59 - Dispensationalism, Part 1

Well, welcome to the

Striving for Eternity Academy's School of Systematic Theology. Before we begin class, let us just say that if you send in your video of your little darling singing the intro song to the

Academy, well, we'll play yours too. All right, so that was little

Abby singing or trying to sing her version of the

Striving for Eternity Academy's intro song. So, we have now actually had both of the

LeBron children doing their version of a Carey song, so that's pretty cool.

But we are in our class on Systematic Theology. We have been going through book number three.

Book number three we've been calling the God Speaks to the World, the

Doctrine of the Bible. And this week's lesson is going to be on the dreaded

D word, dispensationalism. That's right. So, if you have a syllabus, you can grab your syllabus and follow along.

If you want to get a syllabus, you can go to our website at strivingforeternity .org, go to the store and pick up a copy of Systematic Theology book number three.

They're priced at about $25 each so that we keep the price the same for all the syllabuses, just so you can make it easier.

These might be good for some people that are using them for homeschooling, things like that. That's fine.

We are working on trying to provide tests and quizzes for homeschoolers as they're going through these lessons.

So, that's some things that we'll be having in the future, depending on if you're watching live.

Now, this lesson we're not going to finish in a week. We will not have class next week if you're watching live.

But this is something we're going to take a little bit more time on. This is an issue that a lot of people seem to want to debate and argue over.

Basically, we're going to try to go into what are the differences between what's called covenant theology and dispensational theology.

We're going to show similarities and differences between the two. And I'm also going to take time to address what these systems are not as we go through these, because there's a lot of debate that goes on.

Maybe these are new terms for you. If that's the case, fine, good.

You're learning. But you'll often hear people will argue these things and people get a concept of dispensationalism.

That's bad. Covenant theology, that's bad. And they don't really know why. If you're going to argue that something is good or bad, you should know why.

My challenge to you is to try to understand what the people that hold to a system believe from their system.

Now, to preface this, I want to explain something that I had when I took a class on dispensationalism in seminary.

I took a class on dispensationalism. And so, fortunately, I went to a seminary where the dean felt very strongly on teaching people to study differing views than the ones you hold to.

And so, you had to read everything, even positions you don't agree with. The advantage of that is that you get to learn to understand what someone actually believes, not what the critics say they believe.

There's a big difference often between those two. And so, I would read many books on dispensationalism.

And for example, this was one thing that I had seen in one of the books I read, and I'm paraphrasing, but it basically said this is, and we're going to get into what this is, what dispensationalism and what covenant theology is in a few moments, but I just want to give an overview here.

But basically, the book kind of summarized and said this, you know, dispensationalism, or actually, sorry, it said covenant theology believes in two means of salvation, works in the

Old Testament, and they use the argument of a covenant of works and tried to support that, and grace in the new because there was a covenant of grace.

Those were the names given to them. But it went on to say this, dispensationalists that believe that ever since the fall of Adam, salvation has always been by grace.

And I said, well, okay, I believe that the Bible teaches that since the fall, there's one way of salvation, it's by grace and grace alone, not by works.

And so, that's what I hold. So, dispensationalism must be right, right? Well, maybe not.

See, because after I got done reading the position that I hold to, I started reading covenant theology, did read a bunch of books that misdefined dispensationalism, having just read the dispensational view and having held to that.

And I also ended up realizing that some of the books I read from a dispensational view explaining covenant theology, they didn't get it right either.

Here's the example. See, when I read the covenant theology position, summarizing, this is basically what

I read. Dispensationalists hold to two ways of salvation, works in the

Old Testament, and they gave evidence from Schofield's reference notes, the Schofield Bible, which if you don't understand that, that's fine, but that was the argument, and grace in the

New. But we covenant theologians believe ever since the fall of Adam, it has always been by grace.

And I went, wait a minute, that's what I read in the dispensational view. So, I went over to my shelf and I grabbed my dispensational book and I opened it up and I looked and I went, these guys are killing trees for no good reason.

They're not listening to one another, are they? No. They're both making argument of the other view and really saying the same thing about their view and what the other one believes.

I was amazed. That was like the light bulb going off. Yes, I know.

Some of you think that light bulbs never go off in this noggin. I understand. But believe it or not, once in a while,

I actually do get a good thought. Okay. Once a century.

So, I'm done with my good thought for like the rest of my life, okay? Now that we're done with that. But that was a light bulb moment.

That was that eureka moment where you were saying, oh wait, these guys read what other people say about what they believe and then respond to that.

