[Music]
welcome to christ the center your weekly
conversation of reformed theology this
is episode number 666
my name is camden busey i'm uh
here at the reform forum studio in
gray's lake illinois
delighted to be back today for a fun
conversation an important one
i'm sure many of our listeners many of
you are going to be interested in this
subject
and have some familiarity with it even
personally but to speak uh on the
subject we have with us for the very
first time
on the program reverend michael glotto
who is the associate professor of
pastoral theology as well as the dean of
the chapel
at reformed theological seminary in
orlando welcome to the program mike it's
good to see you
thank you camden it's great to be with
you i love
uh love the the not just the title but
the
but the focus of christ the center uh uh
i think we have probably a lot of
theological relatives in common
yeah not just uh systematic but probably
biblical theological too so it's a
pleasure to be here absolutely
oh it's our pleasure we're delighted to
meet you kind of in this way
this is the pandemic normal way to meet
now pretty
soon uh and uh we're happy today to be
opening up uh a new ish book i've had it
for a little while a pre-pub copy i
don't know um
exactly when it was published to the day
but we're taking a look at a chapter
from
the new book covenant theology biblical
theological and historical perspectives
which is published by crossway edited by
guy prentice waters nicholas reed and
john meathers we're very thankful for
this book
it's tremendous as an enormous amount of
contributors
all folks you know either professors of
i believe or somehow they're in tied to
reformed theological seminary in its uh
its networks uh but uh our guest today
mike
glotto has written a chapter titled just
simply dispensationalism
so we were joking beforehand this is
entirely unintentional but in the lord's
providence he saw
fit to have episodes 666 on
dispensationalism
and uh we're going to look not just at
the system
of doctrine known as dispensationalism
but looking also at its history and
development
i think to me that's that's fascinating
there's so much there that i would like
to
know more about and this is what got me
so excited about this particular chapter
learning
not just what dispensational is but its
context in american
history also its interaction with
american presbyterianism if i'm not
mistaken started in presbyterianism
and then how that has been developing
over the years into different
stages and variations all the way up to
christian zionism and even today with
various new covenant theologies and and
what we might say for you know
progressive covenantalism and things of
that sort so if you're interested in
topics like this pick up a copy of the
book you will not be disappointed i'm
i'm
working on scheduling interviews with a
lot of contributors
there are many many excellent chapters
and i just haven't even
been able to read a third of them yet
but uh
mike why don't you tell me a little bit
about your work down at rts
and particularly uh how you
you came to contribute this particular
chapter to this wonderful book
uh glad to camden uh i guess
one way of starting is by saying this is
the subject on which i
probably didn't want to become any kind
of
authority congratulations
and you know you know you know because
you're a pastor but
sometimes the we don't get to choose
what we do because we serve the needs of
the church
that's sort of my original trajectory
uh when i was a seminary student
somebody referred to francis schaefer is
a prophetic generalist
and i said that sounds like a good job
description i think i'll do that
and and although my original training
uh is in old testament
i very soon became involved in
teaching preaching i spent 10 years
at the seminary level teaching gospels
as well
and so even though now i'm primarily
pastoral theology and preaching
you know i've come through old testament
and new testament and hermeneutics
which was the focus of my study at
westminster
and so there are a lot of roads that
meet in not only my background
but there are a lot of roads that meet
in the demands of pastoral work
and i've been one of those academicians
who
tend to stand more at the intersections
of things than
being a specialist so that's part of it
i guess being a somewhat qualified
because dispensational involves it
involves hermeneutical issues it
involves
biblical theological issues involves
uh sociological issues indeed yeah
um and uh
in thinking about talking to you i
actually remembered
conversation in back in the 90s i was
teaching a class in the pentateuch i
think it was
and progressive dispensationalism had
come along
and a lot of people in the
dispensational tradition were finding
that a more
compelling explanation of how to read
the bible and i said to my class i said
you know uh we're gonna talk about
dispensationalism but
you have to realize that it's the
classic or traditional dispensationalism
is
rapidly losing
interest in the academic community and
one very
thoughtful and polite middle-aged
student raised her hand and she said
but it's still what everyone in churches
believes
and i said that's that's right that's
exactly right that
uh no matter if on the scholarly level
there are questions being raised
modifications being made people in the
pew
um take a long time to catch up with
that
and here we are 25 years later
and some of these related issues are
actually
at play in the newspapers in terms of
global affairs and things so
when the project of the book on covenant
theology was being put together
i was asked if i would contribute a
chapter
because probably of a number of these
factors old testament new testament
hermeneutics
a lot of pastoral and ecclesiastical
work
i don't think i don't think it was
because they knew
i had gone forward at a baptist revival
to the
sound of larry norman's song i wish we'd
all been ready
[Laughter]
did you ever hear that song as a kid no
i don't think so
definitely not a church classic 1970s
life was filled with guns and wars and
everyone got trampled on the floor
i wish we'd all been ready
then there's a chorus two men walking on
a hill one disappears and one left
standing still
i wish we'd all been ready yeah there's
no time
to change your mind the lord has come
and you've been left behind
that was i was a covenant child baptized
as an infant and
i should have just stuck with that but
anyway i went forward
at a uh at a youth revival to the sound
of that song
now i mentioned that um because
i do want to make clear and i do make
that clear in the article
that we have a lot in common with uh
dispensationalists and we should be
thankful
for ways in which uh dispensationalists
and covenant
theologians have stood together have you
know the battle for the bible
uh the upholding of the historic gospel
uh the necessity of personal faith and
repentance
uh for salvation there's so many so many
things that uh we need to make sure
people understand that we're
appreciative of
uh even even as we're kind of launching
on a little bit of a critique here
and even in my college years or the para
church ministry everybody's heard of
that
also at that time at least was primarily
a dispensational brand
uh and but yet i mean that that ministry
had a
pretty helpful impact in my life in
terms of helping me be a disciple of
christ so
uh so my
i don't know if ligand duncan uh whoever
decided who wrote which chapters knew
that i had
come to faith through a rapture song but
that just
adds to my vitae on this subject i like
it yeah
we all need a new heading there uh you
know
some sort of uh miscellaneous or
whatever i
i it's interesting to hear you you speak
we've been chatting uh the listeners who
know
uh even before we hit the record button
about some
points of biographical intersection in
illinois and uh
particularly down in southern illinois
as as mike
went to university of illinois which is
