Flaws with Dispensational Theology

[puritan lad]

Like jlay, I'm afraid you will not be convinced, nor do you desire to have a biblical or logical argument over this. Instead, you wish to post nonsense like the above statement. May this debate show other readers the truth that there is but one gospel for Jew and Gentile, and that there is but one Second Advent, not two. You may do with this what you wish.

[jlay]

PL, convinced of what? What you guys are discussing isn't dispensational. It's a distortion of it.

Regardless of whether you believe there is a future plan for Israel as a nation, there is only one way of peronal salvation past, present or future. And that is through Jesus Christ. Granted, OT people did not have complete revelation. Abraham's faith was 'credited' to him as righteousness. Just as Martha did not have complete revelation of the death, burial and ressurection. But she believed what HAD been revealed to her. Without the atoning work of Christ, that faith would have been useless. But hey, the Lamb was slain from the creation of the Earth. (Rev. 13:8)
To be saved, an individual Jew can respond to the Gospel of Jesus Christ just like anyone else. There is no difference. Just as there is no difference in those who reject it.

[zoegirl]

Sorry GMan, but we will not agree to disagree on this. The stakes are far too high.

Yes loud and clear PL... The current state of Israel is the work of satan or synagogue of satan..

Very clear. Nuke em...

Gman, you know that's certianly not the point PL is making and this is rather...weak...

[Gman]

Sorry GMan, but we will not agree to disagree on this. The stakes are far too high.

Yes loud and clear PL... The current state of Israel is the work of satan or synagogue of satan..

Very clear. Nuke em...

Gman, you know that's certianly not the point PL is making and this is rather...weak...

I may have spoken that in haste, but he has been insinuating that the current establishment of the state of Israel is a satanic influence.

[Gman]

I'm not willing to pull it that far..

[zoegirl]

Well, with any blindness or cloaking of any unbeliever, do we not attribute both a hardening from God as well as deceit from Satan? I'm not in any way disparaging them, simply pointing out that if they indeed have had their hearts hardened, we are looking at spiritual battles, just as any other unbeliever.

[B. W.]

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Geeze with two of these form threads going on, not even sure if this is the right post for the right thread! So if it is out of place - oh well - it can work here too
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Hi Gman, the question has been posed to Messianic Jews regarding if their people can be saved by some other means and the answer according to them would be – Yes and No.

No in that they need to come to Christ like everyone else does.

And Yes, that the OT reveals Christ and from it, revelation can come and one can believe in him from the OT names used for God.

Both depend on divine revelation, opening of the eyes, by grace. Proof would be those OT people in the part of Sheol know as Paradise that Jesus went to and led to heaven. That was both an example of grace and divine intervention.

Abraham believed God and it was accounted to Him what? Who did he believe in? God wasn’t it? In the OT, the way the names and titles are used of God show forth the Divine Trinity of one God in three persons, thus fulfilling God’s own statement about himself as there being NONE like him and that he is incomprehensible. So by reading the OT the Lord can show them that Jesus spoke to Abraham and thus Abraham believed on Christ.

Likewise, Moses spoke with Jesus often as Jesus identified himself as the I AM in one passage. So, by reading the OT the Lord most certainly can lead a Jew to saving knowledge in Christ thru the uses of the names / titles for God used in the OT. Divine revelation of who he is. He may however use the OT name to call upon the Lord such as Yahweh, Elohim, Malak Yahweh, El Shaddai, I AM, as Jesus used in his pre-incarnate state, and thus be saved by the convention of the NT. No violation to it at all. Those who call on the Name of Yahweh shall be Saved...

So it is possible for a Jew, thru God’s divine intervention, come to saving faith in Christ, through Grace by reading the OT.

Next,

How long ago was the book of Romans written? What day and time is it now? Things change. The Jews have only a partial hardening, not a full hardening and this partial is slowly being removed today. So everyone please be careful what you say about God’s chosen people. There is more Law oriented in reading that they are enemies from Rom 11 but that was how long ago after how much time has passed? Time of the Gentiles just well maybe in the closing stages – what then?

The use of the word enemies was a poor choice for a translated word to use in the context of all Rom 11.

