe about dispensations in the Bible has given me a far better understanding of the Bible as a whole, and it has really helped me to see the big picture. Also it has not taken away my desire to obey God, and it has not lessened my responsibility before Him, if anything I have become more accountable.

Here are some questions that were presented to me in light of dispensations. Does God deal with people differently today then He did 4000 years ago? Does He expect the same things from us as He did from the children of Israel in the wilderness? Are God’s dealings with man today, the same as in the Garden of Eden? The obvious answer to all of these questions is no! God does not expect us to offer sacrifices on a bloody altar, in a Temple, in Jerusalem! Every Christian could certainly agree to that?!God held Adam and Eve accountable to for eating from a tree in the middle of a garden. Is God hold you to the same?. It should be obvious to anyone, even with those few thoughts, that God has dealt differently with people in times past. That means that God has a different system of principles today than He did when dealing with the nation of Israel.

Based upon that simple logic I can already conclude that every Christian wether they like it or not is a dispensationalist of some sort, to one degree or another! Another conclusion that this lead me to is that there are certain parts of the Bible that were not written with me in mind, an obvious example would be that the Children of Israel were commanded to have fringes on their garments, I have never seen a Christian do that. What I have started to see is that many false doctrines arise out of people that don’t give any thought to whether certain portions of scripture were written to the Israelites, or the Church, or perhaps even someone before there even was a nation of Israel.

I believe when Paul wrote to Timothy and told him to rightly divide the Word of truth he was telling him to make distinctions in the Bible, to be careful to see who God is speaking to in any given context.

Let us look at a few possible time periods where God’s system of principles would have changed in regards to Him relating to the sons of men. You will notice that in all dispensations, faith has been required, for without faith it is impossible to please God. Heb. 11:6. Although we could no doubt find similarities in all of God’s dealings with mankind it does not make void the differences.

1. Obviously God dealt with Adam in a different manner than what He does today. He was required to exercise faith in God’s words, by believing and obeying God and not giving heed to the serpent. The consequence for disobedience would be banishment from the garden, and ultimately death. Gen.2:17. Notice that God did sanctify the Sabbath, but did not give a command for Adam and Eve to observe it. There was no command to be religious at all! They were simply required to dress and to keep the garden and not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They seemed to have an intimate, external relationship with the Lord, as seen in the statement ‘they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden.’ Gen 3:8.

2. After the Adam and Eve’s disobedience they were banished from the Garden and the presence of the Lord. There was no direct command given to Adam or his descendants. So far God has still not given any commands to be religious. God himself killed animals in the stead of Adam and Eve and clothed them in the skins but there was no command given to Adam or his descendants to make sacrifices. (Although we do see Cain and Abel bringing an offering to the Lord, this seems to have been done based upon imitation and a heart felt need rather than a command from God.) Romans 5 speaks of the two men that have affected the human race, Adam and Christ, verses 13 and 14, make an interesting observation about this particular dispensation. It says, For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law, during this time period, from Adam to Moses, God did not deal with people in the same way as He did with Adam in the garden. He didn’t reveal Himself to the people, He didn’t give them a list of rules to abide by, or certain days to keep Holy. He basically left them to themselves. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. Can you see the obvious difference between the way God dealt with people after the fall as opposed to before? There may be more ways to divide this era, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but for now we will just leave it the way that Romans 5 puts it, from Adam to Moses.

3. The next system of principles, or dispensation, whereby God dealt with His people is obviously the Law. He gave this dispensation by Moses. John 1:17. The children of Israel had been in captivity for four hundred years in the land of Egypt, finally God makes the move to stay true to His promises to Abraham by freeing His people of Israel. The Lord was seeking for a means by which He could reveal Himself to the nations of the earth, and He chose Israel, His peculiar treasure!
Deu.7:6 For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God: the LORD thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.
Exo 19:5 Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine:
Exo 19:6 And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.
There are many other verses similar to these that prove beyond a doubt that the nation Israel was a very particular people. He expected things from His special people that He did not expect from anyone else!
He related to them as a nation, yet He required faith and obedience from them personally. He had blessings for them when they obeyed, and curses for their disobedience. It was in the wilderness that God first instituted the Sabbath day. God gave them very strict rules about this day. They were not to go out of their tents to gather any food, or gather sticks to make a fire, there was absolutely no work to be done on this Holy day. It was the seventh day of the week and God instituted it based on the fact that He Himself had also rested after six days of creation. You will notice in the passage below, along with many others similar ones, that God is introducing the idea of sabbath keeping. He gave this observance directly to the children of Israel. That means that Noah was not a sabbath keeper! Isn’t that plain? Verse 16 below states that the children of Israel shall observe the Sabbath throughout their generations! Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, were not children of Israel. God was revealing Himself to these people in a way that He had never done before.
Exo 31:13 Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the LORD that doth sanctify you.
Exo 31:14 Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death: for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
Exo 31:15 Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD: whosoever doeth any work in the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.
Exo 31:16 Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.
Exo 31:17 It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.