not exactly southern illinois but um
it's
it's further south in chicago and people
from chicago think it is
and people uh people down south you know
wish chicago was its own state
and illinois might would probably be
better off if it was
uh such as life uh here in in illinois
the
number 50 state in the union um but
you know there's a lot of intriguing
things going on i mean i i went to
bradley university which is
in peoria illinois uh central-ish
illinois but still
north of the capital uh springfield and
there uh you know i attended um
a a baptist church it was it was very
much uh
more in the macarthur vein of things
many of the
professors and the professors some
professors
many of the the pastors were graduates
from the master seminary one was from
dallas
uh so you get a sense of the feel there
but they were
dispensationalists but yet absolutely
committed to the inerrancy of scripture
to expository
preaching in a grammatical historical
vein
but yet they were all five except one
all five point calvinists and the one
was the dallas guy who was more
four-ish you know calvinist so
i i cut my teeth there really i grew up
in the mainline presbyterian church
a conservative one uh but
you know that that was calvinist and
held to held to the inerrancy of
scripture as well
a small country church but when i got to
college
you know i made a lot of friends in the
in the campus ministry as well
and started to hear all sorts of ideas
about things i'd never heard of before
you know i had not read
uh you know the late great planet earth
and
i think the left behind series was just
coming
on the scene or just becoming popular at
least hadn't reached my orbit yet
and then all of a sudden you know it i'm
i'm i'm being asked well don't you know
about the rapture don't you know about
the millennial kingdom and and all this
ordering of things that i
i completely foreign to me it's like a
different religion
and not i'm not saying it is a different
religion but you get my point it was so
foreign to me that i felt like
i felt like what did i i was raised in
the church and
spent my whole life at the church uh and
all of a sudden i never
heard about these things was such a
shock i'm wondering did you feel the
same way when you encountered these
things
the popularization that happened around
mid early 70s was
and i don't know the specific catalyst
for all
that but uh my high school sunday school
class
in the church i grew up in that at least
we spent two years
with the teacher talking about the late
great planet earth really
uh now it was a mainline church where
you know expos story study the bible
inductive study of the bible wasn't
the preferred way of reading the bible
but yeah
but um
one one thing i mentioned in the article
is
we have to pay attention to sociological
factors
often when we look at these especially
these eschatological shifts
norm cohen wrote this uh work on
in uh you can help me with the title
it's
footnote in in the in the article um
about the whole millennial phenomenon as
a sociological phenomenon
and this is certainly true of the
origins of dispensationalism
uh but i would want to put my mind in
terms of this popularization
in the 70s i want to try to put my
finger on some things you know
social upheaval uncertainty certainly
coming out of the 60s and the protest
movements and then you had
the american malaise where things just
felt bad you had
hyperinflation um
and then perhaps too just the the
waning voice of mainstream
christianity i'm talking about mainline
where the preaching of the bible wasn't
i mean once you deconstruct the bible
with critical methodologies you know
what do you say on a sunday morning
and the churches that were vital and
felt a sense of urgency
and so forth you know those tend to be
bible focused and by that time
so many good bible-focused churches have
been
depending on say dallas seminary and
other similar institutions
i've i've heard a story
that i think was fairly typical it was
told to me as a typical story
there's a very well-known presbyterian
church in the east it's now pca but back
then it was still mainline
and the pastor was a sort of a prince of
pulpiteers he was a very notable
expository preacher
and the church was in the united
presbyterian church
and he would he would tell his young men
who wanted to go to seminary who were
going to the ministry
go to princeton just get your degree
just
don't argue with anybody and i'll make
sure you have a church when you get out
so put up with the liberal theology it's
just an
expedience that same pastor one year
when he went to speak at a bible
conference when he learned there was an
amillennial speaker
on the on the agenda he left the
conference it wouldn't
speak wow so
um so within the main within the
northern prison church in particular at
that time there's a certain pragmatism
toward
just getting along with the you know
tolerating the liberalism we'll get our
bible
from the bible conferences we'll get our
bible from dallas seminary we'll
you know we'll depend up upon
those conservative institutions and
perhaps there was a little bit of a
hesitation toward to depend upon the
conservative reformed institutions
because of the history of
tensions you know with the the
presbyterian
uh splinters of the of the 20th century
so
and that's what i'm saying the the the
the bible conference movement the
in in in the in the dispensational
institutions became
the training ground for a lot of in this
case northern presbyterians
and so that would that would
um uh perhaps explain
some of your experience there in peoria
yeah yeah
yeah one thing was the local pca church
uh near where i went to to uh college
was you know effort had a history of
dispensationalism and used to invite
various people to come for these
prophecy conferences
bruce dunn was the pastor this is all
prior to my time but the back in the
history
looking back i think in the 60s and 70s
and then they would invite i think even
dwight pentecost and others would come
and
and and speak on on bible prophecy but
this is all within the presbyterian
church in america
uh you know post uh what is it 73 if i'm
not mistaken
yeah yes but that but that that always
perplexed me so to read your article
and to to start to put some of these
pieces together
is really helpful to me to understand
historically and sociologically
how some of these things happen i think
i think i think there's a good thesis to
be done here
uh if there's the interest level but at
least i was able to figure out
some of this connection between
southeastern michigan detroit
essentially
and st louis uh with ingles and darby
and then ultimately in st louis you know
schofield
launches out of there um of course
interestingly enough peoria is you know
halfway halfway between
and my ordination credentials i
i have an opc friend by the way um
you know the way people refer to their
minority friend i have an rpc friend
uh some of my best friends are opc
people but uh
i'm in the epc uh sort of there's a
whole story there but
um the epc started in 80 81
and i definitely remember encountering
churches from the northern
presbyterian church that were distinctly
dispensational they mean
good solid in terms of the
proclaiming christ and belief in the
inerrancy of scripture and so forth but
i realized there was a whole family out
there
now what i didn't tie in and uh
i don't have the background to do it at
this point but
you know there were certain sympathies
even as the rpces
the reformed presbyterian church
evangelical synod
uh with its
insistence on pre-millennialism
there's certain affinities to
dispensationalism within that movement
too and when the rpces
eventually makes its way into the merger
with the pca
uh all that's to say
even within the pca perhaps at least in
a number of years ago you had people who
more naturally
thought in somewhat dispensational ways
my colleague john meather actually has
written a piece on this
