[0:00] We welcome you to the media ministry of Bethel Community Church, Knowing Jesus, Making Jesus Known. It's good to see everybody today. I'm glad you were not scared away by the ice and snow.
[0:16] We are in a study of dispensationalism, and this is session six. Remember, we have this premise that if you read your Bible cover to cover, and if you read it through the lens of what we would call a literal, plain, grammatical, historical view, it's called, you would find, you would come away with the understanding that God has different systems, if you will, relationships, if you will, with people throughout these different time periods, and we would call those dispensations.
[1:00] And, you know, generally it's viewed today that there's seven different time periods, or seven different dispensations. We also were focusing on, well, what makes a dispensation?
[1:12] So the theologians that have studied this stuff have said that, well, you can think of it in terms of characteristics in each dispensation, that there are what you would call primary ones, where you would have like the different responsibilities that mankind has.
[1:30] There's revelation from God. Usually you'll find that at the beginning of a dispensation, and then toward the end of one. And especially revelation from God that brings us to the next dispensation.
[1:46] And in that way, we say that revelation from God is progressive. We would also see that there are elements that are brought forward.
[1:58] Let me give you an example. In the time of Adam and Eve, before they ate the forbidden fruit, what would, how would we think of them? We would think of them as little children, maybe three or four-year-olds, innocent.
[2:14] But then they ate from a tree. And what was the name of that tree? Anybody? What was the name of that tree? Go ahead, Kurt. Tree of Knowledge and Good and Evil.
[2:26] That's right. They ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And it says their eyes were opened. And even the Lord says that now they have become like one of us.
[2:38] They know, in other words, good from evil, right from wrong. That's called a conscience. And today, do you have a conscience? Yeah.
[2:48] That was brought through the various dispensations. Similarly, think about a civil government. There was a time when a government was needed to be established for people.
[3:01] And so we saw that established during the time of Noah. And so, anyway, that was brought forward. So we see these things that are brought forward. Not everything is brought forward, but there are certainly many things that are.
[3:18] So some of these, those are some of the primary characteristics. We also see some secondary ones. There's a test. Or as I said last time we were together, I prefer the word demonstration.
[3:29] A demonstration. It's a demonstration that God cannot fulfill our responsibilities. And then there's judgments. There's a subsequent judgment that takes place.
[3:42] And then, of course, we see that there's God's grace throughout this whole thing. So hopefully that makes for some understanding of what a dispensation is.
[3:54] Here's a slide of the various ages. Look at kind of the length of some of these. This is just a graphic representation. So what we're doing is we're going through these orange balls here, these dispensations, because we're looking to see what are the primary and secondary characteristics.
[4:18] But we also want to examine what occurred during each of these dispensations, because we're going to see that something happened. Actually, many things happened.
[4:29] And then we're going to see God's viewpoint of that. In other words, more revelation from God. So, you know, and the other thing, a big part of that, is we're going to see the biblical covenants, how they are given through these dispensations.
[4:47] So, you know, the groundwork that Mark laid out for us, we're now adding a layer of these biblical covenants that we see that the Lord gave humanity.
[5:01] Now, remember, this is not a study of covenant theology. We're going to talk about that later. But we're looking at, we will see the biblical covenants. We'll see that especially next week. So, if you look at, let's go to this next slide here.
[5:17] We'll see here, there's this sheet here that you have. I want you to notice the length, because we ended with the covenant of promise.
[5:33] And I want you to notice here, we're talking about the Abrahamic covenant. Look at how long that is, the Abrahamic covenant. In fact, we see that it actually extends into our current time frame.
[5:50] So, and you'll see here some of these things. We talked about the seven folds of the Abrahamic covenant. Basically, these are the things where God said, I will, I will do this, I will do this.
[6:03] So, let me go to the next slide here. We're going to be getting into the law today. Yeah, because this is a really exciting time here.
[6:15] How did the Abrahamic time covenant end? What were they doing? Remember, we saw these promises. God made these promises to Abraham.
[6:27] He gave promises to Isaac. He gave them to Jacob. And we saw at the last time that the Israelites were where? Where does that end up in Genesis?
[6:39] They were in Egypt. That's right. Where should they be? What did the Lord promise them? Canaan. That's right. So, Kevin's going to answer all the questions today.
[6:51] No, that's good. They ended up in Egypt. And so, we see the, and they became slaves in Egypt.
[7:03] And also, let's see here. Let's go to this next slide. Here's the Mosaic law. Kind of a nice picture there of Moses thinking about Christ.
