Steve Lortz

George & Danny - The copy of Lampe I came across was in a university library. Otherwise, I would make it available. Love, Steve

I've been working on a presentation regarding the significance of baptism on the Day of Pentecost. It has become apparent to me that I can't really do it without first establishing some of the things the "Old Testament" says about the "New". So that's what I am giving priority to now. When I get to posting, we'll be looking at Deuteronomy 29, Isaiah 43&44, Ezekiel 36, and Jeremiah 31, as well as Joel 2. Love, Steve

I wrote, "When I return, we'll look at what exactly the Word of God says happened on Pentecost." It's too much to try to do in a single post. We're going to have to take it in pieces. We know the Bible says they were baptized with holy spirit. So as soon as I get time, we'll look at the significance of baptism. This post is a heads up, so everybody can get out their concordances (and their orange books, if they want to) and load up with ammunition. Love, Steve

A few quick notes: Danny - In your post of 12/14/04, 11:40, you wrote, "But we would do this word ["aion"] a disservice by viewing it in every single instance in the Bible only in the light of one static, literal meaning, as Steve has asserted." Would you care to point out where I made that assertion? You can't, because I never made it. I wrote, "The New Testament contains a fully developed system regarding the arrangements of various 'periods of time'. Paul's uses of the phrases denoting 'this age' are in consonance with that system's arrangement. The system unambiguously uses the word 'aion' to mean a period of time'." I didn't write "every time Paul used the word 'aion', it means..." I wrote "Paul's uses of the phrases denoting 'this age' are in consonance with..." the New Testament's arrangement of periods of time, as opposed to Wierwille's scheme of "administrations". The reason I mentioned the phrase "this age" is because I DO agree with you that there are other places where Paul uses the word "aion" in a sense other than strictly a period of time. But when he includes "aion" in phrases indicating "this" one, or the one "to come", I believe the meaning is to be taken literally. I've been interested lately in doing some study in the writings of the Church Fathers. I found a copy of "A Patristic Greek Lexicon" edited by Lampe. My hat is off to you, brother! I'm not sure even how long it's going to take me to learn to decipher the citation abbreviations :-D ***** A note to everybody, fine-tuning our understanding of "oikonomia". A stewardship isn't just the "rules of a household". It is an arrangement where one person is given responsibility to manage another person's property. The owner of the property doesn't set the rules, except in a very basic sense, the "mission statement" if you like. The steward makes the rules which govern the nuts and bolts of everyday life. Corporations operate the same way. The property actually belongs to the shareholders. The shareholders elect a Board of Directors which hires the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), who actually makes the day-to-day decisions about running the company. The CEO is usually assisted by a group of functionaries who are collectively known as "management" or the "administration". Note that here, also, we have a use of "administration" that does not necessarily mean a period of time. This understanding of "oikonomia" helped me understand Ephesians 1:10, Oakspear. Let's look at the context, If "in the dispensation" was an expression of time, it would have been "en oikonomiai". "Eis oikonomian" is not an expression of time, it's an expression of purpose, "toward stewardship" or "toward management". God has made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself: toward management of that which fills the times of decision, to head up all things in the Christ... That was the mystery God had to keep secret. If the princes of this age had known it, they wouldn't have crucified Jesus Christ! They wouldn't have wanted him to become the Lord of Glory. God made Jesus the CEO of His property. All for now. Love, Steve

I don't have much time to post now, or during the next few days. I just made up the semester final exam for the class I teach. Since it's going to be open notes and open Bible, it's going to be a bear, both to take AND to grade. When I return, we'll look at what exactly the Word of God says happened on Pentecost. There are some eye-poppers in there! Love, Steve

