What is Dispensationalism, and what does “Rightly Divide” mean?

1st Semester / Week 5

(To listen to this study on YouTube, click here)

Do We “Rightly Divide” the Bible?

“Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that need not be ashamed, RIGHTLY DIVIDING the word of truth,” (2 Timothy 2:15).

Furthermore, is our particular denomination like our favorite football team, and we must support and defend it at any cost, and every other denomination is like our rival team that we’re obligated to be against? Must we hunker down and defend our particular brand of Christianity and think that everyone else is deceived? Or, is it wise to be curious how the Holy Spirit has been at work in other followers of Christ? Is it also wise to question if the people who started our particular brand of Christianity somehow allowed mistakes to creep into their doctrines? Have those preconceived ideas and manmade traditions blinded us to Truths contained in Scripture?

Fortunately, we learned in our very first study that the Bible encourages us to question what we’ve been taught. We must be like the Bereans who eagerly listened to what Paul taught them, yet what made them special was that they then searched the Scriptures every day to see if what they had been taught was correct (Acts 17:11). We’re encouraged by Scripture to study to see if the doctrines of our denominations are actually Scriptural. Yet do we truly know what’s actually in the Bible as opposed to what’s just manmade traditions?

Since our generation seems to have been primarily taught dispensationalism, we should keep this verse in mind:

“The one who states his case first seems right, until another comes and cross-examines him,” (Proverbs 18:17).

John Nelson Darby believed that he “rediscovered” a lost truth, which was supposedly lost immediately after the New Testament was written. This supposedly “rediscovered” knowledge just so happened to have occurred on the exact same year that another man “rediscovered” more supposedly lost knowledge, and that man’s name was Joseph Smith who “discovered” Mormonism. Perhaps these relatively new views should be compared with the traditional views as well as being compared with what Scripture actually teaches, rather than relying on traditions passed down since 1830. Perhaps we need to press the pause button to make sure that the popular yet relatively new teaching in dispensationalism isn’t just as flawed as Mormonism might be.

When studying the Bible, it will reveal that each of these men found something that wasn’t actually taught in the Bible. For 1800 years it was known that Jesus is the fulfillment of all of God’s promises, yet even though they try to condescendingly say that the traditional view is “replacement theology,” it’s actually dispensationalism that’s the “replacement theology,” because they’ve tried to “replace” the body of Christ with a future Kingdom based on people who have Jewish DNA. But Scripture is actually Christocentric, it is Christ-centered. Jesus said He fulfilled all that God had purposed for Him to accomplish, and we must put our eyes back on Jesus and all that He has already accomplished.

All of God’s promises are fulfilled in Christ (2 Corinthians 1:20), and we should note that “Supersessionism has formed a core tenet of the Christian Churches for the majority of its existence.” Christ fulfills all and has superseded all. “For most of Christian history, supersessionism has been the mainstream interpretation of the New Testament of all three major historical traditions within Christianity. The text most often quoted in favor of the supersessionist view is Hebrews 8:13: ‘In speaking of ‘a New Covenant’ [Jer. 31:31-32] he has made the first one obsolete.’” Early Christian commentators taught that the Old Covenant was fulfilled and superseded by the New Covenant in Christ, such as: Justin Martyr, Hippolytus, Tertullian, and Augustine. However, beginning in 1830, dispensationalism tried to separate Israel from the Church and link promises based exclusively on whether someone has Jewish DNA.

In regard to it’s foundation, even a supporter of dispensationalism like John MacArthur has had to admit about the founders, “Many of these men were self-taught in theology and were professionals in secular occupations. Darby and Scofield, for example, were attorneys, and Larkin was a mechanical draftsman. They were laymen whose teachings gained enormous popularity largely through grass roots enthusiasm. Unfortunately some of these early framers of dispensationalism were not as precise or discriminating as they might have been had they had the benefit of a more complete theological education” (John MacArthur, The Gospel According to the Apostles, p. 223).

R. C. Sproul, President of Ligonier Ministries, has stated, “Dispensationalism should be discarded as being a serious deviation from Biblical Christianity.” Is this a correct statement? How can we know the answer to this question? The only way to know is to compare the doctrines of dispensationalism to what’s found in Scripture.

Sure, the word “dispensation” is mentioned in the Bible, but the word “fulfilled” is actually mentioned many more times, such as when Scripture explains that Christ is the fulfillment of all that was promised. For just one example, the NLT translates 2 Corinthians 1:20 this way:

“all of God’s promises have been fulfilled in Christ,”

which the NIV words this way:

“for no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ.”

For another example, in Matthew 5:17 we read:

“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to FULFILL.”

Therefore, specifically, is Jesus the “fulfillment” of the promises made to Israel, and is Jesus also the ultimate “fulfillment” of Israel?

