Dispensationalism and the Doctrine of Election
Refutation of Calvinism, Arminianism, and Covenant Theology
Chapter One
Principles of Biblical
Interpretation
Where
do we start a study on the doctrine of election?
Should we jump right into the Scriptures and begin with
suppositions we might already have in our minds?
Do we begin understanding what God has to say about
election by reading the commentaries of men or the Systematic
Theologies of men like Augustine, Luther,
Calvin,
Zwingli or any of the hundreds of our contemporary theologians
that have written on this doctrine?
Undoubtedly, the best place to begin is to clear our
minds and thoughts of any pre-suppositions we might hold and
turn solely to the Scriptures (Sola
Scriptura).
When we do so, we must come with some basic rules of
Biblical interpretation (Hermeneutics).
This chapter is not intended to be an exhaustive
presentation of Hermeneutics.
There are many excellent books that present these
principles in an exhaustive way.
The best I can hope to do here is to state some
general governing principles of Biblical interpretation.
Of course, these principles are intended as
guidelines for the purpose of avoiding the common errors
that we see so often.
However, Biblical interpretation is not an
exact science.
Instead, we might say it is an
exacting science.
There is no room for
superficial research if we want our hermeneutics to be
exacting.
The problem of interpreting the Bible is that we
naturally do so from the parts to the whole.
This is known as an
inductive methodology.
Obviously, no one can begin with a full and complete
knowledge of what God has said unless he is God in the first
place. We all
begin in ignorance and work towards knowledge.
That knowledge can and never will be complete.
The more details we know of the parts, the more sure
we can be of our understanding of the whole.
Therefore, the exacting science of Biblical
hermeneutics must be about details.
The danger in this is that we tend to fractionalize
the Word of God and this opens the door for the
misinterpretation of any portion of Scripture to be carried
into other portions of Scripture.
Therefore, each portion of Scripture must be
carefully exegeted from the context of the book it is
written in.
Solid and dogmatic theological conclusions must be based
upon the total weight of evidence from solid exegesis of
each text and what each text has to say about a subject.
Exegesis; the application of the laws of
interpretation to arrive at the exact concept or idea God
intends to convey.
(Exegesis makes an analysis.
Theology correlates these analyses.
Exegesis reveals the meanings of text.
Theology interrelates those meanings.)
I do not want to put numbers on these principles of
Scripture interpretation less, through that means, we
emphasize one of these principles
above the other.
They are each equally
important and each must be used to guide the other.
Together they formulate a
system of checks and balances to insure that we arrive at
God’s intended meaning of what He says in His Word.
Since God is
immutable, He must be consistent in the revelation of
Himself and in the revelation of truth.
Any conclusive concept or
idea that is contradictory to another concept or idea must
be rejected as in error or a misinterpretation because God
is consistent in Truth (I John 2:21, II Timothy 2:13 and
Titus 1:2).
Since all Truth interrelates, all systematizing of
Truth must be congruous (in harmony).
Every book of the Bible is part of a choir of Truth
singing in perfect harmony.
True exegesis does not involve itself in a lot of
mental gymnastics and contortionism trying to make the
Truths of God’s Word harmonious.
This is merely
wresting the Scriptures (II Peter 3:16).
Ø Scripture Interprets Scripture
Sola Scriptura
means the Bible alone.
We should be very careful to avoid philosophical
methods.
Therefore, we must reject the concept of reason, human
logic, higher reason or higher criticism such as relativism
or existentialism, as means of understanding what God has
said (I Corinthians 2:9).
Instead of human logic or rationalism, we must rely
solely upon the Spirit of God to enlighten (illuminate) our
understanding of the Scriptures both in its parts and as a
whole. This
does not mean that our conclusions or the process should be
illogical, alogical, or irrational.
God does intend for us to use the minds He gave us.
We should be extremely careful that all of our ideas
and understanding come solely from Scripture and that we do
not add to or take from what God’s Word says (Deuteronomy
4:2). We must be
very careful to avoid philosophical integrationism in our
process.
God has not intended that the Scriptures be
understood only by a group of educated elitists.
God said what He said in simple language intending
that language to be understood by anyone through the
illumination of His Spirit.
This means we must read the Scriptures literally.
Literal: normal, plain, or literal:
since it is God Who seeks to communicate with man, and not
confuse man, it is assumed and presupposed that He would do
so in the normal, plain, and simplest way of communication,
not with hidden, mystical meanings (allegories).
Therefore:
Ø Seek the Plain, Literal Meaning of a Text
A simple rule has been, “When the plain sense of
Scripture makes common sense, seek no other sense.”
This refers to the
primary, ordinary and
literal meaning of
words. In other
words, we should not make words say more than what they say
(primary).
We should see words in the way everyday people of the
time (historical
context) would have understood them (ordinary).
We should not give allegorical, metaphorical or
parabolic meaning to words unless we are directed by the
text to do so (literal).
We must be careful to avoid reading our own
preconceived ideas or the ideas of others into a Bible
Ø Text Out of Context is Pretext
The Bible is a book of 66 individual books.
