Address—C. Hendricks
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Begin this afternoon by singing 330. What raised the wondrous thoughts? Or who did it suggest that we the Church to glory broad should with the sun be blessed. Oh God, the thought was thine, thine only it could be.
The wisdom love divine, peculiar unto thee #330.
When I talk a bit afternoon on the word dispensation, you probably heard of dispensational truth. What does that word mean? It the word is composed of 2 words in the original and it means a house law, the ordering of the house principles upon which the the house is is ordered. A dispensation doesn't mean a period of time.
But.
In a certain period of time, God does administrate his affairs in a certain way, and this differs.
From one dispensation to the next.
And if you don't understand that.
You'll never understand the Bible that he's not dealing today as he dealt before the cross, as he dealt 1500 years from Moses to Christ.
The law was given by Moses.
Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. There's a change of dispensation.
And then there's a future one that the old dispensation prophesied of over and over again.
And that's the millennial Kingdom, when righteousness will reign.
But in order to know.
How we are to conduct ourselves in this present day, We have to understand what dispensation we're living in.
And what are the rules of the house, if I can put it that way?
But is the.
Administrative responsibility that we have.
Recently in our country, in the United States, we had an election and President Clinton went out of office and President Bush came into office.
There was a change in administration.
Or I can say the dispensation changed.
President Clinton ruled things one way.
And President Bush quite differently.
President Clinton was a very brilliant, intellectual, competent man, but morally very wicked President Bush.
Is a Christian.
And he seeks to carry out his administrative responsibility.
Pleasing to the Lord.
Very difficult position he's in.
To be in such a position.
To be a Christian and a politician is just like saying to be black and white at the same time.
Very difficult.
I'm looking at you don't have to turn to it, you know it well. I'm looking at I just want to read a few verses in Genesis 12. Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house unto a land that I will show thee.
That will make of thee a great nation.
And I will bless thee, and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curseth thee. And in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Now we know, we who know the Bible, we know that that great nation came from Abraham.
And then he bore Isaac through Sarah, and Ishmael through Hagar.
And the one was a child of promise, and that was Isaac.
And then Isaac and Rebecca. They had two sons, Esau first born and Jacob.
And we know Jacob had twelve sons, and those were the heads of the 12 tribes of Israel. So we have the nation of Israel formed through those generations, starting from Abraham.
And they were an earthly people.
And to them God gave his law through Moses.
And the dispensation of the law began.
And they had the advantages and the privileges of.
Their religion that the gentile nations round about them did not have.
And they were to bear, they had one main responsibility, the Jewish nation, Israel, and that was to bear testimony to the one true and living God, Jehovah. That was his covenant name in relationship with his people. And they were circumcised as a sign of that covenant.
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They were called the Circumcision and the Gentiles Roundabout. Most of us in this room this afternoon probably come from the Gentile stock, the Uncircumcision.
And so in the Old Testament there were basically two kinds of people in this world. They were the circumcision and the uncircumcision, the Jews, the Israelites and the Gentiles. And after the Lord came here, he was born as a Jew and family.
And we know the history. He lived a perfect life. He died on the cross of ignominy and shame and reproach and dishonor. And that laid the very foundation for God to bring in His eternal purpose of grace with respect to man.
Something that far exceeded what the Jews had in Judaism, and we call that Christianity.
It's founded upon his death and resurrection.
And his ascension to heaven.
And.
Paul was a he was a special administrator of that this precious truth. Now let's turn to 1St Corinthians chapter 4. First Corinthians chapter 4, verse one. Let a man sow account of us as of the ministers of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.
Moreover, it is required in stewards that a man be found faithful.
But with me, it is a very small thing that I should be judged a viewer of man's judgment. Yeah, I judge, not mine own self.
For I know nothing by myself, yet I'm not hereby justified. But he that judgeth me is the Lord.
And then he says, Judge nothing before the time until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, will make manifest the councils of the hearts, and then every man shall have his praise of God.
Well, he was a he was a minister of the mystery, and the steward mystery of Christ, and the stewards of the mysteries of God.
