Robert McLaughlin Bible Ministries
What it means to be initiated into the secret of the mystery, Part 7. Our Lord begins to illustrate the mystery.
Friday, January 14, 2005
Completely clean = once saved always saved, you are completely clean in the eyes of God.
“You are clean” - pres-act-ind - eimi = you keep on being clean - that is eternal salvation.
The only issue for the unbeliever is that portion of doctrine called the Gospel, made up of Christology and Soteriology - that is the only part that is applicable.
Jesus Christ stripped off His clothes to do this washing and that is a reference to Him being stripped at the cross -
MAT 27:28 And they stripped Him.
“When He had washed their feet” = the cross where the Lord Jesus Christ “washed us from our sins.”
REV 1:5 Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood,
TIT 3:5 “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit”
The taking of the garments refers to His resurrection from the dead.
“Reclining at the table” = our Lord’s session, being seated at the right hand of God the Father, after His work was finished -
the doctrine of the session.
With TLJC seated at the right hand of God the Father, God the Father is now able to do something that He has not been able to do in all of human history.
These doctrines are now available to us because He was seated at the right hand of the Father or - after He reclined at the table.
In foot-washing, He is actually depicting Himself in resurrection, in ascension, and session, and only after that, when Christ is glorified, does God the Father provide from Heaven the mystery doctrines pertaining to the Church-age.
Historically, the Church-age began ten days after Jesus Christ was seated at the right hand of the Father.
A dispensation, or period of time in human history, where every believer is their own priest.
For the first time, every believer is indwelt by the Holy Spirit.
Now the doctrine that is to be taught in the Church-age demands something greater in learning it than whatever existed before.
To understand the advanced doctrine of the Church-age and for the total principle of inculcation by grace it becomes necessary to have God the Holy Spirit resident in every believer-priest.
Message Bible -
JOH 13:27 “Do it and get it over with.”
REV 22:14 “Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter by the gates into the city.”
Things that the great prophets of the Old Testament, who made prophecies that would come to pass, would have loved to have studied and taught.
Only the beginning and the end were prophesied but not the Church-age itself, because the Church-age was a mystery.
The only prophecy fulfilled in the pre-canon Church-age dealt not with the Church but with Israel; that took place in 70 AD when national discipline hit Israel and they were completely wiped away as a nation under God.
The doctrines of Christ as Savior, Christology, and His saving work, Soteriology, were prophetic during the age of the Gentiles, from Adam to Abraham, and the age of Israel.
They were fulfilled during the dispensation of the Hypostatic Union.
We also look forward to those prophecies surrounding His Second Coming, His Millennial reign on earth, and His eternal glorification.
The dispensation of the Hypostatic Union fulfilled many Old Testament prophecies and the two coming dispensations, the Tribulation and the Millennium, are described in both the Old and the New Testaments.
The Church-age itself is a period of prophetic silence. No events of this dispensation are found in prophecy, except for its termination which is the Rapture.
World events and world conditions may seem to parallel biblical descriptions of the Tribulation, but this does not indicate that the Rapture is near.
MAT 24:36 But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone.
Throughout the Church-age, the Church is to expect one prophecy to be fulfilled - the Rapture of the Church,JAM 5:8, REV 22:7,12, 22:20.
God’s yet unfulfilled prophecies concerning Israel still belong to Israel.
Rather than fix our attention on particular prophesied events, God directs us to concentrate on the tremendous doctrines of the mystery or “mystery-doctrine.”
The testimony of TLJC during this dispensation is manifested not through prophecy, as in other dispensations when He proved Himself over and over again, but through the Church-age believer.
The Church is the body of Christ.
The Church is in union with Christ.
The Church has access to the same divine assets which sustained the humanity of Christ.
The Church possesses the completed canon of Scripture, given to sustain spiritual growth which glorifies Christ.
The Church is meant to be inculcated with the mind of Christ.
God excluded prophetic events from the post canon Church-age to emphasize the dynamics of Bible doctrine in the Church-age.
1. When one acknowledges that the Church Age is a mystery dispensation, absent from O.T. prophecy, he recognizes that God’s yet-unfulfilled prophecies and promises concerning Israel still belong to Israel.
2. In the meantime, the fulfillment of divine prophecy will not be seen again until the Church departs and the Tribulation begins.
3. Jesus Christ controls history, but rather than fixing our attention on particular prophesied events, He directs us to concentrate on the tremendous doctrines of the mystery.
4. God excluded prophetic events from the post-canon Church-age to emphasize the dynamics of Bible doctrine in the soul.
5. Believers should learn the whole realm of Bible doctrine rather than specialize in prophecy