Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Atonement

  • Eastern Orthodox Tradition and Atonement

    I want to promote some comments so that more people see them.

    Mark Olson (Pseudo-Polymath) commented on an earlier post:

    If you have the time, could you relate this statement

    First, no matter what stream of Christianity one belongs to, the atonement comes out somewhere near the center.

    With this:

    On the subject of the atonement, the Eastern Orthodox tradition has some quite different ideas to the Protestant tradition, and the whole paradigm of salvation tends to be very different. Many of the essential protestant concepts such as original sin, penal substitutionary atonement, and salvation by faith are not present, and instead other very different ideas tend to be utilized. The Eastern Orthodox church traces its tradition and teachings very strongly to the writings of the church fathers of the first millennia.

    Thanks, whether or not you choose to take me up on my question. 🙂

    Not take the question on? This is the sort of topic I live for, especially because it takes me well out of my normal lines of study. The link above is to a category, but the quote comes from a most interesting post, Guest Post: The Doctrine of the Atonement in the Early Greek Fathers.

    As I commented later in that thread, I read straight over the link, and thus asked Mark for more links.

    Here is my original response:

    I may need some clarification on the question. My argument for several weeks has been that the atonement is not defined by penal substitution, but rather that PSA is one metaphor among many and not the central metaphor.

    When I say atonement is near the center, I do not mean PSA. I see the incarnation as absolutely the center, expressed liturgically through the Eucharist and ethically through the two laws (love for God and love for neighbor) which get their Christian meaning from the incarnation. Atonement follows immediately from the incarnation, and can be described in various ways. Penal substitution isn’t even the only version of substitution.

    As an aside, were I asked to explain why Jesus had to die as Brian McLaren was, I would say that the incarnation would be incomplete if Jesus didn’t share all characteristics of his brethren, and experiencing death is an integral part of that.

    Thus I am rather happy to hear that the Eastern Orthodox tradition does not use penal substitution. I would love to read some of what they do. Could you recommend some eastern church fathers I should read and particular references? I’m more acquainted with the western fathers, though friends often tease me that I don’t know anything that happened after 100 AD. They’re not entirely wrong, either.

    This is a subject I’m always happy to discuss.

    As noted, I withdraw the request for links, though additional material would be helpful. I would like to quote a section from that same blog post as follows:

    The basic paradigm of salvation universally held by these writers [Greek fathers of the period 100-400 AD] is as follows:

    1. Humans have free will to engage in either vice or virtue, and the ability to become more or less virtuous over time.
    2. God is virtuous and desires humans to be also. He is pleased with virtue and displeased by vice.
    3. Christ taught virtue to mankind.
    4. By following Christ’s teachings, and by the help of the Spirit, we can progress and improve in virtue if we make the effort.
    5. All men have the ability to achieve a standard of virtue acceptable to God.
    6. The Final Judgment will be decided based on our level of virtue.

    OK, this sounds a great deal like Pelagianism, another view for which I have expressed some sympathy, though not total sympathy. I’ll have to try to get more precise on the comparison. It looks to me like I would differ from this formulation on a number of points, though not nearly by as much as most evangelicals would differ. This formulation leaves substantially less room for acceptance of PSA even as one metaphor for atonement.

    I don’t think it changes the basic notion of having atonement, derived from the incarnation, somewhere at the center of Christianity. It simply uses different metaphors, both of which I recognize and accept, to describe how atonement takes place.

    I hope by promoting these comments to a new post I will generate discussion. I’m really terribly weak on my acquaintance with eastern church fathers, though I’m working on remedying that.

  • Smartypants Notions Like Cosmic Child Abuse

    Somehow it seems as thought advocates of penal substitutionary atonement (PSA) as the key model of the atonement (I’d prefer metaphor) can’t stay kind and respectable. I wonder why it is that those of us who think that one needs to consider the character of God in terms of love, mercy, and forgiveness as well as justice, and who are concerned with careless formulations, are somehow less pious.

