The Dispensation of Promise
From the Call of Abraham
To the Egyptian Bondage
Know of a surety that thy seed
shall be a stranger in a land that
is not theirs, and shall serve them; and
they shall afflict them four hundred years;
and also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge:
and afterward shall they come out with great substance.
Genesis 15:13-14
The Dispensation of Promise is also called the Age of the Patriarchs. Remember when you were young you learned the Patriarchal stories of old—Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? We marvel at the numerous duties of the Patriarchs, that of father, ruler, military leader, family priest, and representative of God.
The Israelites had an innate need for an intermedial process. They feared dealing directly with Jehovah God. When He called Abram out of the Ur of the Chaldees, He chose to separate One Family to preserve pure religion. Abram became a nation with the charge to witness of the One True God in a world that had gone after idols. God covenanted with him, giving him a command and a promise—leave your country and go to a land of promise.
Abram’s strong abiding faith led him “out of and into.” Chapter 12 of Genesis takes us way beyond the history and statistics of that “called out” nation. God’s promise was to multiply Abram’s seed, but to that time there was no seed.
Both Abram and his wife, Sarai, were getting old, and now in Genesis 15:6, the Bible says Abram “believed in the Lord, and he counted it to him for righteousness.” Sarai got ahead of God’s plan, though, and gave her handmaid, Hagar, to Abram. Hagar bore a son, Ishmael, who was not the son of promise. But he was the only son for fourteen years. When Abram was ninety-nine, the Lord appeared announcing Sarai would bear a son herself. From a barren womb, she conceived and the son of promise was born—Isaac. At the promise, God changed Abram’s name to Abraham.
This in itself is a story of promise and from the day Isaac was born, he rightfully took his place as the son of the Covenant between God and Abram. Genesis 21 tells the story. Read it! If you believe God’s Word, it will open your heart and mind to what is taking place in the world today. From the time Isaac was born, natural enmity was taking place between the two sons and later their seeds. The Ishmaelites (Arabs) and the Israelites (Jews). The conflict continues to this day. The Arabs claim the land of Palestine by right of the first born of Abraham. The Jews, by the right of the everlasting covenant. This covenant was repeated and confirmed in Isaac and Jacob in Genesis 15, 18, 26, and 28.
For eighteen centuries, the land has been known as Palestine. It remains the land that God gave to the Son of Promise, Isaac, and in the end time Israel will be re-gathered and restored to her homeland, the land of Israel (Ezekiel 38). We have seen the rebirth of Israel as a nation, independent and self-governing. Through the ages, the enemies of Israel have desired to cut her off, but the fact remains that she belongs to Jehovah God and she will remain. Read Isaiah 66:22.
We can shorten our story for the sake of space by focusing on the text from Genesis 15, and by reading the story of Jacob’s son, Joseph, how that his brothers first put him in a pit to die, but through brother Reuben’s appeal, they sold him to Egyptian merchants, who sold him on the slave market to an officer of Pharaoh’s household. God was working, for Pharaoh on the throne gave Joseph the honorable position of Prime Minister. Many years later, Joseph died, but not before he was reunited with his father, Jacob, and his brothers. He had brought them to Egypt with him. When a Pharaoh “who knew not Joseph” came to the throne, Abraham’s seed were forced to labor mercilessly under the Egyptian government. Of course, you know the birth and story of Moses, who was raised up in Pharaoh’s household, but who heard and answered God’s call to lead the people “out of” and “into.”
Don’t you love that?
God leads us out of sin and into salvation.
Out of darkness and into light.
Out of bondage and into freedom in Christ.
But the Children of Israel lingered in bondage in Egypt, suffering afflictions unmentionable. In Exodus 3:7-8, “…the Lord said, I have surely seen the afflictions of my people, which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; … And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them out of that land unto a good land … flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanites …”
And so the Dispensation of Promise begins with a call—the call of Abraham out of the Ur of the Chaldees, and a covenant that God will bring His people out of and into. And in Exodus 12, we have the fulfillment of that promise as “the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel” come through as God executes judgment upon the Egyptians with the ten plagues, with the final plague as death striking the palace of Pharaoh. And Moses leads the Children of Israel out of Egyptian bondage. Redemption!
And was it not from the bondage of sin and shame that God delivered us, through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ? He was the promised Redeemer. At this time of year, since a blessed moment in history over 2000 years ago, we celebrate the virgin birth of our Savior in Bethlehem, the City of David, and we are reminded of God’s redemptive plan that materialized through the blood line of King David, and the Patriarchs Abraham … then Isaac, and then Jacob. When you read the story of the son of Promise, think about Isaac as a type of our Savior.
Explore the great Plan of Redemption in the book of Exodus. Israel’s Redemption is a type of the Redemption of mankind to all those who will come to Jesus in full pardon of sin. I hope you have done that. Thank God for our dear Savior, Immanuel—God with us!
May the Christ of Christmas bring you joy and peace!
Victor W. Baugh, Sr., Th.D., Ph.D.
Pastor, St. Luke AME Church
Havana, AL
Author of The Anchor Holds, Victor’s Story
http://www.thatgracemayabound.blogspot.com/ ©2012
That Grace May Abound Ministries International ©2014
