Covenants, Dispensations and the Rapture
The phrases "covenant of works", "covenant of grace" or "covenant of redemption" are not in the Bible, they are theological constructions. We do have the "Old Covenant" and "New Covenant" clearly stated in the Bible, the exact wording.
The word "dispensation" is not found in the NET2 Bible, the REB, NRSV, GNB, Weymouth NT, CEV or Williams NT. Rather than "dispensation" you find the words "stewardship", "a commission", "a trust" and "the task assigned". The Greek word for "dispensation" is "G3622 οἰκονομία oikonomia" and it is used in Isaiah 22:19, 21 in the Septuagint where it is translated "administration".
Theologians and men of God have used the word "dispensation" in the past, but nothing like these absurd uses of today. Two examples:
Joseph Benson, 18th century Methodist on Isa. 2:2 - "The Jews, it must be observed, divided the times or succession of the world into three ages or periods: the first, before the law; the second, under the law; the third, under the Messiah: which they justly considered as the last dispensation, designed of God to remain till the consummation of all things. “Accordingly St. Paul tells us, that Christ appeared επι συντελεια των αιωνων , at the consummation of the ages, or several periods of the world, Hebrews 9:26; and, speaking of his own times, saith, τελη των αιωνων , the ends of the world, or conclusion of the ages, are come, 1 Corinthians 10:11."
R.L. Dabney, 18th century Presbyterian: "We conceive the familiar and established division to be correct,which makes two dispensations only, the Old Testament and the New."
That misused word "rapture" is found nowhere in any translation that refers to the return of Christ on the last day. The word can be found in some translations as read in the following:
"Then when you reach the hill of God, where the Philistine governor resides, you will meet a company of prophets coming down from the shrine, led by lute, drum, fife, and lyre, and filled with prophetic rapture...When they reached the hill there was a company of prophets coming to meet him, and the spirit of God suddenly took possession of him, so that he too was filled with prophetic rapture...When the prophetic rapture had passed, he went home." (1Sam 10:5, 10 13, REB)
"And Zechariah his father was filled with the Holy Spirit, and spoke in a rapture of praise." (Luke 1:67, Weymouth)
The etymology of the word "rapture" is an eye-opener:
rapture (n.)
c. 1600, "act of carrying off" as prey or plunder, from rapt + -ure, or else from French rapture, from Medieval Latin raptura "seizure, rape, kidnapping," from Latin raptus "a carrying off, abduction, snatching away; rape" (see rapt). The earliest attested use in English is with women as objects and in 17c. it sometimes meant rape (v.), which word is a cognate of this one.
The sense of "spiritual ecstasy, state of mental transport or exaltation" is recorded by c. 1600 (raptures). The connecting notion is a sudden or violent taking and carrying away. The meaning "expression of exalted or passionate feeling" in words or music is from 1610s."
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=rapture
The biblical Hebrew or Greek is not to be found behind the word "rapture". There is NO passage in the Bible describing the dispensationalists "rapture". It must be read into Scripture out of man's perverse mind.
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