uh it's he's been challenged by my
my wonderful history professor will
barker on that point but
but you certainly have like in the bible
presbyterian church even today
what i would say is clearly identifiable
as dispensationalism
uh kissinger's kissinger's survey of the
history of interpretation of the sermon
on the mount it's a scholarly work
uh on the history of interpreting the
sermon on the mount
the chapter exemplifying
dispensationalism his chapter on
dispensationalism
uses donald gray barnhouse as its
exemplar wow
and barnhouse was the pastor of the 10th
creditor in church
philadelphia you know prior to dr boyce
so that i remember uh when i ran into
that chapter
thinking wow there there clearly is a
dispensational
thread within northern presbyterianism
and by the way a great place in the
bible to go to sort out
whether you are or not a
dispensationalism is i think sermon on
the mount is a good place to go
sure there are other places as well but
is that an ethic
for the people of god today is it an
ethic for a future millennial kingdom
um uh when
when the church is raptured out of the
world
yeah i think it'd be useful just to
spend a moment to talk a little bit
about some of that
early history but even back up before
that
we don't need to get into all the nuts
and bolts of the system of
dispensationalism i would encourage
people to take a look at uh one of our
other programs here on reform forum
uh theology simply profounded a whole
series on dispensationalism rob mckenzie
our friend uh walked through that in in
a lot of its details so many many hours
of material there if you'd like to
follow up and i'll include a link to
that in the episode description for
everyone listening
but it would be worth at least you know
asking the question about the word
itself
dispensation or dispensationalism that's
become kind of the touchstone for this
system but it's
certainly not a word that's foreign to
us presbyterians
in our confession yeah uh it's uh
if somebody doesn't read the confession
before they become reformed or as they
become reformed and then they
they start to read through and they uh
they find that the confession
uses that very word uh in chapter seven
paragraph six of the western confession
like
uh it can be a bit of a crisis so
uh and i address that in the article um
historically christians have agreed that
there are
periods in which i identify or distinct
periods
in which god administers his covenants
if you will and that there are changes
that take place between those epochs
all progressing toward what paul says in
galatians 4 5
is the fullness of time and he says
elsewhere at the at the right time
and so the term itself is not not
necessarily revealing and i
by the way in terms of resources vern
poitras book understanding dispensation
is
it's just a wonderful book on on the
whole subject of
of dispensationalism but he goes into
this um
as does palmer robertson and his book
christ the covenants
uh it's not the fact that there are
dispensations
it's uh what what what we
mean when we say dispensations so a
dispensationalist sees a fundamental
degree of discontinuity between these
periods of history
and in each period of history god
deals with his people in a different way
and he deals with them based on
revelation
specific to that period of history
so every period every dispensation
involves
a new offer of god
uh in order to to in as to how to relate
to him
and then a probation if you will of
mankind
and then inevitably mankind whether it's
in the days of
adam it's in the days of noah moses
abraham ultimately fail
until a future time in which god will
sovereignly
administer his kingdom and overcome
people's failings
but each period has its own
revelation and on that basis
dispensationalists
and we're talking about traditional
dispensationalists not the other
movements which you've
uh needed to here uh dispensationalists
have
have traditionally seen that um the the
the period that we're now
in the church age was unanticipated
and not anticipated in the old testament
and it is the new revelation that goes
with our period
of history uh what is
most that what is uh fairly unique in
in the dispensational scheme at
the moment of christ come coming is that
um
there's a delay of what god would have
done
had the jewish nation accepted jesus as
messiah
and so that delay is going to be the
until the future kingdom happens through
the second coming of jesus so we're in
this
previously undisclosed period of time
which is how they explain the word
mystery
say is it paul uses it in ephesians i
don't think that's the
best way to understand that term they
say it was something hidden
but now it's been revealed because
israel rejected jesus so everything
hinges
upon the rejection of jesus and this is
i know we're not getting into
hermeneutics yet but to me this presents
a
tremendous hermeneutical leap because
you have the old testament meaning
something that it didn't mean
until israel rejected jesus and that's
that's that runs directly contrary to
how the new testament writers treat the
old testament
yeah when they talk about the it's
fuller sense it's
it senses plenty or that the
significance of scripture seen in the
full light of jesus
life death burial and resurrection uh
it's
it's what shines the light back on the
full meaning of the old testament
and so dispensationalism says you know
it would not have meant those things had
israel not rejected jesus
yeah it's definitely contrary to what
you know what we understand in reform
biblical theology especially with
one of our favorites here gerhardis boss
this organic progressive unfolding and
development
of the old testament into the new we
don't see those as a sharp distinction
clearly their
god is is is revealing himself
progressively
and in different ages and different
times and it's important
not only to understand what god has said
but when and to whom and
how uh but what we find in
dispensationalism is
is uh this particular type of
hermeneutic we can discuss but also
an a priori distinction between israel
and the church
which is right in line with with what
you're speaking of there
it it just given the categories that are
adopted in advance
the the old testament simply cannot mean
what the reformed church
understands it to mean yeah or what the
apostles
seem to be treating it as or the book of
hebrews for example
you know and and it's funny you
mentioned that camden because
the summer before i started seminary i
was a bible study was dropped in my lap
to lead at the at the church where i was
a member and a deacon
and for some reason i chose the book of
hebrews there you go
um and for me when i started learning
about reformed theology
in general i had been taught
we believe what the bible teaches and so
when i
calvinism reformed theology wasn't that
hard for me because
it seemed to be pretty obvious and
reading through the book of hebrews it
seemed to be pretty obvious that the
whole old testament was about jesus
and in that kind of simple way at that
time that i understood it
but uh what you what you you you said ah
priori and i think that's
very important to understand in the
beginning of the article
i pick up on something that both
robertson and poytheist poythers
mentioned and um particularly poetry's
if you're trying to talk to somebody
about dispensationalism you're trading
views respectfully and terribly sure
yeah
that you can often feel like you're
picking at bricks on a wall but there's
no
cracks developing
and dispensationalism is a
very tightly developed system
that if you it's like is it jenga
will you pull out exactly right yeah
yeah so
you can pull out a lot of pieces but it
doesn't destabilize the system
because it's so tightly interrelated and
um
and and but but ultimately it is if you
really
continue to examine it everything
depends upon this
robertson used the word existential
commitment
uh this ah priori that
