Dispensationalism vs Covenant Theology

All right, so we're going to begin one of the more difficult areas of our doctrinal statement. According to the Moores Corner Church Statement of Faith, this church is a dispensational church. So let me just define the term dispensationalism.

Is this totally new for any of you, or I think most of you have probably at least heard the term. So dispensationalism is a theological system that recognizes these ages. We're going to get into that, that these ages are ordained by God to order the affairs of the world.

Or if I can put it a little differently, God works in different ways at different times with different people groups. Just to kind of put this out in the most basic of ways, there is a time before the Law of Moses.

There was the covenant of the Law of Moses. The Law of Moses came to an end, and now there's the new covenant. So God is working with different people at different times. So this list that I gave you gives the seven dispensations.

We're going to look at that in just a moment. But look at the screen. Here are some of the basic differences. Because no matter what church you go to, any evangelical church you attend, it's probably going to be one of two types of churches.

Either a dispensational church or a church that holds to more what is called covenant theology. So your average Baptist church will probably be dispensational, more like us. If you go to a Presbyterian church, they will be more in line with covenant theology.

So while we share many of the same beliefs, and the deity of Christ and the Bible is the word of God, the return of Jesus, the virgin birth, we share basically the core doctrines of Christianity. But when you get into maybe secondary issues, there is a vast difference.

So our church is on the dispensational side of things. Therefore, we hold to a literal interpretation of the Bible. Those who hold to covenant theology, they have a more allegorical interpretation. Things are more symbolic where we just, hey, that's what it says, that's what it means.

It's more straightforward. We believe in a future for Israel. Those who hold to covenant theology, they think that the church is Israel. That the church is the new spiritual Israel. So we believe in a future for the Jewish people in the plans of God.

Those who hold to covenant theology oftentimes do not. We believe that there will be a rapture of the church. In 1 Thessalonians 4, Paul says that the saints will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air.

We believe that this could happen in any generation. Those who hold to covenant theology, the reformed Presbyterian types, they do not believe in a rapture of the church. Also the tribulation, and there's some differences, but we believe in a seven-year tribulation.

They oftentimes do not believe in that. We believe when Jesus returns, he will set up a literal physical kingdom upon the earth, which lasts for how long? A thousand years. It's called the millennium.

Millay means 1 ,000, so we believe in a kingdom on the earth where Israel will be restored. Those on the other side, they are generally amillennialists, meaning no kingdom. So we believe there's a kingdom on the earth that's coming.

They might say, no, that's not going to happen. There'll be a new heavens and new earth, but no 1 ,000-year kingdom. All right, so that's kind of a basic rundown of some of the differences. So again, any church you go to, evangelical, Bible-believing, Protestant, it's going to be one of the two, most likely.

So we are which one? Dispensational. Dispensational, okay. Any questions?

Yes, Carolyn. Go back to the church as Israel. Yeah. Now, when Christ was on the earth and he told his... Disciples. Yeah. To go out and preach the word, and that is the church. Right. How is that different from the church as Israel?

Israel has chosen, right?

Right, well, so in the Old Testament, Israel was God's chosen. They were God's chosen people. They were a elect nation. But when Jesus came, the nation had fallen into a state of apostasy. The rabbis were teaching tradition over the word of God.

Things were a real mess. So when Jesus came, he preached the truth to them. And did Israel accept Jesus and his teachings? No, they didn't. Some Jews did, right? But the majority, the nation as a whole, rejected Jesus and they had him crucified.

So for the next 40 years, from 30 AD to 70 AD, there was a transition from Old Covenant to New Covenant, from Israel to the New Testament church. So by the time 70 AD happened and the Jewish temple was destroyed, that Old Testament nation of Israel, that was done.

Now we believe there's still a future for the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But for now, they're done or they're set aside. Now God is working in and through the church, which is Jew and Gentile.

So these are just two different things. Israel in the church, Old Covenant, New Covenant. They're different. I think everyone would acknowledge they're different. But what this side says, the Covenant theology types, they claim that the church is the fulfillment of Israel.

Or the church is the new spiritual Israel. If that sounds confusing to you, I think it should because the Bible never says that. I don't believe that's the case. Israel and the church are two different things.

So here's the point though. Nowhere in the Bible does it say that the church is the new spiritual Israel. The church is something new. It's something different. So let's just go through the seven dispensations.