Very few people do the due diligence of actually studying what someone believes from what their position.

In other words, I'm not saying you have to believe my position, but understand how

I hold to my position before you knock it down. I remember someone that was arguing against dispensationalism with me and he wanted to argue against it by arguing for the end times view of dispensationalism versus his view.

And I said, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Dispensationalism is not about an end times view. It's about how you interpret the

Bible. It's called hermeneutics, the art and science of interpretation. It's how you interpret.

It's the different ways of interpreting the Bible. Now, the byproduct is going to have a different way when you look at the end times, how you understand future prophecies.

But that's the byproduct. You never define a system by the byproduct. You define it by the essential teachings of the system.

But what this person wanted to do was argue against the byproduct and bypass the essential teaching.

That's a mistake to do. And when you do sound like that, what you're doing is you're not trying to understand what the position teaches.

You're trying to figure out how to attack the position. Now, you and I are going to disagree with different theological systems.

Maybe you disagree with me. Maybe I would disagree with you. And that's fine. That's okay. But if you're going to disagree with someone, do it from a right understanding of their system.

Do it with trying to understand what it is they actually believe before you go trying to knock it down.

That's a fair way to do it. Isn't that what you'd want someone to do with you? Wouldn't you want someone before they go attacking what you believe to spend some time trying to understand what it is you actually believe?

I've had this many times where people will tell me what I believe and I'm like, no, that's not what

I believe. Yes, it is. Okay, there's one of the two of us that know better what I believe and I think it's me.

I had one person once online told me I hide my beliefs. Really? They've been on the internet for like a dozen years.

I don't know. I mean, for years I've had my beliefs. It's like 10 or 12 pages. It's pretty detailed.

You want the longer version? It's 75 pages. So, it's pretty detailed at 10 pages, 12 pages.

I'm not hiding it. It's on the internet. Go read it. Go to whatwebelieve .org.

You can read it. It's actually people who use it because the way it's organized is a quick reference to what Christianity believes.

But let's start with this issue of dispensationalism. Again, I'm saying if you disagree, that's perfectly fine.

We're going to disagree on some things. But what I want you to do is hear me out on what it is

I say I believe and I'm going to try to do the same thing with covenant theology for those that would hold to new covenant theology.

We'll touch on that too as well. And really try to say what is it that each of these things believe?

Where are they different? Where do we agree? Where do we disagree? And let's try to be fair with what each other believes.

Okay? So, if you have your syllabus there, lesson 8, among evangelicals there are generally two approaches to interpreting scripture.

Now, notice what I'm saying there. First off, generally two because there's actually more than two because there's nuances.

You have dispensationalism. Within dispensationalism, you have classic dispensationalism. You have what's called

Ryrie's dispensationalism or today's dispensationalism. And then you have progressive dispensationalism.

So, even within dispensationalism, you have some movement. But then you have covenant theology and there's movement within there.

You have historical covenant theology. You have reconstruction covenant theology.

You have new covenant theology. All kind of… So, if you kind of draw a…

I love to think of it as an arc. I should have actually put this as a picture because I actually have it somewhere. But a picture of an arc and really where you're going to see is the differences are going to be how you deal with Israel.

We're going to explain that a little bit. But, you know, you have the extremes of like, you know, this classical dispensationalism and this, you know, historic, you know, covenant theology.

And then you kind of go up to progressive dispensationalism and new covenant theology and they're kind of really close on the arc.

You know, it's just almost the only difference is what they do with end times. I mean, it's really the difference between progressive… what's called progressive dispensationalism and new covenant theology are very, very similar.

I argued… a friend of mine who is actually, literally wrote the book on new covenant theology,

Fred Zaspel, I joked with him once, said, come on, just admit you're a dispensationalist that doesn't like the terminology.

You know, because a lot of it… there's a lot of agreement that we have. And he actually came from a dispensational view and moved to covenant… moved to a new covenant view.

But they're very similar. And it's not worth, in some of it, making the arguments against it.

And what you often find is this, everyone makes their arguments against the extreme and wants to fight against the extreme and make everyone in that system hold to the extreme ends of the system.

Let's not do that. Let's be fair in what people are actually believing. So, among evangelicals, there's generally two approaches of interpreting the

Bible. Note that because that's important. Dispensationalism and covenant theology are not an end times understanding of the

Bible. They're an interpretation method. Okay? It is an approach to how you interpret the

Bible. We must remember that. Okay? So, what are these two? Covenant theology, dispensational theology.