[7:16] He didn't know that that was exactly what Christ is going to look like. Anyway, so, here's a question for you. We know that the Israelites are in slavery in Egypt.
[7:31] Moses is born. He comes on the scene. And he goes to them. And he meets with Pharaoh. And Pharaoh resists that he should let the people go.
[7:44] And then, of course, we see these miracles. Pharaoh would call them plagues. I guess we should, too. So, you have Moses. You have the plagues.
[7:55] You have this event called Passover, where this is getting toward the end here, where there's going to be this final plague. And we have the sacrifice of the lamb.
[8:09] And the blood was put around the doorposts. And then you had this great miracle of the parting of the Red Sea. And so, think about this.
[8:19] Where? Remember, the Israelites belong in the Promised Land. But there's a pit stop that they need to make. Where is that pit stop? Come on, you guys saw the movie.
[8:33] Where? Mount Sinai. They're going to stop at Mount Sinai because God has to, He's going to give them some revelation.
[8:45] So, here, look at this verse with me here. Let's read this together. Now, therefore, this is the Lord speaking to the Israelites. They've just come out of the Red Sea.
[8:57] They've just ended up at Mount Sinai. And the Lord is speaking to Moses. And this is what He's, and this is for the people here. Now, therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, He's talking here about the Mosaic covenant now, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine.
[9:21] And you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel. I'll tell you what, friends.
[9:33] This verse ought to be memorized by all of us because this verse lays out everything that we're going to see in the Mosaic law.
[9:44] Notice, first of all, it begins with what word? If. Okay? That's it. Now, so here's something that distinguishes this covenant from like the Abrahamic one, the word if.
[9:57] What does that mean? It means it's a conditional covenant. Now, God did not say to Abraham, if you do this, if you do that, not especially with the first three times He met with Abraham.
[10:13] But here we see a conditional covenant. And it means that if Israel would obey God, He would do three things for them.
[10:23] Three things. First of all, they would become God's special treasure. We see that in verse 5. In other words, in contrast to all the other nations that are out there, Israel would be special to God.
[10:40] They have a unique relationship with Him. Secondly, they would become a kingdom of priests. By the way, this is the first time we see the word kingdom used in the Bible where it's referring to God's, what He's establishing, His rule.
[10:59] The first time we see it. But notice, they would become a kingdom of priests. What's a priest? That's a mediatorial function. It's a person who's like a mediator, mediating between two parties.
[11:13] And as we'll see here, the Jews could become mediators between God and all of the other people of the other nations.
[11:26] And they would be responsible for bringing God to other people and bringing people to God. So they could become mediators.
[11:37] Thirdly, they could become, if they obey, they would become a holy nation. That means that they're set apart. They're going to be different from other nations.
[11:49] That's what God wanted them to be. And they would become different as they devote themselves to God and as they separate themselves from the ways of the Gentiles, the ways of the pagans.
[12:03] Here's the... Yeah. No, the whole nation. But we're going to see some offices.
[12:14] Yeah, just stick with that. But yeah, this is... Think about a kingdom of priests. You know, keep Jews being able to represent the Lord.
[12:25] Here's the summary. In summary, Israel can become a testimony to the whole world as to... how glorious it can be to live under the rule of God.
[12:39] So, let's look at the Mosaic Covenant here. As far as... As far as... Here is the Mosaic Covenant. It's based in Exodus 20, verses 1 to 31.
[12:53] We're talking about the law. And it puts forth 613 commandments dealing with civil, moral, and ceremonial aspects of Israel's life.
[13:07] And this includes some of the things we talked about today. The tabernacle. Later on, the temple. The sacrificial system. In the law, it even establishes these seven feasts of the Lord.
[13:21] A feast. You know, like Passover and so on. These are called holy convocations or holy assemblies. Here's some...
[13:33] Let's look at some of the key understandings of the Mosaic Covenant. I think my battery's on. There we go.
[13:49] Thank you, Brad. Let's look at... Here's some of the key understandings of the Mosaic Law. First of all, it's conditional. And it sets forth the conditions of blessing and cursing.
[14:02] If you obey me, this good thing will happen. If you don't obey me, this bad thing will happen. It sets forth conditions. Next, the law...
[14:17] Here's another very important thing. The law was not intended to replace that previous covenant with Abraham. Look with me what Paul says because it really does help us to understand.
[14:31] Now, Paul is a Jew. Paul was studied as a Pharisee. And if there's anybody who can tell us about the law, it's going to be Paul. And look at what he says. Here's what I'm saying.