    I was really not planning to post any more on this topic for awhile, but then Adrian Warnock quoted this from J. I. Packer:

    Since all this was planned by the holy Three in their eternal solidarity of mutual love, and since the Father’s central purpose in it all was and is to glorify and exalt the Son as Saviour and Head of a new humanity, smartypants notions like “divine child abuse”, as a comment on the cross, are supremely silly, and as irrelevant and wrong as they could possibly be. [emphasis (color) from Adrian’s quote]

    But it’s not theologically educated opponents who are generally missing the point here. It is careless formulations that are being heard regularly in the pews as something very similar to cosmic child abuse. Some people like it, because it allows them to proclaim a tough God. They want the God of justice to put fear into the next generation. Others are driven away by it. It’s not the critics who have a problem here. It’s the proponents.

    I understand the trinity and the incarnation quite well. That’s why I’m disturbed by formulations that do sound very much like cosmic child abuse. It’s pointless for theologians who are writing for a lay audience to say things like “God’s wrath was poured out on his innocent son instead of on the guilty people who deserved it” and then complain that if people really understood the trinity, they’d realize it is really God pouring his wrath on himself. If people don’t understand the trinity–and you’ll find a crowd of folks in the pews who don’t–then they’re going to hear that sentence incorrectly and get the wrong idea about God.

    In fact, if they really do understand the trinity, I think they’ll have to see that PSA must be a metaphor. It elucidates part of the problem, but if you try to make it stand on all four, it just doesn’t fully make sense. Now not fully making sense isn’t entirely a bad thing. That just shows that a full understanding of the atonement remains outside our human grasp.

    If you want to call that a “smartypants” response, that’s your privilege and also Packer’s. But I think that dismissive attitude is dangerous. (Note that much of Packer’s article itself avoids the difficulties in phraseology to which I’m referring. He simply seems to ignore the problem of other formulations to which critics may respond. Of course, I still do disagree with him on making PSA central, but I do think he formulates PSA appropriately.)

    After having been annoyed by that quote, I also read this one by Peter Kirk. I think he deals well with Carson’s material. I would simply add that I prefer the word “metaphor” to “model.” “Models” need to be worked together into a single whole, or at least that is the feeling I get with the word. Metaphors can illustrate different parts and need not necessarioly stand on all four feet.

  • Divine Child Abuse and the Use of Scripture

    It has probably seemed a little odd that I, as a non-evangelical, would follow the atonement discussions as closely as I do. To the extent that I have managed to do so, it has been for two reasons. First, no matter what stream of Christianity one belongs to, the atonement comes out somewhere near the center. If it does not, then I have to wonder if we’re talking about Christianity at all. Second, some of my best friends are evangelicals. Seriously, they are! I have been frequently told that I could be an evangelical if I wanted to, and I have even met people who call themselves evangelicals who are somewhat more liberal than I am.

    Nonetheless I prefer not to try to defend my use of a label for myself, so I’m going to stick with the twin “passionate moderate” and “liberal charismatic” labels that make so many people crazy, and allow others to define just what an evangelical is.

    I was interested in two posts by Adrian Warnock today. The first one dealt with the emerging church and the Emergent Village. There are a couple of points I want to engage in that post. The first is simply the statement of penal substitutionary atonement (PSA). Bluntly I think advocates of this position are either a bit careless with their vocabulary, or they do believe in a doctrine that is dangerously flawed.

    Adrian is doubtless right that this problem is one that is not limited to the UK. While it was not so public an issue, I was part of a discussion group in seminary in which we debated some of these issues, and my seminary days are more than several years ago.

    Since Adrian’s post consisted largely of an extended quote from an article by Brett Kunkle on Resurgence, I will quote and work directly from that article. I am operating on the assumption that Adrian quoted this article approvingly. The article covers a great deal of ground and does so very carefully and so far as I can tell, fairly. I should note that in making my own judgment of fairness, I am working from what appears to be a weaker knowledge of the Emergent Village (EV) than Kunkle’s. My response is to his comments, and not intended either as a critique or endorsement of specific EV views.