This is a way people will interpret the Bible. The seven dispensations. The first dispensation is innocence. So that is from Adam. Adam was under probation prior to the fall of man because the Lord told Adam one thing.

Adam had one rule, one commandment. Don't eat. Don't eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And of course, Adam did eat. And because of that, he was expelled from the Garden of Eden. From the time Adam was created perfect, from the time that he sinned and was kicked out of the Garden of Eden, that was the age of innocence.

Mankind was sinless. Mankind was innocent. And that all changed, didn't it? So just imagine this. God was working with Adam in a certain way because Adam was without sin. But once he sinned, that had to change.

So the way God interacted with Adam, it changed, right? So then the next dispensation or the next period of time is known as the dispensation of conscience. This is from the fall of Adam. So one picks up where the other left off.

That's from the fall of Adam to the great flood. So Noah's Ark. And that ends with the worldwide flood. When Noah got off the Ark, let's turn to Genesis 9. Something changed after Noah's Ark. God gave a new command.

Was there any sort of human government before the flood? No, there wasn't. But after the flood, God, we believe, instituted human government. So look at Genesis 9, verse 6. The Lord says, Whoever sheds man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed.

For in the image of God he made man. And as for you, be fruitful and multiply. Bring forth abundantly in the earth and multiply in it. So now God is giving a new command. And that is, people who would shed innocent blood are to be punished by other people.

So this is the first mention of what turned into human government. So that's the third dispensation, human government. Now God is working in and through appointed men who are ruling over other men. So human government is after the great flood.

Humanity is now responsible to enact the death penalty. And it ends, this dispensation ends with the dispersion at the Tower of Babel. Some people would argue that this continues on since human government continues on.

But we don't need to get too technical. The next dispensation is what? Promise. So now God is doing a new thing in Genesis chapter 12. God chooses Abraham of all the peoples of the earth. He chooses Abraham and makes a covenant with him.

And he says, you know, through your seed all the nations will be blessed. So the covenant of promise goes from Abraham to Moses. And again, I would argue this actually continues up until this day because the promise is still there.

In regards to salvation and a future for Abraham's descendants. But do you understand that God's now doing something new with Abraham that he wasn't doing before? So again, dispensationalism is a way of looking at the Bible and understanding that God is doing different things with different people at different points in time.

Does that make sense? All right. The law is the next dispensation. This is from Moses to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. And it ends with the scattering of Israel in 70 AD. That's what I mentioned a moment ago, the destruction of the temple.

So this is what we call the Old Testament or the Old Covenant. God gave it to Moses. God made the Old Covenant with who? The church. Did God make the Old Covenant of the law with the Gentiles? No, he made the Old Covenant with the children of Israel through Moses.

So the Old Covenant of the law goes from Moses and it ends with, well, the crucifixion. And then there's this transition from law to grace from 30 to 70 AD. So now what dispensation are we living in now?

This should be easy. Yeah, you've heard of this. It's either people call it the church age or the age of grace. That's not to say that there was no grace in the Old Testament. There's always been grace.

That's not the point. But now God is doing something new. Once again, a new entity called the church. And we're under a new covenant. So instead of working with the children of Israel, working in and through them under this covenant, now God's doing something new, working in and through the church, which is made up of people from all over the world.

And then the final, so this is from the cross. The age of grace is from the cross. And where does it end? Rapture. We believe the age of grace ends with the rapture of the church. That's when the church is taken to heaven.

And now God can't work in and through the church on earth. Why? Because the church isn't on earth. The church has been taken to heaven. So at that point, God then turns back and works with the nation of Israel or the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

How do we know that? Because if you look at Bible prophecy, most of Bible prophecy deals with Israel. Not the New Testament church. So that's how the age of grace is going to end. And after the church is raptured, then what happens?

You have a tribulation. This is the time where God pours out His wrath on the earth. We believe in the ministry of the 144 ,000, the two witnesses. They will lead a great revival among the Jewish people.

This all happens during the seven-year tribulation. And the seven-year tribulation ends when Jesus returns to this earth to do what? Set up the kingdom that He promised. In the Lord's Prayer, Jesus tells His disciples to pray, Pray, Thy kingdom come.