He was one of the stewards and he was especially responsible now that word translated.
Dispensation, sometimes administration, sometimes economy.
We don't have that in our King James, but it is in the new translation.
And sometimes stewardship.
And he was a steward and it was he was responsible to exercise his stewardship faithfully. It's required in stewards that a man be found faithful.
Paul was a faithful steward of what was committed to him.
You remember in Luke 16 or a certain rich man had a steward, and he was accused unto him of acting unfaithfully in his stewardship. And the the Master said, Give an account of thy stewardship, for thou mayest be no longer steward.
It's a solemn thing. Well, Paul was a steward of the mysteries of God, and it was given to him.
Especially.
Of all the apostles of the New Testament to give the ministry that was distinctly Christian?
If someone does not read Paul's ministry, he does not know the mystery, he does not know what dispensation we are in.
And if he reads nothing but the Psalms or the Proverbs or the Old Testament, he won't understand some of the things that we're going to have before us this afternoon.
We have to know where we are and if you were a.
If you were a Butler or a maid in a certain house.
And the Master of the House had certain rules and regulations by which you were to serve him.
You would have to know what those were, and you would have to execute your function as a steward faithfully in order to meet with his approval.
If you then left that employment and went to another house and you found out that your new master had different regulations and rules in his house that he wanted you to go by, you would have to learn those and you wouldn't be able to apply the ones that you had applied when you were with that first master because now you're in a different dispensation, if you will, a different stewardship.
Same word. Same word in the original language. Stewardship, dispensation, Administration.
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Economy.
And you would have to handle his affairs faithfully.
A very good steward in the Old Testament was Joseph. He was put in Potiphar's house and he handled Potiphar's affairs. Potiphar turned everything over to him and he was a very faithful steward.
Well, this man in Luke 16 was not.
Give an account of thy stewardship. Thou mayst be no longer steward.
Now we know the we won't turn to it for lack of time, but in Revelation One the Lord appears to John as the Son of Man standing in the midst of 7 golden candlesticks and they represent the seven churches prophetic history of the church that were given.
To see in Revelation 2 and 3.
And he's standing there with eyes as a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brasses burning in a furnace. His voice is the sound of many waters, and he's saying, Give an account of thy stewardship, for thou mayest no longer be steward. We're going to have to give an account of how we have carried on his affairs as his stewards.
In that coming day.
Paul was a faithful steward.
How faithful have we been?
When we think of all that has been entrusted to us, this little small company that I'm facing this afternoon probably has more light and more knowledge and more truth than.
The greatest percentage, the greater percentage of Christendom.
What are we doing with it?
Are we living our lives just as though we were not stewards just to please ourselves?
And to do our own will, or are we here in a responsible position as stewards like Paul was, to carry on the the new ministry, the new era that had come in?
You see, there are those today and there I've come across this on this trip several times that have been disturbed and some even have left us and gone to those that hold to covenant theology.
Basically, they've gone back from Philadelphia to Sardis.
And the next step is to go back to Thyatira.
Which is Romanism? Sad.
They don't see that there's a vast difference between Israel.
His nation that he kept separate, and they were to be separate from the Gentile nations round about. And that's the only nation, by the way, in this world that's ever existed that was really a theocracy. They had God as their king.
In our country we say 1 nation under God.
Well, it's nice sounding.
But it's not true.
Because we don't have in our country. You don't have in your country one God.
That is worshipped here many gods, false gods and so on.
There's only one true God. Israel had the true God in their midst and then they they failed in that responsibility. And, and when we see what the mystery is, that's the main, that's the main line of truth that's been committed to us to uphold and maintain in this present day as faithful stewards.
And of course, the question is, are we faithful or unfaithful stewards in the discharge of this responsibility? Let's turn to the 9th chapter of First Corinthians in the 9th chapter.
Now, in some of these verses that I'm going to refer to, I'm going to have to correct them, and I'm using the new translation to do so in order to get the real force.
1St Corinthians 9 Paul says verse 16.
For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of, for necessity is laid upon me. Gay woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel.
