39-CHAPTER XXXIII "THE PRESENT GOSPEL DISPENSATION IS NO ‘MYSTERY’ BUT WAS FORETOLD BY OLD TESTAM...

CHAPTER XXXIII "THE PRESENT GOSPEL DISPENSATION IS NO ‘MYSTERY’ BUT WAS FORETOLD BY OLD TESTAMENT PROPHECY"

"The New Testament’ applies many prophecies of the Old Testament to the present dispensation of the gospel. Does it not follow that for their fulfillment a still future kingdom age is not only not required but is excluded, so that after the period of the church no kingdom age can possibly be expected?"

Here also it is needful for both sides to guard against an extreme. It would be one-sided to say that the Old Testament kingdom prophecies never speak of the blessings which we enjoy in the present age of the gospel. This would in no way do justice to the manner in which the New Testament cites the Old Testament prophecies. On the other hand it would be likewise one-sided to declare that, because they speak of these now present blessings, henceforth no further, and perhaps still larger, fulfillment than the present can come. In other words, it were one-sided to apply the Old Testament kingdom prophecies to the future, the Millennium, alone, and to separate them from the present gospel age; and equally one-sided to apply them solely to the gospel age, to spiritualize them entirely, thus to separate them from the Millennium and to oppose a literal fulfillment. The one would stand in opposition to the New Testament way of applying Old Testament prophecy; the other to the Old Testament text itself, even to the unmistakable connection of the text and to the meaning that the prophets themselves intended and to the fulfillment that they quite plainly expected.

(b) The New Testament often states plainly that the Old Testament prophets spoke of "these days," and therefore not only of the final kingdom of Messiah. In this it applies the term " these days " to the present period of the church.

Thus the early praying church in Jerusalem said that the hatred of Jews and Gentiles against the Messiah, of which David had prophesied in the second Psalm, had found fulfillment "in this city" in the rejection of Jesus and the persecution of His followers, and thus in the earthly days of the Lord and the immediately following time of the first church, that is, in the present age of salvation (Acts 4:26-28). Paul declares the same of this second psalm, even that the fulfillment had started early in this present age, for he says that the word "Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee" was fulfilled in the resurrection of Jesus (Acts 13:33).

Similarly, on the day of Pentecost Peter declared concerning the prophecy of Joel of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit "in the last days," that " this is that which was spoken through the prophet Joel" (Acts 2:16-17; Joel 2:28-29). Thus the beginning of the present age brought a fulfillment of this Old Testament prophecy. A short time later, this same Peter declared that "all the prophets, from Samuel and those who followed, as many as have spoken, have announced ^’these days’." (Acts 3:24) Thus the foretelling of "these days" he connected not with David only, but also with Samuel and all the following prophets.

Moreover, the "gospel of God" as announced by Paul, the pioneer apostle of the present age, was, according to his own testimony in the Roman epistle, "promised before by God through His prophets in holy writings" (Romans 1:1-2). In Antioch he based the transfer of his message from Jews to Gentiles upon a reference to an Old Testament prophetic word:"We turn to the Gentiles; for so has the Lord commanded: ‘I have set thee for a light to the nations’" (Isaiah 49:6; Acts 13:47). Thus he saw a fulfilling of Isaiah’s prophecy in his own preaching to the Gentiles in this present age. Indeed, he, the chief evangel­ist of the church age, testified before king Agrippa concerning his own message that he said "nothing but what Moses and the prophets had spoken" (Acts 26:22-23). The duty of Jewish and Gentile Christians of this church period to receive one another (Romans 15:7-13) Paul established by a series of separate Old Testament prophecies which he applied to the conversion of Gentiles in this present age, among which was even the kingdom prophecy of Isaiah concerning the coming "Shoot out of the root of Jesse which standeth to rule over the nations" (Isaiah 11:10). And Peter, writing in his first epistle to readers who, like our­selves, lived after Pentecost, and therefore in the present age of the gospel, testifies ( Ephesians 1:12) that the Old Testament prophets had indeed received no light as to what time, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ which was in them signified, but that they had prophesied of the "salvation" and the "grace that should come unto you," and "for you" had ministered the things which "now" have been announced unto "you" through those who preached the gospel unto "you" through the Holy Spirit sent forth from heaven. All this being after Pentecost means in the present age of grace, and the "you" includes us of the present time.

(d) Similarly it is clear that David knew of an age to intervene between the ascension of Messiah and of His final triumph in glory, for he wrote:" Sit thou at My right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool" (Psa. no:1). We in particular who believe in a visible kingdom of God on the theatre of the old earth ought clearly to recognize this. It is this time of waiting which Hebrews also refers to the present age of the gospel (Hebrews 10:13). In emphasizing this we by no means transfer New Testament knowledge backward from the time of fulfillment into the con­sciousness of Old Testament prophets. For David, who, as Peter declared on the day of Pentecost, was also a prophet (Acts 2:30), had "known" of the kingdom of Messiah and "foreseen" His resurrection (ver. 31). In this, as Psalm no shows, David had recognized that before the triumphant kingdom of Messiah there would be a period in which He would sit on the throne of God in heaven and act as the Priest-King after the order of Melchizedek, even "until" God should put His enemies under His feet. Furthermore, the psalm shows that David knew that this priestly rule of Messiah would be introduced by His ascension:" Set thyself at My right hand." In addition David had known that Messiah would die. For "foreseeing" (Acts 2:31) he spake of the resurrection of Messiah, which could not have been save in connection with knowledge of His death (Psalms 16:8-11). Finally, after the mission to him of the prophet Nathan (2 Samuel 7:16) David had the knowledge that Messiah would be his "son," a member of his house, and thus would be born as man.

