James P. Boyce · 31 of 48

Chapter XXVIII: The Atonement of Christ. · Part 1

Several prominent theories have been presented, as to the atoning work of Christ, and the method by which God pardons sin.

1. The lowest of these is the Socinian. This proceeds on the principle that God is pure benevolence, that vindictive justice is incompatible with his character, and that upon mere repentance, God can and will forgive the sinner. The work of Christ, therefore, is regarded as one in which he simply reveals or makes known pardon to man. Nothing that he has done secures it, because he had nothing to do to this end. It was already prepared in the benevolence of God's nature, and is simply now made known. [Symington on the Atonement, pp. 2 and 3.]

The advocates of this theory explain away all that the Scriptures say on the subject of Christ's death for us, by maintaining that his life and death were mere examples to us of the manner in which we should live and submit to God. In their view, therefore, Christ is merely a great teacher and a bright example.

Some of these have even gone so far as to speak of the sacrifices of the ancient dispensation as things suitable only to a barbarous age, and so far from regarding them as types of Christ's sacrificial work, have looked on them as arrangements permitted only from sympathy for the weakness of the people, whom God ordered to offer them. [Nehemiah Adams, Evenings with the Doctrines, p. 197.]

The objections to this theory are:

1. It ill accords with the Scripture description of the nature of sin.

2. It is inconsistent with other attributes of God than mercy.

3. It is at variance with the letter and spirit of divine revelation.

4. It is irreconcilable with the exalted nature of the mediatorial reward conferred on Christ. [Symington, p. 3.]

2. A second theory of the Atonement is that which has commonly been called the Middle Theory. By this is not meant, that there are only these two and one orthodox theory; but, simply, that this stands between the theory of the Socinians and those theories held by persons, who, however, differing from each other, are regarded as Evangelical.

"This theory maintains that in consequence of what Christ did, a certain power to pardon sin was conferred upon him." [Symington p. 3.

"This system supposes that God may pardon sin without punishment or satisfaction."

"But that a difference should he made between innocent persons who have never sinned, and those thus pardoned; that the latter may not boastingly suppose themselves on an equality with the former."

"This is done by the arrangement that, instead of a full pardon, they shall he pardoned on repentance, for the sake of something Christ was to do, because of which he is entitled to intercede for them."

(1.) "This scheme is only apparently superior to the former, in claiming that this is done, because of what Christ has done."

(2.) "It gives a defective view of the divine character."

(3.) "It does not explain the Scripture language as to Christ's work."

(4.) "It fails to account for the peculiarity and severity of his sufferings." [Symington, pp. 3 and 4.]

3. A third theory of the Atonement is that of moral influence. Its most noted advocates in this day have been Horace Bushnell and McLeod Campbell. It is difficult to say whether it, or the one last mentioned, approaches more nearly to that of the Socinians or is more remote from Evangelical ideas.

Like the so-called Middle Theory, it deems repentance alone to be essential for a sinner's acceptance with God. It maintains that there has never been any obstacle in the nature of God to the granting of full pardon upon mere repentance for sin. The necessity for Christ's life of suffering and death of agony is to be found only in the need or motives arising from the love thus exhibited to man to induce him to repent. It is for the sinner's sake that Christ has lived such a life of misery and woe as is incident to man. So far as this theory has been held by Socinians they have recognized the work of Christ simply as that of the exalted man, Christ Jesus. But as presented by Bushnell and Campbell, God in Christ has thus identified himself with man in his misery and sin. Campbell goes so far as to represent Christ as so fully thus made one with man as to have been the representative penitent and confessor of sin. It is the great love thus shown which exerts the strong moral influence which causes man to repent and to be reconciled unto God.

All the objections to the Middle Theory may with equal force he urged against this. To these may be added:

(1.) That, while that theory recognizes the power to forgive sin to have been bestowed upon Christ as the result of something Christ has done, this confines the effect of his work to the production of penitence in the sinner through the influence which the love he has thus displayed exerts in taking away the indifference and enmity of the human heart.

(2.) That, while this theory recognizes the great truth that the love of Christ exhibited in his sufferings and death, has a strong influence in leading men to reconciliation to God, it diminishes the extent to which this love has been manifested by denying that element in those sufferings which arose from their relation to the penalty endured for sin in the satisfaction of the justice of God.