For if I do this thing willingly.
I have a reward.
But if against my will, the new translation reads that, I believe much better, if not of my own will. It's not that it was against his will, but it was not of his own will. He was doing it out of a responsibility that had been entrusted to him, and that responsibility was a dispensation of the gospel is committed.
Unto me new translation says unto me.
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An administration of the Gospel has been entrusted.
Administration has been entrusted of the gospel, not really there. So he had an administration that he was responsible to be true and faithful to. It cost him much, it cost him persecution, it cost him privation, it cost him all kinds of hardships through which he went in his service for the Lord Jesus.
An administration was entrusted to him.
Now let's back up to the second chapter. Don't want to miss that in the 2nd chapter, Paul says. And I'll pick it up in verse 5.
Verse 4 And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.
Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect, yet not the wisdom of this world.
No, He wasn't speaking the world's wisdom, nor of the Princess of this world that come to naughty. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto our glory, which none of the Princess of this world knew. For had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory if the world had known.
What the mystery really was, and that it was founded upon in order for God to bring out His eternal purposes of grace.
That's the mystery Christ in the church.
It had to be founded upon the Lorde death.
Had to be founded upon the Lord's death. Well, they Princess of this world didn't know that, and they crucified the Lord of glory.
In doing so, they laid the very basis for and the establishment of.
The mystery.
Those blessings that God would bring in.
Founded upon his death.
And resurrection.
Now this mystery was hidden. Notice it says we speak the wisdom of God in the mystery, even the hidden wisdom.
Which God ordained before the world.
Unto our glory. And he says in verse 9, But as it is written, I hath not seen, nor ear heard.
Neither have entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.
Now, those are the things that we're talking about that Paul was the steward of. He had a stewardship to be true to the truth that characterizes Christianity. We're living in a so-called Christian nation. Well, I'm in Canada now.
I don't think Canada is a Christian nation anymore, but the United States is still considered such.
It really isn't.
Never really was, but.
We're responsible for the amount of light that we have. It's tremendous responsibility, things that God has prepared for them that love him. But if you look around in Christendom, whether it's Canada or the United States, and try to get an idea of what Christianity really is, you'll never be able to find it.
You just won't be able to find it.
You have to go to the word of God.
And then you have to judge everything that you see out there that calls itself Christian by the word of God.
You don't make the mistake of judging the Word of God by what you see in Christendom.
Because then you will misjudge it.
And you may even say that as the covenant theologists say that the Christianity is an extension of and a continuation of Israel. It's nothing of the kind.
It's a mystery, a secret that was never divulged nor revealed in the Old Testament. Yes, there are types of it in the Old Testament, but you could never read those types properly if you didn't have the revelation of it given to us in the New Testament.
Once we have the revelation of it in the New, knowing that it's the church, the body of Christ composed of Jew and Gentile, united to 1 Newman glorified man in heaven. That's the mystery. Christ in the church. You don't get anything like that in the Old Testament, not at all.
And I don't know how any men can say from reading this book that the church was in the Old Testament.
It's not those that gave us the King James translation didn't know what I'm saying right now because they refer to the church at the headings. You look at the headings of your pages over the psalms and over some of the prophets and it'll say the church did this or the church did that. It wasn't the church at all. The church didn't exist until the day of Pentecost, Acts chapter 2 after Christ was dead raised.
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Risen and glorified, and then he sent down the Holy Spirit.
To unite into one body all believers and to himself on high.
You remember after his resurrection in Acts 1, the disciples said to him, Wilt thou at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel? They still had Jewish hopes and Jewish thoughts and Jewish expectations, looking for the Kingdom to be established.
The two on the road to Emmaus, Well, they said to the Lord. We barely thought that it was he that would have ushered in the Kingdom, that this was our Messiah. Now he's dead. Our hopes are gone.
They didn't know they were talking to the risen Christ.
Well.
Wonderful.
That he has given us.
His revelation?
Of himself.
In the New Testament, I've turned back to Romans 16, just a couple of verses there, verse 25, the end of the chapter.