Thus David had seen all three chief Messianic periods: the first, the birth of Christ as man and as son of David, His death, His resurrection, His ascension: the second, the waiting period, following the ascension, when Messiah sits as Priest-King at the right hand of God in heaven: the third, the victory of His kingdom, the subduing of His enemies and the triumph of His glory.

Thus it is not possible to assert that the whole present age of the gospel was completely hidden from the Old Testament prophets and had been an absolute "mystery" (secret). Much rather had they, at least David, known of the existence of such a period before die setting up of the kingdom, even though, of course, the details of this intervening period were not clearly known by them.

(e) In any case they had known of a coming conversion of the

Gentiles. As a rule they viewed this conversion in one picture with the salvation of Israel. Yet they nowhere expressly say that this conversion of the Gentiles can only be after the salva­tion and renewal of Israel as a nation. As regards the sequence of events, the separate stages in the carrying out of these promises, and as to certain further important details to be added later, no light was granted to them. The "times" in the history of the fulfillment were hidden from them (1 Pet. i:u, 12).

Above all it was not yet revealed to them that in this present time of which they spoke the principle would rule of the equality of Jews and Gentiles in the people of God. Nowhere in the Old Testament was it said expressly that the Gentiles could be received into the people of God without law-keeping and circumcision, that is, directly as Gentiles and solely on the ground of faith. Complete silence reigned as to whether Gentiles must first become Jews so as to gain admission into the kingdom of Messiah. Not a single prophecy in the whole Old Testament deals with and gives light on this question. In the past the principle of the non-circumcision of believing Gentiles in the church of God was an absolute secret. In harmony with this fact Paul, writing to the Ephesians, expresses himself with extraordinary exactness. He does not state that the Old Testament prophets had known nothing at all of what would take place in this present age of grace, but he says that this had not been so made known to the sons of men "as it hath now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets through the Spirit," and in especial measure to Paul himself (Ephesians 3:4-6). The general fact of the call of the Gentiles was already known in the Old Testament, but not the details con­nected with this call. Upon these the New Testament first gives full revelation.

Therefore the "mystery" of which Paul speaks in Ephesians 3:1-21 was that the Gentile believers should receive a completely equal standing in the Christan church with Jewish believers. They are "follow-heirs, fellow-members of the body, and fellow-partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel" (Ephesians 3:6). By this prefix "fellow" (Gr. syri) Paul expresses the closest possible union and indistinguishable equality between Jews and Gentiles in the church. But now, because precisely this principle of equality is one of the most essential characteristics of the New Testament church, it must be acknowledged that none of the Old Testament prophets had foreseen that, in the coming period, such a building of God would arise; and in this sense although not the fact that such a New Testament people of God (church of God, ecclesia) would exist, but its composition, nature, and principle of organic fellowship, was in the Old Testament a "mystery" not yet revealed. This makes intelligible why the New Testament, with its God- inspired and extraordinarily careful manner of expression, never describes the present age assuch as a "mystery," nor calls the ecclesiaassuch a "mystery"; but only terms "mysteries" certain individual principles and detail truths connected with the present age and concerning the church, although these are in the highest degree essential and truly important.

Thus the "great mystery" of Ephesians 5:32 is not the ecclesiaassuch but the relation of love between Christ and the ecclesia’. "This mystery is great, but I speak in regard of [concerning] Christ and the ecclesia." Exactly so in the earthly life, not the existence of the husband and wife as such is a "mystery" but the relation of love which binds them together.

(f) In like manner the New Testament knows nothing of an "offer" to the Jewish people by the Lord, at the beginning of His public ministry, to set up the earthly kingdom of Messiah, which offer being refused by the Jews the kingdom was consequently "postponed" to a later time; so that then the present gospel age would have been inserted like a parenthesis, as some­thing quite unforeseen and never announced. There are three chief reasons to the contrary.

(1) The silence of the Bible:In the whole Bible there is no single place which speaks distinctly of such an "offer" and "postponement" of the earthly kingdom. Rather do all the explanations related to this idea rest upon inexact attention to the wording of certain passages of Scripture or upon inferences drawn from them.

