“For God so hated the world that He savagely butchered His only begotten Son (only for the elect, of course) that whosoever comes crawling on his knees and grovels pathetically at God's feet will not burn for eternity in Hell (although he should), but maybe, just maybe, find himself in Heaven when he dies.”
Really gets you in the worshipping mood, doesn’t it?
Now I'm just an amateur theologian at best, so don't think that I have this doctrine perfectly mapped out. But from what I've read in the Bible, here's what I think atonement is about:
God is the author and giver of life, right? He created everything in nature, and He breathed life into Adam's nostrils. It's only in Him and through Him that we live. He's like oxygen; without it you die. So when mankind decided to do things their way, they removed themselves from that life-supplying force, resulting in both physical and spiritual death. This is why the Bible says sin leads to death.
Fortunately God had a backup plan. He provided a way for His people to avoid death. It started with the animal sacrifices where the Jews would "pass their sins" onto animals, and then the animals would be slaughtered. The animals would face death, but not the Jews. Of course you could only kill animals for so long, so that's where Jesus comes in to establish His Kingdom. And unlike other kingdoms, which are usually established after some bloody battle, Jesus establishes His Kingdom by voluntarily (that's the keyword) being a sacrificial lamb. On the cross He experienced that physical and spiritual death in the place of us. And when He rose again from the dead, He defeated that dreadful curse once and for all.
Of course, there are many different theories of atonement, which you can read about in this Wikipedia article. But for the most part, I don't think it's cosmic child abuse.
I guess the problem is understanding what difference the death of an animal makes to God, given there are millions/billions of deaths at any given moment.
ReplyDeleteAnd I don't think it makes any difference to God whatsoever. Seems to me God is under no obligation to forgive, whether you kill an animal or whether you don't - and to me that is the essence of why Penal Substitutionary Atonement is so unhelpful. We talk as if God can be obliged to do something and as if sin is a debt which must be paid by a righteous God which cannot co-exist with sin.
In brief, clearly God can cope with sin, as Jesus showed, he is not repulsed but moved to redeem. And second, demanding punishment from someone who did not commit the error is not justice and can never be justice. If I have done something which deserves death, it can never be just to punish someone else.
The cosmic child abuse line was a throwaway remark by Steve Chalke to which his opponents took great offence and steeled them against the legitimate comments he was making about the way evangelicals talk about PSA.
For me, sacrifice has always been for man not for God. God can chose to forgive anyone he likes, because he is the creator of all law - but he chooses to forgive those who are penitent and who turn from their wicked ways. It is us who need to understand the costs of forgiveness (ie the sacrificed and penitent life) not God.
I've been chewing on some of these ideas for a while but I've never really come to a full conclusion.
ReplyDeleteThe Penal Substitutionary Atonement is what I've known my entire life -- so it probably makes it hard to give up.
And even in that model, I don't see it as "cosmic child abuse."
Today, I see the cross as and example of Jesus (and God) showing what real love is. It shows us that real love is being willing to lay down your life for the sake of others (for his followers, for his close friends and even the Romans who nailed him to the cross). Rather than doing what the people expected and throwing down with a sword and spear, Jesus threw down his life instead.
Whether there was a cosmic transaction that took place that day for our sins, or whether it was God's way of showing us we were worth dying for, or something else -- I don't really know.
I do like what @thetheologyofjoe says, "For me, sacrifice has always been for man not for God."
When we sacrifice and we repent, it changes US - not God.
I also like what McLaren says about the cross. We've always had one spotlight shining on the cross - our understanding of Penal Substitutionary Atonement. But imagine what we could see if we shine hundreds of other spotlights on the cross. There may be many other things that are revealed.
And who knows - maybe in some way all these things came into play.
So, needless to say, I'm still wrestling through some of these ideas. Thanks for keeping the topic fresh in my mind.
"Today, I see the cross as and example of Jesus (and God) showing what real love is. It shows us that real love is being willing to lay down your life for the sake of others (for his followers, for his close friends and even the Romans who nailed him to the cross). Rather than doing what the people expected and throwing down with a sword and spear, Jesus threw down his life instead."
ReplyDeleteY'see this isn't a description of classical Penal Substitutionary Atonement theory, but sounds much more similar to the or other theories. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atonement_%28Christus_Victor_view%2
I gained much from contemplating the more than 12 atonement theories. For me, the usual evangelical PSA theory is one of the most useless.
No, I agree - I didn't mean to say I'm still a hard fast believer of PSA. A good portion of me is still holding on to it - but today... I see a different view as you pointed out. Tomorrow, it might be something entirely different ;-)
ReplyDelete