Now to Him that is of power to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began. So you can search for this mystery of Christ in the church in the Old Testament. It is not there. It's there in type, yes, but it's not there as revealed because it was a secret hidden God.
And made known.
But now is made manifest. Now is made manifest, and by the prophetic scriptures that ought to read. It's not the scriptures of the Old Testament prophets that he's talking about here, but prophetic scriptures, the New Testament.
According to the commandment of the everlasting God of the eternal God made known to all nations for the obedience of faith. Now what is the obedience of faith? It's that we learn to think God's thoughts.
We we accept the truth of the mystery, if we if I was a Jew.
And had been raised that way and taught that we Jews are above the Gentiles. We look upon them as Gentile dogs. The uncircumcision. You remember when the Lord talked to the Syrophoenician woman who came to him and wanted her daughter healed? He said, it is not me to take the children's bread and to cast it to the dogs. I'm only sent to the lost sheep of the House of Israel. And you're, you're a.
You're a gentile dog.
And she said, she took that place. She said truth, Lord, but even the dogs under the table eat of the crumbs which fall from their master's table. And he said, Oh woman, greatest thy faith. And he healed her daughter. He would not refuse faith, but she had no claim upon him as the son of David. She was not a Jewish, she was a Gentile.
But he would not refuse her faith, but he let her know that he was not sent to the Gentiles, not not when he was here as a man on earth. It was not until he died and rose again. And you remember Mary when he said to her name Mary, she, she said Rabonai and she would have touched him. She would have plunged to him and and held on to him. He said, touch me not. You can't have me back as Messiah to Israel, Mary.
I'm risen now and haven't descended to my Father, but when I do, I will send down the Holy Spirit. He didn't say all this to her, but this is what was involved in what He did say.
I will send down the Holy Spirit and you will then be part of the assembly, which is my body.
The fullness of him that filleth All in all. Ephesians one truth tremendous.
Tremendous truth that is given to us in the Word of God.
So what does he say to her? Go to my brethren, and tell them, I ascend unto my Father, your Father, to my God, and to your God. That was never, never known by the Jews of the Old Testament and the Gentiles. They were even farther off than the Jews were. But even the Jews with the dispensational nearness in which they were, they could not call God their Father. They knew him as Jehovah.
And the Gentiles knew him as Elohim.
But not his Father. It took the coming into the world of the Son of God.
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The eternal Son of God to introduce to us that wonderful word, Father.
And when he did that, they accused him of blasphemy. Thou being a man, makest thyself God.
Because he called God his Father, He was indeed saying, I am the Son.
From all eternity, and He is my Father and having done the work of redemption.
He dies, rises again, sends down the Spirit, and brings us into the same nearness of relationship that was his as a man down here.
And unites us to himself.
And to one another as members of his body.
Going over a lot of truth here that we'd have to turn many pages in order to uncover, but I think I'm talking to those that are familiar with these passages that I allude to. We are the most privileged, the most blessed people that have ever, ever lived or ever will live on this planet. We've been brought into a place of relationship and nearness and favor that exceeds that of the angels or any other created intelligences.
The bride of the Lamb, the bride of Christ, one with him.
United to him by the Holy Spirit, and every single one of us in dwelt of the Holy Spirit.
And the Spirit of God collectively dwells among us and in our midst and unites us to Himself as members of His body. These two tremendous, wonderful truths while he talks about this mystery, Romans 16, which was kept secret since the world began. It's an eternal secret that has now been divulged.
The last shall be first in the first last he's kept. The last he's kept the best for last.
And you and I are privileged to be participants in this greatest of all blessing. I don't know anything more sorrowful than to see any one of us.
Anyone of us.
With this wonderful revelation of the mystery of Christ in the church, we're living in the dispensation of the mystery.
I haven't turned to that yet, but it's in Ephesians 3.
And it's also called the dispensation of the grace of God.
Far better than the law.
The law could only condemn and curse and slay the disobedient. Grace justifies.
Blesses and gives life and that all flows from the heart of God when we believe. It's sad to see any of us going out after the the the bubbles of this world.