(3.) That, as indeed is true of all schemes which depend entirely upon subjective influences in the sinner, it fails to present any method of salvation available for those who have had no knowledge of these sufferings. Thus are cut off from all the blessings of salvation, not only all infants and idiots, but also the many saints of God who died before the birth of Jesus.

4. A fourth theory of the Atonement is the Ethical one suggested by the Andover divines. It agrees substantially with the theory just considered, but because of the recent prominence of the "New Theology," of which Andover may be regarded as the most prominent exponent, it deserves especial consideration in the form set forth by that school. It has been most distinctly presented in a series of articles on "Progressive Orthodoxy," published editorially in the fourth volume (1885) of the Andover Review. The third of this series is on the Atonement. The quotations which follow are from that article.

The specific points of this theory are:

1. That Christ is universal mediator, and as such, must appear for the relief of any portion of the universe which needs his help.

"Christ mediates God to the entire universe. Through Christ the worlds were made, and through him they consist. In him were all things created, in the heavens and upon the earth, things visible and things invisible. To him ultimately not the earth only, but the whole universe is to be made subject, things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth, . . . . Not until he is known as Head of the universe do we perceive nor can we well understand, that he is the Life and Light of men. The whole truth, then, is that Christ is the revealing or manifesting principle; or, more exactly, that through the Logos, the Word, the Second Person of the Trinity, that which is absolute fullness and truth in God is communicated into finite existences; that through the Eternal Word the created universe is possible; that therefore the universe is Christ's, the revolving worlds, and they that dwell therein are his to the glory of God the Father. The created universe and all rational beings are through Christ and in Christ. Therefore he mediates or reveals God to any part of his universe according to the condition or need which may exist in that part. If at any point his world is sick, weary, guilty, hopeless, there Christ is touched and hurt, and there he appears to restore and comfort. This earth is, it may be, the sheep lost in the wilderness, while the ninety and nine are safe in the fold. Christ cannot be indifferent to the least of his creatures in its pain and wickedness, for his universe is not attached to him externally, but vitally. He is not a governor set over it, but is its life everywhere. He feels its every movement, most of all its spiritual life and spiritual feebleness or disease, and appears in his glorious power even at the remotest point. If there were but one sinner, Christ would seek him. If but one planet were invaded by sin, Christ would come to its relief." p. 57.

2. His incarnation would probably have occurred if there had been no sin, but the existence of sin changes its conditions, but not the power and reality of Christ.

"The opinion has reason in it that there would have been the Incarnation even if there had been no sin," p. 58. "It is, of course, true that in order to reveal God in a world of sin and guilt the historical conditions, and especially the suffering conditions, of our Lord's life must have been, in important respects, what they would not otherwise have been. It is also probable that the profoundest disclosure of the love of God in Christ has been made in the redemption of sinful man. But only the conditions, not the power and reality of Christ, are contingent on sin," p. 57.

3. The effect of Christ's work has been to change the relations of God to man which secures a change in the relation of man to God. This is the reconciliation effected.

"The very best word the gospel gives to express the complete result of Christ's work is reconciliation, a word signifying that God is brought into a new relation to man and that man is brought into a new relation with God. The ultimate fact, however, is that God's relation to man is changed in Christ from what it otherwise could be, and that therefore man's relation to God is changed. Redemption thus originates with God, who in Christ finds a way through obstacles to the sinner, so that he can righteously forgive and bless. Because God is reconciled in Jesus Christ man repents and begins a new life," p. 58.

4. In the work of Atonement there is no imputation or transfer of the sin of man to Christ nor of Christ's righteousness to man.

"It is no longer believed that personal merit and demerit can be transferred from one to another. . . . It is not believed that the consequences of sin can be removed from the transgressor by passing them on to another. Conduct, character, and condition are inseparable. The results of sin are part of the ethical personality, and cannot be detached, nor borne by another," p. 60.

5. Yet in Christ as the substitute of man the race approaches God representatively suffering for sin and repenting of it.

"He is an individual, but an individual vitally related to every human being. He preferred to be called the Son of Man. Paul sees in him the Head of humanity, the second Adam. He is one who is not himself a sinner, yet is a man who is not himself contending against sinful and corrupt tendencies, yet has so identified himself with humanity that its burden of suffering rested on him, and every man was within his reach of sympathy. . . .