Danny - In your post of 12/12/04, 05:25, you wrote, "When considering again the examples you cited, comprising of a succession of terms in reference to heavenly rulers or overlords, - 'Aion' may easily be viewed as another parallelism that functions as and is supported by the other 'rulership' terms in those contexts." Let's look at Ephesians 1:21 Ephesians 1:21 does NOT set up a parallelism between "aion" and the other dignities listed. They are all objects of the preposition "huperano". "Aion" is a noun denoting time, and is the object of the preposition "en", in the dative case. This is an expression of time, not of personification. Beside which, if "aion" is understood to be the personification of an emanation from the "great god", what is that emanation understood to be, if not time itself? So we have a situation where we can understand "aion" in its simple, primary sense as "a period of time", or we can understand it as a convoluted personification which represents... A PERIOD OF TIME? Matthew 12:32 mentions the idea of "this age" and "the age to come", but we learn more about the concepts from Matthew 13, Notice that the "harvest" is NOT an angel. The angels are the "reapers". The harvest represents the end of this "aion" or "period of time". Notice also that the enemy who sowed the tares is not an "aion" either. Dittos for the Son of man. In the time before the harvest, the tares grow along with the good seed. In the time after the harvest, the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. This age ["aion"], and the age ["aion"] to come. Periods of time. Let's review Luke, where Jesus was responding to the Saducees' question regarding the woman who had been married seven times, This age "age" and that "age". Notice verse 36 does NOT say that "aion" means "angel". It says those who are counted worthy to obtain that age ["aion"] are like angels. Luke associates the resurrection from the dead, and not having to die anymore,... and becoming children of God, by the way,... with "that age", the age to come, not with "this age". This goes along with what we saw in Matthew, that the righteous shall shine forth like the sun in the kingdom of their Father... when? In the age to come. Can you see why the disciples were so interested in the transition from this period of time to the period of time which is to come? shining forth like the sun in the kingdom of their Father... the resurrection from the dead... becoming children of God? The New Testament contains a fully developed system regarding the arrangement of various "periods of time". Paul's uses of phrases denoting "this age" are in consonance with that system's arrangement. The system unambiguously uses the word "aion" to mean "a period of time". Wiierwille's scheme of "administrations" uses a variant meaning of "oikonomia" to read a foreign arrangement of "periods of time" into the Bible. It is an exercise, not in exegesis, but in eisegesis. Wierwille's system of "administrations" contradicts the scriptural system of ages. Love, Steve

George - I am known as "the Geezer" on some of the websites where I post, so I wasn't meaning in any way to impune YOU. Danny - As with George, I recognize that you and I differ because we have chosen to accept different presuppositions. I admire the diligence both you and George have used to research, think through and articulate your positions, even though, starting from different assumptions, I arrive at different conclusions. When it comes to basic presuppositions, "De gustibus non disputandum est!" Those things being said, I have some comments, Danny, on your post of 12/12/04, 05:25, Two points: First, you wrote "'Aion' was to the ancients another term for a deity or godlike being." SOME of the ancients, Danny, not ALL of them. Even though some ancients used "aion" with the sense you put forward, its primary, fundamental meaning in everyday language was the span of a life-time, hence, "a period of time". Some of the ancient philosophies used the word "aion" to identify or personify certain "emanations" from "the great god", but not all. Stoicism was the predominant philosophy in the first century. I did a quick check of "The Origins of Stoic Cosmology" and "Greek Philosophical Terms", and I couldn't find any references to "aion" in relation to Stoicism. Second, you wrote, "In ALL of the passages you cited by Paul, this particular usage or understanding could and would work just as well if not better." If the uses I quoted were the ONLY places where "aion" occurred, your line of thinking would have some plausibility. However, let's look at Luke 18. The whole passage from verse 18 through verse 30 is instructive for those interested in the Biblical, rather than the dispensationalist concepts of salvation, since it equates the ideas of inheriting eternal life, entry into the kingdom of God, being saved, and receiving eternal life in the age to come. But we're only going to look at two verses, The operant phrases are the last two. In the Greek they are, "en toi_kairoi_toutoi kai en toi aioni toi_erchomenoi zoen aionion" "In this time and in the age that is coming life of the age." The word "kairos" was a term of art in Greek military writing. It meant "the decisive moment", the time in a battle where to act means victory, and not to act means defeat. Here "kairos" is the object of the preposition "en", and it occurs in the dative case. This construction is an indication of time. The conjunction "kai" creates a parallelism between the phrase "in this time [kairos]" and the phrase "in the age [aion] to come". The word "aion" is also in the dative case, and appears as the of object of "en". "Aion" here is also used as an indication of time. I do not believe that Jesus, Luke or Paul used the word "aion" to mean a "deity or godlike being". I believe they all used it in its plain, ordinary sense of "a period of time". You wrote, "Sorry Steve, but this term 'aion' is not off the 'ambiguity' hook either." If that's the way you choose to see it, Danny. But you're going to have to present solid evidence if you hope to persuade. Love, Steve

