For Whom Did Christ Die? - C.H. Spurgeon

I realize this message is dated awhile back and I haven't look to see if Frank responded, but I hope James and Frank do not mind if I give my take in the form of an angel who related to me the last portion of a conversation he overheard between a Father and His Son in heaven:
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The Father said, "Son, they may hate you."

The Son replied, "That's okay, Father; I'll just love them anyway."

"Son," the Father solemnly answered, "even if you give your life on the Cross for their sins, they may still afterwards reject you. I cannot guarantee that they will appreciate what you will do. They may not return your love."

"Father, that too is okay," assured the Son, "It will still be worth it all if I am able to snatch even one from Satan's grip and deliver him from hell."

"But Son," the Father tenderly responds, "what I am saying is this: there is the possibility that no one will be saved; that not even a single sinner will heed, believe and be saved. What will you do if no one returns your sacrificial love? Will you still be willing to go as I ask and endure the Cross, even if every single person for whose sake you die turns away and rejects you?

With saddened eyes the Son answers, "I guess my death would be a waste if not even one person is saved."

"My only Son," the Father again asked, "are you willing to risk wasting your life away?"

"Yes, Father," answers the Son without hesitation. "A thousand times, yes!"

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“Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us…”
1 John 4:10

[ May 13, 2002, 11:12 AM: Message edited by: Nelson ]

 

Nelson:
I appreciate your post. I agree.( Hebrews 2:9,I Jn. 2:2,John 3:16). I do not remeber if I responded previous to this post. Yes,Christ died for the sins of the whole world.
Frank

 

Nelson,

That is a cute little story but it is very unbiblical. Are you suggesting that Christ did not propitiate our sins? If you agree that Christ did propitiate our sins and the sins of the whole world without exception, can a just God then demand a second propitiation by sending people to hell for eternity? In other words, can a just God demand that a debt be paid twice?

Such a judgment would never stand in the finite and corrupt courts of this country. How much more will it never stand in the courts of the infinite God.

Sularis, no one has said that the blood of Christ was incapable of covering the sin of the world. The question is not one of capability but of actuality. I believe Christ did, in some sense, die for all the sins of all men. That is what we call common grace. However, Christ effected atonement only for the elect. Hence the designation, sufficient for all; efficient for the elect.

 

I realize this message is dated awhile back and I haven't look to see if Frank responded, but I hope James and Frank do not mind if I give my take in the form of an angel who related to me the last portion of a conversation he overheard between a Father and His Son in heaven:
__________________________________________________

The Father said, "Son, they may hate you."

The Son replied, "That's okay, Father; I'll just love them anyway."

"Son," the Father solemnly answered, "even if you give your life on the Cross for their sins, they may still afterwards reject you. I cannot guarantee that they will appreciate what you will do. They may not return your love."

"Father, that too is okay," assured the Son, "It will still be worth it all if I am able to snatch even one from Satan's grip and deliver him from hell."

"But Son," the Father tenderly responds, "what I am saying is this: there is the possibility that no one will be saved; that not even a single sinner will heed, believe and be saved. What will you do if no one returns your sacrificial love? Will you still be willing to go as I ask and endure the Cross, even if every single person for whose sake you die turns away and rejects you?

With saddened eyes the Son answers, "I guess my death would be a waste if not even one person is saved."

"My only Son," the Father again asked, "are you willing to risk wasting your life away?"

"Yes, Father," answers the Son without hesitation. "A thousand times, yes!"

__________________________________________________

“Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us…”
1 John 4:10</font>[/QUOTE]Wow !! Here is a God who does not know the future, is not sure of what will result from His sacrificial love, and still sends His only Son to die on the cross for the posterity of His original
creation who rejected His goodness and chose instead to believe the father of lies.
Here's my own take of what actually transpired in Heaven:

Son, Adam whom we created sinless and free and whose every need we supplied and with whom we fellowshipped face to face chose to have everything, including what we restricted to him.
Since he did that he is now a slave to sin, and all his posterity after him are enslaved to sin.
He has corrupted himself, and his posterity after him.
We have fully warned him of the consequences but he chose to ignore our warnings. Our first law had a penalty so all are now under that penalty.
But we love Adam so we are going to redeem him, and also some of his posterity, which we listed in the book of Life since we knew that Adam will fail the freedom we gave him. Our law must be satisfied, though. The penalty must be paid if redemption is to happen.