Rom 11:24 For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?
Rom 11:25 For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.
Rom 11:26 And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: "THE DELIVERER WILL COME OUT OF ZION, AND HE WILL TURN AWAY UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB;
Rom 11:27 FOR THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS."
Rom 11:28 Concerning the gospel they are enemies (antagonistic/hostile) for your sake, but concerning the election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers.
Rom 11:29 For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.
Rom 11:30 For as you were once disobedient to God, yet have now obtained mercy through their disobedience,
Rom 11:31 even so these also have now been disobedient, that through the mercy shown you they also may obtain mercy.

We we all at one time enemies of God?

Rom 11:1 I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not! For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.
Rom 11:2 God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel, saying,
Rom 11:3 "LORD, THEY HAVE KILLED YOUR PROPHETS AND TORN DOWN YOUR ALTARS, AND I ALONE AM LEFT, AND THEY SEEK MY LIFE"?
Rom 11:4 But what does the divine response say to him? "I HAVE RESERVED FOR MYSELF SEVEN THOUSAND MEN WHO HAVE NOT BOWED THE KNEE TO BAAL."
Rom 11:5 Even so then, at this present time there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

[Gman]

Yes yes yes... Bryan you got it.. You just blew me away.. I love clarity.

This is what I'm beginning to see here too...

Amen brother!!!!!

[Gman]

Well, with any blindness or cloaking of any unbeliever, do we not attribute both a hardening from God as well as deceit from Satan? I'm not in any way disparaging them, simply pointing out that if they indeed have had their hearts hardened, we are looking at spiritual battles, just as any other unbeliever.

Ok.. Here is the problem with saying that satan is behind the current nation of Israel or that it is defunct, etc... The OT is telling us that God is the one pulling the strings here. It is God who is pulling them back to their land.. Not satan or not man's devices!!!

Look at Ezekiel 36:24; 37:11-14, Jer 23:7-8, Zech 8:4-5 just to name a few....

This is the point I'm trying to make here... It seems that God is pulling these non-Christian Jews back to their homeland. For what reason? For them to finally receive their messiah!!!! After thousands of years of waiting folks...

This is why I really think we have to be careful when we talk about this stuff. And we need to be really careful when we are dealing with God's plan or His people..

Why? He is still trying to fulfill his promises to them.. He is actually chasing them!!! Beautiful...

[Gman]

I still can't get over that post of yours Bryan... WOW. The Trinity comes flying out!!! Sorry for the drama folks..

You have a prophet's touch or something.. Scary.

I'm running for cover next time..

[B. W.]

Yes yes yes... Bryan you got it..

This is what I'm beginning to see here too...

Amen brother!!

Yes, learned this from Messianic Jewish brethren. In fact, 1983 thru 1986 I was one of the founding members of a Messianic Jewish fellowship, played in the praise band. Nice and good and decent people as I remember them. Left there, due to the Lord’s leading and training in another church venue and adventures.

You learn from them to accept biblical prophecy as it is – not what you wanted it be. The principles of the hermeneutics of Dispensationalism is a more flexible system willing to repent when it found an error, over the Preterist system, or Idealist models. Does it have flaws – yes, but it is self correcting and in being so – uncovers truth and accepts easier than inflexible thought models.

Form Messianic Jewish Brethren you learn to accept truth: God placed Israel back in the Land and You dare not call God satan for bringing back the Jewish people into their own land approx 1900 years later. You also learn experientially and come to realize that in these current modern times – IT IS THE GENTILES and some in the GENTILE CHURCH that are ENEMIES toward the Jewish People and not the other way around and such are more apt at persecuting the Jews rather than the Jews Christians.

In Paul’s time the Jews persecuted Believers in Christ. That is why he wrote what he did in Romans 11:28 and qualified it in Romans 11:25 and Romans 11:1.

I would like to REMIND PEOPLE READING THIS that the JEWISH PEOPLE are NO LONGER PERSECUTING Christian believers! GET OVER IT! WE HAVE NOW BECOME more of an ENEMY to the JEWISH PEOPLE than they could ever be to US!