Truly, Jesus is the fulfillment that we should seek. Yet in order to cling tightly to Covenant Theology, or to cling tightly to dispensationalism, a person has to ignore large parts of Scripture. A great many Bible scholars, after previously believing in dispensationalism, and after having been convicted by what Scripture has clearly taught them, have turned away from it because it doesn’t fully align with what the Bible teaches, and they’ve publicly apologized for what they had previously taught. Dispensationalism (as well as Covenant Theology) puts blinders on people and forces them to view Scripture by their terminology, their manmade definitions and presuppositions, rather than using Scripture to interpret Scripture. We should remember “Sola Scriptura” (by Scripture alone). We must look to Scripture to interpret Scripture, and try to not make up things that aren’t in the Bible. There currently appears to be a mass exodus away from the manmade teachings of dispensationalism, and the Holy Spirit is using the bright light of Scripture to correct false teachings that have been ingrained in our modern assemblies which unfortunately had significantly shaped the policies of America.

Again, the word “dispensation” is mentioned in Scripture, yet is it wise to build a whole theological system around that one word? Have dispensationalists added more than was meant. Does the word “dispensation” mean what they think it means?

There absolutely is an Old Covenant and a New Covenant, the differences between the two are huge, and we know all about these differences because the Bible clearly explains it to us. (Sadly, some dispensationalists think the New Covenant isn’t for Christians and is instead only for people who are Jewish). Unfortunately, a dispensationalist believes in 5, or 6, or 7, or 8, or even up to 9 different dispensations, with each time period having different rules and requirements for mankind, and what was once true in one dispensation is no longer true in each of the next dispensations.

They think this way because they’ve been inspired by 2 Timothy 2:15, and they take pride in claiming that they’ve used their brains to figure out how to cut up Scripture into different sections. But what does 2 Timothy 2:15 mean when it uses the phrase “rightly dividing?” It is actually just one Greek word, which is Strong’s Greek 3718, orthotomeó. Notice the prefix “ortho” which means “straight.” An orthodontist “straightens” teeth. An orthopedic surgeon fixes broken or deformed bones by making them “straight” again. And now, what does the word orthotomeó mean? It means to “cut straight,” and is translated as meaning “accurately handling” or “to teach rightly.” It has nothing to do with chopping Scripture up into different sections like a dispensationalist thinks it means.

Regarding “rightly dividing,” the following quotations are from Dr. Paul M. Elliott:

“In New Testament times, orthotomeo was used in the Greek language primarily as a civil engineering term used for road building. The idea of the word was “to cut straight,” or “to guide on a straight path.” The idea was to cut a roadway in such a manner that people who would travel over that road would arrive at their destination directly, without deviation. Orthotomeo was also used as a mining term. It meant to drill a straight mine shaft so that the miners could get quickly and safely to the intended destination.”

“There is, however, another word in the Greek language, katatomeo, which means “to cut into sections.” But that is not the word that the Apostle Paul, under divine inspiration, uses in 2nd Timothy 2:15. Paul is not talking about “rightly dividing” in terms of dissecting the Word of God, or cutting it into sections based on Jew and Gentile, or Israel and Church, or any other criterion. It is very interesting that the Apostle Paul does use that other word – katatomeo (“cutting up”) – in Philippians 3:2, where he says, literally, “beware of those who would divide you up” — in other words, beware of those who would try to make a difference among believers between Jews and Gentiles.” [End of quotation from Dr. Paul M. Elliott]

Therefore, “beware” of the dispensational “cutting up” of Scripture.

Another problem with dispensationalism is this: where does the Bible tell us about different rules and requirements for different time periods (other than the time periods of the Old Covenant and the New Covenant)? It doesn’t. Those are manmade ideas, but we should focus on what Scripture actually says. They look at Scripture through a manmade lens, but we should let Scripture interpret Scripture and our lens to understand the Old Testament must be Christ and the New Testament authors who gave the final, more complete explanation.

The following quotes are from Philip Mauro:

“The Bible distinguishes—not seven dispensations, each having a character exclusively its own—but two great eras of God’s dealings with mankind; the first of which was preparatory to the second, and the second of which is the completion of the first. Their scriptural designations are:”

“First: The Old Covenant; or the Law and the Prophets; or simply, the Law.”

“Second: The New Covenant; or the Kingdom of God; or simply, the Gospel.”

“This division is not man-made, artificial, conjectural; for it comes to us plainly marked in the structure of the Bible itself, which is composed of two grand divisions, the Old Testament, and the New Testament.”[End of quotation from Philip Mauro]

The Jesus that Covenant Theology teaches about is too small. To them, Jesus was a rabbi, a teacher who was mostly just an interpreter of the Mosaic Law, but Jesus is actually our Prophet, Priest and King. He is the new prophet with a new and better message that was prophesied in passages such as Deuteronomy 18:15-19, and we learn the “newness” of our higher standard New Covenant in passages such as Jeremiah 31:29-34, Hebrews 8, 2 Corinthians 3, Galatians 3 and Ephesians 2:14-15.