israel and the church are two different
entities that god
continues a plan for each and
we read the whole bible from that
perspective
and uh
[Music]
if you read the bible without that a
priori
um you don't you don't see that
you know um you re you alluded to voss
and we all
probably familiar with vos's analogy of
the acorn
you know from acorn to oak tree if you
do a
23andme test is that the right
that works you know if you do a 23andme
on the oak tree and the acorn it's going
to come back
as being identical right
and so revelation is organic the same
story that begins
not just in genesis uh three
because we know that eschatology
precedes zoterology
speaking my language anyway
the story that begins in genesis 1 even
uh is the same story that finds its
realization
at conclusion at the end of revelation
so there's the organic character of
scripture now
what's hard having a conversation with
someone
is dispensationalism
really rests heavily on proof texts
and while covenant theology
has its proof texts it's also an
organic picture so
you can't you don't get covenant
theology
by just looking at the pixels you get
covenant theology
by looking at the portrait right and
that's not adding something on because
the pixels make the portrait indeed
but it's a and vos you'll know the
section i'm talking about in the very
beginning he he says the advantage of
this kind of redemptive historical
reading of the bible
it it it frees us from an atomistic
approach to interpretation
so that interpretation is not simply the
addition of word meanings into a total
meaning but
rather interpretation is the bible's a
book of literature it's not it's not a
it's not
it's not the human genome you know it's
not the
periodic table and um
honestly you know different people their
brains work different ways
and and especially in a and the modern
age
probably was necessary to give birth to
dispensationalism because of the
of the pitch toward more scientific
atomistic you know
empiricistic kind of thinking um
so um just don't
don't for your listeners don't get
frustrated if you're having a
conversation with a dispensational
brother or sister
you find out you're not making much
headway right uh
because the system does cohere
and it takes a while to and by the way
if you're if you have dispensational
friends listening here we love you so
i'm
trying to deconstruct you but i guess we
kind of are
but um
it does tightly cohere and uh and the
reformed approach to the the redemptive
historical approach is a more
organic way of reading the bible i had a
long-suffering pastor those three four
years when uh i was attending this
baptist church and he would
meet with me for breakfast every
wednesday morning
and i'm so indebted to him and thankful
for that but he was coming from a
dispensational perspective and i was
rustling through this so i'm i'm truly
amazed that he had breakfast with me so
frequently because i must have been just
terribly precocious and just
hammering on all these issues because i
struggled with him i just did i didn't
see it and we'd go back and forth and
back and forth
but i felt that very same thing you know
you could you could go
text by text and there are there are
answers retorts
other texts it it does hold together on
its own terms
you have to get deeper to these these
foundations to talk hermeneutics to talk
ecclesiology
one thing that was helpful for me in our
conversation eventually
and there never was a real good answer
to this but it's in romans 11 which
talked about
uh the natural branches and the
unnatural branches but at the end of the
day how many trees are in this metaphor
there's only one tree and the root of it
is christ so the question is how
how we are connected to one another and
this that raises a whole host of other
issues in the
than the typical response about
replacement theology where you're
getting away or you
you hate israel you hate the jews
because you replace them with gentiles
which are unfair conversations but
at the end of the day i i love my you
know my dispensational brothers and
sisters
and and i admire them because of their
unwavering commitment to
god's word and we can have differences
on how to interpret that and some of
them very significant differences
but i'm thankful for the commitment to
scripture and if we can
if we can just if that's our problem
we can stand on the same foundation that
this is god's inerrant infallible word
and what he has said is the case
and we need to live according to it
let's you know i'll take that any day
because the good dispensationalists will
say show me from the bible amen
amen yeah um and and
you know uh you know this probably but
you know in the in the when the
evangelical theological society formed
that is the scholarly society of
bible-believing scholars bible affirming
scholars
it was dispensational and reformed
people
uh including i think of uh you know
somebody like harold hohner from dallas
seminary
yeah new testament professor and dear
friends with simon kistamacher who was
my senior colleague and taught at rts
stonehouse stonehouse is one of the
co-founders from westminster that's
another yeah
um and yeah they all were working
together and they recognized
when they needed to pull together and
have their
have their disagreements uh if i could
you said
replacement and we need to get to that
of course
um because i think it does
to me it's one of the more compelling
pictures biblically if
if the dispensations will just kind of
listen to this
i think it could help so it's often said
of
reform and here of course i mean
hermeneutically reformed
because we recognize many
dispensationalist brothers and sisters
are
reformed in their sociology so when i
say reformed i mean hermeneutically
reformed
uh redemptive historical um
some it is often a a
alleged that the reformed person
believes in replacement theology that
israel is replaced by the church and
then when you put it that way
how could god simply abandon his
promises to israel
and and and replace them and
um yeah and maybe he'll replace us
you know that's the thought well yeah
yeah
uh how are we to know the future way the
church is going
now you know but um well they take it as
an affront against god's
faithfulness that god is a liar that god
that's how
that's how it's received and we you know
god all of god's promises are yes in
christ and he didn't throw
any of his promises out now
dispensationalists
plead with reformed people not to
misrepresent
their views on say the mosaic covenant
was a merit-based
covenant you know schofield said that in
the first bible and they changed it and
and they they get understandably upset
if people still represent that as a
dispensational view so
it's really important in reverse for
dispensationalists not to misrepresent
reformed views
replacement theology is not what any
reformed person believes that i've
read think of it this way
abram looked at the stars abram looked
at the sand of the sea
and if he had had enough foresight and
faith at that moment he would have said
to himself
you know one day we we jews are going to
be a minority in this thing
because the whole nations are going to
be
blessed through him yeah if you read the
the closing chapters of isaiah where the
return from exiles happened you've got
egyptians and babylon
running alongside jews saying can we go
back with
i mean there's an expectation that if
god keeps his promises to israel
the ones he made to abraham that one day
jews would be a minority among the
followers of god
so what happens in the gospels jesus
comes first to the house of israel
as has been the history over the whole
old testament it's only a remnant
who really truly trusts in the lord and
so
jesus and there are multiple peril
parables which reinforce this one
one of the most clear is the parable of
the vineyard yes absolutely
yeah so the stewards of israel the
official leaders
not only progressively reject the
prophetic message but they end up saying