    Here’s the first key quote:

    . . . Carol, a Christian, answers with a summary of substitutionary atonement: “Well, I believe that God sent Jesus into the world to absorb all the punishment for our sins. That’s what the cross was all about. It was Jesus absorbing the punishment that all of us deserve. He became the substitute for all of us. As he suffered and died, all our wrongs were paid for, so all of us can be forgiven.” . . . [quote footnoted to Brian McLaren, The Story We Find Ourselves In (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003), 101.]

    Please note that I have grabbed a piece of a paragraph. In order to limit the size of the quotation, I’m making the dangerous assumption that you will check the broader context. My reason for quoting this is that, as stated by Carol, the fictional character in McLaren’s book, PSA would, in fact, be divine child abuse. This statement of PSA ignores the doctrine of the Trinity, in my view, and carelessly states the doctrine of substitution as though God found some other person, an innocent person and had that person absorb the punishment for the rest of us, making forgiveness possible.

    At the same time, the idea that such “absorption” made it possible for all of us to be forgiven is troubling, at best, in terms of theology. Do the advocates of PSA truly believe that God is universally locked into this Medieval sense of punishment and satisfaction, so that he will somehow believe that justice has been done when an innocent person has been punished? Do they believe that he is unable to create the universe in any other way? That short statement, without a broader context, displays an impotent God, caught off-guard by our sin, and unable to resolve the matter except through this odd mechanism of killing an innocent person. Yet this is a description I have frequently heard in churches. It is precisely how many older Christians understand atonement. I am in no way surprised that McLaren would have the character in his book find injustice here–it would be hard to miss–and would look for better formulations.

    In response, however, Kunkle quotes two scriptures:

    Let me say three things in response. First, does McLaren actually think Jesus did not know why he had to die? What about Matthew 20:28? “…just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” Or what about Jesus’ words to his disciples at the Last Supper? “And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you; for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.’” Surely Jesus knew why he had to die. One cannot read the New Testament and conclude otherwise.

    Now this is one of the things that disturbs me in these debates even more than someone’s position on the issue of the atonement. Texts are trotted out, and we are told to assume they mean a certain thing when they don’t mean anything of the sort. Matthew 20:28, for example, is not a PSA text at all, it speaks of a ransom. Discussing to whom the ransom was to be paid has generated a whole string of weird theories over the years, which illustrate the problem when an illustration or a metaphor is extended beyond its intended use.

    Barclay comments eloquently in the Daily Study Bible on the parallel passage in Mark 10:45. His whole comment is worth reading, but let me just quote briefly:

    He had come, He said, to give His life a ransom for many. This is one of the great phrases of the gospel, and yet is is a phrase which has been sadly mishandled and maltreated. People have tried to erect a theory of the atonement on what is a saying of love. It was not long until people were asking to whom this ransom of the life of Christ had been paid? . . .

    . . . Suppose we say that freedom can only be obtained at the price of blood, sweat and tears, we never think of investigating to whom that price is paid. . . . [Barclay, Daily Study Bible: The Gospel of Mark, pp. 268-269]

    The second text likewise simply tells us that the blood is poured out for the forgiveness of sins, but fails entirely to tell us why this was necessary, or even that the pouring out of blood was absolutely necessary, or how such atonement would work. The advocates of PSA are trying to make the mechanism of the atonement be the key issue, when it should be the fact of the atonement. God, however he did it, has made reconciliation possible. Certainly, the two texts Kunkle has cited do not challenge McLaren’s approach (or mine) in any way.

    It seems to me that there is a greater concern amongst certain people about not merely understanding the mechanism of atonement (a task I believe we human beings will never accomplish this side of heaven), but in making sure that the mechanism is understood in a specific way. In so doing, they are happy with statements that include the mechanism, Jesus dying for our sins, even though those statements impugn God’s character.

    In his second post, Adrian makes quite a number of comments. I simply want to look at two:

    As we finally draw near to the conclusion of this long-running series on the atonement, it has struck me just how the lines are being drawn. On the one hand there are those of us who feel PSA is essential to the Gospel. It’s not that we think it’s the only thing—or indeed that every Gospel presentation must major on it. It’s just that we think it’s essential, and that Gospel presentations can’t deny it.