"Humanity may thus be thought of as offering something to God of eminent value. When Christ suffers, the race suffers. When Christ is sorrowful, the race is sorrowful. Christ realizes what humanity could not realize for itself. The race may be conceived as approaching God, and signifying its penitence by pointing to Christ, and by giving expression in him to repentance which no words could utter. Thus we can regard him as our substitute, not because he stands apart, not because he is one and the race another, but because he is so intimately identified with us, and because in essential respects the life of every one is, or may be, locked in with his. . . . Here is the truth of McLeod Campbell's view of atonement. The entire race repents or is capable of repenting through Christ. It renders in him a complete repentance. . . ," pp. 61, 62.

6. This substitutionary suffering and penitence is not, however, available apart from the power of man to repent, and the attainment in the individual of repentance. It avails only because man, although a sinner, is still, under appropriate influences, capable of repenting, and the suffering of Christ for man, and his sympathy with him are able to awaken man to real repentance which is revolutionary and thorough.

"But Christ's power to represent or be substituted for man is always to be associated with man's power to repent. The possibility of redeeming man lies in the fact that although he is by act and inheritance a sinner, yet under the appropriate influence he is capable of repenting. The power of repentance remains, and to this power the gospel addresses itself. Christ suffering and sympathizing with men is able to awaken in them and express for them a real repentance. It is to this power that Christ, the holy and the merciful, attaches himself. Realizing it in some, and being able to realize it in all he represents humanity before God. Now the power of repentance, which so far as it exists, is the power of recuperation, is superior to the necessities of past wrong-doing and of present habit. It is the one fact which can never be estimated for what it may do, which baffles the calculation of the wisest observers. The penitent man, so far as he really repents, is in the exercise of a freedom which resists and almost subjugates the forces of evil. In union with Christ, who brings spiritual truth and power to man, repentance is radical. Man left to himself cannot have a repentance which sets him free from sin and death. But in Christ he is moved to repentance which is revolutionary. . . . It is not true, we admit and insist, that repentance without Christ is availing for redemption, for man of himself cannot repent; but, on the other hand it is not true that Christ's atonement has value without repentance. Christ's sacrifice avails with God because it is adapted to bring man to repentance. This gives it ethical meaning and value," pp. 62, 63.

7. The sufferings and death of Christ can be substituted for the punishment of man, not because the guilt of man was borne by him and was atoned for in the way maintained by the older Calvinistic divines, but because:

(1.) By them, as truly and fully as by such punishment, was expressed the abhorrence of God for sin, and the righteousness of the law.

(2.) Because in this way is revealed the love of God, who so seeks the sinner as to manifest that even his wrath is but his love which, cannot allow the sinner to be blessed in his sin.

(3.) Because thus is an end put to separation from God, which is the first and greatest punishment of sin; and in view of Christ's death it would be puerile to exact literal punishment of those who are thereby made sorry for sin and brought in penitence to God.

(4.) Because by his knowledge of them man is brought to repentance.

"The punishment and consequences of sin make real God's abhorrence of sin, and the righteousness of law. The sufferings and death of his only Son also realize God's hatred of sin, and the righteous authority of law; therefore punishment need not be exacted."

* * * * * * * * *

"It must be confessed, however, that it is not clear how the sufferings and death of Christ can be substituted for the punishment of sin; how, because Christ made vivid the wickedness of sin and the righteousness of God, man is therefore any the less exposed to the consequences of sin. We must go on to the fact that Christ makes real very much more than God's righteous indignation against sin. The punishment of sin does not save men. It only vindicates God and his law. Christ, while declaring God's righteousness, reveals God seeking men, and at the cost of sacrifice. He shows that God loves men, and energizes in Christ to bring them to himself; that really the wrath of God is only a manifestation of the love of God, since God cannot allow the sinner to be blessed in his sin. The very fact, that God's Son cannot be among men for their redemption except at the cost of suffering from the sin of man and of dying at their bands, shows both the intrinsic badness of sin and the undiscouraged love of God to sinners. What really occurs is the approach of God to men in Christ, who shows by his words and life the Father unto them: who draws them back to God in recoil from sin, and whose sufferings, by reason of sin, condemned sin more unmistakably than the punishment of it could have done."