And we've been presenting in the last reading meeting the seriousness of going after these things that cannot satisfy the soul.
And we would be unfaithful stewards of what the Lord is entrusted to us.
To go out after that, which is only for time.
Well, let's turn to the.
The 2nd chapter of I've already read that. Let's turn to Ephesians 1.
This looks on.
Ephesians One.
I'll begin with verse 7. Christ, in whom we have redemption through his blood.
The forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace.
Wherein he hath abounded toward us.
In all wisdom and prudence.
Whenever you get those two words put together in a passage, right away you can look for the mystery, wisdom and prudence, because that's the wisdom of God to have a bride for His Son.
And to bring her into the nearest relationship possible so that she shares everything that he has.
That's our place.
Wherein He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known unto us the mystery of His will. Now here it's the mystery of His will. We get the mystery three times in Ephesians first chapter, third chapter in the 5th chapter, but here it's the mystery of His will. According to His good pleasure, everything in Ephesians 1 flows out of and from Himself.
If you analyze most of the ministry that you hear from the camp, it's mostly centered in me, in man.
But this ministry is centered in Christ and flows from Him.
Having made known unto us the mystery of His will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in Himself, His will, his good pleasure purposed in himself. These are all expressions that are repeatedly given to us in this first chapter.
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That in the dispensation there is that word, the administration, the economy, the the stewardship, all those are all the words translated from the same Greek word. That in the dispensation of the fullness of times. When is that?
Well, that's the millennial reign of Christ when he reigns for 1000 years.
He might now the King, James says, gather together in one doesn't really express what it says in the original, and I quote it from the new translation to head up all things in the Christ.
Both which are in heaven and which are on earth, even in Him.
In whom we also have obtained an inheritance to head up all things in the Christ.
Now the Old Testament spoke about the Messiah, the Son of Man, in Daniel 7.
Inheriting a Kingdom and everything would be placed under him, his earthly Kingdom.
His disciples asked him that in Acts 1 Wilt thou at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel? And he said, It is not for you to know the times of the seasons which the Father has placed in His own authority, but ye shall receive power after that. The Holy Ghost has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and unto the ends of the earth.
That's Christianity that was going to be reduced, introduced something altogether new, something that went so far beyond anything the Jews had in the Old Testament. You have to remember how difficult it was for Jews to accept the Christian message, because after all, the Jews were given their law and all the ordinances and all the ceremonial and the whole thing with the Tabernacle, the temple, the priesthood, the sacrifices.
That was all given to them and regulating their society and how they were to live. The house was ordered. There's that word house order. That's dispensation, the economy, how that was ordered. It was ordered differently. It was ordered on the principle of law and they had it from God.
And now here we have the apostle introducing something altogether different. Not an extension of Judaism, not an improvement on something altogether different. Judaism was a system that held out earthly blessings and temporal blessings, material blessings.
Blessings of the womb, the herds, the crops, everything. To a godly Jew he would be given, but the Lord surprised the Jews when he said it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom God.
Who then can be saved? They thought that to be rich was the sign of God's approval. But the Lord said to his disciples in the world, ye shall have tribulation, Be of good cheer. I have overcome the world. He was rejected. We're following. And we got to remember this, beloved, we're following a rejected Christ.
Were united to a man whom they cast out, spit in his face, crowned him with thorns, smote him, insulted him, cast every indignity they could upon him, and finally they said, we don't want this Mandarin over us. Crucify him.
Crucify him. And they did.
And we're united to that man, and if we're true to him and live faithfully separate from this world, it will think the same of us.
If the world hates you, you know that it hated me.
If you were of the world, the world would love his own, but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hated you.
Those that are Christian leaders and Christendom and promoting and almost making Christians that don't go to the voting box on voting day and, and, and, and deriding them because they're not doing their Christian responsibility. They are doing their Christian responsibility. If they don't partake of politics and those things, that's not Christianity. That's just an updated form of Judaism. We're not an earthly people.
We're a heavenly people. We're not material in our blessings.