    This is succinct, and I must state my disagreement. The mechanism of the atonement is never an essential. The fact is. There is no requirement for theological understanding as a part of salvation. Thus, while I can state that PSA, carefully phrased, is a valuable metaphor for atonement, I believe it is also a very dangerous one, because it can so easily be stated in such a way as to look like injustice and abuse.

    I would say that my position on this issue has hardened, because I truly had not been aware that there were so many careless, and in my view dangerous, statements of substitutionary atonement from people who ought to know better.

    Wherever you stand on all the debates that fly around the blogosphere, I hope we can journey together for awhile and learn from each other—if nothing else, we should at least be able to gain an accurate view of what we both believe. I do believe that if we each focus on moving from where we stand one step closer to the God of the Bible, we will find ourselves gradually drawing closer together in what we believe.

    I have been far out on the periphery of what seems to be more a conservative evangelical debate. Nonetheless I have enjoyed the opportunity to interact even in a small way with this debate, and to hear what my more conservative brothers and sisters (I am an egalitarian after all!) are saying on an important topic.

  • Quotes on Imputed Righteousness

    The translator’s difficulty with this passage arises from the lack of a single English verb to express both “do right” and “be right with God”; of a noun that means both “righteousness” and “acceptance with God as righteous”; and of an adjective to describe the man who is both “righteous” and “accepted as righteous,” or to use the Latin, both “just” and “justified.” The resulting obscurities and inconsistencies give aid and comfort to human nature–Paul would say “the flesh”–in its habit of divorcing faith from faithfulness and justification from righteousness. The interpreter has to guard against basing “justification by faith” upon a fictive or imputed righteousness rather than presenting it as an actuality inseparable from the Christian’s present life in Christ. When Paul says that the righteous man who is both just and justified is to live on the basis of faith, he is describing a way of life that is present as well as future. His faith is the determinant of action which makes righteousness actual even now.
    — The Interpreter’s Bible on Galatians 3:11

    But to him that worketh not – It being impossible he should without faith. But believeth, his faith is imputed to him for righteousness – Therefore God’s affirming of Abraham, that faith was imputed to him for righteousness, plainly shows that he worked not; or, in other words, that he was not justified by works, but by faith only. Hence we see plainly how groundless that opinion is, that holiness or sanctification is previous to our justification. For the sinner, being first convinced of his sin and danger by the Spirit of God, stands trembling before the awful tribunal of divine justice ; and has nothing to plead, but his own guilt, and the merits of a Mediator. Christ here interposes; justice is satisfied; the sin is remitted, and pardon is applied to the soul, by a divine faith wrought by the Holy Ghost, who then begins the great work of inward sanctification. Thus God justifies the ungodly, and yet remains just, and true to all his attributes! But let none hence presume to “continue in sin;” for to the impenitent, God “is a consuming fire.” On him that justifieth the ungodly – If a man could possibly be made holy before he was justified, it would entirely set his justification aside; seeing he could not, in the very nature of the thing, be justified if he were not, at that very time, ungodly. — John Wesley on Romans 4:5

    Note that I’m not quoting these as authority for the position, but rather as expressions of this view of imputed and imparted righteousness to spark thought. I do consider both of these statements very good expressions of my own view on the matter.

    I would place these expressions alongside what Adrian Warnock quoted from Wayne Grudem.

    If I could add my own note, God counted (not “thought of”) Jesus as one of us (sinners), to bring an end to that reality. He counts us as righteous upon our justification, in order to begin bringing an end to the reality of sin in our lives. This is one of the problems I see with making PSA the central metaphor of the atonement. One almost has to see God in error. He sees Jesus as sinful, even though he is not, and he sees us as righteous, even though we are not. I would say that God intentional mixes the categories–counting Jesus as one of us, and then us with Jesus–to bring about the reality. He always knows what he is doing, and I think it’s better to express it in that way.

