I know that in some circles, scripture is not looked at as being part of a planned, revelation of God's nature and will for us. In other words, they might view the imagery of the sacrificial system as a relic of a developing pagan culture who relied upon the propitiation of blood sacrifices as a means to secure blessing and so on and that as Hebrew theology developed, and the concept of Jehovah God developed, theology was also changed to accommodate these new developments.
I have also heard that people (I wouldn't say Christians) who do that as well. I've seen it put as God using paganism and as paganism developing into the Hebrew religion. Seems like this may have been the history channel(?). Either way this is not the Christian...or the Hebrew, for that matter...understanding.
I do think there is a high possibility, however, that pagan religions developed as a corruption of truth. But that's another topic.
Bottom line, IMHO, the view you are describing is anti-Christian.
I tend to believe the that the scripture we have was planned that we have it, no explanations or apologies needed. Therefore the imagery of the blood sacrifice must be taken seriously, and literally, unless and to the extent it is explicitly explained as meaning otherwise.
I agree. In fact, I believe that the purpose of the Levitical sacrifice system was to foreshadow what was going to occur when the Messiah came. Jesus death is mirrored in a very detailed way in the sacrificial system.
I agree the sacrificial system should be taken literally. This is one problem I have with how Penal Substitution theorists deal with it. Rather than taking a literal approach they tend to pull apart pieces and assign roles for God to play in the system as an allegory. This is evident when you consider the position of high priest and who this person represented in Scripture.
I wish more would read Scripture more literally.
I also believe that many times in scripture, as in all things we know that involve more than a single concept, more than one thing must be kept in mind at the same time or the truth will not be understood.
I agree. But at the same time this has led some into subjective "truth", using Scripture to support ideas and theories rather than submitting their understanding to God by deriving doctrine from His Word.
We also have to remember that Scripture is a narrative. It is a story...a true story from beginning to end. People often fail to understand because they simply look up a topic and extract a passage, never knowing the context.
In the case of forgiveness by God of our sin I believe that confession and repentance are promised by God to result in forgiveness. In addition to this I believe that many sins are forgiven and overlooked that we are not even aware of at a conscious level, due to the infirmity of our flesh, or our remaining depravity, or our immaturity. And in those cases we have not even repented or confessed, at least not yet, and we will probably go to our graves with many deficiencies that we never address, yet God forgives.
In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. (Romans 8:26-27)
But the question that needs to be addressed is why? Was there something that the Father and the Son have done that makes this possible, or is it correct to just say God forgives and just leave it at that? And there is where I say that you simply cannot get around that persistent imagery (or more correctly imagery based on a literal event in time) where Christ's blood was shed for the remission of our sins and for it to be possible (or accomplished, depending upon your theology) that we be one with Christ and restored completely to a relationship we should have with God the Father.
This question is actually answer in the text of Scripture (in "what is written").
The Father sent His Son, it was the Father's will in Isaiah that He suffere unjust oppression and in Acts it was His plan to be murdered under wicked powers. The Son lay down His own life, submitted His will to that of the Father and suffered the wages of sin as one of us. This is what I mean by taking the Levitical system literally, BTW. It mirrors what was to come.
I believe we should say what is written in Scripture. If the Bible says that God will forgive us if we are born of the Spirit then say that.
If the Bible says God cannot forgive sins but punished our sins transferred to Jesus instead of punishing us so we will escape God's Wrath then say that.
This is too important a doctrine, too foundational to our faith, to go beyond God's Word.
Any discussion of atonement that does not take into account this aspect of our reconciliation directly, is not sufficient.
I absolutely agree. And this is a major weakness in the Penal substitution theory. There is a huge difference between punishing sins in order totallow the guilty to go free and reconciliation.
And I maintain that what is commonly called penal substitution is essential for a complete understanding of why we have a ministry of reconciliation.
I disagree. Penal Substitution Theory vaguely entertains this ministry of reconciliation, urging men to be reconciled to God, while focusing on reconciliation accomplished with the punishment of our sins laid on Christ.
Have you considered that on the cross God was reconciling mankind to Himseld, not counting their sins against then, which is why we urge men to be reconciled to God?
So the role of Jesus death was that he stood in for us as the guilt, wrath, and consequence of our sin was put on him in such a way as the Father is satisfied that this is sufficient according to Him (and really, that is all that matters) so that God can forgive us, as he always wanted to do, and yet satisfy himself and anyone else he chooses to, that he is also just in doing so.
You are combining what is never combined in Scripture. Here we disagree because I do believe Scripture needs to be taken as it is written. These are God's words, after all.
You are lumping in death, the wage of sin, with judgment. Sin begats death. Sin produces death. The mind set on the flesh is death.
It is appointed man once to die and then the judgment.
Also consider the passages claiming that God will not punish the righteous (you are leaving these out of your discussion). The only way around this is mental gymnastics (God was ounishing our sins on Him, not really Him). And Isaiah 53 debunks that....the Servant was being punished in Isaiah.
It slanders God to suggest that if you believe in substitutionary sacrifice where Christ took our sin upon himself instead of us that you are also then claiming that God either cannot or is unwilling to forgive sin.
It does not slander God at all. You claim that God's forgives sins based on the condition He punishes those sins He forgives.
That is not forgiveness.
What you call "forgiveness" is escaping punishment. Forgiveness would be to forgo punishing sins. Penal Substitution Theory holds that God cannot - by any definition of the word - forgive sins because it is based on a 16th century judicial philosophy that claims a judge must punish a crime for justice to be served.
It ... slanders God to suggest that all the admonitions in scripture about the consequences of sin and the result of iniquity are warnings given in jest and only taken seriously by unsophisticated people who are enamored with pagan sacrifice. This is clearly in scripture, repeated many times and in many ways, and simply cannot be overlooked.
I absolutely, 100% agree with the above.
"Sin begats death". But more importantly sin is the product of the mind set on the flesh. The problem solved at the cross is not what to do about our sins but what to do about us.
it is appointed man once to die (the wages of sin, "sin begats death") and then the judgment (God's judgment against the wicked).
This is where Penal Substitution Theory is inferior to Scripture. In the Bible God can and does forgive sins (the condition being a transformation....being "made a new creation in Christ", "born of the Spirit"). But more importantly, this is legitimately a new creations. The guilty is dead, a new creation exists.