And that's why it's so hard for us to get ahold of because we have so many material blessings, so many of those kinds of blessings, and we think that's a sign of God's favor upon us. Our blessings are not that kind. Our blessings are spiritual. Our blessings are heavenly. I've told this story before.
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A man was working on an assembly line and he was being faithful in his ministry. Souls were getting saved and he was passing out tracts to them. And Satan has a little conference with his demons.
How can we stop John Doe down there from his evangelistic and successful evangelistic efforts? And one of the demons spoke up and said, give him a promotion, put him in management. That will close his mouth. He won't be able to talk to his fellow workers because he will be a cut above them. And I know exactly what that is, exactly what that is. You don't have the same contact with your people as a manager over them that you do as a fellow worker. And So what we sometimes call a blessing.
To us is really not so. They probably thought that when Peter was in prison that was a terrible thing, and they prayed earnestly that he should be released, and he was, and he came to the door and knocked, and they wouldn't believe it was he till they finally saw him.
They probably thought the same when Paul's mouth was shut by putting him in prison. And because he was in prison, he gave us Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, First and Second Timothy. He gave us some of these precious epistles that he probably wouldn't have had time to write if he was free.
So sometimes the Lord will set us aside and it will be for blessing to others, Maybe not easy for ourselves, certainly wasn't easy for him to be in prison. No, it wasn't. He was not a prisoner of Rome. He was a prisoner of the Lord. He took it from the Lord. The Lord sent me here and he was full of joy and rejoicing and the ministry that he gives from that dark, dinky, danky prison that he was in.
Is the highest ministry that God has been pleased to give us. Thoughts of man are not meant. Thoughts of God are not man's thoughts.
That in the dispensation of the fullness of times, the coming day when Christ will reign here with his bride alongside of Him.
He might head up all things in the Christ, the Christ, Christ in the church. The Christ is not just Christ alone, but Christ and his bride. We will sit with him, reign with him, share everything with him. In Romans 8 it says if you are children, then you are heirs. Who's heirs? Heirs of God. What are we heirs to? Joint heirs with Christ.
So everything that he has won is man, he's going to share with us and we can be attracted. Shame on us, shame on me.
Shame on us when we're attracted by the gaudy tinsel that this world offers to us.
I saw a young child playing with his toy. Mother was there, it was in a department store. And I said to her.
His toys aren't as expensive as ours, are they?
We all have toys.
But ours cost more.
Choice. Things that have no eternal value, things we spend money on, time on, and all kinds of things when the work of the Lord languishes.
Well, there's a dispensation of the fullness of times coming when all will be headed up in Christ, the Christ, Christ in the Church, and they're both witches in heaven and witches on earth. You don't get that in the Old Testament. That's a secret that was not revealed until the new, now the third chapter.
In the second verse he says, If ye have heard of the dispensation.
Of the grace of God. That's what we're living. We're living in that dispensation.
A dispensation is not a period of time. It's a way that he is acting the way he is ruling his house in a particular period of time. Yes, it's connected with time, but it's not time itself, it's a mode of dealing.
His dispensation, his stewardship.
The stewardship of the grace of God.
We're talking a bit about that in the reading this morning.
Of the grace of God, which has given me to you word.
How that by revelation He made known unto me the mystery, as I wrote a four in few words, whereby when you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ.
Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed into unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.
These covenant theologians, they say the mystery is in the Old Testament. It is not. Absolutely is not.
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It's a secret not revealed until through Paul. He was the vessel. He was the instrument. He was the steward to whom God entrusted the mystery.
And he brought it out.
And only he.
Only He brought it out. You don't read Paul's ministry. You will not get for your soul the chiefest blessing that God has brought us into in this dispensation of the grace of God.
And the dispensation of the mystery, that's where we're living today, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit. You, I can hear you saying, I thought you just said it was only revealed to Paul. No, it was only given to Paul to bring out.
But it was revealed to the other holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit so that when he brought it out, they wouldn't say, wait a minute, Paul, we don't know anything about this. They knew it was revealed to them.
