We know God is fair and just, and He is unchanging, so it's interesting to note that each "age" has a change to it - almost like a building up of how God communicates with people. Some theologians explain these ages through the SEVEN DISPENSATIONS:
1. DISPENSATION OF INNOCENCE:
- the time in the Garden of Eden, between creation and the fall of man
- God interacted on a personal level with Adam and Eve
- BUT they chose to disobey the one rule God had given them
- God banished mankind from the garden and sin entered the world
2. DISPENSATION OF CONSCIENCE
- the time between the fall and the flood
- God did not intervene, but allowed man to govern his behavior by his (God-given) conscience
- BUT mankind's wickedness became great
- God judged and destroyed the world with a great flood, saving only 8 people
3. DISPENSATION OF HUMAN GOVERNMENT
- the time from the flood to Abraham
- God gave Noah instructions to replenish the earth
- BUT Noah's descendants disobeyed as they began to build the tower of Babel
- God confused man's language and scattered mankind throughout the world
4. DISPENSATION OF PROMISE
- the time from Abraham to Moses
- God promised Abraham land, seed and blessings in the Abrahamic Covenant
- - - during this entire time, God would send THE angel of the Lord (Jesus manifested, sometimes in the appearance of a man) to guide
- BUT even though God promised Abraham a son, they disobeyed and had Ishmael with Sarah's maid, before God provided them with their own child, Isaac
- Ishmael (with his mother) was sent away because of the immediate tension between the two women, eventually causing tension between Israel and all of Ishmael's descendants, and to this day the tension continues between Israel and every Arab nation
4. DISPENSATION OF LAW
- the time from Moses to Jesus
- God gave Moses the Ten Commandments and in the Mosaic Covenant, God promised the Israelites that they would have their kingdom (with land, seed and blessings) IF they obeyed
- - - during this entire time, God would send THE angel of the Lord (Jesus manifested, sometimes in the appearance of a man) to guide
- - - during this entire time, God would send the (Holy) Spirit to empower certain people, although this was more of an external empowerment
- - - God gave the Israelites spiritual leaders
- - - God gave the Israelites judges
- - - God sent the Israelites prophets
- - - God gave the Israelites kings (and the Davidic Covenant, promising the Israelites that this kingdom would be eternal through David's descendants)
- - - God sent His Son, the Messiah, the (perfect) King of kings to bring about salvation and to fulfill the covenants
- BUT the Israelites rejected their Messiah as soon as He was born, and crucified Him, which temporarily paused the Jewish Age from being completed (with 7 years left)
- through His death and resurrection, Jesus paid the price for all sin and made salvation possible for all people of all time (past, present, future)
6. DISPENSATION OF GRACE (the Church Age)
- the time from Pentecost to the Rapture
- God communicates to us now through His scriptures and His Holy Spirit
- BUT the rapture will eventually happen, removing the Church (and the Holy Spirit) from the earth
(THE TRIBULATION, the Jewish Age continues to complete the 7 remaining years)
- judgment will come to the earth = the "signs" of the end times will happen in order to alert the Israelites of their Messiah's Second Coming, which happens at the Battle of Armageddon. Then, all unbelievers will be removed from the earth. Satan will be bound for a thousand years. All those who became believers during the Tribulation will enter the Millennium.
7. DISPENSATION OF THE KINGDOM (the Millennium, the 1000 Year Reign)
- the time from Jesus' Second Coming to the Last Battle
- Jesus will be on this earth to communicate directly to the people. He will sit on the throne to reign in a time of peace and exercise immediate justice. All of Israel's covenants will be fulfilled. During this time, there will be missionaries sent out throughout the earth, as people being born into the Millennium will still have to chose to become believers or not.
- BUT at the end of the thousand years, Satan will be released and deceive and rally all unbelievers into challenging God at the Last Battle
- at the White Throne Judgment, all sinners will be judged and sentenced to eternity n hell, a place without God or anything good
- all believers will enter into heaven, where they will be judged at the Bema Seat and rewarded for their good works done with pure motives
ALL OF THAT in order to lead into this portion of scripture. Jesus had just finished telling the disciples about going to prepare a place for them in heaven; but because of the disciples' questions, Jesus explained to them the Trinity. Even though Jesus was going to "go to heaven" - at a certain point soon (at Pentecost, the beginning of the Church Age) - all believers would be filled with the Holy Spirit (the Helper)...
(John 14:8-29) Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works. 11 Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me; otherwise believe because of the works themselves. 12 Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do; because I go to the Father. 13 Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it.
15 “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.
16 I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; 17 that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.
18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 After a little while the world will no longer see Me, but you will see Me; because I live, you will live also. 20 In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. 21 He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him.” 22 Judas (not Iscariot) said to Him, “Lord, what then has happened that You are going to disclose Yourself to us and not to the world?” 23 Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him. 24 He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father’s who sent Me.
