Ultradispensationalism Ultradispensationalism Ultradispensationalism Ultradispensationalism

By R. B. Shiflet




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I
have never met a man who admitted that
he was an ultra-dispensationalist. I have
never heard nor read a satisfactory definition
of one. I know that the word has a synonym,
hyperdispensationalism, and the propagan-
dist who enjoys resorting to the effective tech-
nique of name calling may have his choice of
the Greek prefix hyper or the Latin ultra
to hurl at his victim. I am aware that these
terms are thrown about promiscuously by Bi-
ble teachers who have status in conservative
circles, and they are repeated parrot-like by
thousands who are simply seeking status
among fundamentalists. Usually, an ultradis-
pensationalist is one whose system of dispen-
sational interpretation of the Bible goes be-
yond your own. That, of course, is the mean-
ing of the prefix ultraover, or beyond. If
you are a dispensationalist, and your brother
dispensationalist goes beyond the point his-
torically or Scripturally that you do, he is,
naturally, an ultra-dispensationalist.
But I would like to call attention to an-

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other and perhaps even more deadly ULTRA-
DISPENSATIONALISM that is endangering
us today that is receiving little rebuke from
any of the publications dedicated to right divi-
sion. This form of ultradispensationalism I
like to think of as PRACTICAL ULTRADIS-
PENSATIONALISM, rather than doctrinal. I
submit to you that when we become guilty of
any of the following practices, we are ultra in
our dispensationalism; that is, we go beyond
the Scriptures; the Practical Ultradispensation-
alist:

Makes a Sect
of His Dispensationalism

That is, he refuses fellowship with any
who do not agree with him in every facet of
his teaching on right division of the Word.
Not long ago, a lady called our home to in-
quire about our church services. She was fun-
damental in her beliefs, she was dispensa-
tional, to the point of the Scofield-Darby sys-

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tem, but she belongs to an independent fellow-
ship of fundamental churches, and when she
discovered that we were not affiliated with her
organization and its system of dispensational-
ism, she became aloof and would not attend
our meetings, even though we assured her of
the soundness of the teaching and her wel-
come in our meetings. Though this lady's dis-
pensationalism began the body of Christ with
Pentecost in Acts 2, she was so ultra in regard
to her organization and its system she could
not see the many, many things we had in com-
mon and the sweet fellowshlp we could have
enjoyed.
To be honest, we must admit that some of
the most sectarian groups we have ever en-
countered were dispensationalists who took
pride in the fact of their non-sectarianism.
Many who boast in their being non-sectarian
Christians are so hide-bound in their dispen-
sationalism that they disfellowship any who
vary the slightest from their norms.


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Mutilates the Scriptures
by His Dispensationalism

Foes of right division have often accused
us of taking only a portion of the Word and
casting the remainder aside. A well-known
fundamentalist who has been loud in his con-
demnation of dispensational Bible study used
to say that we took only a slice of the bread of
God's Word, while he took the whole loaf. He
was, of course, inconsistent, claiming as he
did to preach the Great Commission of
Mark 16, and at the same time attacking with
all his might the healing preachers who
were attempting to carry out the sign program
of his commission. But the other side of the
picture is that we have been guilty of preach-
ing the mystery and other Pauline truths while
neglecting or ignoring the rest of the Bible.
The error is not in preaching the great truths
of Paul's epistles; it is in failing to give a bal-
anced message and leaving the appearance of
disregarding or casting aside the rest of the

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Book. The revelation of truth concerning the
body of Christ needs the background of the
gospels; the gospels would not be understand-
able without the law, the psalms, and the
prophets. We need the whole book. Let us not
become so ultra in our emphasis on dispensa-
tionalism (where ever we find the boundary)
that we neglect the rest of the Word.