But it was only given to Paul to minister that precious truth, and he consists of three things. Verse 6, that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs. Fellow heirs with whom? With the Jews, With the Lord himself, fellow heirs with the Jews. There, that's a thought never crossed the Jewish mind. They were always the head, the Gentiles were the tail, but fellow heirs.
And of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel. Now I'm going to read that verse as it is in the new translation, that the Gentiles should be joint heirs.
And a joint body, and joint partakers of his promise in Christ.
By the Gospel.
Notice what it says in verse 12 of chapter 2, and he's speaking to the those that had believed among that were Gentiles, that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
That's what they were as Gentiles, and all of us here that were Gentiles, that's what we were. And now we've been brought in. But now.
Verse 13 of chapter 2 Now in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were far off dispensationally at a distance, are made 9 by the blood of Christ. Now that's a vital nearness. That's not like the dispensational nearness that the Jew had, but it's a vital nearness. We're made nigh by the blood of Christ. Verse 6 again of chapter 3 that the Gentiles should be joint heirs.
Joint heirs with Christ and with.
Jews. Gentiles.
And of the same body, joint body with Jews.
And joint partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel. He develops that in in the second chapter.
Where he says.
Verse 14 He is our peace.
Who have made both Jew and Gentile one have broken down the middle wall of partition between us.
Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, for to make it himself of Twain, of Jew and Gentile, 1 Newman.
So making peace, the Newman is due in Gentile united into one body, and to the head in heaven, and that he might reconcile both Jew and Gentile unto God in one body, by the cross having slain the enmity thereby. That's what he's.
Telling us is that mystery, that hidden secret.
Something that when Peter wrote his second epistle, he speaks of our beloved brother Paul, who in his epistles has things hard to be understood.
Very hard for a Jew to understand that there's no advantage of a Jew today.
We're one in Christ, Jew and Gentile, one body united together, no difference.
No difference as to our sinnership, no difference as to our saintship, no difference as to the position that we occupy. And if there's a movement that ever comes up amongst us or any other group of Christians setting certain group, a certain part of the company on a higher spiritual level than others, that's false. That's Judaism in principle.
Grace puts us all on the same ground. We're all ruined.
Lost with no righteousness of our own.
And he picks us up and sets us amongst Princess, unites us to himself and to one another. He's done the impossible.
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One body composed of Jew and Gentile.
I'll tell you another thing that's impossible, and that's for man to get the Muslims and the Jews together.
Peace treaty. It's impossible. Man will never do it.
But God will.
God will do it.
He'll do it after He raptures us to heaven.
And then he will take up Israel again.
Let me go on.
Let me read on a little bit in verse 9.
Well, in verse 7.
Wherever I was made a minister, Paul says, according to the gift of the grace of God-given unto me by the effectual working of his power unto me, who am less than the least of All Saints. Is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all men see what is the now that word fellowship should be administration.
What is the administration or the dispensation or the economy or the stewardship? Same word.
Of the mystery.
So here you have the administration or the dispensation of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God.
Who created all things by Jesus Christ never revealed. You won't find it in the Old Testament.
We often think of the Bereans who were more noble than those in Thessalonica in that they searched the Scriptures daily.
To see if these things were so.
Well, that's wonderful to read that, but if they had searched the scriptures of the Old Testament.
Searched and searched and searched for the mystery. They wouldn't have found it. It wasn't there.
That was a secret.
Hitting God. I like to illustrate it this way. The the full revelation of God was incomplete.
Until Paul brought out the truth of the mystery. It's like a pie with a piece cut out. Lady of the house serves the pie. They said you got a piece missing. Yes, I know that. And then she brings in in a plate that piece and she puts it in place. And that's the truth of the mystery. And that's what Paul says in Colossians, that this completes the word of God.
Completes the revelation.
For any of us, for anyone to pretend to have fresh revelations today when the word of God is complete, it's false. The Mormons say they have 12 apostles. They are false. Apostle whole system is false. But you can test the claims of these cults and these false groups by the word of God.
The word of God is complete.
