Many phases of scriptural truth have not found a place in these pages simply
because The Berean Expositor was published to make known the dispensation of
the mystery committed to the apostle Paul, and its limited size
allowed no margin for outside subjects. For some time, however, it has been clear to us
that we have a responsibility to all believers who are called during this present
dispensation, and while we do not entertain the hope that our circulation will be
increased by this series, we do hope that our readers will be thereby enabled to minister
more intelligently and sympathetically to that great company who give no evidence that
they are members of the body of Christ.
Believers today seem to fall into three groups:
1. Those who believe and stand by the revelation contained in the prison
epistles.
2. Those whose salvation and doctrine is
based upon the
great epistle to the Romans.
3. The great number of believers today
whose 'gospel' is
John 3:16, whose comfort is in John 14, who if not the
'Bride' have great affinity with bridal conditions, and
who may be among the 'Guests' of the marriage feast.
These who may be 'The other sheep' sought by the Lord
are the ones who are particularly addressed by John.
Romans 6 lays the great foundation upon which the mystery is built. It reveals
the identification of the believer with Christ - the truth that we have been crucified
with Christ, that we have died with Him, been buried, quickened and raised with Him. This
great doctrinal foundation is necessary for the added, dispensational feature of Eph. 2:6
- "seated with Him".
In the present series, we have not the second but the third group before us, the
Widest circle of believers. What is their calling? What is their place in the present
dispensation? What is the word for them? Before seeking a scriptural answer to these
questions, it will be necessary to consider briefly one or two possible objections and
suggestions. In view of past misunderstanding, we also wish to make it plain in dealing
with these that no individual writer is in mind.
What is the exact position of the great company of believers who are called
during the dispensation of the mystery, and yet are not of it? Are they enjoying the
blessings of the Abrahamic covenant? Are they in the same position and calling as the
pentecostal church? Do they come under the new covenant?
1. Are believers today enjoying the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant?
We do not believe that the covenant with Abraham is in force today, for as a
covenant is dependent upon the keeping of its terms, and as this covenant has special
reference to a land and a nation, both of which have been for the time being virtually set
aside, the operation of the covenant is impossible, except in some spiritualized sense.
The terms of the covenant of God with Abraham are as follows: "Get thee
out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I
will show thee; And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make
thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: and I will bless them that bless thee, and
curse him that curseth thee; and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed"
(Gen. 12:1-3). Here we have a land and a nation vitally connected with the outflow of
blessing to other nations. To Isaac this covenant was repeated (Gen.26:3), as it was
subsequently to Jacob (Gen.28:3,4). In each case the land, as well as the seed, forms
an integral part of it.
In the fulness of time Christ is born, and Matthew writes his Gospel showing
that the Christ is the Son of David and of Abraham
(Matt. 1; 1). Zacharias, filled with Holy Spirit, refers to the fulfillment of
the covenant made with Abraham (Luke 1:68-79), and
Peter, upon the renewed calling of Israel to repentance, makes it very plain
that the Gentiles can only enjoy the blessings of the
Abrahamic covenant upon the fulfillment of its conditions: "Ye are the
children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto
Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed. Unto you first
God, having raised up His Son Jesus, sent Him to bless you, in turning away every one of
you from his iniquities" (Acts 3:25, 26).
The epistle to the Galatians makes it plain that justification by faith, and
sonship, belong to the believing Gentile as to the believing Jew, but it also most
emphatically repeats the sentiment of Acts 3:25,26: "Christ hath redeemed us from
the curse of the law... that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through
Jesus Christ" (Gal.3:13,14).
Israel was the appointed channel through whom would flow the blessing of Abraham
to all nations. "While they remained a nation in their land, even
though they were not all truly converted, the Gentiles were able to partake of the root
and fatness of the olive tree (Rom. 11), but when Israel were set aside 'in blindness and
unbelief (Acts 28:22-3 1), and subsequently scattered among all nations and temporarily
dispossessed of their land, it became obvious that the full enjoyment of the Abrahamic
blessing must be postponed until the day when "all Israel" shall be saved, their
"receiving back" bringing with it "life" (Rom. 11: 15-26).
2. Are believers today enjoying the blessings of Pentecost and the conditions
and status of 1 Cor. 12?
In Gal. 3:14 "the promises of the Spirit" is directly connected with the
coming of the blessing of Abraham upon the Gentiles, and while Israel remained a nation in
their own land, these spiritual gifts were enjoyed and partaken of by the Gentile
churches. We are not left in doubt, however, as to the purpose of God in thus allowing the
Gentiles to anticipate that day which could only come with Israel's conversion. "In
the law it is written, With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this
people; and yet for all that will they not hear me, saith the Lord" (I Cor.
14:2).
