The Seven Biblical Dispensations

Dispensationalism is the interpretive key that unlocks the pages of Scripture, opens the door for us to understand prophecies, and guides our way of thinking about the plan of divine action for human history.

The foundation of dispensational theology is made up of three complementary principles. The first principle states that the Bible must always be understood according to the obvious and literal meaning of words, including the use of language figures where indicated by the context. A second principle lies in the premise that God has a plan for Israel as an ethnic group and as a nation, a plan distinct from the plan for the New Testament church. The third principle of dispensationalism is that human history is the external and practical form of an eternal plan of God that culminates when He is glorified.

The Greek word for "dispensation", oikonomos, means administration, stewardship. So a dispensation is a distinguishable and identifiable administration in the development of God's design for human history, the book of (Eph 3: 2); (Col.1: 25-26).

God administers all human history as if it were a large family, and moves human beings through sequential stages of his administration. Each phase or dispensation is determined by the degree of revelation that the Lord has provided up to that point in history. This revelation specifies the responsibilities of man, the evidence as to those responsibilities, and the provision of divine grace that provides a solution when something fails.

Although each dispensation has distinctive and identifiable characteristics, the true and the principles of divine revelation and the redemptive plan remain constant. Salvation is by grace, and by faith in Christ. Before the cross, faith anticipated the fulfillment of the promise of salvation through the work of the Messiah.

After the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, faith sets eyes on the past, on its substitutionary atonement consummated on the cross. As the divine revelation advances, other characteristics are modified, such as the practice of animal sacrifice.

Dispensationalists sometimes differ in the exact number of dispensations that have been revealed in Scripture, but they usually mention the following seven:
1. Innocence: from Adam until the fall
2. Consciousness: from the fall to the flood
3. Human government: from the flood to Abraham
4. Promise: from Abraham to Moses
5. Mosaic Law: from Moses to the cross
6. Era of the Church: from Pentecost to the rapture
7. Millennial Kingdom: the literal thousand years of the reign of Jesus Christ after his second coming.

Dispensational theology allows us to correctly understand the prophetic times of God for humanity. The present age does not focus on Israel but on the Church as the people of God.

However, for the prophecy of Daniel (Dan.9: 27) to be fulfilled literally in the same way that the 69 weeks were fulfilled (Dn.9: 25-26), the Church must be removed from the earth. Only then will God begin to fulfill all that he promised Israel in the Old Testament.

This transfer of the Church is called rapture (1Th.4: 16-17), and many dispensationalists believe that it precedes the last seven years of what God has decreed for Israel-an event known as the Tribulation.

These seven years, which technically are the end of the era of the Mosaic Law, begin after the rapture of the Church, and culminate with the second coming of Christ.

So the doctrine of pretribulational rapture of the Church is intimately identified with dispensational theology.

Bibliography: Bible of Study of Prophecy by Tim LaHaye, Reina Valera 1960.