Are these two "dispensations" or one?
It seems that in at least two instances, the word is referring particularly to Pauls ministry, and not to times and seasons in general (1 Cor. 9:17; Eph. 3:2).
Is there anything in the Bible to indicate that "dispensation" was intended to connote what modern-day dispensationalists have come to believe? I submit there is no pattern in the Bible that would lead a person to such a conclusion. Its just bad exegesis of the text containing the word.
The economy of FDR, the revolutionary era economy, and the economy of the antebellum south would all signify an style and ordering of an era.
Of course, Paul's Ephesians 1:
3 Blessed [is] the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who did bless us in every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, 4 according as He did choose us in him before the foundation of the world, for our being holy and unblemished before Him, in love, 5 having foreordained us to the adoption of sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, 6to the praise of the glory of His grace, in which He did make us accepted in the beloved, 7 in whom we have the redemption through his blood, the remission of the trespasses,
according to the riches of His grace, 8 in which He did abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence, 9 having made known to us the secret of His will, according to His good pleasure, that He purposed in Himself, 10 in regard to the dispensation (ECONOMY) of the fulness of the times, to bring into one the whole in the Christ, both the things in the heavens, and the things upon the earth -- in him;
11 in whom also we did obtain an inheritance, being foreordained according to the purpose of Him who the all things is working according to the counsel of His will, 12 for our being to the praise of His glory, [even] those who did first hope in the Christ, 13 in whom ye also, having heard the word of the truth -- the good news of your salvation -- in whom also having believed, ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of the promise, 14 which is an earnest of our inheritance, to the redemption of the acquired possession, to the praise of His glory.