The Jesus that dispensationalism teaches about is also too small. We are now in the New Covenant and Jesus is all; everything finds its fulfillment in Christ, He is the promised one, the son of David, who already reigns as the King of Israel from the Davidic Throne. However, the Jesus of dispensationalism is like a groom who was left at the altar by his bride, the physical descendants of Abraham, just before they were to be married. Their Jesus is shocked, saddened, and had to go to a backup plan. Their Jesus is on the rebound and has found a rebound girlfriend, yet still has a crush on the first love of his life and wants her back, even though she has gone off and found other lovers (Scripture has explained to us that the physical descendants of Abraham were unfaithful and were shockingly compared to a woman who, even though she was married, became a harlot who gave herself away for free, per Ezekiel 16).

But dispensationalists don’t realize that the New Testament actually explains to us what the Old Testament prophesied. The Old Testament is extremely important, yet when we’re able, we are to use the New Testament to interpret the Old Testament. We know that hindsight is 20/20, and in knowing what Jesus has already fulfilled, the authors of the New Testament, as inspired by the Holy Spirit, gave us the fuller and final meaning of the Old Testament. The New Covenant that we are now in is entirely spiritual, and, as John Reisinger has declared, “every single New Testament author spiritualized the Kingdom.”

The scribes and Pharisees had charts describing who the Messiah was going to be, yet they didn’t recognize the Messiah when He was right in front of them. We can look back and see how they were wrong because they misunderstood Old Testament prophecies. That seems to be the current case with dispensationalism. The Pharisees (as well as modern day Jewish leaders) rejected Jesus because their literal hermeneutic tells them He didn’t literally fulfill their personal interpretation of what had been predicted. Similarly, dispensationalists have their charts and diagrams yet can’t fully recognize what the Old Testament was talking about, as is explained to us in the New Testament, because they both share the same extremely literal hermeneutic. Therefore, next semester we’ll begin to look into exactly who “Israel” is, as is described in Scripture. But until then, this is from the back cover of Abraham’s Four Seeds, by John Reisinger:

“The following statement, if correctly understood, will help to clear up a lot of confusion: The nation of Israel was not the ‘Body of Christ,’ even though the Body of Christ is indeed the true ‘Israel of God.’”

“Covenant Theology cannot accept the first part of that statement and Dispensationalism cannot accept the second part. The basic presuppositions of Covenant Theology make it mandatory that Israel be the church and be under the same covenant as the church, and the one thing a Dispensationalist must maintain is the church’s present and future distinction from Israel which makes it mandatory that Israel and the church can never be under the same covenant or inherit the same blessings. What is essential to one system is anathema to the other system.”

“Dispensationalism cannot get Israel and the church together in any sense whatsoever, and Covenant Theology cannot get them apart. Dispensationalism cannot see that the church is the true Israel of God and the fulfillment of the promises that God made to Abraham and the fathers, and Covenant Theology cannot see that the church, as the Body of Christ, did not, and simply could not, exist in reality and experience until the personal advent of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost. Dispensationalism insists that Israel and the church have totally different promises and destinies (one earthly and the other heavenly), and Covenant Theology insists that Israel and the Body of Christ are equally the “same redeemed church under the same ‘covenant of grace’ and governed by the same identical ‘canon of conduct.’”

“Dispensationalism drives a wedge between the Old Testament and the New Testament and never the twain shall meet as specific promise (OT) and identical fulfillment (NT); and Covenant Theology flattens the whole Bible out into one covenant where there is no real and vital distinction between either the Old and New Covenants or Israel and the church.”

“The Old Covenant proved one’s guilt and forbade one to draw near without a perfect righteousness or an acceptable sacrifice. The New Covenant declares a believer to be both righteous and acceptable in God’s sight, and it bids him come boldly without fear into the very Most Holy place that was totally closed off to all but Aaron under the Old Covenant.”

“The law as a legal covenant ended when the veil of the temple was rent from top to bottom, and the law as a pedagogue [strict schoolmaster] over the conscience was dismissed on the day of Pentecost when the ‘promise of the Father’ took up His abode in every believer as the personal representative of the ascended Lord [the permanent indwelling of the Holy Spirit in each and every Elect believer]. The giving of the Spirit is the proof of the accepted work of Christ in the heavenly tabernacle, and the ‘given Spirit’ indwelling the believer is the indelible assurance of our eternal acceptance by the Father.”

“It is the author’s desire that this book would be of benefit to those who desire to understand “What does the Scripture say?” May the watchword Sola Scriptura have real meaning in the church!” [End of quotation]

In summary, what we should learn from the mistakes of dispensationalism is that the proper way to “rightly divide” the Word of God is by making a clear, “straight” path to Jesus! He is the only way to “rightly divide” the Word of Truth!