Here's what we will do Father. Let me take on the form of the slave, put on human flesh, thru our Holy Spirit, and let me redeem them with my blood as our law requires. Then, you will raise me up from the dead, to attest to my Sonship, and in me they shall inherit Eternal Life. Then we shall send forth preachers to proclaim the good news to our people's salvation to as many as they can, and to wherever we direct them.

But, Son, we require faith don't we ?

The Holy Spirit: then we will also give them the gift of faith, and we will regenerate those whom we have chosen from their condemned race.

Son, are you willing ?
Father, I am willing. Here am I, send me. I love thee, and we love them, and for your sake and theirs, I will go. We will not fail. We will lose no one, not one, save him whom thou hast chosen for a definite part in what we are about to do for our own.

Yes, Son. We are right. If we do not intervene for and in behalf of our own, they also shall perish along with the wicked world ruled by our adversary. You, Son, will be our gift to them.
For we want our people to be here with us on the time and date we have decreed.

And so they shall be, Father.
“Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us…” I John 4:10

And the Holy Spirit said, Amen.

 

Unfortunately, it seems the hunt-n-peck method was used here. Please, note that my story emphasises only one point as explained in a previous post.

 

If, by "unbiblical", Larry means the above story is not in the Bible, he is correct.

However, if Larry means the main idea conveyed by the story is unbiblical, then I will disagree.

It will be unbiblical to those who, instead of seeing the general gist of the parable (as it may be called), hunt-n-peck for every minute detail they can grab in order to condemn it and justify their own form of theology.

The main point emphasized in my parable is not in defense of some complex, sytematic theology of salvation but to illustrate the simple truth of the mercy of God as demonstrated in Jesus Christ, who was willing to die for each individual person even at the risk of being rejected.

 

By "unbiblical" I mean it is completely outside the truth of theology. God did not decide to make salvation possible. He decided to save people. He is not at the mercy of human who might accept or reject him. He is God. Your picture of God as a pleading lover attempting to woo some from the multitudes of girls is not in Scripture.

And I noticed that you did not answer the question I asked ...

 

(I saw the initial post on this. Phew, Larry, I'm glad you edited it. You had me wondering if I was a skitzo refuting myself...yeah, me too)

1. By "outside the truth of theology," it seems Larry means that the "main idea conveyed by the story is unbiblical," which I have already mentioned I disagree that it is.

2. If "God did not decide to make salvation possible," did He decide to make it impossible?

3. I agree God "decided to save people." Those who God "passed over" are people, too.

4. Unfortunately, the picture I gave is not as Larry explains it, however, there may be something found somewhat to that effect in the Old Testament prophets (but there is no need to argue this point since it is not relevant to the immediate discussion).

5. Larry's questions were not relevant to the main point of my story, which was to convey the extent with which God loves all men as sinners. But, if he desires to hunt-n-peck...he is the moderator...

 

This is my first posting, I am a simple soul so treat me gently!

It seems to me that we worship a God who is omnipotent omnipresent and omniscient (all-knowing). If that's the case, He knows the first to the last.

The Fall was not a surprise and the plan of salvation wasn't drawn up in response to an unexpected event. It was planned in eternity. The Godhead wrote the Lambs book of life - which will not be edited or amended especially by mere man. Those contained in the book are the elect recipients of His grace.

When a child is chosen for adoption from an orphanage and the others are left it is at the will of the adopting parents. God bestows his unmerited favour (grace) upon whom He wills and we have no right to call into question His soveriegn will.

 

What may be in dispute is not that God possesses these attributes Swindon mentions but, their proper meaning.