Alright? Those are the two. Now, let's contrast these a little. I'm going to give you some of what's in the syllabus and then we're going to go into some more about what we call the sine qua non.

But basically, you get some broad differences that you're going to see. In covenant theology, you're going to see something like infant baptism.

Where in dispensational theology, you're going to see believer's baptism. Well, wait a minute, Andrew. Andrew, stop.

Covenant theologians believe in a believer's baptism. I agree. That's true.

They do. And it's a false argument to say that if you believe in covenant theology, you don't believe in adults that get saved to get baptized.

No. Someone that holds to a covenant theology will hold to an adult being baptized as a believer.

Okay? But a dispensationalist won't hold to an infant being baptized.

Where in a covenant, they will. Now, that's a byproduct.

Okay? And here, I'm not giving you the essence of it. What I'm trying to do because we're not going to get to the definition yet.

I'm trying to give a generalization of how you see the differences here. What are some of the contrasts?

So, here I am dealing with their byproducts and how they practice.

Okay? Infant baptism is something that's going to be seen in covenant theology because the baptism is seen as a replacement to the sign of the covenant that circumcision served.

And so, they would say that there must be a sign of the covenant. I agree there would be a sign of the covenant.

I would just say that I would believe it's the baptism of the Holy Spirit, being indwelt with the Holy Spirit that is that sign.

People say, well, the sign has to be outward. Says who? I'm just saying.

You know, but the argument that will be made is that there must be an outward sign of the covenant and so a child being baptized is baptized into a covenant relationship through their family with God.

This doesn't mean they're a believer. Let's not get into false arguments that some make that that means they're a believer.

No, but there are some who will hold that that infant is, by virtual being baptized, has a relationship, a covenant relationship, and if they die before some age of accountability, they would go to heaven.

And so, some will argue that only children who are baptized into believing families would be saved.

Others would not. That's one way of arguing it. But you see how I'm saying there's some differences, even within the infant baptism, depending on how you're going to interpret some passages.

But a generalization of the contrast between the two are going to be infant baptism, non -infant baptism.

Covenant theology is going to have infant baptism. Dispensational theology will not. What's another one?

Covenant theology is not going to see, in general, will not see a distinction between Israel and the

Church, where dispensational theology is going to see a distinction of Israel and the

Church. Now, I'm saying that in general because that is how people will argue.

However, you will see, even within covenant theology, that there will be distinctions between things that were given to Israel as laws that are not followed through in the

Church today. So, in that sense, there is some distinction. How much?

Really, what we mean when we say this is that in covenant theology, they would see that the

Church in the New Testament is what's called Israel in the

Old Testament. So, the Church in the Old Testament is Israel. In other words, that it's one institution, really, with maybe two administrations is how some argue it.

That you have the Church in the

Old Testament being God's people and it's represented by Israel.

And they would see no distinction there between promises to Israel and promises to the Church. And so, land promises to Israel could be fulfilled in New Testament times in the

Church. When you say that there's a distinction between Israel and the

Church with dispensationalism, it doesn't mean that these two are totally separate entities. No, they're still

God's people. But in dispensationalism, they're going to see more discontinuity.

I'm going to use those terms, continuity and discontinuity. And there's actually a good book by Feinberg that is called

Continuity and Discontinuity, or is it Discontinuity and Continuity? I forget which way the words are titled. But basically, that's what it deals with because that's really at the heart of this issue.

And we're going to get into it when we look at the definition a little bit. But when we look at this, how distinct is

Israel and the Church? That's what's being really the debate between, that's the major issue between these is the continuity versus discontinuity of Israel and the

Church. And that's going to be where we see this, so much of the discussion is on this one issue.

And the reason you're going to see so much of that is because what you're going to see as we look through this is you're going to see that some of the ways we interpret passages of Scripture is going to be based on this understanding of how much continuity or discontinuity is there between Israel and the

Church. If these words are new to you, maybe you don't know what continuity means or distinction.

It means how similar, continuity would mean that it's similar, that there's no difference between two things.

Discontinuity would mean that there's a lot of difference, that they're not the same. And how much of that?

If we talk distinction, it's how unique is it? If we say there's no distinction between Israel and the

Church, then they're one thing. If we say there is a distinction between Israel and the Church, then they're two things.

Okay, does that help? I hope. And so that's going to be where we're going to spend most of the time when we talk about the definition, which

I kind of hope to get to today. May not get much beyond that. Let's see. Yeah, probably not.

Hope to get to the essentials, but we'll see. And I want to take the time, because this is a thing that's hotly debated by people, and yet many, even people, you know,

I see many people go, well, I used to be a dispensationalist, and I don't believe that anymore.