The Gentile believers were reminded that they had been grafted into the stock of
the true olive, contrary to nature, with the express purpose of "provoking
emulation" and "provoking to jealousy" the people of Israel. Israel,
however, were not provoked to emulation. Isa.6: 10, quoted by the apostle in Acts 28,
showed that the olive tree of Israel was cut down. It is true that Isa. 6:13 prophesies
that, though cut down, it will yet sprout again; that in God's good time "all
Israel" shall be saved, but this does not take place until "the fulness of the
Gentiles" has come in. (The words, "Cast their leaves" in Isa. 6:13 should
be rendered, "are felled").
Romans 11 makes it plain that in the first instance the olive tree was entirely
Israelitish. At the time of writing that epistle "some" only of the natural
branches had been broken off, but during the present time there does not exist the
counterpart of this olive tree, that is, an Israelitish calling with a smaller Gentile
addition. Today Israel does not count. Only a false spirituality can attempt to prove that
the olive tree now stands. During this present time Gentiles are blessed without
association with Israel. Should anyone interpose the suggestion that Gentile believers are
still blessed by the Scriptures which came through Israel, are still saved by that
salvation which is "of the Jews," are still accepted in Him Who is of the seed
of David, and therefore are still partaking of the root and fatness of the olive tree, we
would reply that this, if allowed, proves too much, for the epistles of the mystery,
though distinct and peculiar, are necessarily linked with all that has gone before,
and so the mystery itself could be "proved" to be a continuation of Rom. 11, as
some actually *interpret Eph.2:19.
It throws light upon Rom. 11, and the dispensational position of the Gentile
during the Acts period, to remember that Paul is not employing fiction when he speaks of
the usual action of grafting a wild branch upon a cultivated stock, for at the time the
apostle was writing it was a process actually used to "provoke" the flagging
fruitfulness of an aged olive tree. The enjoyment by the Gentiles of spiritual gifts,
"the fatness of the olive tree," during this time was not because the blessing
that will result from the promise to Abraham was then actually flowing out to all nations,
but because the Gentiles were being used to "provoke to jealousy and emulation"
the fast-failing olive tree of Israel. But Israel did not respond, they did not repent,
and in due course were set aside.
If the position of the believing Gentiles is truly described as a graft into the
olive tree, it follows that when at Acts 28 the tree was cut down, a very drastic change
must have come over the world of Gentile believers. Pentecostal conditions will be resumed
only when the time for Israel's restoration draws near, and in consequence the present
interval is marked by other characteristics.
This brief note is, of course, entirely inadequate as an examination of this
second position, but we write for those who are fully acquainted with the whole argument.
The bearing of I Cor. 12 also has been discussed in these pages, and it is obvious to all
who have eyes to see and who refuse to accept substitutes for realities that the
conditions of I Cor 12 do not exist today.
3. Are believers today blessed under the terms of the new covenant?
Equally with the covenant made with Abraham, this covenant, while finding in
Christ the complete ratification of all its terms, nevertheless necessitates a restored
Israel as a nation before the Lord. This can be seen by reading the original terms of the
new covenant given in Jer. 31:27-49. The new covenant was in operation during the Acts, as
2 Cor.3 and 4 'indicate, but, like the covenant with Abraham, its full outflow awaits the
day when all Israel shall be saved.
4. Are believers in Christ, who do not believe the revelation of the mystery,
necessarily "Christendom"? This is difficult to answer, for
"Christendom" Is not a scriptural name, and consequently we can never be sure
that we use it exactly as another may intend. Speaking broadly, Christendom stands for
that great mass of professing Christians, largely leavened with false doctrine and finally
developing into the apostasy, that precedes the end. Accepting this definition we are
compelled to say that it would be most uncharitable as well as untrue unceremoniously to
sweep aside all those men of God who fail to see the truth of the mystery, and who 'indeed
are sometimes antagonistic to it. Just as it was not necessarily true during the Acts that
if Paul was right Peter was wrong, so it does not follow that every believer today should
be a believer of the truth of the mystery - he cannot be unless chosen of the Lord, and
his calling and election may place him in an entirely different company. This, of course,
remains to be proved.
5. Are all believers today members of the church which is His body, whether
they know it or not? To refute this position we should have to reprint the bulk of the
last 20 years' witness concerning the dispensation of the mystery. We cannot find
justification for assuming that any believer is a member of the body of Christ unless he
believes the Word of God given to make that blessed position known. As that word is found
in the testimony of the Lord's prisoner, and is the revelation of a mystery, membership of
that body will be manifested by belief of the truth revealed concerning it, as surely as
salvation is manifested by the belief of the gospel.
Without, therefore, pretending to have given anything more than a cursory glance
at these varied views, we proceed to the examination of Scripture to discover whether
there has been written a book, an epistle, or section of the New Testament that embraces
all the peculiar conditions that characterize the outer circle of faith among Gentiles
today. This will necessarily be the subject of another article.