God And His Word - A Question And Answer Approach To Understanding The Bible

-------- What Do the Interpreters Say?- ------

• The Kingdom of God is the unifying theme of biblical history. • The messianic/Davidic reign has been initiated in heaven by Christ. • The new covenant is already in force, with the full blessings to be realized in the Millennium. • Many promises formerly relegated to the millennial King dom are currently seeing fulfillment because of Jesus' reign on the Davidic throne in heaven (as, forgiveness of sins and Holy Spirit ministry), with complete fulfillment at the Sec ond Coming. • The importance of Israel and her future in Palestine is down played, and far more emphasis given to the Church and her present and future roles in the plan of God. • The Church is not just a new people group, but redeemed humanity, including both Jews and Gentiles. There is still place, however, for God's special promises to literal Israel. • Prophecies referring to the nation and land of Israel are in terpreted literally, and the Millennium will have a distinc tively Jewish character. • The customary dispensations of biblical history have been restructured into four periods: the patriarchal (Adam to Sinai), Mosaic (Sinai to the ascension of Christ), ecclesial (the ascension to the Second Coming) and Zionic (part 1, the Mil lennium; part 2, the eternal state). • All the dispensations are related to the final dispensation, and the gradual development toward that goal is what gives progressive dispensationalism its name. 21

Reading That Promotes the Progressive Dispensational Approach 22

• Blaising, Craig A. and Darrell L. Bock. Progressive Dispensa tionalism (Victor/BridgePoint, 1993). • , eds. Dispensationalism, Israel and the Church: The Search for Definition (Zondervan, 1992).

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