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By his own confession Peter would not have hesitated to have classed
Cornelius the devout, with the swine and the creeping things which he saw in
the net. Is That the Unity of the Spirit!
A -- What do you intend me to understand then, that Peter had been
wrong all along?
B -- By no means. Peter was right all along. He had no idea such as
that `the church began at Pentecost', and he therefore prosecuted the
commission given to him to urge his own people Israel to repentance. The
thought of such an association with a Gentile as is implied in the idea of
the church was totally foreign to the `apostles' doctrine, and fellowship'.
It is your friends who have departed from the apostles' doctrine, and have
made Scripture void by their traditions.
A -- Why then should Peter have made the change in Acts 10?
B -- Because in Acts 9 the apostle Paul had been called and appointed
as the messenger of the risen Christ to the Gentiles, thereby introducing a
change of dispensation. This was followed by the warning vision to Peter and
by the confession:
`Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life' (Acts
11:18),
a pointless remark if the church began at Pentecost.
Can two Dispensations run together?
A -- In talking over the question of membership of the One Body with
other believers, one of them suggested the possibility of two dispensations
running together at the same time. This I said was absurd, but thought I
would ask you about it.
B -- What makes you think it absurd?
A -- Well, you might as well say that April and May can run together as
to say that two dispensations can run at the same time.
B -- I wonder whether your difficulty arises out of the meaning of the
word `dispensation'. Do you take the word to indicate a period of time?
A -- Yes, just the same as an age.
B -- That is where you are mistaken. Even an age indicates something
more than a period of time, although the time sense is strong, but a
dispensation is much further removed from a time sense than an age. Turn to
Luke 16 and let us consider the first occurrence of the word in the New
Testament.
A -- (Reading the first few verses). I see something here about a rich
man and a steward, and the necessity to render an account of his stewardship,
but I have not come across the word `dispensation' yet.
B -- The word translated `stewardship' is exactly the same as that
rendered `dispensation' in 1 Corinthians 9:17; Ephesians 1:10; 3:2,9 (R.V.);