George Aar - I've always enjoyed reading your posts, though we haven't interacted much at GreaseSpot. I can respect your decisions to believe the things you do, even though I have made different decisions. "Skeptical Inquirer" is one of my favorite reads, but I'm too skeptical to believe everything they print :-D I'd add "Scientific American" and the "Wall Street Journal" to your list. As far as "Comprendez vous?" goes, I learned all my French from Inspector Cluseau (sp?) :-D (Did you realize we get our English word "geezer" from the French word "guiser", which, transliterated into English would be "wiser"? Cool, huh!?!) Love, Steve

Biblefan Dave - You wrote, "If there is an 'administration (oikonomia)of grace', how could it not represent a period of time?... In otherwords, how can administration be void of time?" The word "oikonomia" may be considered the way you do in your post, but we have to ask ourselves, is that the way the Word of God uses it? If Paul used it to mean "a period of time", then his use of it ought to be in consonance with his use of other "time" words, such as "aion" = "age" If "oikonomia" were to mean a period of time, then we are living during an era which could be called the "age of grace", the "age of the mystery" or the "Church age". Wierwille tied these all together by saying that the existance of the Church, as a distinct entity separate and discontinuous from Israel, had been hidden until it was revealed to Paul. This "age" was given to Paul, and it's full of the wonderful grace of God. Let's see how Paul actually considered the period of time in which we live, by looking at his uses of "aion", the word that undisputably means "age". Now let's look at what Jesus said, Paul did NOT consider himself to be writing in a period of time different from the period in which Jesus spoke. There was no change of "age" between the time of the gospels and the time of Paul's letters. Did Paul consider himself to be living in a wonderful period of time characterized by the grace of God? According to Paul, God DOES extend grace to us, but it's not integral to the period of time in which we live. In fact, it's God's gracious will for us to be delivered OUT of this PRESENT EVIL AGE. According to PFAL, God committed to Paul the "rules of life" for the period of time in which we live. and How can Paul consider this to be a "period of time" governed by "rules of life" given to him, when he calls the adversary and his minions the "god" and the "princes" of this age? (By the way, the mystery that the princes of this age didn't know was NOT that Gentiles could have Christ among them, but that God was going to raise this pitiful guy on the cross to the "position" of Lord of Glory.) How can the things Paul taught be considered the foundation for relating to God during this "adninistration" when Paul writes "We speak not the wisdom of this age... but the wisdom of God"? If this present period of time was committed by God to Paul, how then could Demas have forsaken Paul, having loved this present age? The word "oikonomia" may or may not mean a "period of time" outside the writings of Paul. BUT, if Paul IS using "oikonomia" to indicate a "period of time", as Wierwille claims, why are the conclusions Wierwille draws about this present period of time so radically different from the things Paul wrote when he used "aion", the word which indisputably... unquestionably... catagorically... means a "period of time"? Wierwille took advantage of an ambiguity in our understanding of "oikonomia" to read foreign meanings INTO the text. Wierwille taught things about "administrations" that directly contradict what Paul actually wrote about "periods of time". Comprendez vous? Love, Steve

Biblefan Dave - You wrote, "It is never a good idea to try and label people and put them in this box where one presumes that everyone within a certain group or organization all act the same way or think the same way." If you really believe that, then why do you presume my conclusions about "administrations" are based on disappointment or hatred of Wierwille? You also wrote, "...We discovered that TWI had made errors, and had refused to correct them. Some people were upset about the error, and became angry, bitter, and resentful. They rejected everything they were taught. They developed an agenda to try and disprove everything VPW and LCM and other leaders taught. They were adamant about trying to show how wrong TWI teachings and teachers were. Thus, the agenda caused people to reject things that were true because the intent and goal was to prove them wrong. This overcompensation or overreaction caused people to err in the wrong direction." Do you presume that I opened up my concordance to find the uses of "oikonomia" and "diatheke" because I was bitter, angry and resentful? No. I did it because I wanted to reassure myself about the things we had been taught regarding the pretribulation gathering together of the Church. Guess what. The things I found actually written in the Word of God do not support the things Wierwille taught in PFAL. Do you presume I'm driven by an agenda to prove everything I learned in PFAL wrong? If so, then why do I still speak in tongues? "Thus, the agenda caused people to reject things that were true because the intent and goal was to prove them wrong." You hector some of us here for judging the validity of Wierwille's teachings based on his perceived (or possibly misperceived) intents. Why do you then judge the validity of what I write concerning "administrations" based on your misperception of MY intents? I don't reject Wierwille's scheme of "administrations" because my intent and goal is to prove it wrong. I reject it because it IS NOT TRUE. If we apply the principles of PFAL the way they were PREACHED (NOT the way they were actually TAUGHT, and I can give you citations it you want them), then we find that there is NO SCRIPTURAL FOUNDATION for believing that the Word of God ever uses "oikonomia" to indicate a "period of time". Wierwille built his scheme of "administrations" on sand. Love, Steve

