KING'S BUSINESS PROPHECY SECTION Edited by Dr. Charles L. Feinberg, Dean, Talbot Theological Seminary
The Church
of Christ
by Charles H. Stevens, President, Piedmont Bible College
T o err in the building’s foundation is to err so griev ously as to affect all that follows. If we were called upon to name two or more requisites to a correct study and to a proper understanding of Scripture, we would without hesitation name: First, the principle of spiritual discernment. I Corin thians 2:14: “ But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” The Bible is a holy book and names its own science of interpretation. It can be understood as no other book. Spiritual truth must be spiritually discerned. Second, we would insist on the principle of division. II Timothy 2:15: “ Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” God alone can estimate the amount of confusion and the resultant harm that has emanated from a mistaken division and an unwarranted application of Scripture. The need of a proper and correct division of divine truth cannot be unduly emphasized. The proof of this statement is found in its application— the Bible becomes a new Book in the hands of the believer. This new Book, or shall we say, a rediscovered Book, becomes indeed a “ lamp unto our feet and a light unto our pathway.” This method of apportionment should not be strange to us. All wisdom in life finds its manifestation in one’s ability to recognize, select and divide. It is true in science. Mathematics is mastered when the art of know ing when and how to add, subtract, multiply and divide, etc., is acquired. The same is true in business. Success is the result of correct decisions, right purchasing, and prudent selling. Why, then, may we ask, is it so difficult to get people to exercise the same wisdom when dealing with divine revelation? Much criticism, some of it justi fied, has gone out against dispensationalism. And yet dispensationalism in the scriptural sense of the term is
simply recognizing that God, in certain periods and under given circumstances, changes His methods in dealing with mankind but never His principles. To fail to see that God has dealt and is now dealing with three classes of people, the Jew, the Gentile, and the Church of God (I Cor. 10:32) is to err so fundamentally as to cast a shadow upon all that follows. Having said this, we come to our immediate task of attempting to make a proper distinction between the Church of Christ and the Kingdom of Christ. Few ques tions are more pertinent to a satisfactory and workable conception of divine program than that of making a proper and adequate distinction between the church and the kingdom. This distinction is not academic, but funda mental, not theoretical but practical, and vitally deter mining. To adopt a premise that fails to account for this difference between the Church of Christ and the Kingdom of Christ, is to err so grievously as to lead one into a program that is pointless, necessitating adoption of means that are unauthorized, and to the setting of a goal that is as unattainable as it is unscriptural. In this study, we begin by saying that which has often been said before — The Church of Christ is not the Kingdom of Christ. AS RELATED TO CHRIST HIMSELF Christ is vitally related to each as we shall see. TO THE CHURCH, the Lord Jesus Christ is set forth in Scripture as the Bridegroom of her heart, the Head of her body, the Chief Cornerstone in the temple of her worship, the living High Priest of her ministries and the Bright and Morning Star of her hopes. TO THE KINGDOM, Christ is the promised seed of Abraham, the channel of all Israel’s natural blessings, the prophesied King, the heir to David’s throne, the theme of the prophet’s vision, the fulfillment to the priest’s ministries, the Sun of Righteousness in Israel’s new day,
THE KING'S BUSINESS
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