The first dispensation: Innocence

Good afternoon, beloved friends and brethren present, and those who are in different nations, in different churches. May the blessings of Christ, the Angel of the Covenant, be upon all of you and also upon me. In the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Warm greetings to Missionary Rev. Miguel Bermúdez Marín and his wife, and all ministers in all nations, and their congregations.

Let’s read in Genesis chapter 1, verses 26 and on. It says the following:

“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.”

May God bless our souls with His Word and allow us to understand It, may He open the Scriptures to us and our understanding, and our heart to believe It and receive It there in our soul. In the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

“THE FIRST DISPENSATION: INNOCENCE.”

God created man in His image; and His image is spiritual, it is a spiritual body, a heavenly body, a theophanic body like that of the angels, in other words, of another dimension. And he led the animals, the fish… he was placed over everything – God placed the man whom He had first created as a spirit-man, a spiritual body. And later on, in chapter 2 of Genesis, He gives him a physical body, as it tells us in chapter 2 of Genesis, verse 7:

“And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”

In other words, first He made man in another dimension: the dimension of the angels or the sixth dimension; and He placed him over the whole planet Earth and everything the planet Earth had at that time, as ruler, as king over the planet Earth. In other words, God the King of the universe, made His first son King over this planet Earth.

And then He gave him his physical body, where He placed the masculine spirit and the feminine spirit; and He instructed him: that he should not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for the day he ate of that tree, he would die.¹

And then He took Adam (in whom was the feminine spirit and the masculine spirit), He made him fall asleep—that was the first anesthetic used on the human being—and then out of him, out of his side, He took a rib, and from there He formed a feminine body; and He took the feminine spirit out of Adam and placed it in that feminine body; and He closed up the place from which He had taken out the rib to form a helpmeet for Adam.

Then, we find Adam and Eve happy in the Garden of Eden, where God’s place of worship was and where God met Adam every day in the evening; and the Tree of Life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil were there. Therefore, we need to see what Rev. William Branham tells us regarding these trees in the Garden of Eden. He says that those two trees there: the Tree of Life is Christ, and therefore, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is another person.²

The Tree of Life always continues to be Christ. There is no other person who can be the Tree of Life.

Remember that the human being is represented in trees, he is also represented in animals. For example, we have the Lamb of God, the Lamb, the Lamb that would take away the sin of the world; and when John sees Him, he says: “Behold the Lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the world,”³ and when people look, what they see is a man, Jesus.

Christ also says that He is the Lion of the tribe of Judah; He is not a literal lion, He is a man. The Scripture also speaks of the Two Olive Trees that stand before God, the Two Anointed Ones,⁴ and they are Moses and Elijah, the ministries of Moses and Elijah, which will be repeated according to Revelation chapter 11, verses 1 to 14. See? They are represented in two olive trees.

So, human beings are represented in trees, in animals, and so forth; and nations are also represented in trees, such as Israel, which is represented in the fig tree.

Christ also represents the other nations in trees: the fig tree and all the trees or other trees, the prophecy of Saint Matthew 24: the fig tree and the other trees budding at the end time. That is a very great sign for Bible readers.

Even Christ also represents Himself in the true Vine, in the Vine; because Christ is the true Vine. And He represents the believers in Him in the branches; that is, He says: “I am the Vine, ye are the branches.”⁵ In other words, on a grape tree or plant, the branches are called: pampanos or galhos, as they are called in Brazil (not the gallos of chickens, but galhos as in the branches of a grape plant).⁶

And Christ also represents the children of God in wheat in chapter 13 of Saint Matthew; and those who are not children of God, He represents them in the tares. As simple as that. In other words, everything is, let’s say, codified in parables.

And the disciples ask Jesus Christ in chapter 13, verses 11 to 17: “Why do You speak to them in parables?” Christ says to them: “Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the Kingdom, but to them it is not given, except through parables.” In other words, the children of God are given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of Heaven.

