When, at the fullness of time (Gal. 4:4), God determined that His purpose in decreeing the law had been attained and that the law had been used to its full extent, He became flesh, thus terminating the dispensation of law and inaugurating the dispensation of grace. At that time God again changed the way of His work of the new creation on the man of the old creation by replacing the demand of the law with the supply of grace. The dispensation of grace is from Christ’s first coming to His second coming, which will mark the beginning of the millennial kingdom. The dispensation of grace is also the dispensation of the mystery of the church.
When God inaugurated the dispensation of grace, the Triune God became flesh in the Son, who was born of a woman to become Christ, possessing both the divine nature and the human nature and bringing grace and reality (John 1:1, 14, 17). He passed through human life in humanity, experiencing every hardship and suffering. He also lived out the Triune God in humanity. He passed through the death of the cross in humanity, accomplishing an all-inclusive death and releasing the divine life for multiplication and increase to constitute the Body of Christ, which is the church. Moreover, the Triune God was raised from among the dead with a resurrected body in humanity, that the only begotten Son might be born the firstborn Son in His humanity in resurrection. At the same time, those who believed in Christ were regenerated (1 Pet. 1:3) to become His many sons. This Christ, who was resurrected to become the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b), breathed Himself into those who believed in Him (John 20:22) to be the reality of their spiritual life for their spiritual existence and living. Then the resurrected and glorified One was exalted in ascension. He was made both Lord and Christ to be a Leader and Savior (Acts 2:33-36; 5:31), that He might give repentance and forgiveness of sins to God’s chosen people. Moreover, in ascension He poured Himself out as the consummated Spirit of the Triune God (Acts 2:4; 10:44-45), baptizing those who believed and became His members in this consummated Spirit into one Body (1 Cor. 12:13), that they might be His fullness to express Him. These matters include mainly the person and work of Christ and constitute the gospel of God to be preached to sinners, calling those who were chosen of God to believe, to be saved, and to be regenerated. God then constitutes them to be the churches in different localities that the Body of Christ may be fully built up. In this way God obtains all those who believe in Christ in the new testament as the third part and the majority of the new race in God’s new creation, signified by the sun with which the universal woman in Revelation 12 is clothed, for the accomplishment of the constitution of the New Jerusalem to be God’s ultimate and full expression in eternity.
After the conclusion of the dispensation of grace, God will change for the last time the way of His work of the new creation on the man of the old creation. He will set up His kingdom on earth (Rev. 11:15) to carry out His administration, and by His absolute righteousness He will bring to a conclusion the different kinds of people among the human race, that He may accomplish His work of the new creation in the old creation. This dispensation is called the dispensation of the kingdom. In this dispensation righteousness will reign as a king. Hence, this dispensation is also called the dispensation of righteousness. It will cover a period of one thousand years (Rev. 20:4-6), beginning with the second coming of Christ and ending with the putting away of the old heaven and old earth, the old universe.
In this dispensation God, according to His righteousness, will use the manifestation of the kingdom of the heavens to reward the just men perfected in the old testament and the overcoming believers in Christ in the new testament that they may participate in Christ’s kingship and joy. Moreover, according to His righteousness, God will perfect the immature believers in the new testament and also will deal with all the Israelites who repent and believe in Christ at His coming back.
The dispensation of the kingdom, which is the dispensation of righteousness, will be only an age of restoration (Acts 3:21), and as such it will still be a dispensation in the old heaven and old earth of the old creation. This dispensation will be used by God to chasten, to discipline, and to perfect the believers. This means that all the work of the new creation will be completed not in the new heaven and the new earth but in the fourth dispensation in the old creation. God, therefore, will use the last dispensation in the old creation to complete His work of the new creation on the man of the old creation. During this dispensation, God will cause the immature believers in the dispensation of grace to mature in life, and He will cause the repentant Israelites, after the termination of the dispensation of grace, to become constituents of the new race in His new creation. Thus, God will complete the work of the new creation on the man of the old creation in the old creation, a work that will produce and perfect a new race. The people of the new race will be the constituents of the New Jerusalem in the new heaven and new earth in eternity. They are the object that God intends to obtain in His work both of the old creation and of the new creation throughout the generations for the fulfillment of His economy. Therefore, as the aggregate of the result of God’s work of the new creation in all the dispensations within the old creation, the processed Triune God and the transformed tripartite man will be mingled as one to be a mutual dwelling place for His ultimate expression in eternity.
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