(2) An offer of and setting up of Messiah’s kingdom before Golgotha was simply not possible. For no kingdom of glory could come without the forgiveness of sins. But forgiveness of sins was possible only on the ground of the substitutionary atoning death of Christ, and from the beginning He had come for this very purpose that He should give His life a ransom for many (Matthew 20:28). Therefore such an offer would have been a proposal by God Himself which would have stood in strongest opposition to the most decisive principles of His own plan of redemption. Consequently from His very entrance into the world, the Cross stood before the eyes of the Lord as the very first of all matters (Hebrews 10:5-10). First rejection, than exalta­tion:first the crown of thorns, then the royal crown. Therefore also John the Baptist, the preparer of His way, had from the beginning thus announced Him, saying, "Behold, the lamb of God who beareth away the sin of the world" (John i:29). From the very first the sequence was the same: Through Cross to crown; through repentance to salvation. Only through for­giveness of sin to the glory. Never the reverse.

(3) Furthermore, the exact wording of the preaching of the kingdom is to be observed: Both John the Baptist and Jesus had declared:"Repent, for the kingdom of the heavens has drawn near"¹ (Matthew 3:1-2; Matthew 4:17). They did not say, "If you repent then the kingdom of the heavens will draw near." The repent­ance of man was not the condition for the coming of the kingdom, but the coming of the kingdom was the ground of the demand for repentance. The kingdom itself had come in either case. "The kingdom of the heavens has drawn near." Unbelief could not alter this. "But into whatsoever city ye shall enter, and they receive you not, go out into the streets thereof and say, Even the dust of your city that cleaveth to our feet we do wipe off against you: howbeit know this, that the kingdom of God has come nigh" (Luke 10:10-11). For each individual entrance into this kingdom was conditional upon his repentance. Each individual had the possibility to submit himself to the kingly rule of God and so to be blessed, or, as the Pharisees did, "to make the counsel of God of none effect" forhimself (Luke 7:30). In any case we must here guard ourselves from a precipitate equalizing of "kingdom" with "Millennial kingdom." The kingdom of God will indeed have in the end time its appearance in visible glory. But in its essence it is the royal estate of God in general, His sovereign kingship as the ruling and saving God, which sovereignty He displays in different times and dispensations in ever new forms. Therefore the term "kingdom of God" includes of course the Millennial kingdom, but at the same time comprises much more than this. Only the immediate context can make clear from case to case what particular historical form of the kingdom is meant; whether the Old Testament kingdom (Matthew 21:43), or the present spiritual kingdom (in "mysteries":Matthew 13:11), or the visible kingdom of the future (Luke 19:11), or the eternal kingdom. In reference to the national history of Israel the present period of the church is indeed a parenthesis. For until its restoration Israel as a people is set aside, "till the Savior of the Gentiles has come in" (Romans 11:25-26). "Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled" ( = have run out: Luke 21:24). But this is not on the ground of a rejection by the Jews of a supposed offer by Jesus of the visible kingdom of Messiah, but on account of the spiritual and moral rejection of His person and His message by the unbelief of His Jewish contemporaries. But all this God had foreseen from eternity. Therefore everything was included in His plan and was correspondingly announced through the Old Testament prophets, even if in very hidden form.

(g) But the opposite extreme must be equally avoided. The fact remains that in the period of the New Testament church Old Testament prophecies of the conversion of the Gentiles are being fulfilled. But, as both experience and Scripture testify, this applies first of all to the salvation of individuals:"God will takeout of the nations a people for His name" (Acts 15:14). But this does not contradict the other fact that, in the course of the carrying through of this His one inclusive plan for the Gentiles, God will hereafter cause a still greater ingathering of Gentiles, in which the nations asnations will be converted, and, with Israel as a people, will stand under one common covenant of blessing and peace under the one sovereignty of Messiah as King of Israel and King of mankind (Isaiah 19:23-25).

Therefore the fact that the New Testament applies to the present age numerous Old Testament prophecies of the conversion of Gentiles, in no wise contradicts a visible kingdom of God composed of all mankind in the Millennium. The Old Testament prophets foretold only quite in general a conversion of Gentiles. But on the question how this would be carried out in detail, in what stages and in what sections of time, by what measures and in what increasing degree, they said nothing precise. Therefore such general prophecies, and their application in the New Testament, can form no warrant to deprive of their original significance by "spiritualizing" other Old Testament promises, the evident sense of which is a national conversion of both Israel and the other nations in one visible Messianic kingdom of God, or to oppose them as "mistaken prophecies."

(h) At the same time these prophecies look on into eternity. Even the Millennial kingdom is only a portico to the Perfecting. Only then will the promise of the conversion of the nations have reached its full realization.

Thus the carrying through of the Old Testament promises for the nations of the world will be completed in three great and mighty stages:² In the present gospel age, through salvation of many individuals and their incorporation into the organism of the church. In the coming visible kingdom of God of the pre-perfecting, the Millennium, through the renewing of whole nations and their subordinate yet associated position with Israel under the kingly rule of Messiah, Who will have appeared in glory. In eternity, in the conditions of the new world, as nations on the new earth who will live in the light of the new Jerusalem, the city of God come down from heaven.

Notes ¹engiken, perfect; has drawn near ²For fuller details see The Dawn of World Redemption, p. 146-55