Why I am No Longer a Dispensationalist

Credo House ^ | May 21, 2015 | C. Michael Patton

[OK Sun]

My Dispensational Upbringing

I have been taught Dispensationalism from my mother’s womb. I was born in a dispensational environment. It was assumed at my church to be a part of the Gospel. There was never another option presented. It made sense. It helped me put together the Scriptures in a way that cleared up so much confusion. And, to be honest, the emphasis on the coming tribulation, current events that prove the Bible’s prophecy, the fear that the Antichrist may be alive today (who is he?) was all quite exciting. But what might be the biggest attraction for me is the charts! Oh how I love charts. I think in charts. And dispensationalism is a theology of charts!

Making Fun of Dispensationalism

The first time I came across someone who was not a Dispensationalist was in 1999. I am not kidding. It was the first time! I don’t think I even knew if there was another view. It was when I was a student at Dallas Theological Seminary (the bastion of Dispensationalism) and I was swimming with some guys who were at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Once they discovered I was a dispensationalist, they giggled and snickered. They made fun of the rapture, the sacrificial system during the millennium, and the mark of the beast (which, at that time, was some type of barcode). It was as if they patted me on the head and said “It’s okay . . . nice little dispensationalist.” I was so angry. I was humiliated. I was a second-rate theologian. They were “Covenantalists” (whatever that was). But they were the cool guys who believed in the historic Christian faith and I was the cultural Christian, believing in novel ideas.

[MHGinTN]

Do you believe God forces us to love Him?

[CynicalBear]

>>Rejecting the Spirit drawing the hearer is the only un-forgivable sin because it is rejecting the ONLY means God has provided for Salvation.<<

That's not what Jesus said.

Mark 3:28 "Truly I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they utter; 29 but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin "--

Matthew 12:31 "Therefore I say to you, any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven people, but blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. 32 "Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come.

Blasphemy is NOT simply refusing to heed the call. I'm not sure why you would change the words of Jesus to somehow fit this conversation.

>>To assert that God forces us to be saved or not saved does violence to the Great Grace of God in Christ's sacrificing Himself for us.<<

Proverbs 16:4 The LORD has made everything for its own purpose, Even the wicked for the day of evil.

Romans 9:10 Not only that, but Rebekah’s children were conceived at the same time by our father Isaac. 11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” 13 Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15 For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” 16 It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. 17 For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden. 19 One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” 20 But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’ ” 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use? 22 What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? 23 What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory—

All that typing you did but God still says it's His call.

I was brought up in a God fearing family. Who gets credit for that? It was God who determined that I would be born to God fearing parents rather than Muslims or atheists.

Like I said. Are you going to take the credit and the glory for having chosen Christ or is that credit and glory due God alone?

You chose Christ but another refused the message. Does that make you smarter than he is? Are you wiser than he is?

\ My phrase is always: "but for the grace of God there go I". God gets the credit and the glory. Never man lest he should boast.

[Iscool]

Who is due the glory for His Grace? Why of course ONLY GOD is due the glory for His astonishing Grace. If man has no choice, why would God repeat this wooing, in deed why even do it a first time?

Makes sense to me...

Tit 2:11 For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,

Why would that grace be available to all men if it is just meant for some...

1Ti 2:4 Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

That one's kinda hard to dispute...

2Ti 4:17 Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me; that by me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles might hear: and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion.

No need for all the Gentiles to hear the preaching...

As I see it as far as this predestination thing is concerned; there are always exception to the rule but I believe it was the church that was predestinated, not the individual...

[HarleyD]

Do you believe God forces us to love Him?

I believe that,

1) until we are saved we do not love God:

Rom 1:21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.

2) We do NOT have the love of God in us:

Joh 5:42 But I know that you do not have the love of God within you.

3) It is in this state that God reveals Himself to us and makes us alive:

Eph 2:1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins

Eph 2:2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—

Eph 2:3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

Eph 2:4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,

Eph 2:5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—

4) It is when we have been made alive by the power of God that we love Christ and see the glory of God, the richness of heaven, the depths of our sin.

Joh_8:42 Jesus said to them, "If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and I am here. I came not of my own accord, but he sent me.

5) So, yes, God "forces" us to love Him and walk in His statues and obey his ordinances.

1Jn 3:1 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

1Jn 4:7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

1Jn 4:19 We love because he first loved us.

If it wasn't for God forcing me to love Him, I would never know Him. One could argue that God doesn't "force" us to love Him, rather that He makes Himself known and instills us with His love for His Son. But I think that is splitting hairs.

And, I praise God that He has forced me to love the Son to His glory and mercy.