if we kill the sun we'll own the
vineyard
and in one of the gospels jesus actually
has the crowd pronounced sentence
it's brilliant uh rhetorically but he
says
this vineyard is going to be taken away
from those wicked tenants
and given to others who will produce the
fruit in
in keeping with uh god's god's desired
god's purposes
okay who were the first followers of
jesus they were jews
so you have this remnant of jesus
himself being the remnant in a person
but then his followers his jewish
followers
and pretty soon what's happening well
gentiles
are pushing their way in in fact in
john's gospel it's the coming of the
greeks that trigger the hour of
glorification
where jesus said is now's the time you
know for for me to go to the cross so
all that happens in the gospels and all
that comes out of that
in the rest of the new testament is just
the natural outworking what god promised
to israel
the only thing missing is what
the land so that's we can talk about
that
as a separate thing if we have time but
but look it's a
perfectly natural organic process and
you mentioned romans 11
that's what it's talking about right you
have this vine
and we know the vine is jesus and we
know that
branches are cut off those are the
particularly the official leaders of
israel the religious leaders who
rejected him
uh we have wild branches
grafted in and some
branches that are cut off can be
re-grafted into
the new testament overwhelmingly speaks
of being jewish
as something based not on ethnicity
but on faith in christ right so
uh it really takes a lot it takes
something very material and substantial
to go back and reread all that
and come up with an israel church
distinction uh
if you're reading the gospels in in my
in my view no i agree in in mine as well
i mean there there
also is this tendency uh
to to read things in
that this is the not the most precise of
language but what
what is said to be the literal meaning
of the text or the
the plain reading of the text it's not
that simple because jesus also says i'm
the door of the sheep and i've never met
a dispensationalist who thought jesus
was literally a door um but
the plane meaning you know they when
they see prophecies and promises given
to the nation of israel
when it talks about a temple they
they will frequently demand that
these things would come true in in the
straightforward meaning not a
metaphorical meaning that there
literally will be a temple rebuilt
the land will be the precise land of
this geographic dimensions in the middle
east that are described and
etc and to find the ultimate fulfillment
of these things in the person of christ
even even when the bible says certain
things are fulfilled in christ
as in jesus was speaking about his body
when he was talking about
rebuilding the temple rebuilding the
temple
exactly there still needs to be the
the kind of word for word literal
fulfillment that you see in the old
testament otherwise god
is not faithful to his covenant people
and and vern poitras is really good in
his book on this he gives several
examples of how
even though dispensationalists insist on
the literal or plain meaning
that they're they're not consistent in
how they do that
and even to the point of dividing verses
where one verse applies to the church
one verse applies to israel
uh i wasn't allowed to keep it in the
article and it probably shouldn't have
been but a
funny story along these lines we could
say it here
we had a notable i'm not going to give
names we had a very notable progressive
dispensationalist come and speak
give lectures on our campus back in the
90s it was a good time
he spoke well of his uh
of the emerging at that time progressive
dispensationalism
and i asked a question because you know
i i went to westminster when the
literary and
approach to scripture was uh was very
strong
and it occurred to me so i asked the
question
and i actually find it i found a
documented quote
for the article here increasingly
increasing literary awareness of the
increasing awareness of the literary
nature of the old testament
had an impact on dispensationalists who
became progressive disciplines
sure and so i asked this uh very fine
scholar i asked him that question i said
has a literary approach that's become
pretty
strong among conservatives now did has
that
helped foster progress dispensationalism
well he knew where i was going
he said well he said if ezekiel said a
temple i have to believe him in a temple
and he was teaching at a very notable
dispensational institution at the time
and
if you know me my personality wouldn't
be surprised that i said to him well i
know you
have to believe that but you know
he uh he kind of he didn't appreciate
the
humor sure because
if he had given up on some of those
fundamentals
uh he probably would have been looking
for he would have found a job he's a
good scholar but yeah
there are certain things and i was
looking for a sociological term
i i thought it was a reification but
it's it's that's not the right word
uh but one one term that might fit is
vestigial
there are certain vestigial beliefs
even when larger pieces start to fall
there's certain features that hang on
even though the reasons for those
features
yeah um aren't necessarily still in
place and i think that's
one and for your listeners if they've
never read edmond clowney's
article called the final temple
from uh the journal of the evangelical
theological society
uh uh back in the maybe early 80s
late 70s it's just wonderful on this
and i i don't mean to be uh cute because
i don't think he means to be cute when
he says it but i'm paraphrasing him
if after jesus meets the woman at the
well and says
essentially no longer on gerizim no
longer in jerusalem
but everyone will worship
in the spirit
uh and you have to connect that back to
what he was saying in chapter two about
him being the temple
jesus is the temple now present among us
in the spirit
he said if you're talking about sending
jewish people back to a stone temple
it in my words now it's like sending
them to the back of the bus
that's right once you've worshipped in
the resurrected the spirit of the
resurrected christ
to then relegate a portion of god's
people to back to its own temple is a
regression it's not a progression of
of salvation and that seems to be what
the author of hebrews is
castigating or warning warning the
people of old covenant believers who
have been brought into the new covenant
but seemingly want to go back to the old
they like the modes and methods of old
covenant worship
he said this is this is a re-sacrificing
of christ
in my understanding of that it's because
the old testament organically
gave birth to and brought about christ
and if you don't like
the christ you got you can't rewind the
clock and ask for a different one
i mean this this is naturally what we
receive and we couldn't get anything
better than that
he's the ultimate well said i mean in in
in hebrews leads toward that that
chapter there in 12
where we have come to zion we have come
to um the city of god the myriad of
angels
uh to a kingdom which cannot be shaken
yeah and dispensationalists traditional
dispensationalists believe
we're not in the kingdom promised david
yet
david is not on his throne yet well
hebrews 12 says we've come to a kingdom
which cannot be shaken
but all um all these things that were
promised to earthly israel
we're told in hebrews 12 now we've come
in because christ himself has entered in
we're there now and to say
i want to go back is to
it's like well that's what you're
suggesting right it's like going back to
egypt once you've been
exactly that's exactly the point that's
the illustration he says
yeah yeah that's this is this is so
helpful i think
people are going to really appreciate
this i'm curious if we can walk through
a little bit of the history
and the development of of the movement
we go back to
uh john nelson darby whose dates are
1800 to 1882.