Thy will be done where? On earth as it is in heaven. So how does that make any sense when people say, Well, actually, there is no kingdom. I mean, this is what really gets me. All these verses and passages in the Bible that talk about the kingdom, Revelation 20 mentions it six times, a kingdom, a thousand years on earth.

And they interpret that to mean, actually, there is no kingdom. Or it's a spiritual kingdom, meaning you can't see it. And it's not here on earth. And a thousand years doesn't mean a thousand years. So in that, you really see the difference between us.

We have a literal interpretation of the Bible. When the scripture says there's going to be a thousand-year kingdom on the earth, What does that mean? How do you interpret that? No interpretation necessary.

It means what it says. But again, they have an allegorical interpretation where, Yeah, that's what it says, but it actually means something else. And then sometimes it means the opposite of what it says.

So we're definitely on the dispensational side. Amen. All right, so let's kind of go back and restart this. And again, if you have a question, just raise your hand as we go along. But we're looking at the doctrine of dispensationalism.

So evangelicals generally will fall into one of two camps. You'll either be dispensational, or a church will either be dispensational, more like us. Or there are those who hold to covenant theology. Let me read from the Morris Corner Church doctrinal statement.

It says, we believe in the dispensational view of Bible interpretation. But we reject the extreme position of hyper-dispensationalism. Which opposes the Lord's table in water baptism as a scriptural means of testimony for the church in this age.

And then it says, we take the pre-millennial view dispensationally. I had no part in the formulation of this statement. So I don't know what was behind it or what people were thinking when they wrote it.

But I notice here that it says we are dispensational. We talked about that. But we reject hyper-dispensationalism. So when the word hyper is put in front of something, what does that mean? It's a bad sign, usually, right?

Radical. Extreme. You're taking it too far. And I'll say this. There are some things that are considered dispensational. So let's say somebody watches this video online and they hear me saying that I'm a dispensationalist.

Don't assume that, oh, that means he believes this, this, this, this, and this. Because I think there are elements of dispensationalism that do take it sometimes a little too far. That's the problem when we use terms like an ism.

There's Calvinism, Arminianism, dispensationalism. And anytime you use one of those terms, it carries a lot of baggage. So don't assume that you heard something that was dispensational and assume that, well, I must believe this.

For example, in the early Schofield reference Bible, when people think of dispensationalism, there's a few names that come up. John Nelson Darby, who we really have no connection to at all. But the name that people know is C .I. Schofield.

Who knows the name C .I. Schofield? I think, and it's interesting, I went back in our church records and C .I. Schofield preached at this church for our fifth anniversary. So when the church was established in 1896, so in 1901, I think Schofield might have been ministering in Northfield at the time.

But Schofield preached here in 1901 for the church's fifth anniversary. So Schofield is known because his reference Bible, it may be the most well-known, the most famous, best-selling reference Bible in history.

So dispensationalism has found its way into churches. I mean, I would argue that this is just what the Bible says in many cases, but a lot of churches are dispensational. People believe these things because Schofield had it in his notes and his Bible was everywhere and people read it.

Yeah, that's what we believe. So that's one of the names, Schofield. Another institution is Dallas Theological Seminary. They've kind of been the, how do I put it? They're the flagship institution for dispensational teachers.

My point is, I don't agree with everything that Schofield said. In his early reference Bible, there's a note that seemed to imply that under the old covenant that people were saved, Jews were saved by their adherence, based on their adherence to the Ten Commandments.

I don't believe that's true. We're saved by faith. I think throughout all the ages, people were saved by faith. And they have actually removed that note from the Schofield reference Bible. So if you buy one today, they've removed that note.

Schofield isn't here to defend himself. Maybe that's not what he meant. I mean, I don't know. So again, I say all of this to say this is a term. It's kind of an umbrella with all these teachings underneath it, and we kind of have to sort through it and what we believe, what we don't.

I don't want to complicate things, but here's the core of what we believe. Literal interpretation of the Bible, future for Israel, rapture of the church, thousand year kingdom on the earth. Here's the main thing.

There is a difference between the church and Israel. Most of you know that the pastor, because we all listen to pastors on YouTube or on TV or on radio. We all kind of have our favorite guy to listen to who's well known, right?

Well, who's mine? Who knows? Yeah. Actually, there's other guys I probably would prefer to listen to your average sermon more than MacArthur. But I do love John MacArthur. John MacArthur has described himself as a leaky dispensationalist.