Each book comes with its own purpose and context.
However, each book lies within the unity of the
larger context of the whole.
The Bible is a book of unified Truth.
Although we often see it in parts and divisions of
Truth, as a whole it reveals a unified Godhead.
Therefore, the
historical context must be taken into consideration with the
grammatical context.
What is the overall message the writer is talking
about? Word
meanings certainly determine context, but we should
carefully consider how the context affects the meaning of
words. That
context often determines the meaning of words.
We should never interpret a word in a way that
contradicts that context.
A central principle of good exegesis is the trinity
of context, context and, context.
Unfortunately, failure in maintaining the context of
a book or the whole Bible is a common failure in the
verse-by-verse exposition of a particular book of Scripture.
There is a tendency to
fractionalize the Word of God and take verses out of context in
expositional preaching and Bible study.
In order to avoid taking a verse out of context, the
exegete must first read the whole book and determine the
main theme of the book finding key verses.
Then, the book can be broken down into subcategories
of that main theme of the book.
This is known as
outlining. Each verse
must carefully be viewed through the
lens of the main
theme (context) of the whole book and, ultimately, of the
context of the whole Bible because the Bible is
harmonious Truth.
The harmony of the Bible simply means that each book is connected as a
Choir to all other
books, none of which can be out of
harmony with the
others if harmony
is going to be achieved.
To take any verse or book out of context will destroy
the harmony of the
Choir.
In Ephesians 4:13, God speaks of “the faith” as a
“unity.” “The
faith” is the all-encompassing teaching of the “whole
counsel of God” (Acts 20:27) from cover to cover; every “jot
and tittle” (Matthew 5:18).
The believer keeps “the faith” (II Timothy 4:7) when
he maintains the Bible’s unity in teaching and practice.
“3 Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; 5 One Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. . . 11 And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; 12 For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: 13 Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:” ( Ephesians 4:3-6 & 11-13).
History, Culture and Dispensations
Word meanings change down through the years.
Cultures change.
Dispensations change.
In various parts of the world and at different times,
cultures were/are radically different from one another.
If we are going to understand what God is saying in
any given point of history, we must understand that history
and the culture of the time of the writing of that book of
the Bible. This
often requires a great deal of research and effort.
What God said in any given book was not difficult to
understand by the people of the time and culture to which it
was addressed.
The operations (dispensations) of God change, which in turn changes the way God’s people are governed. There are a number of instances where understanding these dispensational transitions are critical to understanding the meaning of a particular portion of Scripture. One example is Christ’s statement regarding John the Baptist.
“Verily I say unto you,
Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a
greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that is
least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he” (Matthew
11:11).
This portion of Scripture cannot be fully understood
apart from understanding the transition from the
Dispensation of Law to the Dispensation of Grace and the
importance of the Day of Pentecost in that transition.
Only the saved that were “born again” beginning with
those alive on the Day of Pentecost and the baptism with and
indwelling of the Holy Spirit would be
resurrected/translated to rule and reign with Christ at His
second coming.
Since John the Baptist was killed prior to Pentecost, He
will not rule and reign with Christ during the
We must caution here against monothetic definitions
of words.
Although there are certain things innate to a word in the
definition of that word, there are also variations to that
definition in varying contexts.
Context can paint different word pictures.
For instance the phrase,
see the boy running
paints a different picture than the phrase my
egg is runny.
Both are derivative of the same word
run, but the use
in different contexts radically change the word portrait
before us.
A second caution is against the tendency to begin our understanding of Old Testament books from the context of our understanding the New Testament writings. We tend to interpret the Old Testament from the New Testament rather than interpreting the New Testament from the already established truths of the Old Testaments. There may be mysteries that are obscure in the Old Testament books that are revealed in the New Testament books, but generally we interpret the New Testament books from the Old Testament. Although the NT may clarify what the Old Testament teaches, it never contradicts what the Old Testament teaches.
The true etymological definition of a word can only truly be determined by “discovering the meaning of the word inductively.1" Why is this true? Because God has said, “For I am the LORD, I change not . . .” (Malachi 3:6).
Ø The Principle of Recurrence
The Principle of Recurrence is an inseparable partner to the Principle of First Mention. Often in the Bible, we find a new historical account of something previously revealed in Scripture. The repetition of such an account may give added details that the previous account did not provide. Each mention of such historical events, doctrines or word use must be carefully researched to discover the context and if added details are provided. This is also known as an inductive methodology (not to be confused with deductive/inductive logic). An accurate understanding will come when we gather all the Scriptural evidences to a particular subject or doctrine. This process is what defines a doctrine and what allows the exegete to become dogmatic about any given subject or doctrine.
An inductive methodology reasons from parts to the whole; from particulars to the general; a conclusion is drawn from the weight of all the evidence.
An inductive
methodology is primary to avoiding eisegesis.
Systematic Theologies are conclusive and dogmatic
statements based upon the weight of Scriptural evidences
arrived at through the inductive exegesis of
every Bible
When all of these
checks and balances are carefully applied to every
1Exegetical Fallacies; D.A. Carson, Baker Bookhouse
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