Therefore, it is important that we take advantage, knowing the mysteries of the Kingdom of God while we live on this Earth. So, when we are told about the Vine, who do we think of? Jesus Christ. When we are told about the Vine branches, who do we think of? Ourselves. When we are told about the wheat, whom do we think of? Ourselves. And when we are told about the Two Olive Trees, who do we think of? Moses and Elijah; in other words, the ministries of Moses and Elijah being repeated at the Last Day. The Bible is as simple as that.

Christ would speak to the public in parables, but He would explain things clearly to His disciples. For example, He says that the One who sows the good seed, in chapter 13, 1 to 23, of Saint Matthew: “…He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man.” In the field is where the good seed is sown, and the field is the land where the sowing takes place; in other words, human beings. One is sown by the wayside, another is sown upon stony places, another is sown among thorns, and another is sown in good ground.

The one sown by the wayside are those that hear the Word and later on the enemy comes and takes out what was sown in their hearts. Then, at the end, the one that was sown in good ground, it says, are those who hear the Word and understand It, and bring forth fruit; some a hundredfold, others sixtyfold and others thirtyfold.

In other words, a grain of wheat (or whatever it may be) is sown and it brings forth one hundred; a wheat grain is sown and it brings forth sixty; a wheat grain is sown and it brings forth thirty. Such is the good ground, one produces more than another, as it usually happens. That is representing the children of God as the good ground where the Word is sown, and that is the good seed: the Word, to bear fruit.

In other words, the Word of God, the Gospel, is sown in the heart of people (the good ground), for it to bear fruit. Not for you to do nothing in the Kingdom of God; it’s for you to bring forth the fruit of the Kingdom.

Remember that the Kingdom, Christ said in chapter 21 verses 43 and on, of Saint Matthew, He said to the Jews and religious leaders of that time: “The Kingdom of God is taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.”

In other words, the people whom the Kingdom was passed on to, the Kingdom was given to, so that they bring forth and would bring forth His fruit, that is the people made up of all the believers in Christ, whether they be Jews or Gentiles; that is where the fruit of the Kingdom of God will be found.

The fruit of the Kingdom of God, as sons and daughters of God, and the works of the sons and daughters of God, will be found in the believers in Christ, who form the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, and who are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ Jesus our Lord; they inherit in the Kingdom of God.

“Fear not, little flock; for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.”⁷ In other words, the Kingdom of God is with the believers in Christ, and they form the people of the Kingdom of God.

In the time of Adam they were living in the stage or Dispensation of Innocence. They were not in a stage in which both consciouses were separated: they were together; but when they sinned there was a serious problem, even in their brain. The same thing happens when a person fails, he gets all confused.

The human being was going to fall, God knew that, and those Divine Attributes of Savior, of love, of mercy, of Redeemer, and so forth, had to be manifested. And the Title Deed that Adam had, the Book of Life, which is the Title Deed of Eternal Life and of all Creation, with which and by which Adam had dominion of the whole planet Earth along with everything it had: He would command the animals to move to another place, and they would go, the fish too, the birds too, and even the trees; he could tell the trees: “Move from here to there,” and they would move.

Doesn’t Christ say the same thing: “If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say unto this mountain, move from here to there, and it shall move; and nothing shall be impossible to you”?⁸

So, Adam had that authority, but he lost it when he lost the Title Deed, which returned to the right hand of God. And from that point on there was a change in the mind, the brain, and the whole body of Adam and Eve: they became mortal, because they had not been adopted or glorified yet; they were in a time of trial.

We find that the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ would go through that same stage or stages.

Now, in the Dispensation of Innocence they were – it was under the Divine Covenant; a Covenant… the Edenic Covenant, in other words, the Covenant of Eden.

It is important to know these things in order to know what Adam and Eve lost. She sinned due to lack of believing what Adam had taught her, and she ignored what Adam had taught her on behalf of God, and she was deceived.

By Adam receiving her, he sinned voluntarily; he became sin for her and with her; and the consequence was that he lost the right to live eternally in the body of flesh that he had. And from that point on, neither he nor she could live eternally in the body of flesh that they had.

