In early 1992, I was invited by Dr. Ernest Pickering, pastor of Fourth Baptist Church and president of Central Baptist Theological Seminary, Minneapolis, to participate in the annual Founders Conference in the seminary. He expressed an opinion that we needed “a clear call on the subject of dispensationalism.” I was honored to be asked and was delighted to go. I suppose there is never a time when we do not need to refresh ourselves on doctrinal truth, especially the distinctives of dispensationalism.

Dispensationalism is simply an approach to understanding the overall storyline of the Bible. As a set of systematized principles and teachings it began about 1825 with John Nelson Darby. However, there were unsystematized principles of a dispensational nature long before him. There has been refinement and modification over the years in dispensational thought. Revision, reevaluation and more precise statement are always ongoing in theology and biblical studies.

A brief historical outline of general dispensational thinking is given here, followed by a discussion of one major area that calls for clarification and/or a renewed understanding.

EPOCHS IN DISPENSATIONAL THOUGHT

Darbyism/Niagara Premillennialism: 1875—1909
Darby’s systematized dispensational thought, developed in about 1825, prevailed in the Niagara Bible Conference (Niagara, Ontario). It had a somewhat official beginning in 1875 with George Needham and James Inglis, and is generally acknowledged to be the inception of the Bible conference movement. The dispensationalism of the conference (not all were dispensationalists) emphasized an almost absolute dichotomy between Israel and the church as two separate peoples of God. The church was a heavenly people and Israel was an exclusively earthly people. It also promoted the pretribulational rapture of the church.

Scofieldism or “Classical” Dispensationalism: 1909—1965
A new era dawned with the publication of C. I. Scofield’s Reference Bible (1909) along with the writings of Lewis Sperry Chafer, A.C. Gaebelein and others. There was a unified approach to all the Bible via seven dispensations. A dispensation was defined as “a period of time during which man is tested in respect to his obedience to some specific revelation of the will of God.”[1] The central thrust was “a period of time.” Classical dispensationalism also vigorously emphasized the two peoples of God in strict dichotomy. Pretribulationalism was also one of the chief components. Dispensationalism fairly dominated the Bible institute, Bible conference and other movements of the time.

Classical premillennial dispensationalism was strongly faced with rebuttal by scholarly thought self-styled as “historic premillennialism.” It was alledged that pretribulationalism began in the early 1800s, whereas premillennialism before was posttribulatlional, going back to the early first- and second-century Church Fathers and continuing through various (relatively small) groups until the 19th century.

The New Evangelical coalition, formed in the 1940s, played probably the largest role in advocating covenant premillennial postribulationism and criticizing dispensationalism. This occurred in the 1950s and ’60s, principally through the energies of George Eldon Ladd, professor at Fuller Theological Seminary. This brought out a strong dispensational response through the studies of Charles C. Ryrie, John F. Walvoord, J. Dwight Pentecost and others, and schools such as Moody Bible Institute, Philadelphia College of Bible, Omaha Baptist Bible College (now Faith Baptist Bible College), Dallas Theological Seminary, Grace Theological Seminary and Talbot School of Theology, to name a very few.

(To be continued)

Dr. Rolland D. McCune served at Detroit Baptist Theological Seminary from 1981 to 2009 as professor of systematic theology, dean of the faculty and president. He previously taught at Central Baptist Seminary for 14 years. He is the author of A Systematic Theology of Biblical Christianity, 3 vols. (Allen Park, MI: DBTS, 2008-2010) as well as other books and many journal articles. It is a truly a blessing to welcome him as a contributing author to Dispensational Publishing House.

Copyright © 2016 by Dr. Rolland D. McCune. Used by permission of the author.

[1] New Scofield Reference Bible (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1967), p. 3. See also p. 5 of the Scofield Reference Bible (1917 ed.).