And often what you end up having is somebody is raised in a church, whether it's a covenant theology church or a dispensational theology church.

They never really understood what their church taught, but they started to study the other side, and the other side's attack on what their position is, and they go, wait a minute.

I agree more with this position. This must be the position I hold to. I don't agree with my original position

I grew up with, because, and what are they using? The arguments of those who are attacking.

Remember that thing I started this class with? It's exactly what people do. They attack a position by giving a straw man argument, because it makes it easy to attack it, and it makes it sound really good, and it makes your argument sound really strong.

But if you're going to study, please study both sides. I mean, I know so many. I remember sitting at a wedding of some dear friends, and sitting down with the groom and the best man the night before the wedding, and we started this conversation of dispensationalism.

First started with best man, who is the uncle. We started talking dispensationalism.

He's like, well, I used to be a dispensationalist, but now I'm Presbyterian, and he wanted to talk.

He's like, you know, but I really don't understand what dispensationalism is. You see, that was the thing, and then

I talked to the groom, and it was a similar thing. We carried that over into the wedding conversation. It was a great conversation, though, but the point being is they were swayed by a argument against the position they held, and at least in this case, they're honest about it.

They really weren't studying out dispensationalism. They were studying out the view of covenant theology and Presbyterianism, and they came to a conviction of that, and where they came to that was fine, but they don't go attacking, in this case, dispensationalism because they really don't understand it.

That's honesty. Where I've also seen people, you know, on both sides, I've seen people that come to do it on both sides of the aisle, but I've seen many people that will attack the position, and they say, well,

I used to hold to that as if that makes them an authority, and then I will challenge them and say, well, what are the essence of covenant theology, or what is the essence of essential teachings of dispensational theology, and they don't know.

That tells me they really didn't understand what they claimed they held to, and they're arguing they're an authority in because they used to hold to it.

A lot of people hold to things that they're not authorities on because they never took the time to actually study what they grew up to believe.

It's just what they grew up being taught, and maybe they weren't taught very well, or they never really paid attention.

I had like, what, 10, 12 years of Hebrew school, and I gotta be honest with you,

I just wanted to be out of there. I didn't really learn all the details of Judaism from sitting in Hebrew school for years.

I had to learn Hebrew. I had to learn it to be bar mitzvahed. I had to be able to read, you know, the

Torah and the Haftarah when I got to my readings. I had to do all that. I had to understand the traditions, but I didn't understand at the level

I did when I started to read as a Christian believer, the Talmud, and start to really study it.

That's when I really learned it. Not as a kid. I wouldn't argue that I'm, and I have people that make this argument, well,

Andrew knows Judaism because he was raised Jewish. That doesn't mean I know

Judaism. It means I was raised Jewish. You know, it doesn't mean I really understood it or studied it or wanted to even learn it.

I mean, did I want to spend several hours, you know, several days a week and on the weekends in Hebrew school?

No. I did it because mom and dad made me do it, right? So, you gotta be honest about that.

Just because you grew up in an understanding son doesn't mean you're an expert on it, right? And then here's a third distinction between these two.

Generally, covenant theology is going to hold to an amillennial or postmillennial position of end times.

Remember, I said these are deal products, byproducts of the interpretation. Dispensationalism will consistently hold to a premillennial.

Now, are there covenant theologians that hold to a premillennial view? Yes, there are.

Premillennialism, actually, when it started was held, you know, really dispensationalism started with people studying premillennialism and you had

Presbyterians that were dispensationalists. Now, you really only see Baptists and offshoots of Baptists.

You have Baptist Bible churches, your Assemblies of God, some of those groups are all going to be generally dispensational.

Your Presbyterians, Lutherans, Reformed are going to generally be covenant theology.

So those are some generals. But when you look at that, you know, when dispensationalism started, you know, as a theological system, and I'm making a distinction there because I would argue that the teachings of dispensationalism you have in the

Bible. You have it in the writings of Paul, you have it in the early church, but it wasn't developed as a system.

This is the argument I have against some more recent theological systems that have started within the last 50 years and they don't have, they try to argue, well, no, we're founded from the

Bible. Everyone says they're founded from the Bible. But the system was not. Calvinism was not founded in the

Bible as a theological system. It was founded in the writings of John Calvin's followers after they argue, you know, against the arguments of the followers of James Arminius, okay?

So those were systems that developed over time, okay?