[CynicalBear]

>>If man has no choice, why would God repeat this wooing, in deed why even do it a first time?<<

Isaiah 55:8 "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways," declares the LORD.

[MHGinTN]

All that typing and some still don't see with spiritual eyes. God Created the Unicerse and all therein (John 1). He is the Sovereign over ALL He has created, including satan. He is Sovereign over me as well. He has given to me the astonishing gift of the responsibility to choose His Life in me or choose not to have His Life in me. I imagine that really ticks off satan. That God would offer His Life to indwell lowly humans who decide, in the small sovereignty God has given to them over their choices, to accept such a glorious, unfathomable Gift! So satan works all the time, unceasingly, to get humans to ignore or disregard, or scoff at, or not believe that God is offering this unfathomable Gift to them.

At any moment in time upon any point in His Creation, God has the final call. Always. From the Bible and the Creation we may know that God IS and that He promises. God is Love. He said so. Can love be forced?

[MHGinTN]

There is only one certain barrier to Truth, our presuppositions. Paraphrasing Edmund Spencer

[CynicalBear]

I’m not sure why you’re going there with me. If you want bragging rights go for it.

[MHGinTN]

"And, I praise God that He has forced me to love the Son to His glory and mercy." Oh my, how have you read so much Scripture and missed the Character of God so smoothly? How have you developed such a twisted definition for Love? Let me illustrate why this is error:

For God so 'designed' the World that He 'forced some to Love His Son; the rest He condemns for not loving His Son'

Doesn't sound right, does it? ... Apparently that sounds just fine to some ears. But it is not what The Bible teaches us about God, His Character, or His plan for His Creation.

A Gift is not a gift if forced upon someone. Love is not Love if you force your love upon someone or demand they love you for you forcing yourself upon them. I am shaking the dust from my proverbial sandals at the door of this error.

[MHGinTN]

Bragging rights? How cold of you! No, I will brag of God’s Garce, of His astonishing Gift to us because He first Loves us. But bragging rights? I leave you to your needs.

[MHGinTN]

Bragging rights? How cold of you! No, I will brag of God’s Grace, of His astonishing Gift to us because He first Loves us. But bragging rights? I leave you to your needs.

[CynicalBear]

Hey, if anyone claims it was they who chose God then they have boasting rights over those who didn’t. There’s no two ways about it. Do you choose to sin? If not where is the free will?

[MHGinTN]

Please, try to read what I have actually posted. Romans is not unfamiliar to me. It is God's Spirit Who woos the spirit of man. BUT that man must accept the Truth when it is pricking at his heart. What do YOU imagine were the pricks Jesus spoke of when He spoke to Saul on his way to Damascus? the particulars I cannot give you, but the theme is emblazoned across the Bible ... Faith cometh by hearing, and hering by The WOrd of God. Faithful is He that calleth you for He will also do it. By Faith Abraham had righteousness accounted to him. Saul knew all of these things. Gamaliel would not have let him loose from studies as a young man had he not learned these key things. And Gam old boy told the Sanhedrin that they better take care what they fought against, for if it be of God they are doomed in their endeavor.

But eno8ugh of my writing. You all know more thn me ... but you do not know the God of the Bible if you even entertain the notion that God forces anyone in this Church Age to Love Him or receive His Son. The Gift of God is His Grace in Christ Jesus.abd each of us will answer for whether we faithe in Him or in our own vain imaginations. When some come to Him and plead this or that life, calling Him Lord, He will say depart from Me, I never knew you. Satan knows Jesus is Lord, but satan will not allow God to be God in him. Any boy, girl, man or woman who will thank Him for His astonishing Gift and let God be God in them, that one Jesus knows! But how can one 'let' if they have no sovereignty over their will? Amazing that such a thing is impossible to hear with some.

[xzins]

Harley, in my mind it is either true that God actually cares or it isn’t true. There are no half measures, hidden agendas, sophisticated use of words. God cared about those people and wanted the best for them. It’s true that He is also going to judge with justice, but He isn’t going to feign caring.

In an ultimate sense, you can’t say you care about someone that you’ve pre-ordained to hell. Not in my mind you can’t, anyway.

[Springfield Reformer]

Blasphemy is NOT simply refusing to heed the call. I'm not sure why you would change the words of Jesus to somehow fit this conversation.

A couple of thoughts.  First, in all good charity I know this line of thought very well, as many I grew up with, including myself at one point, used it routinely in arguments with Calvinists.  I do not think there is any willful intent to misrepresent the words of Jesus, and I know you didn't say that.  I'm just leaning on the point to make it clear.  