25 “These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you. 26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. 27 Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful. 28 You heard that I said to you, ‘I go away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced because I go to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. 29 Now I have told you before it happens, so that when it happens, you may believe..."
(John 15:26-27) “When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me, 27 and you will testify also, because you have been with Me from the beginning.
(John 16:1-15) “These things I have spoken to you so that you may be kept from stumbling. 2 They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God. 3 These things they will do because they have not known the Father or Me. 4 But these things I have spoken to you, so that when their hour comes, you may remember that I told you of them. These things I did not say to you at the beginning, because I was with you.
5 “But now I am going to Him who sent Me; and none of you asks Me, ‘Where are You going?’ 6 But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. 7 But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. 8 And He, when He comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment; 9 concerning sin, because they do not believe in Me; 10 and concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father and you no longer see Me; 11 and concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.
12 “I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13 But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. 14 He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. 15 All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you..."
Today's takeaway: the Holy Spirit is God sealing us, indwelling us, changing us from the inside out - as we allow!!! As we are saved by grace, we are sealed with the Holy Spirit and there is NO WAY that we can lose our salvation. But while on earth, we can chose to quench the Holy Spirit, or we can allow the Holy Spirit to "fill us" with His power and guidance, etc - allowing Him to work in us!...
(Galatians 5:22-26) But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. 26 Let us not become boastful, challenging one another, envying one another.
So I will confess that I struggle with guilt and fear regarding sharing the gospel, although I do pray for wisdom, guidance and opportunity. Just this Sunday, we were given a little (anonymous) survey to quickly fill out in the church service, which had the question - "When was the last time you got to share the gospel?" I know that each year I could count on one hand the amount of times I have shared, so I again apologized to God and asked that He continue to use me as He saw fit.
Then on Tuesday (yesterday), I drove out to the bigger shopping mall to specifically look for a mother-of-the-bride dress. I prayed fervently that God would help me find an appropriate dress at a very reasonable price. This prayer was answered within one hour. I was blown away! Like - this was a minor miracle for me!!! Now I had the rest of the afternoon to wander the mall and purchase a few other little necessities of life. For some reason, I decided to stop at the food court to eat. This is something I RARELY do, as I see it as a big waste of money; but I justified it this time since I was far from home and I still had to do my grocery shopping at the end of my journey.
As I sat down to eat, I noticed this little elderly man wandering from restaurant counter to restaurant counter. He would stop and ask questions, then walked away and sat down to jot a few things into a little notebook (maybe doing some math), then he went back to two of the counters to ask more questions... So I started to wonder - did he not have much money? - was he hungry? - was he spiritually hungry? I had barely started eating my meal when I decided that I could give it to him instead. So I started to ask God to sort out the details.
I picked up my things and moved to a table closer to where this man had been wandering. I had many tables to chose from, as the place was nearly empty. Finally I saw a server take a tiny container and fill it with a little something and patiently waited while the man paid for it - maybe all in coins??? I couldn't quite see what was happening, until he was carrying his tray with his tiny bit of food, looking for a place to sit, and heading my way.
I caught his attention and I motioned for him to join me. It was like we had a scheduled appointment! He gratefully sat down and opened his container of vegetables. I immediately asked if that would be enough for him. Oh yes, he figured it was MORE than enough. So we spent about an hour chatting, and low and behold - I got to share the gospel message with him. He had grown up Muslim, but after traveling the world, and going to school in Europe to earn his masters, he realized that the Koran was not truth.
As we spoke about "truth" and who God is and what God has done for us and what God has done in my life... he quizzed me about his age. Maybe as a test??? He gave me a mathematical equation to figure out. wow. So here I am - math is NOT my thing, I'm A.D.D., there's a TV blaring in the background, people rushing by... lol, at first I gave him the wrong answer, although I was very confident that it was correct. He just smiled and motioned with his head side to side like "sure, it is around that number" and we kept talking.
A few minutes later, there was a very clear voice in my head, which cut through all the noise, saying "92". Seriously! the Holy Spirit was helping me do math!!! Perhaps this answer was critical. I mean, the answer was clearly given to me from God, so I should probably say something. I then smiled and said to him, "You are really 92, aren't you!" He smiled. He was. Now, I have no idea if I "passed the test" - his test. But I left him with the challenge to read the Bible and test out God's truths for himself.
It was not up to me to convince this man to become a believer. All that is expected of me is to be available to share, and live out what I believe. I thanked God for His guidance and the opportunity, and now all I can do is pray that the Holy Spirit works on this man's heart!
(Ephesians 6:18) With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints
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