  • Exclusion and Inclusion and Vague Boundaries

    A community must have some sort of definition in order to exist. This may seem fairly obvious, but often in discussions of religion we lose sight of that fact in efforts to be inclusive. It’s important to remember that there is a difference between saying somebody is a bad person and saying that they don’t fit into a particular community.

    I could go on and on here, talking about communities within a community, such as congregations and denominations within the broader community of the Christian religion in general. There are different requirements for different communities. That’s not the particular issue I want to write about, however. I simply want to note that I’m aware that boundaries are necessary for there to be communities.

    Having said all that, I’ve observed with interest the advent of exclusion talk in the atonement debates (recent discussion of PSA). While these specifically deal with the evangelical movement in the UK, I think many of the same questions are applicable on this side of the pond.

    What’s interesting to me is that having heard the suggestion over the years (not just in the current debate) that liberals are not really Christians because of their view of the atonement, suddenly it is conservatives, specifically conservative proponents of PSA, who are concerned with exclusion.

    I have noted the same thing in recent discussion with United Methodists. Some evangelical pastors and/or candidates are feeling exclusion from sponsors or from boards of ministry. This is an issue that concerns me a great deal. If the exclusion is real, and is not part of setting the appropriate bounds of the community, then we have folks on the liberal side not living up to their principles.

    There is an alternative. Some people who have had the power to exclude become very irate when that power is taken from them or restricted. I have encountered more than one church in which established membership has become extremely angry and has felt excluded simply because newer members have gotten power and as a result have restricted the power of people who thought of themselves as permanent leaders.

    A very specific case of this is when one restricts someone else from exercising the power of exclusion themselves. Let’s take a couple of hypothetical situations. (Though these two situations may resemble broadly some real situations, I do not intend to duplicate any real-world situations.)

    Situation #1: A candidate for ministry expresses a very conservative view, supporting the United Methodist position (per UM Discipline) that homosexuality is not compatible with Christian practice. The candidate’s liberal mentor makes every effort to block this candidate’s continuation toward ordination.

    Situation #2: A minister is accustomed to reject for church membership anyone he can identify as being homosexual in orientation, irrespective of whether such a person is celibate or not. He is instructed by his DS that such behavior is inappropriate. He claims he is being persecuted for his conservative views.

    These are not well-rounded situations. Fill in the blanks as you wish. Even better, fill in the blanks in different ways, potentially producing different results. A key difference between the two situations, in my view, is that the first candidate believes nothing that is contrary to the accepted beliefs of the community, and has given no indication that he will not carry out his duties appropriately. (You may, of course, fill in the blanks with contrary information.)

    The second candidate is potentially acting contrary to church discipline, yet he feels persecuted, and perhaps excluded by the actions of church authorities. (Note that I’m not a United Methodist pastor, and I don’t have a finely tuned notion of just how important an “admonition” for one’s DS actually is.)

    Is the second person actually persecuted? I would suggest not. He can remain and carry out his duties as instructed.

    Let’s compare these ideas to the PSA issue. Supposing we have a pastor of a church who believes in PSA and has been teaching people that in order to be regarded as Christians, they must understand and accept PSA. When new members transfer from another church, they are immediately indoctrinated into this position and are only made welcome as part of that church community if they accept that position.

    If a superior authority in that denomination admonishes this pastor is he being exclusive? Consider the fact that if this pastor is ordered not to act as he has, he will feel that he is not truly bringing people to a saving faith in Jesus. Is it possible for him to minister honestly under those circumstances?

    The boundary lines become somewhat difficult to draw under these circumstances. I’m simply exploring them. Off hand, I would suggest that the liberal mentor I mentioned is wrong to attempt to exclude the conservative candidate, but that the denominational authorities in my two other examples are acting appropriately. If these two pastors cannot function in a way that they feel is faithful to the gospel, they need to find a different congregation/denomination in which to exercise their gifts.

    Membership in a loosely defined “evangelical movement” is a bit more difficult. Nobody holds the keys there. How much does the word “evangelical” mean? I’m not certain of the answer to that.

    I would like to see moderates and liberals to support the maximum amount of inclusion possible consistent with creating a coherent community.

