Church prophesied? Or Mystery?
Dispensationalists like to argue that the Church was not revealed until the New Testament. They claim all prophecy of the Old Testament is silent about any idea of the Church, so that the Old Testament is wholly wind-swept empty regarding the Church.
But we should not deem the new covenant era, international Church as a mystery “completely unrevealed in the Old Testament,” as Ryrie does (based on Eph 3:5). Certainly the revelation’s clarity increases in the New Testament, and obviously the audience who hears it expands, but the revelation itself was given in the Old Testament.
Ephesians 3:5–6 reads: “which in other generations was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit; to be specific, that the Gentiles are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” We have already seen that the Old Testament anticipated this. Now we must note that Ryrie and the dispensationalists misread Paul’s statement. Consider the following.
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