I didn't think you had intended any offense, Vertical Limit, but we can often cause offense when we don't really mean to. I get to see that nearly everyday, teaching part time in a high school. We have to constanly remind the boys to keep their words and behavior on the most cordial plane possible, otherwise it can descend into mayhem very quickly. I appreciate the thoughtful contributions you make, Vertical Limit. I also respect Biblefan Dave's understanding of his own experience as he comes to terms with the genuine abuse we suffered at the hands of VPW. Love, Steve

First, a word to the community at large on this thread. The correct acronym for "Biblefan Dave" is "BD", NOT "BFD". To apply the vulgar meaning of the acromyn "BFD" to our fellow posters and their views is pointless, demeaning and inflammatory, and does NOT advance the cause of open discourse or the truth. Biblefan Dave - You wrote, "When I was 18 years, I told God that things had to get better or I would kill myself on my 19th birthday. On my 19th birthday, I was sitting in the second week of PFAL." I have no doubt you received wonderful deliverance around the time you first took PFAL, Dave. Many people did. But let's take a look at the Word to see how that deliverance was accomplished, The credit for the deliverance that any of us have received belongs to God the Father through His Son, Jesus Christ. Weirwille preached many things that were true. When people believed those things, they called on God in the name of Jesus Christ and got deliverance. But right after that is where things started to go wrong. We were encouraged by the TWI culture (particularly rehearsing testimonials to present at Public Explanations) to give God the credit... NOT through the Son, but through what?... PFAL and VPW. What is PFAL? It is a man-made thing. What is it when we give credit to God through man-made things? That's right, it's idolatry. In the encouragement we received to laud PFAL, we were receiving instruction in the practice of idolatry. Wierwille preached many things that were true, but he also taught many things that were patently false, right there in PFAL. One of those falsehoods was his scheme of "administrations". Scriptural salvation is resurrection life in the age to come. Wierwille's dispensationalisn, which IS wacky when you stop and actually think about it, wrecks our understanding of Scriptural salvation by obliviating our understanding of references in God's Word to "this age" and "the age to come". Love, Steve

