"The present age" is characterized by its own aspect of God's grace and its own aspect of Christ's return. It began with "the grace of God…bringing salvation for all people" and it will end with the appearance of Jesus Christ to fulfill "our blessed hope" (Tit 2:11-14).

God governs His people by design. In the age just before ours He ruled His people by His law. In ours He rules His people by His grace. A major way to highlight the imminent return of Christ for us and to heighten our anticipation of it is by distinguishing God's administration of grace from His administration of law. Besides that, we must include the setting of the church age as it falls between the administration of God's law and a brief period of time in the future when God will fulfill certain unfulfilled promises He made to Israel.

We must see that God has interrupted His program for the nation of Israel to initiate and run His program for the church. He'll end His program for the church for this intervening age abruptly with the rapture. He began our age with an interruption and will end it with an abruption. Then He will turn again to His program for Israel and carry out His unfinished business with them. He'll end their age with the establishment of a new age and new administration, Messiah's millennial kingdom on earth.

We call our age the age of grace. Of course, being under grace does not mean that we have a different way of salvation than those under law. They too were saved by grace, never by keeping God's law.

When Elijah, in the age of the law, thought he was the only one of God's people left, God told Him that there were seven thousand others whom God had reserved for Himself. Paul compared those reserved people to God's people in this present age: "So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace" See (Rom 11:2-7).

Just as we belong to a remnant chosen by grace so did the reserved people of God in Israel in Elijah's time. God "foreknew" them, that is, foreordained them. They as His "chosen" people obtained a right standing with God, whereas other people in Israel did not.

Verse 7 harks back to Rom 9:30-32 where we see those in Israel under the law who substituted their own works for faith who did not get a right standing before God. There they are contrasted with the Gentiles who did obtain a right standing before God saved by grace and faith. On the one hand, works obtained no salvation; on the other hand, grace and faith obtained salvation.

So being under grace does not mean that we have a different method of salvation than those under law. What it means is that we have a different method of administration than those under law.

God has interrupted His Jewish administration to bring in His administration of grace. When He is through with His graceful administration in our age He will start up His Jewish administration again. Please notice that I've purposely chosen "Jewish administration" instead of the administration of "God's law."

I think it safe to say that no one can venture an adequate guess as to what God's regulations for Israel will be during that time, since He has nailed the law to the cross (Col 2:13-14). So to avoid confusion, I'm saying Jewish administration rather than give the impression that the full Mosaic order will be reinstated.

A couple of unanswered questions arise and remain. Regarding the rebuilt temple, what regulations will God impose and what regulations will the Jews impose on themselves? Two main things to see are clear. Regarding the age before ours God's people were distinctly Jewish. Regarding the continuance of their age after ours God's people with be distinctly Jews and Gentiles. Jewish believers in Christ will be Jews and Gentile believers in Christ will be Gentiles.

In our age God's people are non-racial. So when God wants to pick up with His Jewish people again, we'll be out of here! Right now everyone in Christ--everyone in His body, the church, is under grace Eph 1:22-23. Grace, not law, governs God's people in the present age.

We call our age the age of grace. We also call it the age of the Holy Spirit. God's law legislated and made demands impossible for anyone to satisfy but God Himself. God's grace enables us to live a life that pleases Him, a life that He Himself produces in us through the Holy Spirit's presence in our hearts.

Under His law God commanded His people, Israel, to live by an external code of regulations. Under His grace God enables His people, the church, to live by the internal presence of the Holy Spirit.

In Tit 2:11 grace is personified: "For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people,training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age." It is our trainer for renouncing "ungodliness and worldly passions" and for living "self-controlled, upright, and godly lives."

But the personification of grace is really accomplished in us by the Holy Spirit. In this age we are governed by "the law of the Spirit of life," by "the Spirit of God" operating as "the Spirit of Christ" in us. "But now we are released from the law...so that we serve not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit" (Rom 8:2;. 8:9;. 7:6).

We are not "outside the law of God but under the law of Christ" that operates in us as "the fruit of the Spirit" and "against such things there is no law." As we "walk by the Spirit" He enables us to bear the burdens of others and thus we "fulfill the law of Christ" (1 Cor 9:21; Gal 5:22-25; 6:2).

"For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people" (Tit 2:11). During His own ministry Jesus said that He had been sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. After His resurrection and ascension His ministry through His disciples began to go beyond the confines of Israel with a view of outreach to the whole world (Matt 15:24; 28:19-20). Though the grace of God "appeared" in the incarnation of Christ, its "bringing salvation for all people" didn't begin to take effect until the present age.