[14:42] The law, which came 430 years later, does not invalidate a covenant previously ratified by God so as to nullify the promise.
[14:53] It's a good thing to know. Here's the next slide here. The third point. The law was not intended to be a means of justification. When I say justification, I'm talking about establishing our rightness with God.
[15:10] Not intended to be a means of justification. Never was. Rather, the law was intended to reveal man's sinfulness and separation from God.
[15:21] Here's a verse, again, quoting Paul. He says, Because by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified in his sight. For through the law comes the knowledge of sin.
[15:35] Here's the next point. Accordingly, the law reveals man's need for a savior. That's what they should have got out of the law. Paul even says in his letter to the Galatians, Therefore, the law has become our tutor to do what?
[15:53] To lead us to Christ that we may be justified by faith. Here's the last characteristic. The law was intended to be only temporary.
[16:06] Here's another. Here's a quote out of Hebrews. For the law, since it's only, what is it? It's a shadow. The law was only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very form of things can never by the same sacrifices year after year which they offer continually make perfect those who draw near.
[16:31] And here's why. Or it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin. So, you know, just looking here, I want you to, again, look at this part in the chart here.
[16:45] Look at how long the Mosaic, I'm, yeah, I'm sorry, the Mosaic covenant, look how long it is in this chart. It's like a little blip, isn't it?
[16:57] You notice that? And yet, how many times do we talk about the law? Why is that? Well, I'll tell you, I'll give you one reason is because we tend to think of the law as being something more than just the Mosaic law, but rather any works of righteousness.
[17:23] And because, you know, we see people actually trying to earn their way to heaven. And so, we tend to expand anything that the law would include, anything that it would seek to, by our own righteousness, you know, get to heaven or get to God.
[17:44] It's an interesting thing. The other thing is that you've got to remember that the letters that we read by Paul and by others, that that was a time when they were still grappling with Israel's false understanding of the law.
[18:05] Why did Israel have a false understanding of the law? Now, when I say Israel, I don't mean all of Israel, but most of them. It's because they had Pharisees.
[18:15] It's because there were 400 years of silence. It's because of this tendency to seek our own righteousness. And so, you know, by the time John the Baptist comes along, you know, people, you know, they had some bad ideas about the law.
[18:35] In particular, they believed that they were a part of, they were Jews and they were saved as under Abraham just because they were Jews.
[18:48] So, we'll see that later here. Anyway. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
[19:05] Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. Civil. It's all one. Yeah. It's right. It's one.
[19:15] And we're not under any of it. Not even the moral law. We're not even under that. Right. That viewpoint, by the way, to try to parse them out, you know, and say, well, we, you know, we're still part of adhering to the moral law.
[19:30] That's actually, they're trying to fit something in that doesn't fit. So, anyway. But anyway, the, let's see.
[19:44] You said it was short, but wasn't it for a thousand years? Yeah, yeah, but, you know, in terms of, you know, just how much we talk about it, you know, and so on.
[19:55] Five minute debt is part of the actions. Yeah, 1,500. 1,500. 1,500. So. Here's a question.
[20:07] Yeah. To John's point of not being under the law, is there a difference between being under the law and still having guidance of saying the civil law or whatnot and having that kind of?
[20:19] Oh, yeah. Yeah, it would be wrong to say that we don't observe the law anymore. We do it in Christ.
[20:30] Christ is the one who fulfilled the law. And so if we are in Christ, he fulfilled the law, and so we're, that's how we do it.
[20:40] We're not using it under. John's using it under. Under. We're not under the law. Yeah. But, John's point, in Christ, you obey God.
[20:53] Yeah. Well, that's why Paul writes Romans 13, to show, like, he's established that we're free from the law, but then he writes Romans 13 after he does all that and says, don't think that you're not under the government still.
[21:09] You're still governing. He's running for that. Right. One more question. Yeah. Yeah. The Mosaic Covenant. Yeah. What's the what?
[21:30] What was the covenant there? Oh, it's actually exploded in Leviticus and Deuteronomy and Numbers.
[21:41] I mean, and Exodus. The covenant that you have, you have three promises that the. Well, he's, he, you're asking, like, what specifically is the Mosaic Covenant?
[21:57] Yeah, just reading that verse just doesn't seem to be very. Well, he's pointing us to that, like, that previous verse, that it's sort of like the theme verse of the whole thing.
[22:09] I mean, it would take us, you know, several days to cover all of the law. And it is very interesting when you look at the law because it does break, the law does break down.
