My Notes on the History of Dispensationalism – Part II

As stated in Part I, please do not copy and paste this elsewhere.

THE DARK AGES

Any gems of literal thinking of the previously mentioned church fathers were undermined by Augustine.

Augustine is where the wheels of any and every dispensational thought fell off.

THE 4TH AND 5TH CENTURIES

Certain gems or thinking of previous dispensationalism by Martyr, Pabius and Iranaeus were undermined by Augustine.

LITERAL VS FIGURATIVE

The Bible must be taken literally, and when it is meant to be taken figuratively, God will tell you, as in eating his body and drinking his blood, He says not to take it literally in John 6.

Augustine was a good writer and extremely influential.

CATHOLICISM’S AUTHORITY

Augustine made up stories about Bible prophecy to make them seem to be fulfilled in his lifetime. Augustine beheaded and dismembered those who disagreed with Catholicism’s system and authority.

BINDING USED AS AN EXCUSE

Their exercising of judgment was based on Jesus’ words, (paraphrased) “whatsoever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven”. This rationale, excuse and justification was used for the evil things they did with a clear conscience. They however took a few verses literally, but the overall structure was to allegorise it.

ALLEGORICAL HEAVENLY KINGDOM

Why Augustine undermined previous men’s teachings it was because he owed a debt to Tachomius who shaped much of Augustine’s thinking. He was focused on a heavenly kingdom and thought it was his job to put it into place.

Fulfillment of Bible prophecy was up to him to do on an allegorical level as it couldn’t be accomplished on a literal level.

WHAT INFLUENCED AUGUSTINE: THE ERRORS OF FORERUNNERS

He was put off by the date setters who were wrong, he was also put off about the Millenniamists who said the Kingdom was about physical pleasures.

Like Augustine, opposers of Dispensationalism had good cause in opposing the errors. So the rightness which began to emerge in first 3 centuries was lost due to the errors and because of the bad influence of Augustine, Constantine and Origen.

This is where the wheels fell off.

THIS TRAIN OF THOUGHT STILL EXISTS TODAY

All this surrounds us in Christianity today. Many Christians today think they are reigning with Christ and bringing down strongholds and it’s their job to clean up the world and practise borderline exorcisms of casting out demons. They are so perilously close to the inquisition in their thinking that it’s frightening.

Some have already blown up abortion clinics as they think they have the authority of God to do so. They are no different than Pope Innocent.

A NEW CHURCH ERA IN THE 5TH CENTURY

Augustine’s book brings in a new era in church history from the 5th century onwards, and is pre-eminent throughout the Middle Ages.

DATING SYSTEM

The AD dating system didn’t start until the 10th century. Anno Domini means “in the year of our Lord”. Before this was Anno Mundi – from Adam.

APOCALYPTIC THOUGHT

People thought the year 1000 would have apocalyptic significance, that it would be the end of the world. Around the 960s there was a terrible plague and everyone thought it was the Tribulation, and that the year 1000 would be the coming of the 2nd coming of the Lord.

THE DATE IS FROM THE DEATH OF THE SAVIOUR AND NOT HIS BIRTH

Raoul Glabber in 1000 AD said since Christ didn’t return, one has to date it from the death of the Saviour and not the cradle. He was right, as Messiah was cut off after 69 weeks. This was a nugget of dispensational thought on his part.

ABSO & THE ANTICHRIST

950 AD: A monk named Abso wrote an entire book on the Antichrist, and it is the first complete chronicle about the Antichrist outside the Bible.

Abso said the Antichrist would be Hebrew, from the tribe of Dan and raised in the Middle East. A false king, who will make a false deal with Israel. He would promise peace but bring about war. His book was titled “The Last World Emporer”. He was right.

FUELED PERSECUTION

This led to a tremendous amount of apocalyptic thinking and gave fuel to people who wanted to kill the opposition.

MACHIAVELLI

Machiavelli wrote a book titled “The Prince” and in it he stated how to manipulate circumstances, situations and people which is still significant today.