What is that? What do you think he means by that? Yeah. Full of. Yeah. Basically, he is considered a dispensationalist, but there's some things that he just doesn't hold to. But he said the main thing is a difference between the church and Israel.

And I really echo that because if you get that wrong. Then you're going to get so many other things wrong, especially your doctrines of the end times. All right. So am I confusing? I hope this is clear.

I'm doing the best job that I can. All right. I hope so. So if you don't remember anything else, remember this. There's a difference between the church and Israel. You'll be doing OK. All right. Jen. Oh, yeah.

Sorry. Let's go back to that hyper dispensationalism. So that's what we reject. Sometimes this is called, I believe, acts nine dispensationalism. Basically, these are people who call themselves dispensational, but they do not believe the church should be practicing the Lord's Supper.

They do not believe in baptism. Baptism was something that Jesus and the Apostles John the Baptist did. But once this new dispensation started with the ministry of the Apostle Paul, no more baptism. So I don't even have time to get into why they believe this.

But yeah, hyper dispensationalism, we reject. And also, there are some who I would consider hyper dispensationalists who they think that Jews can still be saved by keeping the Mosaic law. I'm reluctant to use any well-known names because I don't want to misrepresent anyone.

But anyone who says, well, the Jews were saved by keeping the law of Moses, that would be to me, hyper dispensationalism or any type of work salvation that's going to be present in the tribulation. I don't agree with that.

Okay. Any other questions? Okay. I had all this charted out and my notes are just out the window this morning. So I'm just kind of flying by the seat of my pants here. No, no. Yeah. I really want you to raise your hand if you have anything at all.

So I have a video on YouTube on my channel. If you go on YouTube and search Morris Corner Church, there's the church channel and I have my own. So Pastor Michael Grant on YouTube and I have a video titled, What is Dispensationalism?

And as of now, it's got something almost like 3000 views. So somebody must have found it helpful. And I'm just going to read what I put in that video. It seemed to be helpful to people there. I'm just going to read it.

So the Greek word economy is found seven times in the Bible. In the King James Version, it is translated four times as dispensation and three times as stewardship. So the word dispensation is a biblical term.

All right. Obviously, it depends on the translation you were using. But King James, New King James. This is a biblical term. So here's the definition. Dispensationalism is a system of biblical interpretation, which teaches that God deals with mankind in different ways at different times.

During each time period or dispensation, we saw conscience, law, promise, grace. So during each time period or dispensation, God gives mankind a test. Mankind ultimately fails that test. There is a judgment.

But through it all, God shows grace to those who trust him by faith. Let's just kind of work through this initially. So God gives mankind a test. What's the first dispensation? Yeah. Innocence. Right.

So what was the test that God gave man?

Don't eat from the tree of good and evil.

Don't eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. So God gives mankind a test. Mankind ultimately fails that test. How did Adam fail the test? He ate it. He ate it. Then there is a judgment. What was the judgment?

Kicked out of the Garden of Eden. You got kicked out of the Garden of Eden. His relationship with God was interrupted, if not severed. But through it all, God shows grace. What was the grace? You can see the grace in that God.

Because when Adam ate the fruit, the first thing he realized was what? Yeah. He's naked. He realizes it's not even symbolic, really, but he recognizes his shame, his sin. But God showed grace by doing what?

Covering him with the animal skins. He tried to cover himself with the fig leaves, symbolizing his own works. He found this stuff and tried to make an apron to cover himself. God said, that's not good enough.

God shed the blood. I like to think of a lamb and use the skin to cover him. And that's symbolic of the Lamb of God. An innocent being, an animal, had to give its life to cover his sin. That's symbolic of Christ dying to cover us through his blood.

Yes, Linda. You can say that as the first animal sacrifice?

Yeah. The first animal sacrifice was in the garden, offered by God. Right. So that's dispensationalism in a nutshell. That's how you can see these different periods of time throughout the scripture. God gives mankind a test.

Man fails that test. There's a judgment. And through it all, God shows grace to those who trust him by faith. So the system of dispensationalism divides human history into seven dispensations. Innocence, conscience, human government, promise, law, grace, also called the church age or the age of grace.

And finally, the millennial reign of Jesus Christ on the earth. So dispensationalism teaches the rapture of the church. A seven-year tribulation period with, at the end, a physical return of Jesus Christ to the earth.