    Dave Warnock made a couple of very cogent comments in his post :

    I do not believe in a Christianity, or an Evangelical Christianity which does not welcome Adrian and those like him who believe so strongly in PSA. Mind you I also do not believe in a Christianity which demands that all believe in PSA nor an Evangelical Christianity which demands the same understanding and acceptance of PSA that Adrian has.

    . . . and again . . .

    We do need to recognise though that it is always a difficult challenge to include in a community those who continually attempt to exclude others.

    He’s responding to an update by Adrian Warnock to his post Christianity Magazine reviews Pierced For Our Transgressions, in which Adrian says:

    Since writing this article, I came across a piece from Carl Trueman that alleges that some UK ministers feel that they are being leant on quite strongly on the issue of the atonement.

    Now Dave is right when he notes (in the same post) that there are a number of feelings and vague accusations going around (my paraphrase of his words). But those feelings and vague accusations are precisely what most exclusion is made of. It is rarely a matter of direct confrontation. It is a matter of suggestion and pressure, often subtle and not clearly expressed.

    I advocate bringing these suggestions out into the open. We need to examine the boundaries we can accept openly. This is essentially what I was advocating in my post from June 2, 2006 Unity, Diversity, and Confusion. Sometimes we’re so afraid of setting explicit boundaries that we allow vague boundaries to contict our appropriate freedom.

  • Expressing the Multifaceted Nature of the Atonement

    Peter Kirk has a post, The personal relevance of the atonement, that expresses what I have been trying to say about the atonement much more precisely than I have managed to do it. I commend it strongly.

    At the same time, Adrian has posted again regarding a review of Pierced for Our Transgressions. Since I haven’t gotten hold of a copy of the book yet, I’m not going to comment on the review itself, but Adrian said one thing that has left me wondering.

    It is ironic that the more inclusive the evangelical movement in the UK aims to be – by including people who attack or minimize PSA the more they seem to exclude those who hold a more traditional evangelical position.

    I don’t call myself evangelical, but after talking to a few evangelicals from the UK I probably could. (I’m absolutely not going to fight over labels.) I’ve even encountered a few folks on this side of the pond who call themselves evangelical and appear to be even more liberal than I am.

    But even from my more liberal perspective I have no desire to exclude those who hold a “strong view” of PSA from any tent. They believe that God has provided redemption through Jesus Christ. I know of none of them who reject the incarnation. The feel I get from Adrian’s post is that if one doesn’t join in excluding the more liberal elements on this issue one must be excluding the more conservative.

    It would be a total denial of my view of the importance of non-essential doctrines (and I regard the specific metaphor used for atonement as a non-essential) for me to deny someone the one expression of the atonement that best brought the message of God’s reconciling grace home to them.

    I’m wondering if it’s really true that any evangelicals in the UK want to exclude advocates of PSA from their big tent. Could any of my UK readers help me with this?

  • In Which My Wife Uses the Language of PSA

    This morning as I was listening to my wife’s message for our Running Toward the Goal podcast, I heard her use some distinctly PSA-like language. I thought I’d link to it. Today’s podcast was first broadcast on local radio here in Pensacola on July 21, 2003 and is titled I Surrender All. This is the first time it has been podcast. (The speaker is my wife, Jody Neufeld.)

    Those on the PSA side who also are complementarian may not want to listen to a woman teach, but I’m fullly egalitarian and enjoy sharing both blogs and platform with my wife.

  • Notes and Links on Atonement

    I’ve gotten severely behind in reading the current atonement debate, but I haven’t ceased being interested. I note that Adrian has taken to throwing passages at his opponents, ones which we’re sure to have read before, including Isaiah 53, and 2 Corinthians 5. Because I accept substitution and even penal substitution as valid metaphors, but not as the key or sole metaphor, I am not surprised to find some substitution in scripture.

    I wrote two items on the atonement in partial response to the debate. The first is an entry for my wife’s devotional list, which was posted this morning and expresses my view that understanding the details of doctrine is not nearly as important as many seem to think. The second is a few notes on Isaiah 53 and the suffering servant.