A few comments: Vertical Limit - I may not agree 100% with some of the things you wrote in your post of 12/08/04, 07:25, but I do agree with your last paragraph, Oakspear - You asked, "In your "non-administrative" view of the bible, do you believe that there are some parts of the bible that aren't 'written to us'?" I wouldn't characterize my view of the Bible as "non-administrative". There ARE administrations in the Bible, they just aren't periods of time. There was the administration of Joseph over Potiphar's household. There was the administration of Joseph over the prison. There was the administration of Joseph over Egypt. All of these were foreshadowings of Jesus Christ's administration over creation, instituted by God the Father when Jesus Was glorified after his resurrection. There was also the administration of Paul over the knowledge that God had extended grace to believing Gentiles, as Gentiles. I would call my view "anti-dispensational". When Wierwille called his scheme "administrations" he was just slapping a different label on Darby's can of dispensationalism. Wierwille by-passed Bullinger's ultra-dispensationalism because Bullinger believed the manifestations of holy spirit evident on Pentescost went out with the revelation of "the mystery" to Paul when he was in prison in Acts 28. "Do you believe that there are some parts of the bible that aren't 'written to us'?" The truth is, Oakspear, I don't believe there are ANY parts of the Bible written directly TO us. It appears to me that every scrap of the Bible was written with a specific purpose in mind TO specific people at the time of the writing. For instance, I think Samuel and Kings were composed during the reign of Solomon with a view to establishing the legitimacy of his authority. In the process, they foretell the coming of a son of David who will also be a son of God, to whose kingdom there will be no end. Was it written TO me? No. Is it necessary for me to know what's written in Samuel and Kings in order to be saved? No. Do I gain, by knowing what's written in Samuel and Kings, a fuller understanding of what Paul meant when he wrote about who Jesus Christ is, and the nature of his lordship? Yes. Was the book of Hebrews written TO me? No, it was written to believers who had come to Christ from Jewish backgrounds. Do I need to know what's written in Hebrews in order to be saved? No. Do I gain, by knowing the book of Hebrews, a fuller understanding of how Jesus Christ mediated the New Testament originally promised to Israel in Jeremiah 31? Yes, I do. Was the book of Ephesians written to me? No. It was written to a group of believers who lived in Ephesus around the middle of the first century, who additionally, had been personally ministered to by Paul. Do I need to know what's in Ephesians in order to be saved? No. Do I gain a fuller understanding that I, as a Gentile born and bred, can still get in on the benefits of the New Testament God promised to Israel? Yes, I do. Was the book of Romans written to me? No. It was written to a group of believers who lived in Rome around the middle of the first-century. I can learn a lot from reading Romans about what Paul thought, because he had to explain more things to them. He had never taught them in person before his writing. And no, I don't need to know what's written in Romans in order to be saved. The fundamental promise of Christian salvation is Joel 2:32a. Is the book of Revelation written TO me? No. It was written to seven groups of believers who lived in Asia Minor near the end of the first-century. One of those groups was living at Ephesus. Some of the older people at Ephesus, sitting there listening to John's messenger read Revelation, may have been able to remember sitting there as youths, listening to Tychicus read Paul's letter to them. Both Ephesians and Revelation may have been written to the SAME INDIVIDUAL believiers! Do I need to know what's in Revelation in order to be saved? No. By knowing Revelation, do I learn about the rewards Jesus offers to those who remain faithful in the midst of tribulation, and the "rewards" he offers to those those who oppose him? Yes, I do. As for you list of "administrations", Oakspear: You list a "Post-diluvian Administration -After the flood" immediately after a "Antediluvian Administration - pre-flood", yet we know the flood itself lasted for at least a year. Shouldn't we include a "Mid-diluvian Administration - during the flood"? We know the "rules of life" had to change. Somebody had to be responsible for shovelling all that poop. Shouldn't your "Gettin' Their Butts Kicked by the Gentiles Administration" be divided into a series of 40 year "administrations" alternating between the rules of life being set by judges and the rules of life being set by various tribes of oppressors, concluding with the "Samuel's Sons Administration"? In your "Petrine Administration" you wrote, "still following the law", and in your "Pauline Administration" you wrote , "out with the law". Yet you don't have any "Law Administration" listed. How can we know the extent of the "Law Administration" if you don't indicate when it began? You have the "Christ on Earth Administration" immediately following the "Post Captivity Administration", but Luke 16:16a says "The law and the prophets were until John [the Baptist]..." and in John 3:30 John the Baptist says "He [Jesus Christ] must increase, but I must decrease." Shouldn't there be a "John the Baptist Administration" in there somewhere? :-D Hey, dmiller, what does that do for your numerological gematria? & again :-D Love, Steve

Call them "eggnog graphites", call them "dispensations", call them "administrations". Call them what you will. The division of God's Word into "periods of time" distinguished by changes in "the rules of life" is every bit as man-made, every bit as artificial, as its division into chapters and verses. Wierwille's scheme of "administrations" is every bit as devoid of authority for interpretation as the Bible's chapter and verse breaks. Wierwille's scheme of "administrations" is not the fruit of exegesis, reading valid meanings OUT FROM what is actually written, but rather a product of deceptive or naive eisegesis, reading foreign meanings INTO the text by distorting the meanings of the words. The word "oikonomia" NEVER, in ANY of its Biblical uses, indicates a "period of time". Not in I Corinthians 9:17. Not in Ephesians 3:2. Not in Ephesians 3:9. Not in Colossians 1:25. A RESPONSIBILITY TO MANAGE was committed to Paul, NOT a period of time. Not in Ephesians 1:10. God headed up all things in Christ TOWARD STEWARDSHIP of that which fills the opportune moments. And that was the REAL mystery of the first century church. The god of THIS AGE, the princes of THIS AGE, didn't know that God was going to raise this pitiful Jesus up to the position of Lord of Glory because of his obedience unto death, even the death of the cross. So they killed him anyway, to their own detriment. The only mystery first revealed to Paul was that believing Gentiles, as Gentiles, could also get in on the blessings of the New Testament God had promised to Israel in Jeremiah 31, on the same basis as the believing remnant, by grace through faith. The "Age of Grace", the "Age of the Law", the "Church Age" and the "Age of the Mystery" are ALL foreign concepts. Paul himself would have rejected them as gross distortions of what he actually wrote. The Bible only gives us enough information to distinguish two ages, this present evil age and the age to come. Everything that happens between the fall of Adam and the appearing of Christ is part of this present evil age. The age to come will begin with the appearing of Christ to resurrect and gather the elect. To concern ourselves with perceived changes in time periods due to perceived changes in the rules of life is essentially pointless. Since they aren't based on anything scriptural, we can make them mean anything, or we can make them mean nothing. We can make them mean whatever we like, and no one can show us a verse to prove us wrong. Wierwille's scheme of "administrations" also distracts and alienates us from a biblical understanding of salvation as resurrection life in the age to come. Love, Steve