That grace motivated Christ to come to us wearing our humanity, and it "appeared" in His incarnation. But it didn't become operative as God's administration of His people until God nailed the law to Christ's cross (2 Cor 8:9; Col 2:13-14).

Grace brought salvation "to all people," those "not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles" (Rom 9:24). God's grace first "brings salvation" to them, then, after they have been "saved by grace" (Eph 2:8), that grace, as Titus 2:11-12 shows, trains them to live the Christian life. God's grace translates actively in our lives as the fruit of the Spirit.

How then, you might ask, can it be said that we "are not under law" (Rom 6:14)? Well, for one thing, in Christ we are no longer under the curse of the law (Gal 3:13). But besides that, we are no longer under God's law as His administration, or method of governing His people.

Sometimes the Bible has its own illustrations. There's a very helpful and significant one in our main text, Heb 3:1-6, that I'd like to bring to your attention.

"Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant...but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. And we are his house...."

Here we see two specific houses of God. We see each in its own time period and each with its own system of administration. One of His houses was the Hebrew people, His house in which Moses was a faithful servant. The other is the church, His people of the present age, which house His Son is over as its Head (Col 1:18).

The first is the administration of Moses or the administration of God's law; the second is the administration of the Son of God or the administration of God's grace.

"For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ" (Jn 1:17).

The law was given to Moses but its administration continued after his death. To Israel the name of Moses became synonymous with the law of God that Moses had delivered to them. And in Jesus' time the Scribes and Pharisees sat in Moses' seat (Lk 16:29-31; 2 Cor 3:15; Matt 23:2).

Grace came with Jesus Christ but its administration began after His death. To the church the name of Jesus, "the name that is above every name," became synonymous with "all authority in heaven and on earth" (Phil 2:9 Matt 28:17).

Obviously, house in Heb 3:5-6 means household. The ESV translates the same Greek word oikos, as household in Acts 16:31 where Paul tells the Philippian jailor: "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household." Moses managed God's household under law. Jesus manages God's household under grace.

The ideal example of administering or managing a household in biblical times went beyond attending to raising a family. It meant managing a household as an estate and business, with hired servants in the home and farmers and ranchers tending crops and animals. That's no doubt the idea being captured to illustrate the two types of administration before us in Hebrews 3:1-2; and vss 5-6.

Yet there seems to be a shift from household to house in Heb 3:3-4. There we read that "the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself. For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything." Here the house seems to be a building rather than people. The same Greek word oikos can be translated either way.

So what do we have here? Two satisfactory answers can be given.

The first one grants that the word builder could refer to the founder of the household. Thus he has built his household by increasing his family and staff as he has prospered.

The second one, the one I favor, takes the word builder as the constructor of a material house. While the position of Moses as a servant in God's house and that of Christ as a son over God's house suit household, the occupation of builder suits house better than household. As I see it, we have here the metaphor of God's people as a household and a simile of a material house to illustrate that household.

The builder of a material house is cited to illustrate the superior position of a son over a servant in a household: "For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses--as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself."

The administration of God's law on earth through Moses and the administration of God's grace on earth through His Son are two absolutely different kinds of His administration in two absolutely different time periods. God doesn't overlap these time periods. He has His Jewish household and His non-racial household, a period of Jewish administration with its own kind of end and a separate period of church administration with its own kind of end.

The time we're living in is a specific age uniquely designed by God. It has its own particular characteristics. It began at the cross of Christ and will end with the return of Christ for His church. It is the age of grace, the age of the Holy Spirit and the age of the church. Though the church itself began on the Day of Pentecost the church age began when Jesus died on the cross. It will end with the rapture, a fast exit that will snatch the church off the face of this earth.

Read (Heb 3:5-6) again. Notice the word "hope." The two administrations offer their own hope. There is one hope for God's people of the administration of law and another for God's people of the administration of grace (Rom 9:4; Eph 2:11-12; vss 13-19; 4:4). God's people under law were given hope of the coming of the Messiah to set up His kingdom on earth. That has yet to be fulfilled. God's people under grace have hope of the rapture and entrance into heaven. That might be fulfilled today!

Our hope of the rapture will be fulfilled at least seven years before Israel's hope of the restoration of God's kingdom to Israel will be fulfilled. First the rapture, then the tribulation period, then Messiah's kingdom on earth. That's God's order of things.

An intent look at the administration of grace will prove the imminent return of Christ for His church. This administration belongs to a specific age, ours, with its own beginning, unique characteristics and imminent ending. A contextual study of Scripture shows us that the Lord Jesus could come back for us at anytime.