    There is quite a bit of good stuff on the atonement going around the web right now. I got a link to Is Your Gospel Robust Enough, and I wish I could give a hat tip to the right person, but I can’t find where I got the link. The post discusses our excessively individual view of salvation, a problem that is common to many advocates of PSA–and to many of the rest of us as well.

    Dave Warnock is preaching from Ephesians 2:11-22, one of my favorite passages, and is doing a wonderful job of it. At the same time Peter Kirk is keeping active, with a post titled UCCF Director contradicts the Bible and the Apostles’ Creed which he starts from a comment he made here.

    I plan to get back to talking about literary genres tomorrow, but I may be tempted to say more about the atonement. You can always hope not!

  • Narrowing a Doctrine: Penal Substitution and Isaiah 53

    In a previous post, Adrian Warnock said there were two reactions to his interview with the authors of Pierced for our Transgressions. I’m guessing he referred to the favorable and unfavorable, and intensely so in each case. In the rest of that post, he implied pretty strongly that those of us who are opposed to PSA [as the sole metaphor for the atonement I would add, but Adrian did not] are not spending enough time with the scriptures.

    I also note two sets of reactions. I see one set of reactions that deal with the actual position of opponents, and one set of reactions that prefer to make accusations. I don’t want to spend much time on this, but let me just quote one example, from Grave Updates

    Isn’t off how it is always those with robust theology who are told to become broad and drop our distinctives, as if the greatest sin is to offend those who hold to vague and are like those Paul speaks of in 2 Timothy 3:7, “always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.”:

    I would simply like to note here that my position on PSA has nothing to do with avoiding offense to anyone. I’m also not afraid of giving offense to the proponents of PSA as the exclusive or “real” teaching of the atonement when it is, in fact, one metaphor for the atonement. I am quite open in saying that such teaching is wrong and presents a stumbling block. It’s very easy in Christian circles to attribute “truth value” to being persecuted, and to give great credit to teachings which are exceptionally offensive. After all, the gospel is foolishness to those who are perishing (1 Corinthians 1:18). But Paul never said that every stupid and offensive thing thereby automatically became God’s truth. It is crucially important, I believe, for us to make sure that it is the gospel that is offending people when they are offended, and not our behavior or our made up teachings.

    Now Adrian hits us with Isaiah 53. It’s not a bad chapter to use in discussing the atonement, but I find it amazing to have Adrian quote it and let it “speak for itself” as though nobody who rejects his view of PSA has ever read the passage. Well, I have read, memorized, studied, and restudied that passage many times. Having Adrian quote it one more time is unlikely to change a thing, unless he can point out how that scripture challenges my view that:

    1. Substitution is broader than penal substitution
    2. Atonement is broader than substitution

    I have never denied substitution. I took a class Exegesis of Romans (from the Greek text) from a professor who believed in the moral influence theory. He tried to teach it from Romans. It didn’t work. He massacred Paul’s teaching. I did my very best to see it his way. I was inclined to see it his way. I liked the professor and enjoyed his lecture style. Nonetheless, I just couldn’t do it. Nonetheless there is an element of moral influence in the atonement.

    There is also an element of substitution in Isaiah 53, though very little of it is penal in nature. Isaiah 53 needs to be viewed in the broader context of the servant passages of 2nd Isaiah (40-55), but even that is not the primary point. I’m not arguing that Jesus is not described here, though that interpretation will not work as an exclusive look at the chapter. That is another debate. But let’s look at the substitution in this case:

    Notice in verse 4 that it is the people in general who esteem the servant “smitten by God.” They view him as suffering for his own sin, and thus under the wrath of God when in fact the servant is suffering for their sin. The servant gets all the suffering for the guilt of the whole people, and he submits to it. That is absolutely substitution, but there is no indication that God’s anger is directed at the servant. He certainly dies as a substitute, but the notion that God turns his anger purely on the person of that righteous person is simply not there.

    The debate here, at least with me, is not that Jesus did not suffer and die for our sins. It is rather with the penal aspect, and with the exclusivity of either substitution or the penal aspect. I see nothing whatsoever in Isaiah 53 that denies my position. Even verse 10, that especially in the ESV sounds most like penal substitution can be read quite easily and appropriate as the Lord allowing the stroke to fall on the servant rather than the whole nation.

