One God and One Salvation, Contra Dispensationalism

One of the worst doctrines found in classical dispensationalism is that history is divided into periods when believers were saved in different ways. For example, the Jews were supposedly saved by obeying the Law, while Christians live in a different dispensation, in which we are saved by grace. While most self-described dispensationalists now repudiate that concept, it has crept into a more-general evangelical audience. You will often run into people who claim that Old Testament salvation was by law, but the New testament is grace.

That assertion is false.

On one hand, it is true that the Bible says, "You shall therefore keep My statutes and My rules; if a person does them, he shall live by them: I am the LORD" (Leviticus 18:5). On the other hand - and no one seems to notice this - it is never stated that any person has achieved eternal life in that way! Even David, the man after God's own heart (I Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22) is described as a sinner (Psalm 51), and never as one saved by his law obedience.

Why is that? Because, as David himself says, every man, woman, or child since the fall of Adam (excluding Jesus) is born a sinner, and any sin, even just one, makes that man, woman, or child a rebel under the Law (James 2:10). So, what about Leviticus 18:5? It is God's word, and, therefore, necessarily true. However, it is just hypothetical. If there were a man who was 100% consistent with the Law in thought and action, from his conception forward, then that man could claim eternal life as his due. However, besides Jesus, there has not been, nor could ever be, such a man.

Has the Law then deceived us with an impossible dream? Not at all. Rather, the Law should lead us to despair of that way of salvation. And, indeed, that same Law points us to the only alternative: "I will not spurn them, neither will I abhor them so as to destroy them utterly and break My covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God. But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the Lord" (Leviticus 26:44-45). In that same Law, God promises the salvation of His people, not on the basis of Law, but on the basis of His covenant to be gracious to His chosen people! 

Therefore, whenever anyone claims that there are two (or more) methods of salvation in the Bible, or that Jews are saved in a different way from Gentiles, then he is parroting something which he has been taught, because there is no such dichotomy in Scripture.