The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism: How the Evangelical Battle over the End Times Shaped a Nation

by Daniel G. Hummel

The distinction between individual and social agency, and between spiritual and corporeal brotherhood, allowed Dixon to wax about spiritual equality while ignoring social racism in his midst. Northerners as well as Southerners inhabited cities stratified by race and material inequality, yet Dixon was muted on why such a situation existed. The “solidarity of the race” was God’s intention, Dixon preached, but sin broke it. “Now God is making a new solidarity which begins at Calvary and is based upon the new creation,” and yet the plane of transformation was narrowly spiritual. “Only the cross can make the confusion of Babel give way to the fusion of Pentecost,” he taught, referencing God’s act of dispersing humanity into separate tribes and language groups, and the latter coming of the Holy Spirit to diverse early followers. “Only in this fire of God’s love can races be molded into one family with the spirit of true brotherhood.”11 Clarence was no Thomas, yet the distinctions he made fueled new premillennialist views of racial difference.