THE DARK AGES & MARTYRS

Existed from Augustine to Martin Luther. During the time of Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, Christians died because they held to the Christian faith.

GENOCIDE

Hitler killed only 6 million people whereas Catholicism killed 60 million. Let that sink in.

ANTICHRIST NOMINEES

Charlemagne was depicted as the Antichrist. This is one of the reasons why dispensationalism gets a bad rap.

Current day Christians said Mikhail Gorbachev was the Antichrist, King Charles, Prince Ferdinand of Spain – same thing.

DATE SETTING & NAMING THE ANTICHRIST DURING MODERN TIMES

Great dispensationalist, EW Bullinger, although Acts 28, was guilty of date setting and naming the Antichrist as well.

PRIVATE INTERPRETATION

Believers need to let go of the baggage of error and foolishness of private interpretation.

PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS

Many a time in the Old Testament God raised up heathen nations to persecute and rule over Jews as judgment upon them . Persecution of Jews is also a common denominator in church history.

STATE AND CHURCH COMBINED

During the Dark Ages, the church and state were ruled by the government.

THE REASON FOR THIS WAS TO KILL OFF THE OPPOSITION

Abso stated this in his book – the reason to keep church and state together was to have the oppostion killed. And this is exactly why there is a drive to keep the two separated today.

The Bible becomes a whole new book to you when you learn to rightly divide it. So don’t let your good be spoken evil of. Walk circumspectly.

ANTI PAULINE

Both amillennialism and post millennialism are anti Pauline.

POST MILLENNIALISM

Says: kill the opposition then Jesus will return.

Amillennialism says: there is no future millennium it is now.

AMILLENNIALISM TO POST MILLENNIALISM

In the year 1100 there’s a change from amillennialism to post millennialism.

THE BIBLE DELINEATED INTO OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS

Joachim in the year 1135 constructed the Bible into 2 streams, a time for Israel and a time for Christians, so the Bible was delineated into Old and New Testament. The 39/27 deliniation however is not true, yet it is still prevalent today. As we already know, there are 3 streams. OT, NT and the mystery.

Mainstream thinking is in opposition to Mid-Acts dispensationalism.

JEWISH PERSECUTION

Because of division between OT and NT, persecution began as one set saw the other as the enemy.

THE PAPACY

Popes have a tawdry history. In 13th century there were 3 Popes and each said the other was the Antichrist.

In 1273 Pope Innocent IV declared war against every emporer that had a crown in Europe, killed them all and reinstated new kings. This was done in order to kill the Antichrist. This war continued into the 1300s. He thought he was deposing the Antichrist. Popes thought of themselves as latter day Messiahs. Vicarious Christs: Vicars of Christ. Vicariously doing what Christ would do.

BUBONIC PLAQUE

The Bubonic plague started in 1347 and ran for 3 to 3.5 years. So these people thought they were in the first half of tribulation. Exactly what modern day teachers are doing, like Hal Lindsay, John Hagee, Texe Marrs, et al.

THE GREAT SCHISM

1378: The Great Schism. Avignon in Clement, and in Rome, Pope Irvin VI. Accused one another of being the Antichrist. This kind of behaviour continued until the end of the 14th century. They thought Revelation 13 and 14 was taking place. Apocalyptic thinking was common in those days.

CATHOLICISM IS AMILLENNIAL AND LOOKS FOR THE KINGDOM NOW

Looking for a kingdom, looking for God’s authority on earth. Looking for a promised land and it couldn’t be Europe as it was bathed in blood, nor Africa as it was far too uncivilised.

CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS (1400s)

Christopher Columbus was a Catholic. He believed in the Great Commission and drew charts much like dispensational ones and believed the world would come to an end 7000 years after it was created (Anno Mundi).

His motivation to navigate the seas was to find the promised land. A land of opportunity. 5343 was the year Columbus thought he lived in.

He thought there were 318 days in a year. Yet today you don’t learn in school that Columbus was into Bible prophecy, you don’t learn he was exploring for Bible reasons, that he was attempting to see fulfillment of prophecy and a that he was a date setter trying to set a date on the second coming of Christ.

THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA

1492: Columbus discovered America and the rest is history.

FOCAL POINT OF HISTORY

The focal point of dispensational history was the forcing of a kingdom down the oppositions throats, so one of the ways people were murdered was by ramming a sword down their throats.

MARTIN LUTHER & THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION

Martin Luther – 1500s. The onset of the Protestant reformation.

Luther used to baptise babies. Believed the just shall live by faith but not much more. The things he wrote about make one wonder if he was a saved man.

WHAT HE GOT RIGHT

What he got right was the reformation and going to the book of Romans. He recovered a tiny nugget of Pauline truth.

He had an understanding that he couldn’t lose his salvation, a Pauline truth.

WHAT HE GOT WRONG

He said every man needs a bottle of wine and a wench to prove he was still a sinner as all dogs have fleas.

However, the light he discovered is still blinding the religious establishment today.

Luther wrote a letter to the Pope and called him “your hellishness”.

The murderous boot of Rome was removed and some Pauline truth was recovered at this stage. Luther however didn’t get the whole picture.

STARTING POINT OF THE RECOVERY OF PAULINE TRUTH

This was the starting point of the recovery of Pauline truth once the Catholics lost their physical power and their overall power started to wane.

It was a time of tremendous confusion.

Luther struggled with the theology of his day and was surrounded by much darkness.

He did his 95 theses on 31 October 1513.

THE GENEVA BIBLE & CALVINISM

The Geneva Bible written in 1602 is the Bible of Calvinism and applies Revelation 9 to all of mankind. Calvinism rejects the premillennial return of Christ.

Calvin said of Millennialists that their fiction is too childish to be in need or worthy of refutation.

Calvin said a 1000 years is too limited for Christ to reign or too short for believers to enjoy themselves.

Calvinistic understanding is based on the erroneous understanding of the church and who it is. It is unable to discern between the millennial church and the Body of Christ.

A Calvinist will never be a good dispensationalist and a dispensationalist has no business being a Calvinist.

His limited atonement comes from the “many” used in Matthew, Msrk, Luke and John.

There are only two elect: Christ and Israel, not Calvinists.

Calvinism spiritualises the resurrection, like RC Sproul did.

Luther and Sproul both struggled with what happened to the soul after a person died.

Calvin undermined the Pauline truth recovered by Luther by teaching out of the books of Hebrews and Matthew.

During this time, people realised they were saved by grace through faith but there was still very little dispensationalist thinking to be had.

SIXTEEN CENTURIES HAVE PASSED

At this particular point in history 16 centuries had passed since Paul said only Luke was with him, the crowd was never large and only bits and pieces of Pauline truth had been recovered.

Dispensationalists are their own worst enemy by being trapped in heresies, and important lessons for them is to learn from history.

LINES THAT CAN BE DRAWN IN HISTORY

Up to 325 AD – Ante nicaea fathers.

500 AD – Post nicaea fathers with Augustine and his book and then 1000 years 550 AD to 1513 AD to Luther.

1600s to 1700s – modern day dispensational thinking started taking place. An ever increasing trend to the recovery of Pauline truth.

NOT POPULAR THOUGH

● This doesn’t make it popular or that there are more people who understand it.

● We have failed the body of Christ because so many out there don’t understand.

● We should not be ashamed of being Pauline.

● We should not be ashamed to use the word Dispensational.

JONATHAN EDWARDS 1703 – 1758

Jonathan Edwards is a very important figure.

● Studied Revelation and had a fervent hope that those doing so could expect a visitation by God.

● Didn’t see the difference between BoC and other believers.

DISPENSATIONAL THINKING

● Bible believing Christianity comes at a great expense as you and I were purchased with the blood of Christ, and the blood of the martyrs, for their blood is God’s blood.

● Dispensational thinking was never popular, never mainstream and we need to understand that.

● Paul is the key to worshipping God today.