And they continue to develop. There's nothing wrong with that. It's progressive, just like the

Bible was. We'll get to that in a moment. But what we end up seeing in that is that dispensationalism was actually more eclectic in a sense in the original

Niagara Falls conference that started where it really was founded as a system.

You had Reformed guys. You had Presbyterians. It started some with the writings of the fundamentals.

A lot of that was going on. There's some history that maybe you don't care about. For some of you, you do, and I'm just trying to get that out there.

So that's some of the general contrasts. A dispensational approach to Scripture is not an attempt to place a man -made approach on interpretation, okay?

I say that because that's the argument that many make against it. The reality is those that make that argument are doing the very same thing that they're saying is wrong with their own system.

You see, covenant theology is a system just like dispensationalism is.

Is it a system that's developed by men? Yes, they both are. Is it a way of interpreting?

Well, I'm going to argue that I think that a dispensational way is more consistent with the way we interpret literature and specifically the

Bible, okay? And so, we're going to have some disagreements there.

That's good. That's fine. We can disagree, but let's be fair with one another and not give false arguments.

What dispensationalism is is a way to describe the progressive, that's your blank there, progressive revelation of God and its outworking, the application for our lives today.

So, what we're seeing is that God wrote the Bible progressively and He gave laws and instructions to people and He gave more instruction to people over time.

He had a higher expectation of obedience because He gave them further revelation.

The revelation He gave to Adam and Eve is nowhere near as much revelation as Noah had, which is nowhere near as much a revelation as Abraham had, which is nowhere near as much as Moses had, which is nowhere near as much as David had, and what

David had is nowhere near as much as what you and I have after Jesus Christ. You see, each of these errors of time, these epochs,

God spoke to His people. He gave them more revelation. He gave them more instruction. He gave them these covenants or what we could call dispensations.

We're going to get into that in a moment. And He progressively added more and more, okay?

And He made ways of changing the way He dealt with His people, alright?

And so, it is progressive. I think that both camps, if they're going to be honest, recognize this progression of revelation.

But we want to see that this distinction is, I would argue, makes a difference in what revelation did

God give to certain people? Did He say that it's supersedes or encompasses?

Do you understand those two words? So, supersedes means, okay, I'm giving this instruction to you. I gave this instruction over here to these people, but I'm giving this instruction to you.

That's supersedes. That would be a dispensational view to an extent.

And I think everyone holds to some of that anyway because most people don't keep kosher, even if they believe in covenant theology.

So, they make a distinction. Okay, these rules were for Israel. These rules were for the church. They're doing that, okay?

So, I'm going to argue that we ought to do some superseding. But if it's encompassing, then it's, okay, these are the rules for this generation.

Now we add these rules. All this is for you. And now we're going to add this. And now you have all of this.

And then we're going to add this. And it's all of this. So, that would be encompassing, okay?

So, let's look at some examples. For example, why do we not offer sacrifices on an altar?

Why? A dispensational approach understands that the work as a responsibility of Israel no longer is necessary since Jesus Christ fulfilled that in God's plan, okay?

Now, as a dispensationalist, I'm going to say, well, see, that work was complete. We no longer need to do that because it was fulfilled in Christ.

A covenant theologian is going to make the same case. I just don't think it's going to be consistent if you say

Israel is the church. Here are laws to Israel. Remember, if they are encompassing, then we should still be offering sacrifices to an altar.

Well, why would we do it then? For the same reason that Israel did it. Israel did it looking forward, as it says in Hebrews, looking forward to what

Christ would eventually do as that sacrifice. We can look back as a memorial. Do we have memorials to what

Christ did on the cross or what Christ did in our lives at salvation? Yes. Baptism, the

Lord's table. I do. We partake of the Lord's table. It is a memorial to that sacrifice that Christ made.

Why do we have that one and not the sacrifice? Well, because we no longer have a temple.

As a church, we wouldn't hold to a temple. Why? Well, we would say we are now the temple of the

Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit doesn't dwell in a specific place, the temple in Jerusalem. He now indwells believers.

That's a promise in Jeremiah 31 and Ezekiel of the new covenant. How I would argue.

And I'm saying some things that may be going over the heads of some people. That's fine. I'm hoping that you understand to the level that you understand.

I'm trying to reach a broad range of people in these classes. That's the advantage of watching these classes over and over again.

As you go through all these lessons again a second time, you're going to pick up more than you didn't pick up the first time.

Alright? So, we're going to see something like that. Do you keep kosher or not?

Do you wear clothes with mixed cloth or not? See, mixed cloth is not a ceremonial thing.

