"But none of those things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish MY COURSE with joy, and the MINISTRY, WHICH I HAVE RECEIVED OF THE LORD JESUS, TO TESTIFY THE GOSPEL OF THE GRACE OF GOD"(Acts 20:24).
"For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God, which is given me to you-ward. How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery"..(Eph. 3:2,3).
"And I went up by revelation, and communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles..."(Gal. 2:2). "And when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, PERCEIVED THE GRACE THAT WAS GIVEN TO ME..."(Gal. 2:9).
"According to the GRACE of GOD which is GIVEN UNTO ME, as a wise masterbuilder, I HAVE LAID THE FOUNDATION." (1 Cor. 3:10).
If Paul's ministry was the dispensation of the grace of God, and the good news (gospel) of the grace of God, and the laying of the foundation of grace, and was given directly to him by Christ...and was a secret, a mystery hid in God from the foundation of the world until revealed to Paul...then when is the very earliest the gospel of the grace of God could have been preached? When is the earliest that "but now" could have begun? If it didn't begin until Paul, and Paul was the first to receive it by revelations from Christ, and Paul wasn't even saved until Acts, Chapter 9, then the dispensation of the grace of God, the good news of the grace of God could NOT have begun before Acts, chapter 9. If it began before, then it began before Paul was saved, then Paul was NOT the first, then God revealed it before He said He revealed it to Paul, and that makes God,,,what...?
So where does the Pentecost message, Philip and the eunuch, everything that happened before Paul was saved fit into the timeline? They would of NECESSITY HAVE to belong to "time past". Which is exactly the point of Peter's sermon and Philip's preaching to the eunuch. They do NOT mention Christ's blood being our remission of sin. They mention Christ as Messiah, coming back to reign, restoring the kingdom to Israel, and Israel being the nation of priests that God promised they would be.
They simply did not know this mystery, hid in God, from the foundation of the world, until it was revealed to them, by who? Paul. (Gal. 2:9).
Agree...It would have been revealed during that three year period that Paul spent with the Risen Jesus...Even yet in Acts 26 Paul was not teaching the gospel of Eph 2...
Thanks for posting this information. Is it your understanding the new dispensation of Grace began in Acts 20 or 13 or 28?
Did the dispensation of Grace begin before or after 1 Corinthians?
Were there Gentile/Jewish mixed churches under the older kingdom dispensation which Paul planted and then were incorporated in the new dispensation of Grace?
I am trying to determine your understanding of the time period this changed and people stopped water baptizing and doing works towards salvation.
Thanks