Biblefan Dave - I didn't start questioning the truth about "administrations" because I didn't like Wierwille. I left the Way in '87, as you say you did, and for nearly a decade I tried to preserve most of the things I had been taught in PFAL. One day I began re-examining the pre-tribulation "rapture" of the Church, and when I looked at what the Bible actually says about "ages" and "testaments", Wierwille's dispensationalism washed away like a sand castle in the surf. It really doesn't have any more biblical substance than that. I would say I have more animosity to Wierwille now than I ever did before, because of the way he lied through his teeth in PFAL when he taught that Romans 9 is addressed to the Jews and Romans 11 is addressed to the Gentiles. He lied. You wrote, "Other times, Jesus was telling people about things to happen in the future. Jesus told Nicodemas about being 'born again' but I don't see that occuring until the Day of Pentecost." When Jesus told Nicodemas about being born of the spirit, he was talking about the spirit of resurrection life in the age to come, that God had promised to Israel in Ezekiel 37:1-14. No mystery there. The gift of holy spirit first poured out on the Day of Pentecost was not that resurrection spirit, but the EARNEST of it (II Corinthians 1:22; 5:5; Ephesians 1:14). We have the earnest of our inheritance, but we won't actually be "born again" until we are actually born again in the resurrection/gathering together. By the way, when Wierwille taught about Peter on the Day of Pentecost, he misquoted Acts 2:16. Peter didn't say "This is LIKE that which was spoken by the prophet Joel." Peter said "This IS that which was spoken by the prophet Joel [emphasis added]." The spirit poured out on Pentecost was NOT part of any "mystery". It was promised to the believing remnant of Israel in Joel 2:28-32. Jesus implied as much when he called it "the promise of my Father" in Luke 24:49 and "the promise of the Father" in Acts 1:4. Joel 2:32a, "And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered [saved]...", is the fundamental promise of Christian salvation, not Romans 10:9&10. When we examine the whole of Romans chapter 10, we see that Paul is EXPOUNDING on the promise of Joel 2:32. He even quotes it in Romans 10:13. Apparently, the fundamental promise of Christian salvation comes straight out of the OLD TESTAMENT!?! Wierwille had reasons for twisting the Word of God the way he did. I can no longer believe those reasons were benign. Love, Steve

A note on another point raised by Vertical Limit - "And if you think about the bride and the body. A marriage unites the two into one. And we as the body are to be one with Christ." Right again! Wierwille taught that the Church is separate and distinct from Israel because they were the Bride and we are the Body. However, if you look at Ephesians 5:30-32, it's actually saying that the Bride of Christ, the believing remnant of Israel, has become the Body of Christ through the one-flesh relation of Genesis 2:24. Part of the mystery first revealed to Paul was that believing Gentiles, as Gentiles, could become members of the same Body (Ephesians 3:6). Love, Steve