Dispensational pastors and theologians believe that upon his return, Jesus will destroy the armies of Antichrist at the Battle of Armageddon, after which he will set up his kingdom on the earth, which lasts for 1 ,000 years.

During this time, God fulfills his land promises to Abraham and his descendants. So in the system of dispensationalism, there's still a future for the nation of Israel. In some ways, I wouldn't even call this dispensationalism.

I would just call it the Bible. This is just what the Bible teaches. So if somebody wants to use the term or the label, I don't even really care about that. I don't walk up to people and say, hi, my name's Mike.

I'm a dispensationalist.

I don't really...

But once we start talking about the issues, you're going to find that if you know all this, you're going to find out pretty quick. Someone's either going to be like us and believe the same things as us, or they're going to fall into this other side.

And this other side, they often baptize babies. That would never have... The thought for us of baptizing babies, that's just... Why would you even do that? It's not in the Bible anywhere. But they baptize babies.

Why? Because they think the church is the new spiritual Israel. And Israel circumcised babies. So baptism is sort of the new circumcision. Therefore, we should baptize babies. I mean, that's their thought process.

I want to be clear. We're not saying that, hey, these people... Well, we are saying that they're incorrect. I'm saying they're incorrect. I'm not saying that they're bad, they're not saved. We're not saying any of that.

But they're incorrect on these issues. They still believe in the core... Not all of them, maybe, but they believe in the core issue of salvation by faith alone, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.

The heart of the gospel. We agree on that, thankfully.

Yes? I don't understand how they... Then why do they think that we're... Someone gets saved and then they get baptized.

That's scriptural. That's in the Bible. It wasn't like they were... I don't get why they're getting that...

You know what I'm saying? It's like... There's been several places in the Bible where people get saved. And then what happens? They get immediately... Right. Immersed.

Right. Well, it's an allegorical system of interpretation. So just because it's not spelled out in the text, it doesn't matter. Because they formulate their arguments by taking from here and here and here.

I think it goes down in tradition as well.

I think it goes... Yeah. I'm glad you said that. I believe that, you know, as much as I love some of my Presbyterian friends, I believe it's a leftover from the Catholic Church. They haven't... Sometimes they're called reformed.

Covenant theology, reformed theology. They haven't reformed enough. Because a lot of these teachings are leftover from the Roman Catholic Church. So you're right. I think it is tradition. That's ultimately where it comes from.

It's not in the Bible. But just how would they... Where do they get this idea from? Okay. We put the billboard up in Greenfield. Right. Acts 16, 31. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.

And the end of the verse is you and your household. I didn't put that on the verse because, you know, people are driving by at 45 miles an hour. They only have so much time to read. I wanted the important part about being saved.

But the idea they would have is, see, and your household. And I think there's another passage that talks about, and he was saved, him and his house. See, there's babies being baptized. It doesn't say that.

That's something that they're assuming, reading into the text in order to try to defend their tradition. And then the kicker is there are people called reformed Baptists. Where they're kind of like half and half.

Well, they're just confused. But, you know, many of them are faithful people. You know, we're not trying to. We're not judging anybody. It's just it's a very clear difference. So just keep keep this in mind when you go to a church.

If you let's say you move to a new area someday, you find yourself in a situation where you're attending a new church. Remember, it will fall into one or two of these camps. If you end up in one of these churches that teach covenant theology, you're going to sit there.

And if you attended Morris Corner Church for years and were taught here, you're going to sit there and you might be totally confused. Because this is not sounding like what I was taught or vice versa.

Somebody who is a Presbyterian might end up in a dispensational church like ours. And now they're starting to hear some things they never heard over there. What's the solution? What's the solution? Go to the word of God.

If the pastor or whoever it is, someone on the radio says something that I don't know. I've never heard that before. I don't know if it sounds right. Make sure he's quoting chapter and verse. Decide based on what the word of God has to say.

So if anyone hears something this morning, they're not quite sure of. Hey, come to me. We'll sit down. We'll have an open Bible and we'll look at it. Because ultimately, it's God who decides. And I believe dispensationalism is not just some system of theology that some guy in the 1800s created.

It's just taking the Bible literally. This is what it says. This is what it believes. That's the label that's been attached to it. And I'm not even concerned that much about the label. It's just take the Bible literally.

Okay, you're dismissed. Thank you.