Sin is to be looked on not only as an obstacle which keeps man from coming to God, but also as an obstacle which keeps God from coming to man. God loves man, and would bless him. But sin impedes God's love, sets it back, awakens God's disapproval, so that instead of blessing he must condemn and punish. The ideal relation of God is love, but the actual relation is wrath. The sin of man prevents God's love from flowing forth, so that the God of love is in reality hostile to man. In Christ God can come to man in another relation, because Christ is a new divine power in the race to turn it away from sin unto God."

"God does not become propitious because man repents and amends, for that is beyond man's power. He becomes propitious because Christ, laying down his life, makes the race to its worst individual capable of repenting, obeying, trusting; and he does this in such a way that God's abhorrence to sin is realized, the majesty of law honored, the sinner and the universe convinced of the righteousness of the divine judgments."

"The first and the greatest punishment of sin is separation from God, the withdrawal of those influences from God by which man is blessed. The consequences of sin in body and character are secondary, are only results of separation from God. It is because God is far away that such consequences follow. In Christ, the lowly, the suffering, the triumphant, God can come near to man to bless him. Christ brings God the Person to man the person, and in such manner that God is known as the God of holy love, the loving and holy Father. The goodness of God leads man to repentance. Man is at peace with God, and the worst punishment of sin is righteously removed."

"It is true, then, that Christ suffered for our sins, and that because he suffered our sins are forgiven. But the suffering was borne because it lay in the path to redemption. The realization of God's love in Christ was possible only through the suffering and death of Christ; and because he suffered and died in bringing the knowledge and love of God to men it is no longer necessary that men should suffer all the consequences of sin. The ethical ends of punishment are more than realized in the pain and death of the Redeemer, through whom man is brought to repentance. His death is a new fact, an astonishing, revealing, persuasive, melting fact, in view of which it would be puerile to exact literal punishment of those who are thereby made sorry for sin and brought in penitence to God. But it is all inseparable from repentance or appropriation. There is thus a limit to the vicarious principle. It is limited in its application by the personal relation of every man to Christ. He who is not moved to penitence and faith by Christ is under a greater condemnation. If he is incorrigible the condemnation is final and irreversible." pp. 63-65.

8. The application of the gospel is made by the Spirit who regenerates no one except through that one's personal knowledge and experience of it.

"It is the function of the Holy Spirit to take the things of Christ, and show them unto men. So far as we know the Holy Spirit does not regenerate men except through the knowledge, motive, and power of the gospel." p.67.

9. Justice to God's own love requires that this revelation of himself be made known to every sinner.

"Justice is concerned that every attribute of God should be displayed; is as jealous for the rights of love as for those of holiness. If it is God's very nature to love, if it is a desire of his to save men from sin, justice sees to it that love is not deprived of its rights, and is not hindered in any of its impulses. We may go so far as to say that it would not be just for God to condemn men hopelessly when they have not known him as he really is, when they have not known him in Jesus Christ. And it is evidently the intent of God that all men should know him through Christ. The judgment does not come till the gospel has been preached to all nations. The gospel is preached to a nation, not when within certain geographical boundaries it has been proclaimed at scattered points, but only when in reality all individuals of all the nations have known it." pp. 66, 67.

Various objections may be made to the theory thus presented, which are common to it and the theory of Moral Influence.

The following, however, are some of those which are suggested by its distinctive features:

1. Against the idea of universal mediation by Christ.

(1.) That its plausibility arises from an indefinite and mixed idea of mediation, because of which a relation of actual mediation is based upon facts which do not involve such a relation. A mediator is not an agent by which an act is done by one person for another, as would have been the creation of the world had Christ alone accomplished it for God. A mediator is not a medium of communication by which one person conveys information to another. Yet the writer so claims when he says: "Therefore he mediates or reveals God to any part of his universe." p. 57. A mediator is one who intervenes between two persons to bring them into agreement or accord with each other. It is in this sense only that it is applicable to the position occupied by Christ between God and sinful man. It is not allowable, therefore, to base a theory of the position thus occupied and the work accomplished in it upon any relation occupied by Christ as the agent through whom the worlds were made, or the revealer through whom God makes himself known.

(2) But Christ is not even a universal medium.

(a) He is not so in creation, for creation is not his work alone, but is the work of God, in which each of the Persons of the Trinity co-operated (see chapter xvi on the Outward Relations of the Trinity, pp. 156-159). His work, therefore, could not have been so exclusive as to make allowable the idea that the Father and the Spirit so stood apart from creation, or have, subsequently, been so isolated from the universe as to make Christ the sole medium between God, or between the other Persons of tile Trinity, and that creation. Yet such is manifestly the idea upon which is based the universal unity of Christ with creation and his mediation for it with God.