But there was a sacrifice for them, and God gave them skins, those skins of an animal that was sacrificed for them;⁹ God gave them those bloody skins, a type and figure of the Sacrifice of Christ with which His Blood would cover us, cleanse us from all sin, and thus give us life by taking away our sins.

But we are speaking about the Dispensation of Innocence. They were in the Garden of Eden. When they sinned, God took them out of the Garden of Eden so that they wouldn’t stretch out their hand and also eat of the Tree of Eternal Life and live eternally as sinners.

In these mortal bodies, the more years a person lives, the more he suffers; and especially when he reaches the age of an elderly man or elderly woman, from that point on, he suffers a lot. Therefore, it’s not the number of years that we can live; it is the time that we live serving Christ, working in His Work, being faithful to Him, glorifying Him, and fulfilling what is established for Christians in the New Covenant, in the New Testament, which is in the Gospels and in the apostolic letters of Saint Peter, Saint Paul, and other apostles; and, therefore, in the Book of Revelation, written by John as the scribe, but dictated by Jesus Christ, the Angel of the Covenant, the Holy Spirit.

That is why He always says, when He writes to the churches, He says: “He that has ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.”¹⁰

It is Christ in Holy Spirit in the midst of His Church, speaking through each one of the messengers of each age. That is what the Spirit says to the churches: what He says through the messenger of each age; who hears from God, from the Holy Spirit, from Christ, what He has to say to the Church and in the Church at that time.

And then, anointed by the Holy Spirit, he speaks it; and that is the Holy Spirit speaking through that messenger; and He calls and gathers the elect of that age, and places them in complete union with Christ in the age of that messenger; and thus, that group becomes part of the Mystical Body of Christ. The part of that spiritual Temple of that time is formed by those living stones, by those people.

Now, the first dispensation, of Innocence, already passed. In Innocence they were naked and they were not ashamed because they had no knowledge of what it meant to have clothes on or not have clothes on; they had no knowledge of what sin was, of what was good or bad. But after eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they hid, they took fig leaves to cover themselves.

And since God visited them every day, He asks Adam: “Where are you?” In other words, he wasn’t in the place where he always met God. And he says: “I heard Your Voice in the Garden and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid.”¹¹ But before that, he did not know that he was naked, what it meant to be naked, and he was not ashamed and he was not afraid. But now, the innocence of Adam and Eve disappears. Now they are not innocent, they are conscious that they are naked; which means that they are conscious that they sinned against God, that they disobeyed.

Rev. William Branham talks about what that original sin was; and in one of the conferences that we will have, we will touch on that subject, reading what Rev. William Branham said the original sin was.

We are not going to touch on it today, but later on, when we read it, we will relate it to what we are speaking about today. Therefore, we will leave for another occasion. what Rev. William Branham said regarding what the original sin was.

“THE FIRST DISPENSATION: THE DISPENSATION OF INNOCENCE.”

Someday, in the Millennium, we will return to the Garden of Eden, to everything that Adam and Eve lost in the Garden of Eden. Why? Because the Lamb’s Book of Life will return to Earth: the second Adam will bring It and place It among the second Eve, His Church, in order to return to the Garden of Eden in the Millennium, in other words, to return to that Life with all the rights contained in the Title Deed of Eternal Life, of the planet Earth, and of everything the planet Earth has and will have. That is why the Scripture says that we are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans chapter 8, verses 14 and on).

In other words, this planet Earth is our inheritance, and not only the planet Earth but all of Creation; therefore Christ is heir of all Creation, and we are joint-heirs with Him; that is why we are kings and priests with Him, and also judges, who will judge the world and even the angels.¹²

Therefore, when the Title Deed returns to the human race, by Christ, the Mighty Angel, bringing It, and placing It in the midst of His Church, we will return to everything that Adam and Eve lost in the Garden of Eden; in other words, we will be restored to everything they lost back then, we will be restored to eternal youth, Eternal Life in glorified bodies, with all the power and attributes that belong to us as descendants of the second Adam.