he was effectively the founder of the
system known as
dispensationalism but then we quickly
move on to some other figures inglis and
schofield and we get to dallas
theological seminary i'm wondering if
you might be able to provide a bit of a
thumbnail sketch and even with the
sociological and cultural context in
view how did
how did this arise what gave what
allowed it to
to to come to shape and then you know
why
how and why has it been mutating so
great
over the years and i'll go full
thumbnail on you here camden so we can
make sure we cover everything
well i got nowhere to go but i want to
be respectful of your time as well
i won't get out of control but you know
darby
sees the uh kind of late industrial
post-millennial kind of situation
uh of of the of britain
uh with uh you know the the the crown is
the head of the church and uh
nominalism and then you have the inroads
of higher criticism in the biblical
studies
and i think was bonhoeffer who said when
religion becomes civil it stops being
either
and so darby sees you know this this
this nominalism that is not
what the new testament or what the bible
describes as being a follower of christ
and so and and and you have the social
upheaval that creates a lot of
uncertainty just like right now you know
people
like is the world i remember the 70s you
know and people felt the same way then
what's going on it's a little bit
unnerving
so he stiff arms the uh the official
church
eventually renounces his uh ordination
and and and and he perceives in the
bible this
dualism between earthlings and
and and heavenliness which uh
sets him on this hermeneutical path um
to um both make sure the church
understands
its other worldliness and to
rest upon the literal teaching of
scripture because
higher criticism liberalism in general
uh is not taking the bible seriously
anymore
now james inglis
is sort of a go-between between britain
and
the states where he
brings darby's teaching to the states
but he's as a
more appreciative of american
denominational loyalties
and so he's um he's he's wanting to
uh distance what he's saying from
darby's
uh sectarianism um schizomatic kind of
nature but um
but as we've been talking about earlier
in the in particular in the northern
presbyterian church
where uh the authority of the scripture
is declining and traditional theological
views are declining
it's almost like a back to the bible
kind of movement
and he started the prophecy movement
didn't he was he also involved in
various publications in
in how he proliferated these ideas yeah
so you have the beginning and
parachurch essentially right i see um
and this would be a great kind of side
lesson too
like
letting the church teach us instead of
taking the church's teaching under
advisement
and getting our theology from itinerant
people who
yeah that's a huge issue with the old
school and new school and all that going
on
and that probably explains too because
moody is not a presbyterian
moody is an armenian but you know he's
uh
continuing the new measures of finney
and you know revivalism
and um and and and and finds the other
worldliness
of dispensationalism uh a compelling
system
and so um so that would explain how
dispensationalism permeates the sort of
the non-denom
bible church independent church movement
but english
who has st louis connections
there's a pastor in st louis named
brooks
there's a man who uh comes to faith and
is attending that church in st
louis named schofield and so you can see
kind of the chain developing
from uh inglis who's based i guess in
southeastern michigan but has a st louis
connection and
through brooks and the presbyterian
church there in saint louis
a northern presbytery interesting st
louis is the frontier between the
northern and southern presbyterian
church
and and while the southern presbyterians
have great issue with dispensationalism
st louis is an interesting place because
there's a you know
the two denominations are about it
against one another
scofield is the popularizer and it's i
guess if there's one lesson
you know we can take away from this you
know and it goes back to finney
as well there are certain people who see
the opportunity to popularize
and they know how to do it they know how
to
get the goods to market so to speak the
prophecy conference is one of those
vehicles and uh and and
and schofield's study bible of course is
the yes
if you can get your notes right there
right connected to the very
you know word of god i mean that right
that uh
impacted and shaped just generations of
christians and i don't know if
schofield knew about the geneva bible
but the reformers understood the value
of
of of having theological notes alongside
to help the reader so schofield's bible
and his comp and the prophecy
conferences uh proliferate
dispensationalism
and the social conditions of america
continue to feed the angst
uh that uh makes it all plausible
now it's interesting uh real quick even
on the scofield
reference bible to consider you can
track
a little bit of the movement or the
development of
of dispensationalism itself just through
the editions of the scofield bible
correct yeah you can look at things that
were eliminated and
see how maybe some of the sharp edges
were were softened a little
in palmer robertson's chapter in christ
the covenants actually gives the
references one
particular one that is very informative
is
um in the context of
of genesis um
i don't have the ready reference here
but um
i think it might be 12 12 1. genesis 12.
yeah
uh schofield refers to exodus 19.
so in genesis 12 you have god making the
promised abram
totally gracious totally unilateral all
abraham has to do is trust the lord
and act according to faith
in exodus 19 israel is at the foot of
mount sinai
and god
offers israel the law and israel's
response is all that you've spoken we
will do
and scofield in that very first edition
of the study bible
describes israel as having rationally
accepted the terms of the mosaic
covenant
and in doing so they went from being
under a gracious arrangement with god
to a works based right
meritorious workspace arrangement with
god
and uh he's has another note elsewhere
which might
kind of soften that a little bit but
it's very stark the way it says it
and i think a lot of people probably
still read the old testament that way
abraham good moses bad abraham under
grace
moses is law and there are passages
including in the new testament including
like romans 7
that might mis
if not read uh clearly
could could lend itself to that the law
came and it would paul says i didn't
know
about sin until the law came and uh
but and i'm sure you've done programs on
what paul means by the word law
very uh very contentious or a lot of
different views on that chapter
but but here's here's the easy thing in
terms of of exodus 19
israel was under grace when god gave
them the law
he had already delivered them from the
house of bondage
they were already a kingdom of priests
and a holy nation
uh deuteronomy 7 says the lord loved you
not because you were greatest among the
nations but because the lord loved you
you almost see ephesians 1 right there
you know god's good pleasure to
graciously set his affection on israel
and israel their whole sacrificial
system was
the means by which they could continue
to live under grace
and god's patience over
let's see from 1450 until
you know 586 god's patience with
israel's continued covenant breaking
and giving him opportunity after
opportunity uh
the it's impossible to read the mosaic
covenant as a replacement
of the abrahamic covenant if you if you
read the the data
uh fairly uh but that's how scofield
clearly saw at the beginning and that's
how
even though that comment was removed in
the second edition
i i mentioned in the article ways in
which that
impression continues to be
upheld now we don't want to say
dispensationalists believe that
salvation by works was how people were
saved
under the mosaic covenant much less
