The record of the New Testament reveals God’s New Testament economy, which is God’s dispensing of Himself into His chosen people for the producing of a corporate Body to express Him. In Ephesians Paul gives us a very high word concerning God’s eternal economy. In Ephesians 1 and 3 we see that the economy of God was made for the purpose of producing a church in Christ. If you read Ephesians 1:9-11 and 3:9-11, you will see not only the economy made by God in Himself according to His good pleasure, but also the goal of God’s economy. The goal of God’s economy is to have the church, which is the corporate expression of God. The church as God’s corporate expression is the consummation of God’s economy.
We have pointed out that according to the principle revealed throughout the Bible, the means of God’s dispensing Himself into us is the divine life, and the way is our eating of Him. Ephesians 1 and 3 show us the economy of God, but in these chapters we do not see either the means or the way for God’s dispensing. But if we read the other books written by Paul, we shall see that the means of God’s dispensing Himself is life and the way for God to dispense Himself is our eating of Him as our food.
After God made His economy, He did the work of selection and predestination. Concerning this, Ephesians 1:4 and 5 say, “According as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blemish before Him, in love, having predestinated us unto sonship through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will.” Here we see that both God’s choosing and His predestinating are for sonship.
The only way to produce sons is begetting, and begetting is a matter of dispensing. How can the Father beget children? The Father begets children by dispensing Himself in His life into those who are to become His children. Perhaps you have never realized that begetting, or propagating, involves the dispensing of life. When Adam begot children, he dispensed his life into them. Through such a dispensing the earth is filled with Adam’s descendants. Just as Adam’s descendants are produced by the dispensing of human life, so God’s sons are produced by the dispensing of the divine life.
If the Father’s life had not come into us, how could we be His sons? This would be impossible. Sonship requires the Father’s life. We are neither God’s sons-in-law nor His adopted sons; we are sons in God’s life and nature. Because we have been born of God and because God has been born into us, we now have God in us. The only way we can be God’s sons is for Him to dispense Himself into us.
For the carrying out of His dispensing, God in eternity past made a counsel with Himself to make certain decisions. First, God decided to create man. Without creating man God would not be able to select certain ones to be His sons. After deciding to create man, God also decided how mankind would be distributed on earth. He made a decision concerning seasons and boundaries so that it would be possible for the chosen ones to be ready and available to receive God’s dispensing.
After God created man and man became fallen, God did not give up on man. Instead, He came in to deal with fallen mankind from Adam to Noah. If we had the record concerning only Adam, Abel, Enoch, and Noah, we would not know what God’s goal is. But as we go on to the record concerning Abraham, we can see God’s goal. God told Abraham that through his seed all the families of the earth would be blessed. Who is the seed of Abraham? Abraham’s seed is Christ, the incarnated God. God’s promise to Abraham, therefore, points toward His dispensing.
After giving further promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, God eventually chose the children of Israel, the descendants of Abraham, and made them His people as a type of the church. They were a people separated for a particular purpose, and that purpose was God’s dispensing of Himself into His chosen people to make them His expression on earth. This expression is the church, of which Israel was a type.
After giving the law and making the old covenant, God promised David, the king of the chosen race, that the fruit of his loins would be the coming Messiah, the Christ. This promise is also related to God’s dispensing. As we consider God’s work in the old dispensation, in His old administrative arrangement, we need to have a clear understanding that this work is with a view to God’s dispensing. The “arrow” of God’s work in the Old Testament always moves toward the goal of God’s dispensing of Himself into His people to produce a corporate expression of Himself.
Finally, in His work in the old dispensation God promised the coming gospel of the new dispensation through the prophets among the chosen race. Prophecies were given concerning the propagation of the gospel. If we read the Old Testament carefully, we shall see this matter.
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