The Silence of God: Anderson’s book, Sellers’s turning point—Part 5

[See Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 of this series.]

If, as Otis Q. Sellers held, the divine administration covered in the Book of Acts came to an end—marked by the Apostle Paul’s proclaiming the salvation-bringing message of God to be freely authorized to the Gentiles (Acts 28:28)—what did God replace it with?

The answer is the dispensation of grace (Ephesians 3:2), which corresponds to the time of God’s silence, which gave Sir Robert Anderson’s book its title. The preceding dispensation was not characterized by either silence or grace.

What is the meaning of “dispensation,” the word that traditionally translates the Greek of Ephesians 3:2, οἰκονομία (oikonomia). Let’s hear Sellers as he introduces the subject.

When the Lord Jesus sent forth His twelve disciples, He commanded them not to take any road that would lead them to the [non-Israelite] nations, not to enter into any Samaritan city, to go only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, to herald as they went that the Kingdom of Heaven was at hand, to heal the sick, to cleanse the leper, to raise the dead, to cast out devils, to do it all without charge, and to take no money of any kind with them (Matthew 10:5-10).

In my own ministry I travel quite a bit; and each time I go forth, I ignore or violate all these commands. Furthermore, it is my personal knowledge that most ministers do the same; and, yet, we feel no guilt in so doing. This is because we believe in and practice dispensational truth. Although, many simply practice it while at the same time ridiculing it and denying any belief in it.[1]

The Gospel cannot simultaneously be both off-limits to non-Israelite nations (Matthew 10:5) and freely authorized to them (Acts 28:28), at least not coherently. Between the events marked by those verses must be a change in God’s manner of dealing with humanity—a dispensational change.

On Malta, after Paul shook off a venomous serpent that had bitten him, he healed anyone who needed healing (Acts 28:3-9).

His friend Trophimus, however, he left at Miletus sick (2 Timothy 4:20) and advised a little wine (οἴνῳ ὀλίγῳ, oinō oligō) for Timothy’s stomach ailment Paul (1 Timothy 5:23).

Why the difference in Paul’s response to illness?

There were powers that Paul had in the Acts period that he didn’t have after Acts 28:28 (which is when he wrote to Timothy).

While dispensational truth is ridiculed by many, especially church theologians, I proudly confess that I am a dispensationalist in my handling and interpretation of the sacred Scriptures. Furthermore, I do not believe that anyone can live a consistent Christian life in harmony with the Word of God unless he is a dispensationalist.

But . . .

At the time the King James Version was translated, the word “dispense” meant “administer,” “regulate,” “govern”; and the word “dispensation” signified the plan, the method, or the manner of administering or governing. These meanings fit the word oikonomia [οἰκονομία] very well, and it is somewhat evident that this is what the translators had in mind when they used the word “dispensation.”

But these definitions are now obsolete. New meanings have become attached to both “dispense” and “dispensation” and these are constantly being read into passages where these words are found. Scofield took the word “dispensation” and used it to describe a new idea of his own, an idea that is in no way related to the Greek word oikonomia.

Sellers sums up the etymology:

This word is made up of oikos [οἶκος], a house and nomos [νόμος], law. Note that it is “house” not “family.” The occurrence of oikos in this word has led some to insist that this limits God’s dispensational dealings to His household; that is, His children, the members of His family. This is an error which more study would automatically correct, since New Testament usage flatly contradicts the idea. See Romans 16:23 where Erastus is described as being “administrator (oikonomos [οἰκονόμος]) of the city.”[2]

So, what is the manner of administration or governing Paul calls the “dispensation of grace”?

The fact that God’s administrations . . . vary from time to time, even varying among people at the same time, is an evident truth to the careful student of God’s Word. It is quite plain that God’s method of dealing with Israel in the centuries before Christ was based upon a set of principles which had not been imposed upon other nations. In other words, there was no dispensation of divine law that covered all mankind, even though there was one for the nation of Israel. . . .

A reading of Matthew 10:1-4 will show that God’s method of dealing with the twelve special disciples was somewhat different from the way He dealt with the majority of those who followed Him. These twelve were given great authority; and, of course, with the authority came great responsibility.

A dispensation is not a period of time! It may be associated with a period of time, but that’s not its meaning, not any more than the meaning of “breakfast,” “lunch,” or “dinner” is a period of time.

The administration of a United States president may correspond to a duration, but so also does that of a French president: temporal span is the least illuminating feature of either term of office. Everything we do is temporal, so temporality cannot distinguish one thing from another.