Misses the Sweetness
of Spiritual Applications

Closely associated with neglecting the
word of God other than Paul's letters is the
failure of getting spiritual applications from
portions of God's Word that belonged to other
companies or other dispensations, by interpre-
tation. Dr. E. W. Bullinger, whose name is
often synonymous with ultradispensational-
ism, said in his excellent book, How To Enjoy
The Bible, All the sweetness, all the blessing,
all the truth can be obtained by a wise applica-
tion, without in the slightest degree impairing

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the true interpretation. This may be left and
preserved in its integrity, and yet something
really spiritual may be appropriated by appli-
cations all, in fact, that can be desired, without
doing any violence to the Divine Word ... I
think it was Dr. Henry Grube who called at-
tention to the fact that I Corinthians 10:11 au-
thorizes four types of Bible study: Now all
these things happenedI can study any of
the Bible as literally true, for these things hap-
pened; unto them for ensamples (Gr. tupos,
TYPES) I can study the Bible for types and
shadows: and they are written for our admo-
nition I can study the Bible for spiritual ap-
plications; upon whom the ends of the world
(ages) are come I can study the Bible to dis-
tinguish the ages, or dispensations. Surely
some of God's elect from among the Plymouth
Brethren have done the body of Christ a great
service through their detailed studies, many
still in print, of spiritual applicaticns of Old
Testament truths. Who among us has not re-
joiced with C. H. Macintosh in many of his

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studies in type and shadow? If we become so
dispensational that we miss the sweetness of
these great spiritual truths in type and shadow,
we are ULTRA.

Manifests the Spirit
of Continuous Criticism

By the grace of God, I think that most of
us have grown out of this to a degree, but who
cannot remember the time when a believer
who was new in dispensational truth was al-
most afraid to open his mouth around the
older believers for fear of being criticized for
his choice of words, choice of hymns, etc? We
did not dare refer to the Old Testament or
the New without a dissertation on just when
the Old was replaced by the New. We dared
not use the words Christmas or Easter lest
someone think we were observing days. It
was heresy to sing Stepping in the Light,
because we surely were not Trying to walk in
the steps of the Saviour. In our zeal to stress

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the fact that our Lord Jesus Christ was a Jew
according to the flesh made of a woman, made
under the Law, living on Old Testament
ground, and coming to die for our sins, not
showing us the way but coming to be THE
WAY, we forgot another side of the picture.
While we do not follow our Lord in His Jew-
ish religion, with its Sabbaths and ceremonies,
we do (or should) strive to let this mind be in
you which was also in Christ Jesus. As far as
His humility, His kindness, His graciousness,
and His love are concerned, we must remem-
ber that He left us an example, that we should
follow in His stepsnot to be saved, but be-
cause He lives within. In our zeal to know
Him no more after the flesh, we may have
put a stumblingblock in the path of weak
Christians who did not even know what we
were talking about. If our life is a pattern of
criticizing those who fail to speak what has
become dispensational jargon, we are UL-
TRA.
This message is not an appeal to minimize

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or de-emphasize the precious truth of right
division; it is not designed to discourage any-
one from making known the dispensation of
the mystery. Surely, too few are doing enough
to make these rich truths known. But I am
convinced that Satan sometimes uses the
friends of dispensationalism to be its greatest
hindrance. This truth that was given to us by
the risen Christ, through the Apostle Paul, was
meant to stress the UNITY of the Spirit, the
oneness of all believers in Christ: it is a sad
commentary on our depravity that it has,
through these forms of ultradispensationalism,
become a source of division. A man of God of
whom I have heard and whose sweet spirit has
been an inspiration to me, even though I was
never privileged to meet him face to face, was
Brother Elmer Leake, father of Brother Paul
Leake. He was quoted as having said,
Brethren, if a wall of separation or sectarian-
ism is ever built between us and any other be-
lievers, let's let them do the building. In other
words, this dear brother loved all believers

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and desired fellowship with them through the
Lord Jesus Christ. Brother C. R. Stam once
wrote, We look forward to the day when, in
God's grace, denominational walls will fall
and we can all enjoy our oneness in Christ.
Meantime, we seek what fellowship we can
find with those who love and trust our Lord in
truth, whatever their denominational affilia-
tion.
This statement climaxed an article that this
brother wrote on The Practical Effects of the
Mystery in which he gave an impressive,
clear cut message on the preciousness of the
preaching of Jesus Christ according to the
revelation of the mystery and showed the
practical effects this message should have in
our lives. When we become so concerned with
the letter that we lose the spiritor when we
become so concerned with the minute details
of dispensationalism that we lose the realiza-
tion of our oneness in Christwe have be-
come ULTRA.

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