Bible Study Please check out my Atonement theology

[Cyberseeker]

Hi.

I’m writing a paper on atonement and the following is a concluding summary at the end of it. Could I get comments from those who understand the subject? Is it theologically correct? Could it be worded better? Is it evangelically effective? Please bear in mind that I am disciplined to word limits so it has to be succinct.

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

• The cross of Christ achieved these things:
  
  First, it finished transgression for them that believe so the demands of law can not be charged against them.
  
  Second, it made an end of sins by removing the accumulated sin temporarily covered under the old covenant, plus removing in advance sin confessed under the new covenant.
  
  Third, it reconciled us to God whose justice was satisfied by the propitiating sacrifice of his Son.
  
  Fourth, it enabled the righteousness of Christ to be credited to those that believe irrespective of things they may or may not have done.

 

[Drew]

Before I invest any significant time, are you even open to considering the argument that God never imputes "Christ's righteousness" to us at all. I believe that the Scriptures do not teach such imputation. Please do not misunderstand me. The redeemed are indeed made "righteous" through the cross, but not because God imputes the righteousness of Christ. They get the "righteousness" of those declared righteous in a lawcourt setting - they do not get the righteousness of the judge, as imputation would seem to require.

Even if you disagree with me here, might you get more credit (I assume you are doing this for some course) if you at least engage the specific arguments against imputation. I happen to think those arguments actually show imptutation is not Scriptural, but you may gain more credibility if you argue otherwise.

 

[cyberjosh]

Cyberseeker,

First off let me say you did a super job in summarizing such a complicated theology into a few points. And perhaps differing with Drew, I do believe we are imputed Christ's righteousness, as Christ lives in us, for just as Paul said it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives within me. This is also supported by what Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:21, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him". Now as for reconcilliation the Bible clearly says, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation." (2 Corinthians 5:19). Now also, the theology of atonement also demands something of us, namely to fullfil the Law of the Spirit and the Law of Christ. Of the first, the Law of the Spirit we see said of it, "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death" (Romans 8:2) so that "the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit" (vs. 4).

Now this expresses itself also in what the Bible calls the Law of Christ (which I call the Law of Love), "Bear one another's burdens, and thereby fulfill the law of Christ" (Galatians 6:2). This is what the law of the Spirit and Law of Christ demand from us: Since we have been reconciled, since we have been forgiven, and since we have been loved by God we in turn should seek to reconcile other people to God, forgive them of tresspasses done against us, and love them as we love ourselves. The Bible says, "For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you" (Matthew 6:14) and "Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law" (Romans 13:10).

Thus we are to echo God's atonement on us toward other people. We love him because he first loved us, there for in light of that love we should love other's just as he loves us. And that is the true challenge. James tells us that we can do it though, and says, "Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins" (James 5:20).The whole idea can be summed up in the verse I quoted above: "Bear one another's burdens, and thereby fulfill the law of Christ" (Galatians 6:2).

God Bless,

~Josh

 

[Drew]

Cyberseeker,

First off let me say you did a super job in summarizing such a complicated theology into a few points. And perhaps differing with Drew, I do believe we are imputed Christ's righteousness, as Christ lives in us, for just as Paul said it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives within me.

While I, of course, agree that Christ lives within us, I do not see this as being conceptually equivalent to God ascribing or imputing Christ's righteousness to us. I again appeal to the lawcourt metaphor which Paul certainly deploys in Romans 3, when he make one of the statements that has been traditionally seen as supporting "imputed" righteousness. Who is the judge? Well, I think it is clear that Christ is the judge as Romans 2:16 shows:

This will take place on the day when God will judge men's secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares

In the lawcourt setting, when the judge finds in favour of the person on trial - that is, justifies him - is the judge saying that the defendent has the righteousness of the judge? Of course not. I assert that the scriptures teach that in a Hebrew lawcourt, the righteousness of the judge is constituted by the following things:

1. The judge has acted in accordance with the Law
2. The judge has not shown partiality
3. The judge has defended the weak and the disenfranchised
4. The judge has punished evil

Can these things be truthfully said of the acquitted defendant? Again, of course not. So I think there is a serious error in the whole "imputation" idea, given that the whole idea, in Romans 3 and I suspect elsewhere, if often invoked in a lawcourt setting.

In such a setting, it does not make sense to assert that the righteousness of the judge, who is clearly God / Christ in this case, gets ascribed to the acquitted defendent.

Even though I happen to believe OJ was guilty, his "acquittal" (ha-ha) did not really involve an "imputation" of the righteousness of Judge Ito to OJ Simpson. Far from it - OJ was simply declared to be vindicated, with no notion that we can then say that was is true about Judge Ito's (presumably) exemplary character is to be ascribed or imputed to OJ.