It may not have been a surprise to God but was it His plan that the Fall occur and that inevitably?

Swindon seems to suggest that God planned the Fall to occur and to occur necessarily and inevitably. As such, it would seem that God authored man’s experience of sin and evil.

If Swindon's statement follows the Reformed/Calvinsitic tradition, then I must disagree. It is God’s desire that all men be saved and the fact that not all will actually be saved does not suggest differently.

If the analogy were merely to express God’s concern for the sinner, it might work. However, if by it one is expressing the Reformed/Calvinistic view of election, it fails.

Unlike God, the adopting parents may have no means whereby to adopt all the children in the orphanage. There purpose in adopting one over all the rest seems not based on their love for children, but the means whereby they can provide for them.

Maybe one may also put forth the analogy of one who, in starting an orphanage, takes in all children and treats them as his own without partiality.

There is nothing inherently wrong with questioning God; He is our Father, not a tyrant (Job 23:1-7). What warrants condemnation is the attitude and intention to rebel regardless of the answer.

 

Of course it was his plan for the fall to occur! Why else would He have ordained Christ as Redeemer before the foundation of the world? He made a plan to take care of sin before He had even created--how can the sin of mankind not also be part of His plan?

In fact, the whole of God's work in human history seems to be centered around redemption. Human history is redemptive history. To say that God didn't plan for sin to be present in the world seems absurd given that it is only through our redemption from sin that we see the depth of the riches of God's grace; and furthermore, glorified human beings (products of redemption) will be better off than Adam and Eve ever were.

So, I believe that human sin was a necessary part of God's plan, although He didn't directly work it. But He knew for certain that that it would occur, and He made an active choice not to prevent it, because it was a part of God's perfect plan for human history.

 

1. If sin is planned and planned necessarily by God, then God is the author of sin; if he planned it and planned it as a necessary occurrence, he directly worked to bring it to pass. There is no passivity in God regarding the appearance of sin if He planned it and planned it as certain; he, therefore, not only made an active choice not to prevent it but He made an active choice to cause its occurrence.

2. For my part, a "perfect" plan could never involve sin's necessary occurrence. Would rape be God's necessary and inevitable plan for a child?

3. Please clarify your position: God planning the occurrence of evil and God knowing that it would occur are two different things.

Do you mean God planned it and knew it would occur, and that necessarily and inevitably because he planned it? Or do you mean that in God's plans for mankind, knowing that man would sin (though not necessarily or inevitably because it was not his will or plan that man sin), had plans drawn for its extirpation?

[ May 14, 2002, 12:53 PM: Message edited by: Nelson ]

 

I don't think your "if" necessarily follows from your "then". What does it mean to be an "author" of sin? Who defines what the means? If God tempted someone, or actively worked sin in their heart, then God would be the author of sin. But what if He just left them alone to do what He foresaw they would certainly do. How does that make Him the author of sin?

If I don't plant anything in my garden this year, and it goes to the weeds, does that make me the author of the weedy patch in my back yard? I know if I till and plant seed, and hoe and weed, then I am the author of the veggie garden that results, but if I just leave it alone, then how am I the author of what it becomes?

Once again, the "if" doesn't follow from the "then".

Huh? That's the only way sin can occur. If God is actively working to prevent it, then it CAN'T occur.

Why? Only God is intrinsically good. Any other goodness is derived goodness--any goodness the creation has is derived from the Creator. All God has to do is make a choice not to keep on actively working goodness in something and evil occurs as a lack of God's continuing working of good. Evil isn't some "thing" that has to be created--it's the absence of God.

Ahh....the operative phrase here is "for my part." Unless we are now living out some "second best" plan of God, then this world with it's sin is part of God's perfect plan. Unless God foreordained Christ as Redeemer as some sort of contingency plan, then it is part of God's "Plan A" for us to be redeemed. I believe that God, from the very start, wanted to produce glorified sons and daughters, who would always love and worship him from a deep appreciation of how far He would go to save them, and redemption was God's perfect plan for doing that.