saved that way today
but but that
can is it prejudice too strong a word or
a prejudicial reading of the
mosaic law
sees the the the period of moses that's
antithetical to the period of christ
oh i think i think that's that's
definitely the case uh
in yeah just to just to summarize i mean
the
classic dispensationalism would say that
israel was better off
under abraham and messed up they should
have held out
for a better contract or something yeah
or just decline the offer decline the
offer and just stick with what they have
and how that doesn't impinge upon god's
character is also you know another
problem
i mean and the new testament tells us
you know uh
that even when they drank the water in
the wilderness they drank christ when
they were about
when they went through the sea they were
baptized into christ
and and and jesus isn't the true bread
because moses gave them false bread
jesus is the true bread because he is
the full fullness of what the bread
moses gave
was to point towards so moses was a
servant in god's house and christ is
faithful as a son i mean that's but it's
the same house
he was a servant in the house yes he
wasn't
an enemy of god but um and this is
a a real problem with i'd say the
majority of evangelicals who are
antinomian today
that they don't see the old testament
laws having anything to do with the
christian life today
uh they don't see the grace of the law
or uh another subject for another day
the law is a rule of gratitude i mean
the law preaches christ and all his
fullness
that passover lamb the perfect
specimen that died in the place of the
firstborn on that night i mean
that's not the gospel um
and uh the priest who stood ministering
before the lord with the names of israel
on his uniform that's not the gospel
yes the law of moses makes us realize
how far short of god's will we fall
but it doesn't introduce the illness it
just gives us the diagnosis in a way
that and on the other side too and i
mentioned this in the article
uh it is wrong to see the abrahamic
covenant as not
as unconditional in the sense that
there were conditions attached to the
abrahamic covenant it was to believe the
lord
genesis 18 uh god says
you know if if uh if if you
if you trust in me then i'll fulfill my
promises genesis 26 to isaac
abra i blessed abraham because he obeyed
my statutes law commandments and
ordinances you know
uh faith and obedience are never
disconnected even though they're
discreet
right and so the overplaying of the
unconditionality of the
abrahamic covenant and the over
emphasizing of the conditionality the
mosaic
creates this perception that they're
they don't
have much to do with each other whereas
one they're actually organically the
development of one of the same
covenant perhaps that might play into
how there can be such a disconnect
between
israel and the church even in in the
millennial period where the
church has to be removed through the
rapture so that god may resume his his
plans and purposes with
ethnic israel and then how even these
two groups of people might
remain in distinct realms or at least
distinct areas or purposes even on into
the new heavens and the new earth that
perhaps that helps with the fertilizing
the soil as it were
yeah i think that's a good observation
yeah i'm wondering uh
you know things progressed with with
dallas theological seminary think of
schaefer and walvard and pentecost i
mentioned pentecost earlier dwight
pentecost
i'm curious about uh ryrie and then
moving on into the
the presbyterian tradition just out of
on my own personal history
i wonder if you could help me on some of
this because it's interesting to think
how
especially in the north uh the northern
presbyterian churches
several of them you know gravitated this
way as something of a remedy to
liberalism
rather than going you know maybe toward
the areas that other
more conservative denominations went
such as the orthodox presbyterian church
but
how how did this come about even
sociologically speaking
that these that these that this the
dispensationalism continued to grow and
even flourish in certain quarters of
presbyterianism
um one thing i think is
uh explains that is and i put it this
way
there's a reason there's never been an
amillennial movie
um it would be
boring compared to uh and by that i mean
right dispensationalism
dispensationalism with its end times
structures is a very dramatic
uh suspenseful kind of
a narrative that appeals
to the heightened watchfulness of people
during
uncertain times and i don't mean to
dismiss it all to sociological and
psychological
uh factors but uh you know
there were the the ten virgins
who were to keep their lamps trimmed uh
you know there's a certain watch on this
you know the the coming lord we look
like a thief in the night
and and uh the suddenness of christ
appearing and then
the importance of being ready and there
is
there you know there's there's a
continuum of dispensational primal all
the way through post-millennial and it's
a
matter of degrees all within there are
more
optimistic all males who probably don't
perceive the
antithesis between the kingdom of christ
and the kingdom of this world
there are more pessimistic almails who
feel something more of the urgency of
that antithesis
and um uh i think
probably during this time mains the
mainline churches
are probably predominantly almil and
post mill
which doesn't quite create that sense of
urgency
whereas the post the premium eschatology
does uh touch on that sense of urgency
that's one thing
um the the
the marketing brilliance if you will of
the popularizers whether it's scofield
uh or lindsay's late great planet earth
we shouldn't leave out ryrie study bible
because you know
charles robbery study bible was the go
to study bible of the 70s and 80s
yeah before the new geneva became
available
and the jerry jenkins left behind series
books
well there was even the movie thief in
the night
i saw in a theater when i was probably i
don't know early teens
so that's certainly one factor
um
the relative disconnect between the law
and faith that
was amenable to revivalism
conversionism decisionism
you know the the crusades of the 50s 60s
and 70s the big evangelical crusades
that
put the emphasis on the decision rather
than on discipleship
um those are some factors that come to
mind
are there others that i'm missing that
are softballs
uh you're you're throwing me candy not
that i think of i mean these are this is
enlightening to me
i'm curious if you've seen any
any any movement on this or if you can
uh
wade into the prophetic waters yourself
and and and see
the trajectory of dispensationalism
especially you know more in recent
eras we've seen uh you know movements
like christian zionism but now
progressive dispensationalism and the
new covenant theology and progressive
covenantalism
is that the end of the road uh is there
going to be some sort of
further development where are we now and
where might we be in 10 years
um the one obstacle and i just had a
conversation
with a woman last week on this she was
totally open to
me describing some of these things to
her she says now i still
is a very sincere you know state i still
struggle with
you know how if god promised israel the
land
how could that not still be in play
and so i do try to answer that briefly
in the article
um bruce walkey use
uses an analogy uh i'm not getting it
precisely right but
if i promised you 50 and then later i
said here's a thousand dollars
you would not say to me where's my 50.
and he uses that as analogy god promised
a land
to israel the language of land
is inheritance when you come to the new
testament it
never talks about land but it does use
the word inheritance
certainly an inheritance is always with
reference to
christ himself
the fullness of the godhead and all that
is christ in other words
the the inheritance of the believer in
christ
is god and we have a down payment by the
way in the holy spirit which is
ephesians 1.