I will address 2 Corinthians 5:21 in a future post.

 

[Cyberseeker]

... are you open to considering the argument that God never imputes "Christ's righteousness" to us at all. I believe that the Scriptures do not teach such imputation.

Thanks both of you.

Drew, are you happy with my first three points but disagree with the fourth one?

 

[Drew]

... are you open to considering the argument that God never imputes "Christ's righteousness" to us at all. I believe that the Scriptures do not teach such imputation.

Thanks both of you.

Drew, are you happy with my first three points but disagree with the fourth one?

I will have to get back to you on this. Although I am not certain I understand some of the terminology that you use, I suspect that I will have some disagreement with each of the other three points as well.

I will say this one thing though. I believe that Paul meant what he wrote in Romans 2:7 and that he was not speaking about a route to salvation that no one will take:

7To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life

In other words, I believe that Paul believes that eternal life is granted at a future day of judgement based on the works that have been manifested in the life of the person. As I am sure you realize, this is not the "standard" reformed protestant position.

In any event, if you are writing a paper and even if you do not share my view, you may still wish to consider arguing against my position in order to make your position more credible.

 

[guibox]

Drew, I guess the problem I have with your view is that you are taking the 'judge-righteousness' argument to literally. This is the amazing aspect of grace that only the heavenly judge can do. Legally, a judge who ignores the clear evidence of guilt and finds the defendant innocent would most likely be disbarred and a laughing stock. This is what is amazing about God's act of finding us righteous. We are guilty but He makes us clean, not because the evidence finds us innocent, but that God IGNORES the evidence by substituting Christ in our place to become sin for us so that we can BECOME innocent THROUGH him. This innocence and cleansing cannot be a natural part of who we are, what we do or how we think for we are guilty sinners with no innocence in us to find to be declared innocent in any fashion legally.

How does this cleansing happen?

According to you it is the mere judgment of the judge calling us 'innocent'.

However, the process is that Christ is seen in our place. It is not our righteousness that makes us acceptable to God for we are not innocent. We are guilty. When Christ looks down at the defendant, He doesn't see a guilty person, He sees the robe of righteousness given to us.

This is imputation.

Christ becoming sin for us so that we can be righteous in Him is all about Christ eclipsing sin in our lives and nature. This is imputation.

However, that doesn't mean that works arent' important or don't play a part in our judgement process. You seem to think that it is either imputation or impartation.

Why not both?

 

[Drew]

Hello guibox (and others):

I think that I am not "taking the judge-righteousness" argument too seriously, I am simply reasoning it through and seeing a problem with it. I think that I am being true to the scriptures when I claim:

1. This whole issue arises through Paul's specific use of a "lawcourt" setting - expressing our justification by appealing to a very specific metaphor.

2. Christ is the judge in this lawcourt metaphor.

3. Scriptural precedent (not to mention historical knowledge) establishes that, in a Hebrew lawcourt, the judge is "righteous" when he acts in certain ways - judges according to the Law, shows no partiality, etc.

Can the characteristics of item 3 be said to be true of us, the acquitted defendant in the box? I do not think so. Within the lawcourt methaphor, it simply does not make conceptual sense to say that the acquitted defendent is ascribed the righteousness that the judge displays. Let's say that a Jewish judge Joe knows that Fred is guilty and acquits him anyway (there is no jury in the Hebrew lawcourt). Is he saying that Fred is to be considered to have the righteousness of Joe? No, he is saying that Fred has been vindicated - found to be "in the right".

It might seem that judge Joe has not acted "righteously" after all, since Fred is in fact guilty. Hence Joe has not acted in accordance with the Law and He has not punished evil - these are the things that a righteous judge will do.

Well here is where we need to hop out of this example where "Joe" is the judge and insert Christ as the judge. By going to the cross, "Jesus as judge" indeed acts righteously - He has punished sin (and therefore has also acted in accordance with the Law) by taking it in His own flesh.

So indeed it is conceptually sensible to assert that the defendent is found "to be in the right" - that can indeed happen without ascribing the judge's righteousness to the acquitted defendent.

Are you arguing that there simply is no other way for us to be declared "in the right" other than having Christ's righteousness imputed to us? Remember that we are talking about this in a lawcourt setting. To say that Christ's righteousness is imputed to us in such a setting means that God sees us as "having judged fairly, acted with impartiality, etc." And this is simply not true.

Mysterious as it may be, we can indeed say that God sees us as "in the right" or "innocent" through the atoning act of Jesus without resorting to what I sees as a conceptually incorrect view that the judge's (Christ's) righteous behaviour as judge is acribed to us.