Dispensation of Grace – Page 2

Otis Q. Sellers’s eschatological distinctives, ordered from the Day of the Lord, documented provisionally

Otis Q. Sellers , independent Bible teacher, born in Wellston, OH, 1901, died in Los Angeles, CA, 1992.

The following are notes for my manuscript, tentatively titled Maverick Workman: How Otis Q. Sellers Broke with the Churches, Discovered the Premillennial Kingdom, and Embodied Christian Individualism, a work in progress.

When the events recorded in the Book of Revelation were revealed to John, he was in the spirit on the Day of the Lord.[1] Before that Day’s arrival[2], however, there will be a seven-year rebellion, [3] during the course of which the Man of Sin will be revealed, sitting in the Temple of God, pretending to be God.[4]

The rebellion’s target will be Israel’s restored kingdom, under the conditions of God’s kingdom. The Apostles asked about this.[5] This event presupposes the miraculous transfer (and, for many, if not most Jews who have ever lived, resurrection) of Israel’s descendants from the diaspora to the promised land, the subject of an irrevocable divine promise.[6]

In the wilderness, God will plead His case to Israel, woo her as a man a woman, and reveal Jesus to them as the prophesied mashiach (Messiah).[7] Jesus’ messiahship is unintelligible apart from His fulfillment of the promise of the new covenant with Israel and Judah, which fulfillment He announced at His last Passover.[8] Jews today can neither retard nor accelerate their miraculous return to the land.

The restoration’s context is the prophesied global Kingdom of God, whose imminence Jesus proclaimed during His earthly ministry.[9] During this centuries-long administration or dispensation of divine government, earth will be the mediatorial planet between heaven and the rest of creation; Israel will be the mediatorial nation between heaven, the seat of God’s government, and that rule’s effects on earth.[10] Resurrected Apostles will rule as tribal governors[11] under David, Jesus’ viceregent.

Jesus will leave His throne to descend to earth in order to put down forcefully the Rebellion[12] and then be personally present[13] on earth to reign for a thousand years from His footstool[14] (after centuries of rule from His throne).[15] He will descend with a shout[16] and proceed to take vengeance those who neither know God nor obey Jesus Christ’s gospel, that is, Christ’s “right message” (evangelion, “gospel”) for that day.[17] Belief in the content of that message is the plan of salvation.

The commencement of the Day of Christ—the inauguration of the manifest Kingdom of God—will be a quiet affair (unlike the Day of the Lord). God will pour out His spirit on all flesh.[18] When He assumes sovereignty—bringing forth judgment unto truth and causing the nations to trust in His name—He will neither cry nor cause His voice to be heard.[19] (Were the Day of the Lord God’s next move, there’d be no nations left to trust in His name.) Therefore, the Kingdom of God on Earth must have a premillennial phase. Continue reading “Otis Q. Sellers’s eschatological distinctives, ordered from the Day of the Lord, documented provisionally”

Yielding to Scripture outwardly and inwardly

A friend sent me an image of Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, vested as Pope Benedict XVI, his title from 2005 to 2013, the year he retired, now living a life of prayer, meditation, and Scripture study. Inscribed on it is an exhortation:

I urge you to become familiar with the Bible, and to have it at hand so that it can become your compass pointing out the road to follow.

It comes from his April 9, 2006 message to on World Youth Day. The Scripture chosen for his address is from Psalm 119:105.

“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.“

In his homily, Benedict doesn’t consider the internal resistance some Christians have to letting the Word of God operate as a compass, light, and lamp unto their feet. To understate things, God’s speaking can wrench one out of one’s comfort zone and bring one into conflict with one’s neighbors, business associates, friends, family, and even fellow believers. Continue reading “Yielding to Scripture outwardly and inwardly”

Sellers’s Eschatology: Some Distinctives

At a distance, Otis Q. Sellers (1901-1992) might appear to be just another independent Bible teacher, the kind that can be found across America, in big towns and small. It would be lazy to describe his spot on American Christianity’s map as “nondenominational.” Christian Individualist” is how he positively referred to his walk as a believer in and follower of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The personal and theological merged in his life. Unless his ideas matter, only family and friends will care to read the biography I’m working on. My interest in his life grew out of my fascination with his ideas. My hope is that your interest in both will grow together.

We’re not disembodied, ahistorical spirits. We struggle with ideas while we raise our families, maintain our health, and pay our bills in concrete circumstances. Sometimes our responsibilities threaten to crowd out our projects which, if the threat is repulsed, can speak to people in times and places different from the author’s.

With difficulty, but also with perseverance and God’s grace, Sellers balanced his life and ministry. He wasn’t an academic theologian writing for colleagues (and neither am I). Sellers does deserve academic attention, however, and I hope this book will stimulate it. He was an industrious, self-educated man who fought for every insight to help the average believer understand the Bible. He changed his mind as his studies dictated. “My latest writings are my latest light,” he’d insist. I don’t say this to preempt criticism. My appreciation of his work won’t prevent me from pointing out errors.

First publication, June 1, 1935. Henry “Harry” Allen Ironside (1876-1951) belonged to the Plymouth Brethren movement and was a friend of Sellers. Ironside criticized “Bullingerism” or “ultradispensationalism” in “Wrongly Dividing the Word of Truth,” a series of articles in the Brethren organ “Serving and Waiting.”

Research for this project requires the absorption of seventeen volumes of Word of Truth (1936-1967); 199 issues of Seed & Bread, four-page Bible study leaflets (1971-1987), whose contents total over 375,000 words; 570 43-minute tape-recorded studies, that is, over 400 hours of additional material; and dozens of pamphlets. All of these materials are freely available online. Continue reading “Sellers’s Eschatology: Some Distinctives”