so to to look to the land as fulfillment
of that when inheritance now has been
directed toward god in his fullness is
uh is is uh
almost trivializing what what the new
testament tells us
another good part of the answer to this
question is
the land is answered in new heavens and
earth
and amen yeah anthony hokema's book the
bible in the future
has a good treatment of that so it's not
that
reformed people ignore the land but they
say it's
more than uh what did belinda carlisle
saying heaven is a place on earth
it's it's the whole earth is going to be
god's
territory um so that's one thing
the land thing has to be answered
credibly and sincerely
secondly the the any the future of
of jewish people and you and i know this
that
you know the romans 11 language of then
all israel shall be saved
that can be understood as
being jews and gentiles as we know them
now or
it can as john murray understood it to
refer to some future
stirring up of of of jewish people to
reclaim the promises that were theirs
but which um uh they
through those who rejected messiah
uh failed to embrace so
those two things now um
you mentioned christian zionism this is
a this is a bit of a sticky thing
because
christian zionism is the view that
that christians have a moral spiritual
obligation to support the nation of
israel today
that 1948 was the fulfillment of
of prophecy and that
god will in and through the modern state
of israel
established the messianic kingdom
uh in jerusalem on mount zion
um james jordan and i mentioned in the
article there
james jordan points out there's a real
inconsistency with that
that belief because
according to classic dispensationalism
the restoration of israel and and
and and the rebuilding of the temple all
these things happen after the church is
out of the world
it's not something that's happened
that's going to happen while
while the church is present christian
church is present
that efforts to anticipate the second
coming go against the plain teaching
of scripture because the the lord will
come
unexpectedly
so the christian zionism which is
probably
the most powerful form of dispensational
he actually has an
internal contradiction to
dispensationalism but
i think the reason it's so appealing is
that it appeals
to christian nationalism
there's this sense that america is an
exceptional nation
and we need to be sure to say the
providences of god toward
america have been extraordinary
as if all providences are not but
and so we identify with
israel as an elect people we identify or
we see reflected our own national
experience
now we're feeling tensions right now
because for some people
america has not been an exceptional
experience over
over time especially but this
christian nationalism uh is really hard
to chip away at
because it threatens again people's
security
and um
it it it feels like a bit of a threat
to uh to try to say we should treat
israel as good statecraft that's
diplomatic
work would treat them by the way the
only functioning democracy in the whole
region there's
all kinds of good reasons to be a friend
of israel
but it does help us kind of gloss over
the the the downside
again i mentioned this in the article
some of america's policies where israel
have actually been the hardest on
christians in the middle east
i remember meeting a friend
who was from bethlehem and he had an
arab name and i said so when did you
become a christian he said
my family's been christians for a
thousand years
he grew up in bethlehem which in which
is in the palestinian territory which
has been embargoed it's been
life is very hard there um
christians in the orthodox and
and you know the the syria iraq
and those regions life has been very
hard because of some of american foreign
policy
this is not easy stuff and it's it's
almost like a third rail though
if you start to talk about america
holding israel accountable
on a policy level it immediately
you know he invokes the you know the
penalty flag of
supporting you know i will bless those
who bless you god said to abram
absolutely and i even mentioned the
article
one news story in which a currently
serving government
official has cited dispensational
theology
as a basis for american national policy
so
this is not pie in the sky stuff um
and i'll mention along with that
the the ability of
politicians across the spectrum to know
what they
need to say to get different people's
votes
and this is my personal view it's not
the view of my institution
it's my personal view because i've known
this going back 30 years
of key political strategists
talking in these terms we know what we
need to say
in order to get evangelical christians
to vote for us
and and yet
um we have to if we look at the old
testament law and see what is
what is christian behavior like
it doesn't always match up with the
actual real world actions of
of and i'm talking about politicians of
every stripe so
we need to be sly serpents innocent as
doves and no
uh know the times as it was said of the
sons of izakar
wow it's it's uh
interesting to see all of the
developments here and
and who wouldn't think of it initially
but just how
influential dispensationalism has been
and continues to be
even in even in american politics i mean
it's all over the place
and who would have thought that uh from
this this uh
british guy back in the 19th century
that they would have such a wide-ranging
influence you asked me about these other
developments you have progressive
dispensationalism
that said the people of god are one
people the plan of god is one plan that
was revolutionary
and charles ryrie in his book
dispensationalism today
pretty much says those aren't
dispensationalists anymore
and the fact that they call themselves
progressive dispensationalists
doesn't mean they're just getting with
the times progressive it means
they see a progressively unfolding plan
in the scriptures
there's a separate chapter on that in
the covenant theology book
there's another development that's come
on the heel uh sort of on the heels of
that called new covenant theology
which doesn't insist on a separate
program for israel
and and and and yet still resists
the full degree full level of continuity
between the old and new testaments
that the reform of you takes
there's a separate article in new
covenant theology
right but um it's like
the the proverb of xena on the greek you
know
greek philosophy said uh you know you
can never get anywhere because once you
go halfway you still have halfway to go
and i think
honestly if somebody would step back and
say why are these modifications
happening from classic dispensationalism
to progressive dispensationalism to new
covenant theology
and now there's something called
progressive covenantalism
like it just continues to
move toward more and more perceived
continuity
and and one thing that's helping this is
actually seeing how pre-reformation
people read the bible for a thousand
fifteen hundred years um
the one thing that still remains i think
that's gonna
that's still holding people back is this
idea of regenerate church membership
which you can
talk about about sacraments but but
it is encouraging to see the the
increasing degree of continuity
people are seeing between the new
testament
and the old testament uh because of of
of all things it can
it it it enables us to preach the gospel
from the old testament
and it's not just the old testament was
like
the gospel and and and
you'll you'll this is probably one of
your theme verses at christ the center
but
you know when they when they when they
drank from the rock paul
says in uh in first corinthians 10 and
when they
ate the bread and when they were
baptized and see they they drank
christ himself and this was of course
edmond clowney's
wonderful uh exposition
in the unfolding mystery that it wasn't
just some things that were like christ
the shadows and types of the old
testament were just not only not like
christ but they were the presence of
christ
before the incarnation yeah means of
grace
and uh yeah and so we preach the gospel
from the whole bible just like the
apostles did
not just from the new testament amen i
think that's a useful thing to think
about especially
we mentioned earlier the confession of
faith chapter seven but you look at
chapter
seven section five and then chapter
eight section six talk exactly
about those things which are which are
key differences uh on certain points
with dispensationalism
it's been tremendous to think about this
and our approach to scripture helps us
all to become i think a little bit more
self-critical and think about our own
presuppositions for minutically speaking
but also theologically
and to think about the ways in which
sociology and psychology might influence
our
our or our theological choices as well
but this has been
really useful i'd encourage people to
take a look at the book uh
covenant theology biblical theological
and historical perspectives
i'll put a link to that in the episode
description and particularly
this chapter dispensationalism by your
guest today michael glotto mike it's
been a pleasure thanks for joining me
today
camden thank you so much god bless you
and god bless your listeners
absolutely uh take a look at rts you can
look at the orlando campus but
the whole system over at rts.edu lots of
good going on there and you can stay
tuned we're going to have a lot more
conversations i hope with people
speaking about different chapters within
this book and we're online at
reformedforum.org
where you'll find information about all
of our programs and events and online
courses all that fun stuff
i want to thank everybody for listening
we hope you join us again next time
on christ the center
you