That was something to keep them separate from the nations. Okay? That's an important thing.

Are we to be separate from the world today as believers? Yes. So, the purpose of the separating cloths and keeping kosher, all those kosher rules of food and dress and all that to be separate from the world, that still should be in effect today if the church is

Israel, I would argue. Because those things are things that are still true in purpose.

That we should be separate from the world. Now, let me just touch on new covenant theology because there you're going to see a little bit of a distinction between covenant theology, new covenant theology.

New covenant theology, and I once in a past class mentioned that our brother

Paul Kaiser, Pastor Paul Kaiser, was a dispensationalist and he ripped me up.

He's a new covenant theologian. My apologies publicly, Pastor Paul.

Forgive me publicly for making that nasty, you know, attributing the nasty

D word to you. He's a new covenant theologian. What would a man like him believe? He's going to say that, well, there were laws in the

Old Testament, but they're somewhat done away with, this is the superseded, okay, by the law of Jesus.

See, the law of Christ supersedes those Old Testament laws.

That's where I see a lot of continuity between dispensationalism and new covenant theology.

Boy, is that a fun word to use in this context, right, if you've been following along. So, in this lesson, this week and next class, which will not be next week, but we're going to look at, we're going to draw out a definition of dispensationalism.

We're going to look at the essence, the essential things, essential teachings of dispensationalism, and then we're going to kind of give a survey of what dispensationalism is.

And as we go through that, I'm taking it from the position of what I believe, dispensationalism, but as I've been going through in this class, in each one of these,

I'm going to take the time, which is why it's going to take longer, because I'm going to take the time to explain how each of the other theological systems come to the conclusions they do, where they are in this, what are the distinctions with these.

I'm going to try to take the time to do it in proper context, which takes time, okay.

So, I think that it's actually going to take two or maybe three lessons to do this.

And then if you're watching live, we're going to take possibly a little bit of a break. And again, we're going to take a break, actually, if you watch live from our

Systematic Theology classes, book four, we're going to start a new school on world religions, and we're going to do an intro to world religions and cults, just an intro class, and then we're going to jump back into the theology.

All right, so let us take a look at the definition of dispensationalism.

So, as we look at a definition of dispensationalism, we want to, and this will probably be as far as I'm going to get today, and I may actually have to review some of this, but let's look first at the

Greek term. Where does this idea of dispensationalism come up with? Some people argue, and they'll argue, well, dispensationalism is not in the

Bible, but covenant is. Well, it's not exactly true, just saying.

The Greek term, which is translated dispensationalism, comes from the word ekanoima, and this basically has the meaning of management, that's your blank in your syllabus, management of someone's property.

Where do we see this? So, if you're going to argue dispensationalism doesn't exist in the Bible, well, Luke 16, verses two to four, and he called her, he called him and said to him, what is this that I hear about you?

Turn in an account of your management, or dispensation, for you can no longer be the manager, and the manager said to himself, what shall

I do? Since my master has taken away the dispensation, or management, away from me,

I am not strong enough to dig, I am ashamed to beg, I have decided what to do, so that when

I remove my management, or dispensation, or ekanoima, people may receive me into their houses.

Now, let's be fair, some of you covenant theologians are jumping, yelling at your screen and going, but Andrew, but Andrew, that's not used in the context of the theological system, and therefore you can't use, just say, well, because the

Greek word is in the Bible, that that means this is biblical. Just because the word appears in the

Bible doesn't mean that the system itself is based on it, okay?

You build a system, and everyone's going to build it based off of terminology that they understand.

The terminology that those that were studying this out and started the system known as dispensationalism, they used this idea of management, and so within management, this word, they argued for a dispensation, alright?

And we're going to look at these later, but you know, a lot of this is no different. Look, when we get into and look at the overview of the survey of the dispensations, you're going to see that where the covenant theologians develop a covenant, dispensationalism develops a covenant, and there's like so much similarity.

You're going to be like, why are people fighting over this? Seriously, you're going to be asking that as we go through this because there's a lot of this that shouldn't be fought over.

And so, when we look at this, this is seen as a way of, look, if you're going to argue that, and some make this argument that, well, if it's not in the

Bible, then it's not biblical. Well, then throw out your Bible because the Bible's not in the

Bible. The Bible doesn't mention the word Bible. It doesn't.

It refers to word of God. So, you shouldn't refer to a Bible then, right?

I mean, is God, you know, when we talk about God, you know, some of His attributes, omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, some of those don't exist anywhere in Scripture.