In the wilderness God made known His Holy Law. A system of principles by which the Children of Israel could relate to Him, find peace individually, and be purified nationally. (The peace was only temporary, for it was not possible that the blood of bulls and goat could take away sin Heb. 10:4) The LORD made Himself known as Yahweh. He commanded that a tabernacle be set up, and a mercy seat be made. He demanded blood for all sin, whether it was conscious sin or not. Yahweh would not be appeased except there was blood applied to the altar of His mercy seat.
In short, God revealed Himself to humanity in a system of Laws, and in a Holy, separated, peculiar, Nation. Any man that would desire to know God, had to come to Him through this system of principles. To this day the nation of Israel stands out throughout history as peculiar. Much of what the world knows about quarantining, and sanitation is owed to the way in which God dealt with the nation of Israel.

There were a few obvious problems with this dispensation. For one the children of Israel would not continue to obey the Lord. If there was not a man that God would raise up to turn their hearts back to the Himself they would very quickly return to the practices of the heathen and to worshiping idols! Also as mentioned before, because the only atonement they had was from the blood of bulls and goats, they could never rid themselves from the consciousness of sin. They had priests go into God’s presence on a yearly basis in order to cover their sins again and again. Thirdly God’s whole focus seemed to be upon the children of Israel, and because of that they became a very proud, exclusive nation. By the time God sent Jesus to the earth the Jews had added to God’s commands and had built themselves a corrupt religion. They were taking God’s Holy Sabbath and abusing it by neglecting to even help the poor or hurting on this day. They did listen to God’s prophets that told them that God’s heart was also for the gentiles. They became so content in their own religion that they actually killed the prophets that God sent to them. Because of these things God would allow a gentile nation to take the children of Israel captive and to rule over them.
BUT, there was a promise that God had first given to Eve in the garden, then to Abraham, Moses, David and many others, that there would be one man from the seed of Abraham, the son of David, that would make one offering for sins for all time and bring the people, all people, gentiles included, to the LORD. This leads us to the next dispensation.

4.There is a transition period here between the Old and New covenants. John the Baptist came preaching ‘repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand’. This was something that the Jews had been looking forward to for a long time, they had many promises written to them of a savior and a King that would come and free their nation from bondage once and for all. The prophet Daniel had seen visions of this King coming and destroying all earthly Kingdoms that stand in His way, and establishing His everlasting Kingdom! There are numerous prophecies concerning Jesus being the son of David, and sitting on David’s throne, and even David being raised to sit upon his own throne(Psalm 89), but I can’t get into all that right now, that would take up an article by itself. It seem s to be quite clear that while Jesus was on this earth God was trying to bring the nation of Israel to a place of accepting His Son. Jesus’ focus for the most of His ministry was the children of Israel.

Mat 10:5 These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not:
Mat 10:6 But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
Mat 10:7 And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.

In this passage of scripture there is again an obvious difference from the New Covenant. We know that near the end of His ministry He told His disciples to go into all the world! What happened? Why did Jesus go from being exclusively Jewish to commanding His disciple to go into all the world? Did God change His mind? No, I don’t believe so. During the time that Jesus walked upon this earth we were still under the old Mosaic dispensation! Jesus was commanding the Jews to repent of their hypocrisy and prepare themselves for the coming Kingdom in which He and His followers would sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. (Matt 8:11). He came unto his own, but his own received him not!! It was only at this point of the Nation of Israel’s rejection of Him as a King that he turned his attention to the rest of the world. They actually crucified their long awaited Messiah and King. So God set aside the Jewish Nation as a whole, temporarily, in order to accomplish His purposes in the rest of the earth. (There will be a future dispensation in which God will again turn His attention back to His peculiar treasure, the Nation of Israel. (Romans 9, Jeremiah 33, and many others).

