Dispensations
How God opens the heavens age after age — and how the last dispensation gathers them all into one in Christ.
What a Dispensation Is
A dispensation is a period in which the Lord reveals His gospel, His priesthood, and His covenants to mankind through an authorized prophet. That prophet stands at the head of his age as a steward to whom heaven has “dispensed” sacred truth and authority, with the charge to give it to others. The word itself carries the sense of a stewardship entrusted and administered — a divine economy by which the things of God are handed down from heaven to earth.
Dispensations rarely follow one another seamlessly. More often a season of light is followed by apostasy, as men reject the prophets and the authority to administer the ordinances is withdrawn from the earth. Then, in His mercy, God opens the heavens again, calls a new prophet, and restores what was lost. History, read this way, is not a slow ascent of human achievement but a recurring drama of revelation, rejection, and restoration.
Each dispensation head receives the same gospel and the same priesthood, yet each is called to carry it to his own generation. The pattern is consistent across the whole sweep of scripture, and it points unmistakably toward a final age in which everything God ever revealed is gathered together and made complete.
The Fulness of Times Gathers All Things in One
The Apostle Paul revealed the purpose toward which all the dispensations move. There is to be a culminating age — the dispensation of the fulness of times — in which the scattered streams of revelation are drawn back into a single channel and all things are united in Christ.
“That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him.”
This is the great work of the last days. The Lord declared in modern revelation that He would commit the keys of His kingdom and a dispensation of the gospel for the last times, bringing together all the keys, powers, and ordinances ever held by His prophets.
“Unto whom I have committed the keys of my kingdom, and a dispensation of the gospel for the last times; and for the fulness of times, in the which I will gather together in one all things, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth.”
Joseph Smith taught that this gathering is not merely symbolic. The dispensations are to be linked together like an unbroken chain, each contributing its ordinances and keys until the whole is fused into one perfect and complete order.
“It is necessary … that a whole and complete and perfect union, and welding together of dispensations, and keys, and powers, and glories should take place, and be revealed from the days of Adam even to the present time.”
The Chain of Dispensation Heads
Scripture names a succession of prophets who each opened a dispensation. They form a chain reaching from the first man to the last days — each a witness, each a steward, each holding keys that would one day be welded into the fulness.
The Dispensation Heads
- Adam — the first dispensation; the gospel preached at the foundation of the world
- Enoch — the city of Zion taken up into heaven
- Noah — the covenant renewed after the flood
- Abraham — the covenant of seed and priesthood for all nations
- Moses — the law given at Sinai
- Christ — the meridian of time; the chief corner stone
- Joseph Smith — the dispensation of the fulness of times
Adam: The First Dispensation
The gospel did not begin with Moses or even with Abraham. It was revealed to Adam, the first man, who received the plan of salvation, was baptized by the Spirit, and taught it plainly to his children. In Adam the full pattern of a dispensation is already present: revelation, ordinances, covenant, and a prophet charged to teach his generation.
“Behold, I am God; I made the world, and men before they were in the flesh. … If thou wilt turn unto me, and hearken unto my voice, and believe, and repent of all thy transgressions, and be baptized, even in water, in the name of mine Only Begotten Son … ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.”
Adam holds the keys of the first dispensation and presides, under Christ, over the human family. In the latter days he is named Michael, the Ancient of Days, to whom all the prophets will render their stewardships (see D&C 107:40–57).
Enoch and Noah
Enoch built a people so righteous that the Lord called them Zion, “of one heart and one mind,” and the entire city was taken up into heaven. His dispensation shows what the gospel can produce when a people fully receives it.
“And the Lord called his people Zion, because they were of one heart and one mind, and dwelt in righteousness; and there was no poor among them.”
After the world had ripened in wickedness, Noah preached repentance, was preserved through the flood, and stood at the head of a renewed humanity. To Noah the Lord established His everlasting covenant, setting the bow in the cloud as its token (see Genesis 9:9–16; Genesis 6:18).
Abraham and Moses
To Abraham the Lord gave the covenant by which all the families of the earth would be blessed — a covenant of posterity, of land, and of the priesthood that would carry the gospel to every nation.
“And I will make of thee a great nation … and in thy seed after thee … shall all the families of the earth be blessed, even with the blessings of the Gospel, which are the blessings of salvation, even of life eternal.”
This covenant was sealed by circumcision as an everlasting token between God and Abraham’s seed (see Genesis 17). Centuries later, Moses gathered Abraham’s descendants out of Egypt and brought them to Sinai, where the Lord descended in fire and thundered His law from the mountain.
“Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people … and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation.”
Christ in the Meridian of Time
In the meridian of time God sent His Son, the great dispensation head who is also the Lord of every dispensation. Christ came in the fulness of the appointed time to fulfill the law, atone for sin, and establish His Church upon living apostles and prophets.
“But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.”
His Church was built upon a sure foundation, with Christ Himself as the head and chief corner stone (see Ephesians 2:20). Yet even this dispensation gave way to apostasy as the apostles were slain and the authority withdrawn — setting the stage for the final restoration the prophets had foreseen.
Joseph Smith and the Restitution of All Things
Peter taught that before the Lord’s return there must come a final restoration — a giving back of everything God had ever spoken through His holy prophets since the world began.
“And he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you: whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.”
That restoration began when the boy Joseph Smith knelt in a grove of trees and the Father and the Son appeared to him. Through Joseph the gospel, the priesthood, and the covenants were restored, and to him the Lord committed the keys of the dispensation of the fulness of times — the dispensation that would not be followed by apostasy, but would stand until Christ returns.
“I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other—This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!”
History Is Dispensational
Seen through the lens of scripture, the long story of the world is not a chaos of rising and falling civilizations, nor a blind march of progress. It is dispensational. Again and again the heavens open, a prophet is called, the gospel is given, and a covenant is established — and when men reject it, God waits, and then begins again.
From Adam to Enoch, from Noah to Abraham, from Moses to Christ, and at last to Joseph Smith, the same God has spoken the same gospel in age after age. Each prophet held a portion of the whole; each kept his keys until the appointed time. And now, in the dispensation of the fulness of times, those scattered portions are being gathered, welded, and fused into one — a whole and complete and perfect union of every dispensation from the days of Adam to the present.
This is the meaning of human history: God has never abandoned the earth to silence. He has dispensed His word in every age, and He is gathering all of it, and all who will come, into Christ — that in the fulness of times He might “gather together in one all things… both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him.”