That is why we will return to what Adam and Eve lost, and that is why we will be transformed, we will have glorified bodies; because the bodies that we have, since Adam, is an animal body. And even though the Word seems harsh…, let’s see if it’s in the Bible. Corinthians, in [First] Corinthians, chapter 15, verses 44 and on, it says:

“It is sown a natural body [in Spanish: animal body—Ed.]; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body [in Spanish: animal body], and there is a spiritual body.”

The bodies that we have are an animal body; and of the animal bodies that there are, the human being is the crown. But we are going to have a heavenly body in the adoption of the sons and daughters of God, as it tells us in Romans chapter 8, verses 14 to 39; that will be the adoption, the redemption of the body; then we will have a heavenly body, a glorified body, like the glorified body of Jesus Christ.

He had to be made in the image, in the likeness of the human being, to be able to die as Redeemer, by bearing our sins and thus becoming mortal; He had to come down to have a body like the body of human beings. That is in Romans chapter 8, verse 3, it says:

“For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh…”

And Saint Peter says that He bore our sins, that is why He was able to die.¹³ Just like Adam and Eve became mortal by sinning, by sin coming upon them; when our sin came upon Jesus, He became mortal, and that is why He was able to die for us on Calvary’s Cross, to be able to give us Eternal Life, so that we could live eternally.

This is also what happened in type and figure with Adam and Eve. If Adam didn’t become sin for Eve: Eve would die, but Adam would continue living; and if Christ didn’t become sin for us: we would die, and Christ would continue living on Earth for all eternity because He had no sin. He took our sins in order to die for all of us.

The first dispensation: of Innocence, we find it in Genesis chapter 1, chapter 2, and chapter 3. Later we will see the other dispensations.

Remember that each dispensation is a time period, of God dealing with the human being, where there are covenants established by God; and therefore, there is a way to approach God, to worship God, to serve God and for God to bless the human being.

In this study of the dispensations, we will reach the dispensation where we currently are. There are seven dispensations:

• The Dispensation of Innocence.
• The Dispensation of Conscience (when they are already conscious after having sinned).
• The Dispensation of Human Government, with Noah.
• The Dispensation of the Promise, with Abraham.
• The Dispensation of the Law, with Moses.
• The Dispensation of Grace, with Jesus.
• And the Dispensation of the Kingdom, which is the seventh dispensation.

We will go through those dispensations to see in them how God dealt with people in each dispensation; and then what the type and figure is, of what happened back then, in order to know what will be happening in the dispensation in which we are given to live at this end time.

Remember that in the parable of the ten virgins, when the cry was heard: “Behold, the Bridegroom is coming; go out to meet Him,” those who were prepared received the Lord, they went in with Him to the Marriage, and the door was shut. And when the foolish virgins came to knock on the door, it was already closed; they were left for the great tribulation. That is in Saint Matthew chapter 25, 1 to 13; and in Saint Luke chapter 13, verses 22 to 27.

“When once the Master of the House has risen up and shut the door, then you will begin saying: In…” Let’s read it so you have a clear picture. “We did such-and-such a thing in Your Name,” and He will say that He does not know them. And it feels bad for a person to think that someone else knew him, but when he identifies himself, he is told: “I don’t know you; I don’t know who you are.” Chapter 13, verse 22 and on of, Saint Luke, says:

“And he went through the cities and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem.

Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them,

Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.”

Remember that Christ is the Door. “I am the Door; by Me if any man enters in, he shall be saved, and he shall find pasture,” says Saint John chapter 10, verse 9.

“When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:

Then shall ye begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets.

But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.

There shall be (wailing) and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.”

This will be fulfilled. The Master of the House is Christ, because through Christ comes the Family of God, the House of God, the seed of God, which are the believers in Christ, who form the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ.

That is why the children of God are born by Christ, in and through His Church, which is Christ, the second Adam, and His Church is the second Eve; typified in Christ (the second Adam) as the Corn of Wheat, and His Church typified in the wheat plant through which the wheat grains, the sons and daughters of God, come forth. As simple as that.

Next Sunday we will continue with the corresponding subject of the Second Dispensation: of Conscience, from wherever I am, but I will be with you on the screen.

May God bless you and keep you all.

“THE FIRST DISPENSATION: INNOCENCE.”