glorydaz
Well-known member
I know that you're not going to accept what I'm going to say here and I don't want you to think that I'm over simplifying a response to such a lengthy post. I assure you that I am not. I know I normally respond in a point by point manner but it doesn't make sense to do so here because the issue can't be successfully broached by looking at details. It's a paradigm level (i.e. big picture) issue.
Your post is practically a text-book example of doing precisely what Mid-Acts Dispensationalism specifically allows one not to have to do. I mean, I literally could not have manufactured a more perfect example of just the exact sort of hermaneutics that Mid-Acts Dispensatioopnalism renders unnecessary if I had tried to do it. And I feel like I could do it pretty well if I tried!
When discussing law vs. grace (or any one of several other doctrinal issues), if you take dispensationalist out of the general Christian population and and set them aside, what you'd be left with, generally speaking, is a Christian population made up of two main groups. One group places their theological emphasis on the Pauline epistles and interprets the rest of the New Testament in light of those letters. The other group does the opposite; they interpret Paul in the light of the rest of the New Testament. The first group will take Paul to mean what he says but are forced to interpret Peter, James and John in order to fit with Paul. The second group does just the exact opposite. They take Jesus and the Twelve to mean what they say while Paul is interpreted accordingly. You are squarely in the later group. Incidentally, most people in both groups are not conscious of doing this. They just think their reading the Bible - thus my difficulty! The power of paradigm is a real doozy!
It is dispensationalists and Mid-Acts Dispensationalists in particular, that see that both groups have missed the fact that God changed something when He cut Israel off and turned instead to the Gentiles. For us the Bible is far easier to read and understand because I don't have to worry about whether Paul says the opposite of what James said (Rom. 4 vs James 2). There is no need to reconcile the two. They said different things because they were talking to a different set of people under a different set of rules (i.e. a different dispensation). Thus I don't interpret Paul in the light of James and I don't interpret Jesus in light of Paul or any other such thing. I read Jesus' words and take them to mean precisely what they say. I do the same for Peter, James, John and Paul and any other New Testament author.
Not only do I get to read the text and understand it to mean what it says but this understanding of a new dispensation starting with Paul also just happens to effortlessly resolve all kinds of seemingly unrelated doctrinal issues that have been debated and even fought over in the church for centuries. All because of a super simple idea that the Bible states as plain as day.
Further, not only are a great many doctrinal debates effortlessly resolved but several other New Testament oddities are explained. Things like the existence of Paul's ministry (i.e. where's the need for a thirteenth apostle?) and why did the Twelve force the believers under their authority to live in a commune and why did Paul refer to the gospel as "my gospel" and why was it necessary for him to explain "his gospel" to the Twelve? All of which (and a few other things) are, once again, resolved intuitively if one simply understands that Paul's ministry (and thus his gospel) was not the same as that of the Twelve.
Now, whether you accept all of that as true or not, think about what it would mean if it were true. IF what I am claiming here is actually true, what more powerfully eloquent argument could there be for a systematic theology than that?
I'll let you mull that over and I'll leave you with one additional point...
If Paul was preaching what you are saying he was preaching in the above post, why would Paul have been accused of teaching people that we can sin that grace may abound?
Have you ever been accused of preaching anything like that? I have! By you, no less! (In so many words)
Resting in Him,
Clete
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