(b) He is not a universal medium in revealing the nature and glory of God to the whole universe, for the Scripture no where teaches that he has thus revealed God, except in connection with the work of Incarnation and Redemption. But the revelation made in this is only stated to be to men and to heavenly inhabitants. Nowhere is taught either the fact or the possibility that such a revelation is made by him to the Devil and his hosts. It may be that the corruption and blindness caused by their sin denies to them, as these do to unregenerate man, the capacity to receive such truth. But, upon whatever ground we may account for it, or although no reason can he assigned for it, the fact remains that the Scriptures give no hint that devils participate in that knowledge of God's wondrous excellence which the gospel teaches is made known by Christ to men and angels.

(3) Neither is any foundation given in Scripture or reason for belief that any intermediary is necessary between God and his innocent creatures. The position he occupies towards sinless beings is unquestionably set forth in the language of Gen. 1:31, "And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." The Scriptures in general represent God's pure and holy angels as in his presence, as receiving communications from him, and as messengers sent forth by him to minister to the heirs of salvation. The only intermediary between God and an innocent being which the Scriptures mention was between God and Christ himself, when, after his temptation "angels came and ministered unto him," Matt. 4:11, and, when, after his prayer in Gethsemane for the removal of the cup "there appeared unto him an angel from heaven, strengthening him." Luke 22:43.

(4) But all foundation for a theory of universal mediation is destroyed by the fact that no such mediation has occurred in connection with sinful beings other than man. Especially here has it not been true that "if at any point his world is sick, weary, guilty, hopeless, there Christ is touched and hurt, and there he appears to restore and comfort," p. 57. Who in all creation have been more guilty, or who more hopeless than the "angels which kept not their own principality, but left their proper habitation," and whom it is said "he hath kept in everlasting bonds under darkness unto the judgement of the great day?" Jude 6. Neither in times before nor in the work of his incarnation has Christ provided redemption for these as universal Mediator. In the redemptive work of his incarnation we are expressly told that he did this not, for it is said that "verily not of angels did he take hold, but he taketh hold of the seed of Abraham." Heb. 2:16. Indeed Paul seems to teach that no mediation could have been for any other race than man, when in the context he says, "since then the children are sharers in flesh and blood, he also himself in like manner partook of the same." (v. 14,) and when he elsewhere asserts that the "one mediator between God and man" is "himself man, Christ Jesus."

It seems, therefore, that so far as the idea of universal mediatorship by Christ is essential to it, this theory cannot be accepted. Yet the writer in the review puts it forth as the true starting-point of the inquiry for "a doctrinal statement which shall be comprehensive, satisfactory, and, at the same time, free from ethical objections and inconsistencies," p. 56.

The further objections suggested to the theory itself will test its freedom from these objections and inconsistencies.

2. This theory cannot be an adequate expression of the Scripture teachings about Christ's sufferings and death, because it sets forth nothing in them, because of which God can justly pardon and accept the sinner. The sinner is recognized as deserving punishment. But that punishment is not borne by Christ. All that Christ does is to suffer, but the sufferings and death are not recognized as punishment endured in the place of the sinner. Neither is there any transfer to Christ of the guilt or of the sin of man. Christ is not a substitute to bear the penalty of sin, but only a substitute who represents the race in its approach to God in the confession of sin and repentance for it. This explanation of his sufferings and death does not, therefore, remove the sin of man, nor make atonement for it.

It is said, however, that thus is taken away the greatest punishment of sin, the separation from God. But no reason is assigned why approach between God and man is thus obtained, except that in the death and sufferings of Christ God expresses his abhorrence of sin and manifests the righteousness of the law. But what is there in these sufferings and that death as expounded by this theory which exhibits God's feelings in these directions? It is said, because, rather than save man in his sin or leave him to its just punishment, God sent his Son, although he must suffer and die at the hands of men. But this is the rather an exhibition of God's mercy toward man desiring to avert the sufferings man must endure. There is no evidence of his abhorrence of sin, though he is unwilling that man should continue a sinner. Sin may be looked upon only as great calamity, not as heinous evil. It may be considered only as would be poverty in one of the sons of a rich man, in the deprivations of which the father is unwilling that the son he would restore, should remain in that restoration to his family.