Having
considered the fact that there are many and great differences in the various
dispensations, it will be well to observe that all these different lines of
truth are united, inasmuch as God is working out a mighty purpose, affecting
heaven and earth, and that these changes of dispensational dealings instead of
indicating experiment of caprice, are so many links in a wondrous chain. None but a superficial reader of the Bible
will assume that the Scriptures are given to explain everything, or to answer
all the enquiries of the human mind.
There are some things which God kept secret for thousand of years, never
revealed until He committed them to the Apostle Paul (see Ephesians
iii.). There are some things concerning
which we are told hardly anything. Take
for example the Bible record of Satan.
His first introduction into the
page of Scripture is as a fallen being
(Genesis iii.). No explanation is
offered, no reason is given. We start
the record of the purpose of God as pertains to man with the revealed yet
unexplained fact. As it is with Satan’s
beginning, so with the last we hear of him.
In Revelation xx. he is put into the lake of fire there to be
tormented unto the ages of the ages.
What happens to him at the end of that period Scripture does not
say. Satan may be referred to under the
figure of the king of Tyre in Ezek.
xxviii. 11-19, but it may refer to some
other being, and cannot be used as a definite argument.
The
nearer Scripture approaches that section of God’s purpose that is connected
with Israel, the plainer and more definite it becomes. Israel’s history fills the bulk of the
Bible. The Nations have a comparatively
small space, while the Church occupies a small portion of the New
Testament. The things in heaven, the
spiritual powers, are connected with the great purpose unfolded in the Word,
yet we know very little of what their place in that purpose will be.
There are
many references in the Scriptures to the fact of a purpose, and it may be well
for us to establish this before we proceed to enquire into the details of that
purpose.
Romans
viii. 28, ix. 11, Eph. i. 11,
& II Tim. i. 9 are sufficient to show that the salvation of men is part of a purpose. The word prothesis
means “a placing before”, and indicates a well-considered plan. That this plan or purpose is
unalterable Eph. i. 9 and
Jer. li. 29 will be sufficient to
prove.
The words
in II Tim. i. 9, “before the world began”, are not strictly
true as a translation. The original
reads pro chronõn aiõniõn, and should
be rendered “before age-times.” Another
occurrence of this same expression is found in
Titus i. 2, where a somewhat
parallel doctrine is discovered. Before
the age-times, then, the purpose of God was formed, and in harmony with this is
the teaching that the members of the One Body were “chosen in Him before the foundation of the world”
(these words will be dealt with shortly, D.V.).
Not only is it important to see that the purpose or plan of God was made
before the age times, but that the very ages themselves are necessary part and
platform for the unfolding and ripening of that purpose. Ephesians iii. 11 (A.V.) speaks of an “eternal purpose”. Now while the thought in these words is very
majestic, the teaching of the passage is not strictly rendered by them. The word “eternal” is an adjective, whereas
in Eph. iii. 11 it is not the adjective aiõniõs that is used, but aiõn,
“age”. The true rendering of the passage,
therefore, should be, “according to a purpose of the ages”.
The Bible
is occupied with that purpose. The Bible
spans the ages. What was before the ages, and what lies beyond, is not strictly within the scope
of the Book. Men labour to explain and
emphasize eternity. Philosophy may burden the mind with the
effort to grasp “that which has neither beginning nor end, that which has
neither centre nor circumference”, but the Bible does not. Scripture commences with, “In the beginning
God.” From that basis, the Scriptures
commence to unfold the purpose of the ages.
Having
surveyed the Scriptures with regard to the fact
of the purpose, we next consider some passages which relate to its fulfilment. Here at once we learn that the accomplishment
of God’s purpose does not rest with the creature, but with God Himself. Ephesians i. 11 is emphatic on this:--
“Being predestinated according to the
purpose of Him Who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will.”
Isaiah
xlvi. 9-11 also shows that the O.T.
equally with the New demonstrates this fact:--
“I am God, and there is none like Me,
declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that
are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure
. . . . . yea I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed
it, I will also do it.”
We will not
multiply passages, the Bible is insistent on this grand fact that the God Who
purposes is the God also Who fulfils.
This was the secret of Abraham’s faith, for it is recorded in Rom. iv. 17-21:
“Before Him Whom he believed, even God Who
quickeneth the dead and calleth those things which be not as though they were .
. . . . being fully persuaded that what He had promised He was able also to
perform.”
Nothing
is so strengthening to faith, even in the small details of daily life, as this
glorious fact that God is the fulfiller of His own will.
The next truth
we would bring to notice is that the great centre of the purpose of the ages is
the Lord Jesus Christ. Going back into
the past we find that creation is the work of the Son of God. John in
chapter i. of his Gospel speaks
of Christ as the Word, Who was God (verse 1), Who became flesh, the only
begotten of the Father (verse 14), and says:--
“All things were made by Him, and without
Him was not anything made that was made” (John i. 3).
Hebrews
i. 10 says of Him:--
“And Thou, Lord, in the beginning has laid
the foundation of the earth; and the
heavens are the works of Thine hands.”
Colossians i. 16 speaks further
of the creation, not only of visible but of invisible and mighty beings in the
heavens, yet all the creatures of the Son of God. The first man Adam is “a figure of Him that
was to come” (Rom. v. 14), and is placed in contrast with “the last Adam”, who
is a life-giving spirit, “the second
man” who is the Lord from heaven (I Cor. xv. 45-47). The promise of the seed of the woman (Genesis
iii.) finds its fulfilment in the Person and work of the Son of God. All typical events and institutions, such as
the Ark built by Noah, the Passover Lamb, the Tabernacle, the Offerings, the
Priesthood, all find their anti-type and fulfilment in Christ.
Every
prominent figure of the Old Testament pre-figures either Christ or
Antichrist. We have only to think of
some like Joseph, David, Moses, Pharaoh and Joshua to see how fully this can be
demonstrated. However stupendous may
have been such interferences with the course of nature at the Flood, the
redemption from Egypt, the giving of the Law from Sinai, or however important
such events as the fresh start after the flood, the entry into Canaan, the
setting up of David’s throne, yet all these events but lead on to one point
called by God “the fulness of the time”, marked by the most wonderful event
made known to men:--
“When the fulness of the time was come,
God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law; to redeem them that were under the law” (Gal.
iv. 4, 5).
So the
purpose unfolds, ever revealing more and more the central place that the Son of
God holds in its development, until we read of its fruition and full
accomplishment when the Son, having brought the purpose of the ages to a
glorious consummation, hands over to God a perfected kingdom, that God may be
all in all (I Cor. xv. 24-28).
Not only
have we the fact, the fulfilment, and the glorious centre of this purpose, but we
further learn that all creatures are in some way agents in the mighty
plan. So far as mankind is concerned it
is divided into three classes, two of them racial and one spiritual. First, we have the two national divisions of
Jew and Gentiles. Israel’s agency in the
great purpose may be summed up in three particulars: (1) a chosen people, (2) a
city (Jerusalem), and (3) a king (David typically, but Christ really). The Church, the spiritual agency, made up of
an election from Jew and Gentile, constitutes the third agency. These three divisions run along the appointed
ways without fusing, but draw near together by two great outstanding events,
namely, the first and second coming of Christ.
Satan works along lines that closely resemble the
working of God in some particulars, and his activities constitute a great
opposing feature, overruled and made to contribute finally to the outworking of
the purpose of the God of all grace.
After we
have made clear, in another paper, the meaning of the purpose of the ages, we shall then be able to take up a
little in detail the dispensations into which it is subdivided.
colored text & underscore are mine.
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