But yes, the problem with it is that it connects dots that don't belong together.  Jesus in John 6 is declaring that all that the Father gives Him will come to Him.  There is no accommodation in the Greek for ideas like they "might come if they feel like it," or "have the possibility of coming."  That presumes everyone is equally drawn. But that's just not how He says it:

All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
(John 6:37)

No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me.
(John 6:44-45)

Go back and read it in context, MHGinTN.  Pay special attention to the symmetry. There is no sense of conditionality.  Yes, I know this must be balanced with all the other passages which touch on this subject, but this is a critical passage because Jesus is doing more than just talking about being drawn to Him in some general way. He is setting up a contrast for the express purpose of explaining how this works.  The crowd was insisting on a materialistic understanding of His Bread of Life metaphor.  They were spiritually dead, flat out incapable of reaching the lesson of the metaphor, which was that to have eternal life they must believe in Him.  This passage is incomprehensible without seeing that contrast. Some believe.  Why do they believe?  Because they were given to Jesus by God the Father.  How does God bring this about? He draws them to believe in Jesus.  They are the "taught of God" ones.  That's the good news.  

What's the bad news?  Those who didn't believe (the ones rejecting His metaphor) didn't believe because nobody can come to Jesus unless the Father has drawn them.  They do not believe because they are not the sheep.  So that destroys the idea that everyone is drawn equally, such that the only difference is who responds and who doesn't. CB is right.  That is a distortion of Jesus' teaching.  I know it is very common.  As I said, I grew up believing it.  But it's not right.

BTW, I don't think this is at all easy for us "puny humans" to wrestle with.  Try as we might, I don't think any of us fully grasps what it means for God to be sovereign.  All our pitiful little analogies break under scrutiny. About the only one that is slightly better (at least it works for me) is resurrection.  What freedom does a corpse have?  Like Lazarus, it just lays there in the tomb, rotting, no matter how nice you dress it up.  Then Jesus speaks into the dead darkness, and the corpse suddenly inhales, and starts to breath. It opens it's eyes, gets up, and walks out of the tomb, just what Jesus said to do.  Impossible while dead, inevitable if truly alive.  No one forced Lazarus to live against his will.  But he did not choose to start breathing again either. Once alive, he simply acted as living persons naturally do.  As it is in the nature of the spiritually dead to ignore and resist God, it is in the nature of the spiritually alive to seek and love God.  Life is from God.  How else could it be?  This is not a force against the will.  It is prior to that.  It is two different kinds of being.  And it is the creative act of God that makes the difference.  We call it grace.

Peace,

SR

[MHGinTN]

Thank you for the ping.

[HarleyD]

A Gift is not a gift if forced upon someone.

Is this gift given to everyone?

[MHGinTN]

Thank you for the response. There is a balance in reason between the complete preordination of all things (such that there is no sovereignty of the individual), and the larger view of “God’s Gift is so Great BECAUSE it is by His Promise and His calling, and then the individual’s choice to accept His Life or not.” But I am no longer ‘catching any ears’, so I will leave it to others on this open forum.

[HarleyD]

In an ultimate sense, you can’t say you care about someone that you’ve pre-ordained to hell. Not in my mind you can’t, anyway.

I'd suggest that you have this backwards. Say that Adam had a choice-Paradise or away from God's presence. We know what He chose. Say that everyone is the same way-not wanting to serve God. They would rather reign in hell than serve in heaven. Now, let's suppose that God wants to make His holiness known to those who are perishing and He elects to use a chosen few to make His presence known. They really don't deserve it because they aren't any better than the rest-but God just declares them righteous so that He can show the world His justice and grace. He calls them through a burning bush, through the ark on a dark night in the temple, or on the Damascus Road. He shows them what He is really like, that He cares for people who constantly reject Him-time and time again. Why He suffers such indignation from us I cannot say but those who believe also suffer, albeit in a small way, in His suffering.

In a synergistic world, God pre-ordaining people to hell makes no sense and I agree with you. But that is exactly what we know to be true. I would suggest your synergistic view cannot be correct. This was all planned and is being executed exactly as God ordained.

[xzins]

You are a dear brother, HarleyD. I thank God for your deep knowledge of scripture and the hours of reflection on our Lord that have been a part of your life.

I simply don’t see it as real caring to say to people that you care when you’ve simultaneously removed any hope of salvation for them even before they existed in this realm.

It is caring to assign the wicked to hell. I have no problem with that.

Therefore, God’s actual caring for the people of Ninevah, those NOT His people, says that His caring is real.

The conclusion: EVERYONE has hope. Whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.