There is no doubt that the rape of a child is an evil thing. So is selling a child into slavery in a foreign country and telling your father the child was killed by wild animals. But the selling of Joseph into slavery was part of God's perfect plan to preserve his people and redeem them out of the land of Egypt.

My husband had a horrible childhood including all of the worst things that could happen to a child. Yet he and some of his brothers and sisters often talk of how they wouldn't change a thing about their childhoods, because it is all those awful things that happened to them that made them the people they are today. God used those "worst things" to make a man who sensitive to the suffering of others, who can work as an advocate for abused children because he understands completely what is going on in their lives. My husband believes those "worst things" were part of God's perfect plan for his life, and you would never be able to convince him otherwise.

How so? If God knows it will occur, and He is all-powerful, then He could certainly prevent it, couldn't He? If knows it will occur, but chooses not to work to prevent it, then the occurance of evil is certainly part of His plan. There is no way to get around this, except to build a "god" who doesn't know the future.

I'm not sure I understand the first option, but the second option is silly. If God knows man will sin, then man's sin is necessary and inevitable and it is part of God's plan.

[ May 14, 2002, 01:48 PM: Message edited by: russell55 ]

 

If I make a post on this thread that runs it out to 8 pages, will the moderators close this thread also (please, pretty please!)?

 

Apart from God having, as Russell maintains, planned sin to exist and occur as necessary and inevitable, sin would have no existence and, therefore, God is the author of sin. From my perspective, planning sin as a necessary and inevitable occurrence goes beyond just tempting, allowing or foreseeing it.

In order for the analogy to succeed, it must be assumed that the weeds did not have any existence at all in your garden before you planted.

Who said it did? I would think, grammatically, the “then” follows from the “if.”

Please note, Russell uses "if" and "then," also.

In any case, I agree.

However, if God is actively engaged in sin, He is not involved in preventing evil; and, therefore, He authored it and is Himself involved in committing it.

I think the Bible shows that evil is more than the absence of good or God; it is also the committing of that which is against the good and God.

I notice that in this paragraph, Russell says, "I believe." He uses "operative phrases" as much as I do.

I see no problem with Christ being God’s contingency plan. It can well be one ordained before the foundation of the world. I believe God never planned that man would sin though he did plan for it.

God did not want man to know the good by experiencing evil.

Christ was available in the event that man sin and I see no diminution of His worthiness because of it. If man had never sinned, there would have been no reason for Christ to become a man and die; his intrinsic glory is nowhere devalued by it. Besides, it seems to me that it would be the first-best scenario if evil did not exist at all.

If one asserts that evil is in God's "perfect plan" then, essentially, evil is not genuinely evil but only apparently evil.

God did not sell Joseph into slavery. If one contends that God sold Joseph into slavery, then it can be argued that God rapes children. If selling Joseph was part of God’s “perfect plan,” than the raping of children was God’s perfect plan.

That, from my perspective, paradoxes may be involved in discussing the problem of evil, nevertheless, (again, the “operative phrase”) as I view it, the husband is a better man in spite of the evil he experienced, not because of it. It could have gone differently.

Suffering is no guarantee towards godliness.

However, I will not contend to have the correct interpretation of another’s experiences, good or bad, especially if they have already come to peace with their own interpretation.

Planning has activity and foreknowing is passive.

In any case, divine foreknowledge is a stickler. I have not yet come to a firm conclusion on it. However, at the present time, I do believe God foreknows future events, but somehow, His foreknowledge does not necessitate its occurrence.

I do see also the possibility of contending that God knows all future events that may possibly occur but none are the necessary and inevitable occurrence of foreknowledge. It is not a matter of not knowing future events, but allowing such events, so to speak, to unfold (become actual) on its own.

The question is simply what do you mean by “plan” when it is asserted that it was God’s “plan for the Fall [sin and evil] to occur”?Specifically, does Russell mean that Adam’s sin was a necessary and inevitable consequence because God planned it the Fall itself?

