THE DISPENSATION OF THE CHURCH-AGE IS THE MOST DIFFICULT YET EXCITING TIME IN HISTORY

The dispensation of the Church-age is the most difficult yet exciting time in history.

Friday, June 13, 2008

EPH 3:9 and to make all men see what is the dispensation of the mystery which for ages hath been hid in God who created all things;
- ASV

“Pass me not, O gentle Savior,
Hear my humble cry;
While on others Thou art calling,
Do not pass me by.”

Verse 9 - “ALL” are to see what is the dispensation of the mystery which from the beginning of the world has been hidden.
“Which has been hidden” - per-pass-part - apokrupto = to conceal; to hide; to keep secret.

He said, “You are Peter or petros, a chip out of the stone or a part of the rock, and upon this rock, Petra, the massive rock, [the fact that He is Messiah, as Peter said in MAT 16:16 ‘Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God,’]
I will build My church.”

“Upon this rock I will build my church” - fut-act-ind - oikodomeo [to build] = the church did not exist at the time that the Lord said it; it was future.

Every system of theology which tries to start the church in Abraham’s tent or with Noah or with Moses has an erroneous understanding of the Scripture and does not understand the correct biblical interpretation of history.

The Church-age is the most difficult yet exciting time in history; for God’s plan for the Church is superior in every way to God’s plan for previous and future dispensations.

Never before in human history and never after the Rapture of the Church has so much divine power been available to each believer.

The Church is not an organization; it is an organism.
The Church is every believer in union with Christ, the royal family of God.

Christ, while absent during the Church-age, is Head or Ruler over the Church, EPH 1:22; COL 2:10.

1. The great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union overflows into the Church-age as the challenge to Satan.
2. The strategic victory of our Lord in the angelic conflict terminated His residence on earth.
3. He left behind the Church to challenge Satan, with the potential to attain the tactical victory of the angelic conflict.

There are two parts to the angelic conflict as it extends into human history: the strategic side of the angelic conflict and the tactical side.

The chief witness in all of human history is the humanity of Jesus Christ in hypostatic union.
Our Lord = the strategic witness.

Strategic - He came up with strategy to defeat Satan and executed that plan magnificently and He defeated Satan.

The other witnesses are the invisible heroes, those believers who execute the PPOG in the Church-age.
Mature believers are classified as tactical witnesses.

Tactical = relating to combat tactics as involving actions or means of less magnitude or at a shorter distance from a base of operations than those of strategy.

Our Lord accomplished the strategic victory of the angelic conflict through His salvation ministry on the cross plus His physical death, burial, resurrection, and ascension.

The believer accomplishes the tactical victory of the angelic conflict through his advance to spiritual maturity in the PPOG; at this point he becomes an invisible hero.

When our Lord was on the Cross, He won the strategic victory, when our Lord returns, there will be the Second Advent and the tactical victory.

In the meantime, anyone who believes in Christ is a winner strategically in the angelic conflict, so that in effect, all Christians today, all believers in the Tribulation are strategical victors, but it is the tactical victory that is in view with Bible doctrine.

Your daily attitude toward Bible doctrine, in both perception and application becomes the tactical victory. You can be a strategic winner and a tactical loser. The importance of application of doctrine to the different momentum tests that every believer must pass before he becomes a winner.

In most generations, like ours, and probably the Tribulational generation, the minority of believers are tactical winners. But the tactical winners are the ones who are going to be decorated with the order of the morning star, the various crowns.

They are going to be the ones who will have the uniform of glory. They are the ones who are going to be on the honors list, so that while the Tribulation is occurring on earth, they will be presented in the court of heaven.

Not all believers will be presented in the court of heaven, only those on the honors list, and then at the Second Advent, those who are tactical winners are going to rule a nation in this world.
It may be a small nation; it may be a large nation.

The strategical winner has eternal life and cannot lose it, and will have a resurrection body in heaven forever and forever. The tactical winner is going to have much more. The concept is, RHIP, rank has its privileges, and there is no equality in heaven.

Equality ends with the strategic victory; all believers have the strategic victory by virtue of having accepted Christ as savior; it is the tactical winners who are going to have higher rank and greater privileges forever, and ever, and ever.

Heaven is a perfect place, and a perfect place is based upon self-determination. That is a one-shot decision, and that is your strategic victory, but after that, tactically you have to make a lot of decisions, and the decisions you make on earth determine your status quo in eternity.

MAT 6:1 “Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.”
1CO 3:8 Now he who plants and he who waters are one; but each will receive his own reward according to his own labor.

1CO 3:14-15, If any man’s work which he has built upon it remains, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work is burned up, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as through fire.

COL 3:23-24, Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men; knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance. It is the Lord Christ whom you serve.

HEB 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please {Him}, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and {that} He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.
2JO 1:8 Watch yourselves, that you might not lose what we have accomplished, but that you may receive a full reward.

You must be self-motivated from your self-determination to accomplish a tactical victory. If you have the tactical victory; it wipes out fear in your life.

The First Cycle of Discipline, LEV 26:14-17.