We talk about God being a trinity, and some people argue that the trinity can't be true because the word trinity is a man -made word that doesn't exist in the

Bible. That's true. It doesn't exist in the Bible. It is a way that men created to define something that is in the

Bible. So, they came up with one term that is founded on something larger that's taught in the

Bible, but they use the label to mean this whole system or this whole definition or this whole understanding.

In the case of the trinity, it is to understand the nature and character of God in the definition that He has three separate distinct people in one

Godhead. But instead of defining that that way all the time, people just call it trinity.

One word having this definition, it's easier to say trinity than give that whole definition every time.

And so, it's a label that defines something that we do see in the Scripture, alright?

Same thing with covenant theology. Same thing with dispensationalism. Let's be fair about it.

You know, when we see dispensations, when we look at the survey of the dispensations, you're going to see that each of those are based on a covenant between God and His people.

That's what brings in the new revelation and new responsibility, okay? So, let's just be fair about it, alright?

Now, where there might be some distinction is you have some people that hold to one people, two managements.

A management is what's word? Oh, dispensation. So, they'll call it an administration.

And what they mean by that is God has one group of people, God's people, but He managed them distinctly,

Israel church. And some covenant theologians will hold to that.

I think that might be closer to a new covenant theology. I think that would be a consistent position that they would hold to.

And remember, I'm saying this in generalities. There will be some that do not hold, that hold to a covenant theology and don't hold to everything

I'm saying in covenant theology. This is generalities. Because why? Remember that continuity, discontinuity, that continuum.

There's a lot, you know, on that scale, there's a lot of differences within the continuum. So, we have to be honest with that, alright?

And I'm saying in generalities. So, if I'm saying this is what generally is held to in dispensationalism and covenant theology and progressive and dispensationalism and new covenant theology and you say you hold to that and that's not your specific view, maybe you're outside of what's general.

Maybe I'm saying that from what I've studied and maybe things have changed and it's not general anymore.

I mean, you know. So, let's see if I can, I'll pick this up again next class, but the term, you know what,

I'm just going to pick that up. We'll finish with the definition next class. So, you know, some of you are going,

Andrew, you didn't get very far. You didn't even finish the first point. You couldn't even get to letter

B of the first point of your syllabus. Yeah, okay. Get over it. Let's take the time to, you know, to be honest with these different things and that's why

I'm taking the time, alright? So, with that, where I really am trying to focus though with that is to show the importance of the, when we look at this theology, these things, we got to be fair with what people are believing, okay?

Please do that. Please be fair and honest with what people believe and try to take the time to understand what they believe, alright, if you're going to make this case.

So, with that, if you have any questions about this, you disagree with me, you want to yell at me, that's fine.

Email us at academy at strivingforeternity .org. Be happy to try to answer your questions.

You know, if you think I'm taking your position unfairly, you can email us. We'll try to interact with you with that.

If you want to buy a syllabus, you can go to store at strivingforeternity .org.

Go to store at strivingforeternity .org. You can get our syllabus. You can get some of the other things that we have.

We'll mention some of those next. But remember, no class next week if you're watching live.

I will be in sunny Florida. I hope it'll be sunny at least at that time, at class time.

So, I do deserve a break once in a while. I mean, I try to do classes as often as we can.

I even try to give updates when we're in Ohio and things like that, but I will be away.

But if you do want to feel like, hey, Monday night, you can watch a rerun.

Go to some of the old classes, alright. If you'd like to support us other than our store, that's a good way to support us, what can you find at our store?

Well, one find is, well, my new book, What Do They Believe? But another way other than, you can donate by the way.

You can go to Striving for Eternity and go to the donate page and donate monthly. Just saying, you can do that.

You can also go to Amazon and smile .amazon .com and register

Striving for Eternity as a ministry that you will have. Basically then, everything you buy on Amazon, they send us a check, which is really nice.

We got our first check recently and it was nice that so many of you went out and bought many things.

You don't have to change your spending habits when you buy. I mean, you don't get to give the refund at the end of the year,

Amazon does, but hey, you go buy things on Amazon with the convenience of doing it through them and they donate to help this ministry continue, so that's really cool.

Also, Jersey Fire, two months away, you have one month to register if you want to get a free t -shirt, jerseyfire .org.

It is coming up. If you have never attended one of these Spreading the Fire events, I strongly encourage you to attend.

They are a great event. One of the advantages of these events is that we do not have a green room.

It's one of the things that we did different than many organizations. We have it where you get to actually interact with the speakers.

You will get to talk to Dan Phillips. You'll get to talk to Carl Kirby because there's no place they're going to go to hide.