    Incidentally this goes well with the view that the servant is in the first instance the remnant of Judah, taken into exile, and viewed as the greatest transgressors by those left behind. But they were the ones God was using to preserve the future of his people. In the second instance, Jesus fulfills the remainder of the prophecy as the pure remnant, the final representative of the people who took the punishment on himself. It is consistent both with God’s action and with the action of Jesus in laying down his own life (John 10:18).

    The problem I see repeatedly here is that texts that fit well with more than one view of the atonement are being cited as exclusively supporting one narrow view. I do not regard this approach to interpretation as scriptural. That is my problem with PSA. It cuts a square inch out of a large tapestry and then declares the square inch to be the whole. That’s too close to idolatry for me.

  • Slippery Language on the Atonement Debate

    Adrian Warnock is again posting on the penal substitutionary atonement (PSA) issue, now about an interview with the authors of Pierced for Our Transgressions.

    Now I’m not going to post on PSA today in detail. But Adrian manages to demonstrate some aspects of this discussion from his side of the fence that annoy me-no, that’s not strong enough. I think these statements are just plain wrong.

    At the end of his post Adrian says:

    Where do you stand? Will you join arms with Andrew, Steve, and a whole generation of those of us who feel this issue is quite literally one of life and death?

    Or will you seek to compromise, maybe downplay the importance of precisely how Jesus saves us, and adopt a gospel message that, whilst sounding more acceptable to the modern ear, is in the opinion of many of us nothing less than “another gospel.”

    The stakes couldn’t possibly be higher.

    I’m willing to allow most of the first paragraph. My answer to that would be a resounding NO!. I do not in any sense stand with them on this issue. But I do think that for some people it may be an issue of life and death. Those who malign the character of God through their doctrine may well have to answer before God for those they have driven away. I don’t want to overplay that point, however, because as imperfect humans I suspect we all have those moments and even years when we do not perfectly represent the gospel of Christ. Nonetheless, grace abounds! Where is there evidence that such grace is comprehended on the PSA side of the debate?

    But my major concern here is with the second paragraph: “Or will you seek to compromise . . .” This is the method of extremist madness. You dismiss the opposite extreme, and divide the rest of the world into people who are right and people who have compromised. The compromise, of course, is with that unmentionable evil that has been cut out of the spectrum. It’s “us good guys” versus the compromisers.

    Adrian continues with “maybe downplay the importance of precisely how Jesus saves us . . .” Downplay? Who’s downplaying? I reject absolutely and utterly the notion that precisely how the atonement is accomplished is a critical piece of knowledge. I call that view “salvation by correct doctrine” and I reject it along with all other human based systems of salvation. However Jesus did it, he did it.

    And again: “and adopt a gospel message that, whilst sounding more acceptable to the modern ear, is in the opinion of many of us nothing less than ‘another gospel.’” Of course I adopt what Adrian and many others regard as “another gospel.” Why? I regard what they are preaching as dangerously close to “another gospel.” The only reason I don’t call it another gospel outright is that I think many people sincerely grab hold of the message of PSA and are saved, never understanding any other aspects of atonement. The preachers of PSA are grabbing a part and making it the whole, and it gets twisted on the way. But even further, I do not adopt my view because it is “more acceptable to the modern ear.” I adopt my view because I believe it is right. I believe scripture teaches a multifaceted understanding of the atonement and I also believe scripture teaches that we should realize that we don’t fully comprehend any doctrine, but most especially the incarnation and the atonement.

    I’m not heading again into writing on PSA in detail right now. I’ve written a few things before. My response here is simply to the dismissive type of language that tries to pretend opponents are not working from conviction, but rather from a desire to be more acceptable to the modern world, and to “compromise,” that compromise being with something that is dismissed without discussion.

    Almost Instant Update: Just after I hit the “Publish” button, my RSS feed showed a new post by Peter Kirk which is well worthwhile reading.