Acts 14:15 says,.......the living God, which made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein:
Act 14:16 Who in times past suffered all nations to walk in their own ways.
Act 14:17 Nevertheless he left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness.

Act 17:26 And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;
Act 17:27 That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us:
Act 17:28 For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.
Act 17:29 Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device.
Act 17:30 And the times of this ignorance (the dispensation in which God was dealing exclusively with the Jews) God winked at; but now(in this present dispensation) commandeth all men every where to repent!
Does it not seem quite obvious by now that there clearly are dispensations in the Bible?! Just to clear something up before I am misunderstood, I do believe that ALL of the Bible is profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness, but I do not believe that the whole Bible should be read in a way where I am always trying to apply it to my life! Some of the Bible just very plainly was not written directly to me, for me yes, but not to me!

5. That would bring us to our present dispensation, the New Covenant. First off, the entire life and ministry of our Lord Jesus took place in the old dispensation!(or at least in a transition period between the two covenants). It was not until Christ had laid down His life as a ransom, a sacrifice, and then rose again from the dead, that this system of principles that we now live under came into effect! Jesus fulfilled all of the Old Testament types and shadows, He kept the whole Law, and became the perfect man through suffering.
Lets say for a minute though that you would have lived and sinned during the lifetime of Jesus, assuming you were a Jew, you would have been commanded, even by Jesus Himself, to go to the Temple and kill an animal to cover your sins! Many people do not understand this simple truth, and take for granted that everything that Jesus taught was new covenant teaching. The statement that I am about to make will be shocking if you have not understood what I have said thus far, but if you let me explain I think you will agree. Here goes. If you were to obey everything that Jesus said and taught, you would be considered a heretic in today’s dispensation!! Here is a simple example, In Luke 17, we have the account of the ten lepers coming to Jesus to be cleansed and Jesus’ response is that they should go shew themselves to the priest! And it so happened that as they were going they were cleansed. Now let me ask you, if I was sick and got healed would you recommend that I go show myself to the priest? Obviously not! So if you were to take the teaching of Jesus in this passage and bring it into today’s dispensation, you would be teaching heresy! This of course is a very obvious and simple example, but it does prove my point. Not all of Jesus’ teachings apply to me today! You and I need to be work men that need not to be ashamed and rightly divide the word of Truth. Amen?

The way in which God now relates to His people is through an Advocate, an Interceder. a go between if you would. Much like the Old Testament priest, only Jesus’ ministry is much more effectual. His ministry was successful in not only covering our sins for a season, but removing them for all eternity!!

Heb 9:12 Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.
Heb 9:13 For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh:
Heb 9:14 How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
Heb 9:15 And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.
Heb 9:20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.

Hallelujah! Aren’t you glad that you live in our day and in our present dispensation!?

Paul makes some very bold claims in regards to this dispensation, he says,

Eph 3:2 If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward:
Eph 3:3 How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words,
Eph 3:4 Whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ)
Eph 3:5 Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit;
Eph 3:6 That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel:
Eph 3:7 Whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. (Col.1:25 says something very similar).

Paul says that our present system of principles by which we relate to God, was hid from the whole human race, in all ages(similar to dispensations) past, and was revealed directly to him by special revelation! Do you realize what that implies? Paul is telling us that he was the first to know about the body of Christ, and the Jews and gentiles being made one in Christ. Even the other Apostles were somewhat ignorant to the understanding of the gospel that Paul held and wrote about.(2 Peter 3:16).

If this present Church dispensation was given to Paul then his epistles are inspired by the Holy Ghost especially for the Church. Now before I go any further I feel the need to clear something up, I am not saying that Paul’s teachings are superior or more important than Jesus teachings. There is a lot of beautiful new Covenant teachings in the gospels. What I am saying is that in the gospels we need to be careful to identify the audience to which Jesus is speaking, and to carefully follow the flow of the context. Basically, we need to be careful to rightly divide the word of Truth!

