Question: Are you a dispensationalist? It seems like you are.
No, we are not dispensationalists but we do believe that God has a plan that He oversees to its fulfillment. We are born again, believers in the Lord Jesus the Christ who died for the sins of all mankind and believe that we are saved by grace through faith. In His plan of salvation for Mankind, God has steps (periods of time, age is the word Scripture uses) or phases if you will, of things that have to be completed before the next thing can happen. Example: before the flood, there was no Law of Moses but eight were saved from the flood and all others destroyed. Before the cross, sin was atoned for or covered over by animal sacrifice of blood for both Jew and Gentile. After the cross, sin can now be forgiven/removed by the grace of God through faith in the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, where the blood of Jesus was what met God’s requirement for removal of sin, not that of an animal. Read Hebrews 9 and 10 for context. Israel was under a covenant of law where the Body is under a new covenant of grace. After the 70th week of Israel’s prophetic time (tribulation) is completed, Jesus returns and sets up His 1000 year reign on the earth. For the student of the Scriptures, all of these things need to be recognized and understood.
The plan of God is to save all of Man who will trust and obey Him, and there are many details not mentioned here in this answer. If one can look at what I just pointed out and wants to look at us and say we are dispensationalists, there will be nothing I can do to change your mind but just consider that God has a plan and that plan has structure and order to it. This structure was designed by God, not man, and is very clearly outlined in His Word to mankind. These time periods or ages come with their own specific way to obey the command God gives to that group of people in that age.
For those who say that there were/are no ages, how do you explain Enoch or Noah? Christ had not come to the earth, there was no Law of Moses, there was no Israel and Christ had not died on the cross. So how can one say that he had to believe in Jesus to be saved? Wouldn’t you agree that would be hard to do since they didn’t know anything about Him dying on the cross? It is true that God told Satan, in Genesis 3:3, that there would be one who would “crush your head” and it is possible that God told man about One that would come, but we have no clear Scripture of this. To explain this, one will have to dismiss and distort a tremendous amount of Scripture and still not have an acceptable answer, but if you are really interested in the answer, refer to the paper in the toolbox titled Salvation where we have outlined salvation the way the plan of God lays it out from Genesis to Revelation and then decide for yourself.
There are teachers who are labeled “hyper dispensationalists” and these are the ones who distort the Scriptures with false teachings and give rise to many controversies, and rightly so, as they go way too far with regard to when the body was established and to whom some of the letters were written to and about, etc.
As with anything else, along with the Truth, there will also be those who distort it just enough so that believers, as well as the world, will be deceived and it is for you to study the Scriptures, put all into the proper context, and allow the Holy Spirit opportunity to lead you into all Truth.
Several years ago I called myself a dispensationalist but as I studied and grew in knowledge of the Scriptures, that idea along with other beliefs and traditions that I held, slowly yielded itself to the Truth. Today it is not even an issue to me because now I KNOW that God has a plan and that there are certain things that are to be accomplished in certain time periods as He directs things to happen within that time of the plan. So, if people want to label us as dispensationalists, that’s fine but what we really are is: believers in Jesus the Christ who believe God has a plan that He will see to its end and will save all men who turn to and believe Him for salvation.
I hope this answered your question. Grace be with you as we, the body, all grow together.