[22:24] And there's a lot of different, I'm talking about into the ceremonial aspects. There's a lot of teaching that went into the law. Even the things about holiness.
[22:35] What is holiness? The whole sacrificial system. Now, some of this they already knew because, like, for instance, even in Adam's time, there was an animal that was killed.
[22:50] So they knew about the blood, you know, and they knew Noah offered a sacrifice. Cain and Abel offered sacrifices. So some of these things were already established, but the law just really lays them out because the people of Israel needed to have a uniform, like, code to live by.
[23:13] And this is what the Lord is showing them. And so, here, let's go through this. In fact, I think some of this might even come to play here. During this dispensation, there were some things that happened.
[23:29] The office of priesthood was established. Now, actually, if you look in Genesis, you'll see a priest by the name of Melchizedek.
[23:42] Melchizedek is some kind of, he's a mysterious figure. Somehow he represents God. And we see Abraham interacting with Melchizedek.
[23:56] Abraham received, you know, some instructions. He actually gave a tithe of his spoil after this battle that took place.
[24:10] Because Melchizedek is mentioned several times, ten times in the Old Testament. But I'm talking about, so think of Melchizedek as sort of this figure who represents God.
[24:26] He's like the perfect priest. Whether or not he was a real person, there's a lot of discussion about that. But at least in the scriptures, I believe that he may have been a theophany or something.
[24:38] We'll see that later in Joshua. But as far as he represents, he's a priest, the perfect priest that represents God. But I'm talking here about the priesthood as an office.
[24:53] Because now with the law, we're going to need a system for the sacrificial system. So you have the Aaronic or the Levitical priesthood being established.
[25:07] What is that? That's primarily a mediatorial function between God and Israel. And I'm talking about the sacrificial system. I already talked about, you know, they knew about the blood.
[25:21] They knew about the sacrificial, I'm sorry, the principle of substitution. One of the things we see is that there's limitations in the sacrificial system.
[25:32] Give you an example. The Old Testament priests, they had to cleanse themselves before they could be able to be mediators between the people and God.
[25:44] Isn't that interesting? So, you know, there's limitations in it. There's some other functions that the priests did. One of them is that there was a teaching function by the priests.
[25:57] They did teach things about cleanliness, holiness. It's really interesting. There's a book that I have that lays out this whole thing about holiness.
[26:09] And the holiness, you can put it on a scale from something that's unclean, clean, holy, and most holy. So, four categories.
[26:21] And that applies to everything. That applies to your people. You know, who would be the unclean people? Well, Gentiles.
[26:34] But also, there were things that if you touched a body, a dead body, you were unclean. Then you also had animals. You had animals that were unclean.
[26:44] You had animals that were clean. You had animals that were holy. You had animals that were most holy because they became sacrifices. How about places? The place beyond where the tabernacle was was unclean.
[27:02] And as you move closer into the tabernacle, it goes through those gradations of holiness. How about times? You have times that are just regular times.
[27:14] But then you have holy times. Then you have most holy times. How about people? You had unclean people. Oh, I talked about that. But the most holy would be like the high priest.
[27:27] Priests and then high priests would be most holy. Anyway, very interesting. Another thing that they did was they were agents of blessing and judgment.
[27:39] They had this thing called the Urim and the Thummim, which is this thing. It actually stands for light and truth. And it was some way that they determined God's will for different things.
[27:53] Interesting. We'll see that in Joshua. Here's the main thing, you know, to see. And that's that the imperfections of the Levitical order and the sacrifice aroused these longings for and expectation of God's future provision of a priest and a sacrifice.
[28:13] You guys see that? Here's another one. The office of prophet was established. Who is a prophet? A prophet is one who spoke for God.
[28:26] This person had divine authority. It's interesting that there is a very well-known prophet in the Old Testament. Does anybody know his name? Moses.
[28:39] Moses was the prophet. It's interesting when John the Baptist is on the scene and the religious leaders are wanting to know, Who are you?
[28:50] Are you Elijah? He says, No. They ask him, Are you the prophet? No, I'm not the prophet. They're talking about Moses there. A prophet is someone who spoke for God.
[29:02] He had divine authority. Look what it says in Exodus about Moses. Just that last part. Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend.
[29:15] So, what did Moses do? Well, he actually received truth from God. He wrote the Pentateuch. He saw God's glory.
[29:26] He knew God's personal name. It says in Deuteronomy, It says that since then, No prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face.
[29:40] I don't believe Moses saw the Lord's face, but it says that the Lord God knew him face to face. So, Moses had a very special relationship with God.