Those that say they have tongues today, that's false. By the end of the 1St century, tongues ceased. And the Christians of the 2nd century said what happened to the gift of tongues? Well, it was used to introduce, to substantiate, to reinforce the truth of Christianity.
This new faith that was coming in the religion of the Nazarene, as they called it, and once it was established and the word of God was finished.
We have it.
You know this is the most precious thing I possess the word of God.
I hope you can say the same thing. Far more important than my car, my house, any of my other possessions, the word of God. If I had to make a choice which would I part with last? It would be this, because this is the word of God.
There's nothing more important.
Than his.
You value that much, Do you really value it that much? I have known of not known them, but I've known of those that have walked many, many miles just to have a Bible and we have it complete. What a wonderful.
Thing that is turn to Colossians 1, Colossians one verse 23 if you continue in the faith.
Grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven, whereof I, Paula, made a minister. He was a minister of the gospel.
But he was minister of something else who now rejoice in my sufferings for you and I fill up I complete.
That which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake, which is the Church, where I have, whereof I am made a minister according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me for you to fulfill or to complete the Word of God.
Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his Saints, to whom God would make known. What is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles?
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Which is Christ in you?
The hope of glory in Ephesians. We are in Christ before God.
That's our standing and here in Colossians Christ is in us, the hope of glory. If he's in us and he's going to come back, we expect we will be with him when he comes, whom we preach, warning every man.
And teaching every man in all wisdom, whenever he talks about the mystery, wisdom is connected with it because this is the wisdom of God, that she may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. You don't understand the mystery if you've never read Pauls ministry. You're not perfect, you're not full grown, you're not a mature Christian at all. Just obey like Paul said of the Corinthians, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. Mature.
Whereunto I also labor striving according to his working, which worketh in me mightily for what I would that she knew what great conflict I have for you.
And for them at Laodicea.
And for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh.
That their hearts might be comforted being knit together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding.
Now I'm going to correct this.
To the acknowledgement of the mystery of God, that's where that verse should end. The end of the Father and of Christ should not be there. In which? Not in whom? In which? In which mystery are hid all the treasures.
Of wisdom.
And knowledge now Paul suffered.
Tremendously that the Saints might have.
The truth of the mystery. How many?
How many Christians in this nation know what I've been talking about?
This afternoon, is this strange to you?
Are you acquainted with this? You should be.
You should be.
One more verse and then we'll close. First Timothy one First Timothy 1.
Verse 3.
As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus.
When I went into Macedonia, that thou might discharge some that they teach no other doctrine.
I believe he's referring to the doctrine of the mystery.
And I'll tell you why. Look at the next verse. Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions rather than godly edifying, which is in faith. So do.
New translation reads rather than.
The dispensation which is in faith.
That which had been entrusted to him. It's interesting, when I looked at the Textus Receptus, which is the Greek text that formed the basis for the King James translation, it reads exactly like Mr. Darby reads it. Furtherance of the dispensation.
Not, as it reads here, edifying. And the difference between the two words is just one letter, one letter. But they didn't follow in this instance. They didn't follow the Greek text that they were translating from, they followed another one.
Strange, isn't it?
Why? Because they didn't understand what he meant, I believe, when he said rather than further God's dispensation.
Paul wanted to further God's dispensation. He wanted the Saints of God to understand what was the true character of the dispensation in which they are placed, dispensation of the grace of God and the dispensation of the mystery.
We're not to act towards one another on the principle of law. We're to act on the principle of grace. That's the way God is acting towards us.
Grace and according to the revelation of the mystery, wonderful what we have, but how many know it? How many can act that way? You see, you can't, you can't be a faithful steward. You can't act faithfully in in your stewardship if you don't understand what it is. What are the what are the house laws of that stewardship?
That's what the word stewardship or dispensation or administration or economy. Another word, economy.
From which you get economist. The one thing that has caused more marital problems of anything, in my opinion, is getting into debt, getting into debt, not having enough money to pay your debts.
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And one blames the other for purchasing something we didn't need. And so on and so on and so on. And to be a faithful economist, to handle funds faithfully. And we have something far more important than material things. We have the truth of God.