If it [“dispensation”] were correctly understood, they should be able to see scores of dispensations operating concurrently. Since a dispensation is a method of dealing with men, and since at one time, some men were apostles, they must have been dealt with as apostles, while at the same time others were being dealt with as prophets and teachers.

Inasmuch as we can identify eighteen different gifts in the Acts period, and since each gift constituted a position or calling before God, it would be proper to say that there were an equal number of methods of dealing. Each man had to recognize the gift that God had dispensed to him, and thus, to know his own personal dispensation.

In view of this, it is certainly erroneous to divide all time into seven dispensations [as does the Darby-Scofield system.—A.G.F.], and then to place all who lived during one time under the same method of divine dealing.[3]

The opposite is the case:

[T]here was never at any time a single method of dealing that covered the whole human race until we come in sacred history to the present dispensation, the Dispensation of the Grace of God. This is God’s first universal method of dealing, one under which all men stand before God on the basis of absolute equality, and under which all are dealt with alike. God’s present method of dealing with all mankind, and even all nations, is one of grace.

The next dispensation, which is the manifest Kingdom of God, will also be universal, and will be one of absolute government under which the will of God will regulate every detail of human life. It will be an administration of perfect justice and righteousness.[4]

Paul’s reference to the Dispensation of Grace at Ephesians 3:2 is for “you the nations” (ὑμῶν τῶν ἐθνῶν, humōn tōn ethnōn), addressed in the preceding verse. That is, he’s not writing to Israelites as such.

A few verses later, he declares that the nations (ἔθνη, ethne), Israel included, are “joint-enjoyers of a portion” (συνκληρονόμα, sunklēronoma), “joint-bodies” (σύσσωμα, sussōma),  and “joint-partakers” (συμμέτοχα, summetocha) of Christ Jesus’ promise (Ephesians 3:6).

That was not true during the Acts period. God’s promises to Israel are irrevocable (e.g., Jeremiah 31:35-37), and they’ll fulfilled in a future dispensation. No nation—not the United States, not the modern State of Israel—enjoys “most favored nation” status today.

In the Acts period, so much grace was shown to men that it could be said that grace reigned (Romans 5:21), a fact in the life of all who believed. Nevertheless, there were numerous instances when God acted in justice and judgment. The Acts period was no part of God’s gracious administration, and we stultify the truth of grace when we try to make it so. Consider the cases of Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-11), of King Herod (Acts 12:20-23), and of the Corinthian saints who were visited with sickness and death because of their disorderly conduct (1 Corinthians 11:30). This was God’s dealing in justice and not in grace.

. . . In Ephesians 4:32 we are exhorted to be kind one to another, tenderhearted, dealing graciously one with another, even as God also in Christ deals graciously with us. In this declaration we have a simple and most positive revelation in regard to God’s present method of dealing. The word charizomai [here in the form χαρισάμενος, charisamenos.—A.G.F.] means to deal graciously; and this is God’s declared manner of dealing with us, whether we deal with others in this manner or not. This statement, it should be noted, is found in an epistle written after Acts 28:28. It would not be speaking the truth if it were found in the Corinthian epistle.

God did not deal exclusively in grace with those Corinthians!

In the Colossian epistle, also written after Acts 28:28, Paul declares that these believers had been saved by God’s dealing graciously (χαρισάμενος, charizomenos) with all their trespasses (Colossians 2:13). From these two passages the present-day believer should know that he has been saved by God’s dealing graciously with his sins and that he is kept saved by this same gracious dealing. . . .

In the Acts period, so much grace was shown to men that it could be said that grace reigned (Romans 5:21) . . . . Nevertheless, there were numerous instances when God acted in justice and judgment. The Acts period was no part of God’s gracious administration, and we stultify the truth of grace when we try to make it so. Consider the cases of Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-11), of King Herod (Acts 12:20-23), and of the Corinthian saints who were visited with sickness and death because of their disorderly conduct (1 Corinthians 11:30). This was God’s dealing in justice and not in grace.[5]

God’s dealings with us exclusively in grace, however, will have its last days (2 Timothy 3:1).

So will His silence.

 

Notes

[1] Otis Q. Sellers, “Dispensational Truth,” Seed & Bread, No. 56, nd (1975?)

[2] Ibid.

[3] Otis Q. Sellers, “The Dispensation of Grace,” Seed & Bread, No. 57, nd (1975?)

[4] Ibid. Emphasis added.

[5] Ibid.