 

Nelson,

I have only got a bit of time right now, and won't have much over the next few days, so I am going to respond only to a portion of your post. But it's the part I think goes to the heart of the difference in our viewpoints.

I would disagree with this. I think God can plan for something that comes about by passive means. If God knew beforehand that mankind would sin, but decided not to prevent it, just to let it happen, and went so far as to plan Christ's redemptive work as a solution before He ever created, then the presence of sin is an integral part of His plan for human history. Planning something does not have to mean he actively works to bring it about, it can also mean he just chooses not to prevent something that He knows will occur if He doesn't work to prevent it.

God uses evil to bring about His good purpose. Evil is evil, but in God's hands, it brings forth good, and it brings forth the good that God intends for it.

Nope, He didn't. Joseph's brothers did that.

Ahh...but scripture tells us it was part of God's plan:

"And now, do not be grieved or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life....And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant in the earth, and to keep you alive by a great deliverance. Now therefore, it was not you who sent me here, but God... (Gen. 45)

God had a good purpose for Joseph's slavery, and had good reasons determined beforehand for allowing Joseph to be sold. That speaks of PLANNING to me. Here's more:

"But Joseph said to them, 'Do not be afraid, for am I in God's place? And as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive..." (Gen 50)

The word "meant" is a word of planning, of intent. God planned for Joseph to be sold in order to bring about the good result that came from it. God planned it for good. Joseph's brothers wickedly sold him into slavery, but that was God's place for him.

Here's where the paradox is: Evil is evil because it always comes from evil hearts that intend evil things. But as part of God's perfect plan (or good intent), it brings good things to pass.

[ May 14, 2002, 07:53 PM: Message edited by: russell55 ]

 

The explanation is seen from the perspective of evil already in existence. However, if it was God’s perfect plan that evil (which at one time had no existence whatsoever) should exist, then it seems He had to have been directly and actively involved in its necessary and inevitable existence.

Is it good that the evil occurred so that God brought out the good?Was the evil necessary for the obtainment of the good?

But God did not beat Joseph up and stick him in a pit; nor was it ever His plan to have Joseph get a beating. It is one thing to plan and bring about the evil (in this case, beating and the subjection to slavery) and another thing to maneuver the evil done in order to obtain a good.

I agree that God worked out His purpose through Joseph’s slavery. Whether or not it was “determined beforehand” (in the Reformed/Calvinistic sense) is not explicitly or implicitly stated in the narrative. All that is stated is that God maneuvered the evil done to Joseph to bring about good.

Again, there is no thought of predetermination in the Reformed/Calvinistic sense (or in any sense) nor is it demanded in the interpretation of the text.

I can agree that was what God, under the conditions, planned; however, it need not be necessarily assumed that slavery was God’s initial intent for Him, though, again, under the conditions, I can agree it was.

I agree unless with the first sentence. I disagree with the last sentence if it means that the existence of evil is “part of God's perfect plan (or good intent).”

 

Some persons love the preaching of C.H. Spurgeon because they say, "It is so beautiful. It is a lovely style of preaching; it commends itself," they say, "to the instincts of humanity; there is something in it full of joy and beauty. I admit there is, but beauty may be often associated with falsehood.

 

Let me throw this into this discussion, for whatever it may be worth...

"The LORD hath made all things for Himself; yea, even the wicked for the day of evil."

He who sees the sparrow's fall, and numbers the hairs of our head, and takes away the mind of King Nebuchadnezzer (Dan 4), and restores it at His will...He knows all, and controls all. He made it all, and He directs it all, for His own glory. "He hath done whatsoever He hath pleased."

connieman

[ May 20, 2002, 04:32 PM: Message edited by: connieman ]

 

At the recent Alistair Begg Pastor's conference, Dick Lucas made the statement that we reformed folks need to get over the misnomer that God only loves the elect and recover the Biblical doctrine of 'God so loved the world.' I agree. We needn't feel we have to explain this away. God's Word must simply be proclaimed.