They're going to be sitting there having lunch with you. You're going to sit down and enjoy lunch together and you can ask questions.

You're going to get a chance to talk with them. I strongly recommend you register. Really cool t -shirt.

We don't. All right. We'll try to get a picture maybe of the t -shirts and you can see the cool t -shirts if you register within the next few weeks.

Register now. If you had registered before today, before May, if you registered before May, please register again.

We had some problems with the website. There were some things that were happening as we transitioned to a new website and some of the registration was lost.

We want to make sure everyone gets their t -shirt. Please register again. Register today.

It doesn't take long. Go to jerseyfire .org. Go to the register tab and register. We again would like to strongly recommend if we can come to your church and do a

Bible Interpretation Made Easy seminar teaching people how to interpret the

Bible. We'll come to your church on a Friday night, Saturday, spend eight hours and six sessions going through how to interpret the

Bible. I highly recommend this class. It's a great way of really getting the church trained in the one thing that's like so lacking in the church today, how to interpret the

Bible. So with that, as we do every week, some people ask, why do we do this?

We have a C -Bro or C -Sis that is a Striving for Eternity Academy brother or sister of encouragement.

Why do we do such a thing? I mean, come on, man. Isn't there better ways to spend time than ending your class with like a two -minute talk about some guy or some woman we don't even know?

Well, several reasons we do it. One, we want to be encouraging to people. Two, and this person who we're going to have as a

C -Bro this week is someone I actually was talking about this very issue, talking about why we do this. We do this because of the fact that we want to train you and ourselves to be encouraging one another, but it's also, you know, one of the problems that many ministries have is single focused.

They want you thinking only about their ministry. That's not the way we are at Striving for Eternity.

We want you thinking about everyone else, and we're going to trust in God's sovereignty to produce people that would be interested in this ministry.

You see, there's a lot of people in ministry that have a focus where it's like they want you, you got to be all about this ministry.

Everything's about, you know, don't focus on other ministries. Give your financial support to us. Give your time and energy to us.

We should be the only ones teaching you so that you're totally supportive of our ministry and ours alone or at least really focused on our ministry the most so that, you know, you'd be helping us, promoting us, things like that.

A lot of ministries are that way. Striving for Eternity is not. We have actually helped other ministries get more supporters, more volunteers, more people that are tied into other ministries than our own.

That sounds crazy. People go, well, you can't, this is not the right business model.

Yep, I agree. I just think it's the way God would have us do it, though it's not about us but about others, and that's why we do this because we know we all need encouragement.

We all need people to know about other people that are doing things. I could sit here and talk about my book that I just wrote, but you know what?

I'm going to talk about George Alvaro's book. Why? Because he wrote a really cool book.

He wrote a book called Apostasy. This is a brother who I've gotten to know more and more, and the more

I spend with him, the more I love this guy. I mean, he's the kind of guy that will, you know, he will ask questions.

Hey, I heard you say this. What did you mean by that? Help me understand this better. I don't know if I agree with what you said.

Oh, wait, now that I understand how you mean it, I think I understand, I agree with you. You know, there was a thing, like I've been saying throughout this class, about trying to understand what someone's view.

George does this. More of us need to do that like George. You know, I said things once that rubbed

George the wrong way. I said something, I guess, online once, like, you know, something about, you know, evangelism is not discipleship.

You know, it's like discipleship just starts with evangelism, something like that. And, you know, I made this distinction between Israel, between evangelism and discipleship, and it rubbed him the wrong way.

And we talked about it, and he was like, oh, now that I understand how you mean it, yeah, you know what? I think I agree with you more.

I think I'm agreeing with you more. Not that there's a distinction and such, but, you know, that's the kind of guy

George is. He takes the time to sit and understand people. And the thing I like about him is he's the kind of guy that will pick up a phone if he has a disagreement with you, and hey, brother, let's talk this out.

Yeah, more of us need to be like that. So, I want to encourage you to encourage George this week.

We gave his Facebook. Down there is his Facebook. But you can pick up his real book, not a

Facebook, but his real book, Apostate, which is a word that he coined on people who do not fulfill what he says is the

Great Commission, but basically people that don't go out and evangelize. Not so much that they don't do it as much as those that refuse to do is the challenge.

So, encourage George Alvaro this week. He is putting together in Colorado, well, it's that area, an outreach that I'll be at.

I'll get more details as we get to that, or you could just contact George and get more details from him.

But until next class, which is not next week, remember to strive to make today an eternal day for the glory of God.