Just a drive by posting here, until I've had an opportunity to digest the thread so far. Vertical Limit - (not to pick on you, it's just that your post was the most recent) You wrote, "Wierwille took the word dispensation (which is really stewardship) and changed it to administration and used it to divide the bible into time periods. The only time periods I see are the old and new testament." You've got it pretty right, as far as you go. As I've written before, dispensationalism works by stripping the meanings from "oikonomia" ("stewardship"), "aion" ("age") and "diatheke" ("covenant" or "testament"), and playing a deceptive mix-and-match shell-game with the words and their meanings. You wrote, "The only two time periods I see are the old and new testament." The testaments are examples of "diatheke", covenant. There are only TWO time periods described in any detail by the Bible; what Paul calls "this present evil age" (Galatians 1:4), and "that which is to come" (Ephesians 1:21). It's hard to see in the KJV because it translates "aion" as "world" instead of "age". The age to come will begin when Christ appears and the dead in Christ will rise and be gathered together. Weirwille said the gospels were part of the Old Testament. He was dead wrong. The crucifixion, an event that happened in the gospels, was the mediation of the New Testament God had promised to Israel in Jeremiah 31:31-34. The grace God gave to Paul to steward toward believing Gentiles was that they, as believing Gentiles, could also get in on the New Testament on the same basis as the believing remnant of Israel, by grace through faith. There is no such thing as an "administration of the law", just as there is no such thing as an "age of grace". Love, Steve

I use a library computer and the sound is turned off all the time anyway. So sad. Love, Steve

Maybe Paw could put up a "Help Wanted" forum for the benefit of those who waited too long to jump the foundering shipwreck that is TWI. Love, Steve

Yes, Colossians 1:25 indicates that God gave Paul the responsibility of fulfilling His Word toward the Gentiles. The riches of the glory of this mystery toward the believing Gentiles was that Christ could be among THEM, as Gentiles, as well as among the believing remnant of Israel. Love, Steve

The cluster of concepts Wierwille taught as "administrations" is not only unbiblical, in the sense that it is a foreign meaning READ INTO the texts, it also obliterates a scriptural understanding of what salvation is really going to be. Dispensationalism works by stripping the meanings from "oikonomia", "aion" and "diatheke"; and then playing a deceptive mix-and-match shell game with the words and their definitions. Wierwille defined "administrations" as periods of time distinguished by changes in the rules of life. The New Testament word that denotes a period of time is "aion". Though there may be more than two, the Bible provides sufficient information to distinguish two, and two only, "this present evil age" and "the age to come". Salvation is resurrection life in the age to come. The gift of holy spirit that was first poured out on the Day of Pentecost is the earnest of the resurrection spirit that will raise the dead to life when this present evil age ends, and the age to come begins. Changes in the rules of life are not brought about by changes in time period, but by changes in covenant, "diatheke". We find many qualifiers to the word "diatheke" in the New Testament (the New Diatheke); old, new, second, better, etc. We don't find a single qualifier associated with the word "oikonomia" (stewardship or management). The Bible has many things to tell us about differences of covenants. It tells us NOTHING about differences of "oikonomia". The word "oikonomia" is never even used in the plural... not even once. In Ephesians 3:6 Paul states the mystery that was first revealed to himself, "That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel:" NOT a period of time. But that God had extended grace to believing Gentiles: that under the new testament ("diatheke") they, as believing Gentiles, could be grafted into the covenant community along with the believing remnant of Israel; on the same basis, by grace through faith. It was Paul's job to make this grace known. It was Paul's responsibility to make this grace known. It was Paul's "oikonomia" to make this grace known. That's why Paul said the "oikonomia" of the grace of God had been given to him. Flushing the errors of Wierwille's dispensationalism from our minds is one of the chief tasks we have in recovering a scriptural understanding of the Bible. Love, Steve

It'll be interesting to see what kind of spin Oliver Stone puts on Alexander. My daughter is coming home for Thanksgiving, and I think I'd like to go see this one with her. Love, Steve

UncleHairy - Excellent parable! Excellent!! Love, Steve

I don't have the DVDs yet, but I will probably get them this coming week. The work I do is tedious and engages only certain parts of my thinking. I like to have the TV on to keep from going bonkers. I'm looking forward to going through the DVDs as I work. I've already gone through the LOTR stuff several times. I've been collecting the new Star Wars miniatures. I think they did a much better job with them than they did with the D&D figures. Love, Steve

As the general tone of this thread suggests, I think the way a person would answer the question depends on how that person defines "thought", "mind" and "time". If a thought is an electro-chemical process firing along a neuron pathway, then we've got a bazillion of them going on at any moment. There are some skills, like driving a car with a manual transmission, that require an extraordinary amount of attention and thought during the learning process, but they become unconscious with practice. Sometimes, a decision has to be made. Those are the times when holding two simultaneous thoughts gets difficult. I think TWI's use of "you can't hold two thoughts in your mind at the same time" exhibited a grotesque degree of oversimplification, and was used to encourage group-think. Love, Steve