[29:51] And it says here, I think I might have went too far. I will raise up a prophet like you from among their brothers.
[30:12] This is really where it was sensed that, Well, we need someone more than Moses. And so, the Lord actually gave Israel more prophets.
[30:23] And their purpose was basically to communicate God's truth to people. Usually those are called oracles. Anybody heard that word before? These are blessings or cursings.
[30:36] One of the things we know about prophets is that there's a couple different functions. There's forth telling, which is what they would, these are basically messages.
[30:46] What kind of message do you think a prophet gave to the people? Was it like good job? No. Actually, it was bad job.
[30:58] You know, look to be judged. There were warnings and so on. If you saw a job posting, wanted prophets, don't do that.
[31:11] Because prophets were hated. They always had bad news. You don't want to invite a prophet to a party. Because they'll just, they'll ruin your party. Unless it's a Christian Bethel party, you know.
[31:24] What else do prophets do? Prophets not only told forth, but they also, something called foretelling, which is where they're actually telling of coming events.
[31:38] And we call that eschatology. Eschatology. The eschatology is just a word. It's taken a Greek word, eschatos, and it's adding it, a study of end times.
[31:51] By the way, we're going to have a study of end times starting a week from this Wednesday. So, probably 16 weeks. And come on that day, or that evening, at 7 o'clock, and there'll be a schedule, and we will together study end times.
[32:09] So, that'll be exciting. A lot of times, prophets, their words were accompanied with mighty deeds. And so, you know, you think about Moses.
[32:23] He spoke warnings, and he had mighty deeds that he did. Who are some of the prophets? Well, again, Moses, and then there's John the Baptist. You also have writing prophets.
[32:39] If you look in your Old Testament, you'll see some major and minor prophets. And basically, you'll see that those prophets, many of them lived during the time of the northern and southern kingdom when they fell.
[32:55] What's the main point, though? The desire for a prophet, someone who knew God, aroused the longing for and expectation of God's provision of a prophet.
[33:07] I'm going to try to, boy, we're out of time here. Let's go ahead and end here. Maybe we can pick this up. We're going to go to this last one about the office of the king.
[33:18] It was established. Let me just run through this. This dispensation did not begin with a Jewish king. So that was not part of the law, but it came in this dispensation.
[33:33] You know, you went from Moses to Joshua, then you go to the judges. And so, there's a time when the people wanted a king.
[33:44] They wanted a king because they wanted Israel to be like the other nations. And so, God, it wasn't that he was totally against a king. It's just that he didn't want them to become like other nations.
[33:57] So, they go through and they pick Saul and they grieve over Saul. And then, you get to this golden age of Israel. King David, King Solomon.
[34:09] How did that go, by the way? Well, you have the divided kingdom. You know, that's a long time, isn't it? And so, you have 20 of the northern kingdoms.
[34:22] None of the kings were good. You have 20 southern kings. Only eight were good. Basically, it's marked, that time is marked with a lot of transgression.
[34:35] The divided kingdom. Severe discipline. The Assyrians invaded and conquered the northern kingdom. The Babylonians invaded and conquered Judah. Destroyed the temple.
[34:47] And then, you have this, the times of the Gentiles began. That's in, you know, probably around 605 BC. That's a, you can, there's a passage out of Luke 21, verse 24.
[35:01] But consider these Gentile kings. Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus, Darius, and Artaxerxes. You go in, Alexander the Great, Pompey, Julius Caesar.
[35:13] Here's the thing. And I'll wrap it up here. The dispensation of the Mosaic law does not end with a Jewish king of their choosing. Israel never fully recovered the glory and blessing that they once had.
[35:28] And they never fully occupied all the land that had been promised. But there's prophecies of a Davidic king. Here's a point here.
[35:40] That the imperfections of the Israel's kings aroused a longing and an expectation of God's provision for a king who would rule in righteousness.
[35:50] So we'll leave it right there. Here's what happened. God gave them the Mosaic law. These are laws. Basically, it says, here's what you'll get if you obey.
[36:04] Here's, you know, you'll be cursed if you don't. And during that time, you see these three offices enacted. Prophet, priest, and king.
[36:15] And we see it all detailed out during this dispensation. And we actually see that all three of them had problems. And so, and yet, it should leave us with this expectation that God's going to provide someone who's going to fulfill those.
[36:36] Let's leave it there. We're out of time. We're out of time. We're out of time. We're out of time.
[36:50] We're out of time. We're out of time.