TIMES CHANGE! AS ROMANS 11:25 INDICATED it would!

The time of the Gentiles has come in and from the bible this means One – Salvation to the Gentiles first, and Two – non Christian gentiles and nations will be hostile toward the Jewish people. Part of the Dividing time I mentioned. THIS Gentile period will end when the Gentile Enemies surround the Jewish people again to KILL THEM - EXTERMINATE. Then God returns and wipes out the Gentile enemies INSTEAD!

WHICH SIDE DO YOU WANT TO BE ON?

Reread Romans 11 again…

How in the heck can about 4.6 million Jews in Israel and about another 6 million elsewhere midst the world’s population of 7+ Billion people be a threat and persecutor of the Christian Church world which has approx 400 million people in it anymore?

Who in the heck is doing the real persecuting nowadays?

How does this fit some of the dispensationalist model? We are living in times when the Jews have at last returned to the land promised to them by God, Jews are now becoming Born Again more than ever before, gentile hatred of the Jewish people is increasing – How much bible prophecy can people keep denying? Whose heart is also partially harden as well? The Gentiles are more an enemy now to the Jewish people than the Jews could ever be an enemy to them.

A lot has changed since Paul wrote Romans 11:25 – until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in… Look like its nearing completion.

Ezekiel 36:21, 22, 23 24, 25, 26, 27, 28c

Ezekiel 38: 7. 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 16, 17, 18, 21, 22, 23c

Ezekiel 39:21, 22. 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29c

Zep 3:8 and Zec 14:1, 2, 3, 4
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[Gman]

Form Messianic Jewish Brethren you learn to accept truth: God placed Israel back in the Land and You dare not call God satan for bringing back the Jewish people into their own land approx 1900 years later. You also learn experientially and come to realize that in these current modern times – IT IS THE GENTILES and some in the GENTILE CHURCH that are ENEMIES toward the Jewish People and not the other way around and such are more apt at persecuting the Jews rather than the Jews Christians.

AMEN!!!!!! LOUD AND CLEAR!!!

Bless all of God's children!!! Whether they be Jew or Gentile!!! Blessings!!!!

[Byblos]

Well, with any blindness or cloaking of any unbeliever, do we not attribute both a hardening from God as well as deceit from Satan? I'm not in any way disparaging them, simply pointing out that if they indeed have had their hearts hardened, we are looking at spiritual battles, just as any other unbeliever.

Ok.. Here is the problem with saying that satan is behind the current nation of Israel or that it is defunct, etc... The OT is telling us that God is the one pulling the strings here. It is God who is pulling them back to their land.. Not satan or not man's devices!!!

Look at Ezekiel 36:24; 37:11-14, Jer 23:7-8, Zech 8:4-5 just to name a few....

This is the point I'm trying to make here... It seems that God is pulling these non-Christian Jews back to their homeland. For what reason? For them to finally receive their messiah!!!! After thousands of years of waiting folks...

This is why I really think we have to be careful when we talk about this stuff. And we need to be really careful when we are dealing with God's plan or His people..

Why? He is still trying to fulfill his promises to them.. He is actually chasing them!!! Beautiful...

I don't have an issue with any of this G, it could very well be that God is still drawing them back to Israel for some future mass conversion. But that does nothing for any of them who lived and died after Christ and before this future event occurs. That's all we're saying.

[Gman]

I don't have an issue with any of this G, it could very well be that God is still drawing them back to Israel for some future mass conversion. But that does nothing for any of them who lived and died after Christ and before this future event occurs. That's all we're saying.

Got ya... But in light of Bryan's last post, that might not always be the case. We just need to be sensitive to this issue.

[jlay]

So it is possible for a Jew, thru God’s divine intervention, come to saving faith in Christ, through Grace by reading the OT.

Can they do that and deny Christ at the same time? I think not. John 3:18
So, are we talking about an issue of revelation here? So we even understand the Jewish faith today? There is a lot of variety. It is not the same as it was in the 1st century. Is a modern Jew even looking at the OT with the same authority as we do? A lot more tradition has crept in. So, if a Jew has knowingly rejected the revelation of Jesus Christ, how can we attribute hope to them?