Back to what I was saying, the writings of Paul, along with the other epistles written to the Church, are directly written to instruct the Church (God’s people in this dispensation.) For example, If I wanted to find out what a new Testament believers relation is to the Old Covenant I would not go to the Old Testament or to the four gospels, I would go to the Apostle Paul’s writings to find out. Does that make sense? In the Old Covenant the Sabbath day is highly esteemed. The punishment for not adhering to the Sabbath according to the Law was death, by stoning! If we were to go back to the passage in Exodus 31:16, we would find that the Sabbath was given to the children of Israel to observe throughout their generations, but now Paul says that if a New Testament Christian would observe days, times, seasons, years, and even Sabbaths as though they were a command from God for us to keep, that they will lose rewards or even fall from grace! What changed, why are we not expected to keep the Sabbath? Why would we even lose rewards if we think we have to observe it in order to keep in good standing with God, when the Old Testament Saints would be stoned if they did not observe it? The answer is simply this, ALL of those Old Testament observances a shadow, but the body is of Christ. Col 2:17!
I’ll give you an illustration, it may seem silly but I believe it is accurate. How would you feel if you nearly lost your life in saving your wife from a great peril and her response was to carry your picture around, to kiss it, to talk to it, and basically to be in love with a picture of you? Or what if all she wanted to do was to look at your shadow on the ground, and to touch it whenever she got a chance? Wouldn’t you rather have her be in love with you? To be grateful to you? To want to kiss and hug and touch you? I think that is one of the reasons why Paul so strong against believers going back to Moses to maintain their salvation. Now that we have the real thing, now that the body that made the shadows has revealed Himself to us, lets not hold to the shadows. Let us rather cling to the head of the body, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God. Col 2:19.

Much more could be said in regards to these issues, but I only bring them up to make my point, which is that, God does not deal with us the same today as He did with the Jews in history! Also I think that I have made it abundantly obvious that not all of the Bible is written directly to us as the Church.

6. The next dispensation that I can see in the Bible would have to be in the future. It will be a time in which the Church will be taken out of this earth and God will again turn His full attention back to the Nation of Israel. Paul says that when the fulness of the gentiles shall be come in, then all Israel shall be saved.

Rom 11:25 For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.
Rom 11:26 And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob:
Rom 11:27 For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.

This is one of the clearest portions of scripture distinguishing between the Church and Israel. They are not the same thing, at all! Some would have us believe that we are now just spiritual Israel, but the Bible plainly states that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek! The Church is a mystery that was hid to the Old Testament prophets, God is doing something right now that does not directly involve the Nation of Israel. But when God takes away His Church, the Bride of Christ, then He will again turn His attention back to Israel. Below is a very important passage of scripture, it is the Apostle James’ interpretation of a prophecy, his understanding of our present dispensation, and God’s return to the Nation of Israel.

Act 15:13 And after they had held their peace, James answered, saying, Men and brethren, hearken unto me:
Act 15:14 Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name.
Act 15:15 And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written,
Act 15:16 After this I will return( after God has taken out a people from the gentiles), and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up:
Act 15:17 That the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things.
Act 15:18 Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.

This passage makes it very clear that God is doing something different right now, but plans to turn back to the Nation of Israel, and the house of David.

7. The dispensation that would follow this return to the Nation of Israel would seem to be the Millennium. Again people will relate to God on different terms than we do today. The Bible says the Jesus will rule the nations with a rod of Iron!(psalm 2). The Devil will be bound in the bottemless pit, yet it will not be a period of grace and mercy. Rather, anyone that does not meet the requirement of King Jesus, or does not invest his resources in a way that pleases the King, will be cast into outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth!( Matthew 25).

8. Finally there will be a time when the Devil is released from the bottemless pit, and will be destroyed once and for all. All dead will be raised and will stand before the Great white Throne to be judged! All those that have done evil will be cast into the lake of fire, the second death, and all those that have done good, will be received into everlasting life!

Like I said before, much more could be said, in regards to all eight of these dispensations. My point in writing this was not to expound on all aspects of these times, but rather just to point out that they are there and leave you to study them further yourself. Be a workman that does not need to be ashamed, study to show yourself approved, please divide the Word of Truth. It will give you a much better understanding of the scriptures, and it will save you and those you influence from serious error and heresy.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, I hope you were enlightened. If you have any questions feel free to contact me @ dlblatz@amtelecom.net Dan Blatz