Christ being made sin Volume 2

[JonC]

I think that is the plain meaning. If you are struggling with your pack and I take it then the weight was laid on me. But it was also, by definition, transferred from you to me.

It isn't the plain meaning, but it is a meaning.

If I am struggling with a sorrow and you come along and take that sorrow upon yourself it is not transferred from me.

The issue with transferring sin is that sin, like sorrow, is not a thing to be transferred. It s an action that has occurred.

 

[DaveXR650]

If I am struggling with a sorrow and you come along and take that sorrow upon yourself it is not transferred from me.

The issue with transferring sin is that sin, like sorrow, is not a thing to be transferred. It s an action that has occurred.

It could be that this is the issue. I think sin can be transferred, in the sense of the guilt, penalty and punishment. I believe God can impute these things. Much of scripture is devoted to helping us understand that Jesus is the one and the only one ever qualified to do this. It definitely would be wrong to punish someone else for another person's sins. It happens in our world and we abhor it. But we also abhor sin not being punished. So we just as much hate the idea of major monstrous sins being simply overlooked. We despise judges who do this type of thing. We don't need to worry about that with God. It is His nature to punish sin and hate sin and in a judicial sense - hate the sinner. Don't get too caught up in our human limitations of understanding. There is an animal part of us, and a depraved part of us, that when we experience wrath may very well have a lot to do with our feelings. Our wrath can be totally or partially selfish or wrongheaded and a part of it is a physical dumping of neurotransmitters into our systems. Not so with God. But still, wrath is what scripture uses for our benefit to explain this and with my knowledge of the other attributes of God I have no problem with the expression.

 

[DaveXR650]

What needs to be done is to prove via Scripture that this is what occurred.

The difficulty in doing that is Scripture and scholars existed for over 1,500 years without any Christian coming to that conclusion. You'd be pouring over passages that have been read and studied for a millennia and a half to find what they somehow missed.

Like I have said before we are looking at the same verses and coming to different conclusions but the assertion that this is not in scripture I reject. I also see much of this in early church writings and I reject the idea that it was invented in the 1500's. I do think that it is articulated and developed by the reformers but maybe it needed to be. I do understand and agree with you that this aspect of our salvation needed to be brought to the forefront when you were coming up against a Priesthood that had claimed the power to remit or forgive sins themselves and had the right to set up penances and punishments for infractions. But that in no way makes it untrue.

This happens in other areas too. The early reformers and the Puritans were not big on evangelism or missionary work. The fact that others "found" these things in later years in no way suggests they were newly discovered novelties. Instead I think that these groups were living in a time where this was impossible, they had other important issues that took priority, and that they were probably just wrong to some extent.

I do think that penal substitution is a core belief that was generally accepted without needing to go into it by almost everyone who got access to a complete canon of scripture and had an opportunity to look at Old and New Testament writings. I like Richard Baxter, and even though he had some views on justification that were not reformed and supposedly embraced a governmental view of the atonement, if you read his writings he constantly refers to the blood of Christ being shed in a way that indicates a deeply held core belief in penal substitution.

 

[JonC]

It could be that this is the issue. I think sin can be transferred, in the sense of the guilt, penalty and punishment. I believe God can impute these things. Much of scripture is devoted to helping us understand that Jesus is the one and the only one ever qualified to do this. It definitely would be wrong to punish someone else for another person's sins. It happens in our world and we abhor it. But we also abhor sin not being punished. So we just as much hate the idea of major monstrous sins being simply overlooked. We despise judges who do this type of thing. We don't need to worry about that with God. It is His nature to punish sin and hate sin and in a judicial sense - hate the sinner. Don't get too caught up in our human limitations of understanding. There is an animal part of us, and a depraved part of us, that when we experience wrath may very well have a lot to do with our feelings. Our wrath can be totally or partially selfish or wrongheaded and a part of it is a physical dumping of neurotransmitters into our systems. Not so with God. But still, wrath is what scripture uses for our benefit to explain this and with my knowledge of the other attributes of God I have no problem with the expression.

I have no problem with the expression except I believe it is more humanistic retributive justice than Scripture.

The issue is Scripture itself dies not present sins as being transferrable. Scripture does not present guilt as transferrable. And Scripture presents acquitting the guilty AND convicting the just as equally wrong.

Classic Christianity takes Scripture as it comes. It presents God as dealing with sinners in such a way that He died not acquit the guilty nor does He pour His wrath upon the innocent. I believe it is a more biblical presentation for several reasons, not the least that it maintains Christ as the "Second Adam" (completely, as we can expect to be treated by God as He treated Christ).

We do, often want to see crime punished. That is the flesh, I suppose. God found another way entirely. Rather than punishing the sinner He removed their heart if stone, their old spirit, and puts His Spirit in them. He recreates man.

That is something Calvinism has not fully embraced. They embrace the idea of regeneration but not really the reality of it (they focus on belief rather than actual regeneration).

Think of it this way - if God really removes the old spirit and puts His Spirit in a man, if He really recreates a man and makes him a new creation in Christ then there is no need to have punished sin as that sin is forgiven and the sinner no longer exists.

That is what I like about reading the Early Church writings. They were not plagued by the humanistic judicial philosophy that inundated the 15th and 16th centuries. They may have missed out on Les Misérables, but they had a much deeper theology.

 

[JonC]

Like I have said before we are looking at the same verses and coming to different conclusions but the assertion that this is not in scripture I reject. I also see much of this in early church writings and I reject the idea that it was invented in the 1500's. I do think that it is articulated and developed by the reformers but maybe it needed to be. I do understand and agree with you that this aspect of our salvation needed to be brought to the forefront when you were coming up against a Priesthood that had claimed the power to remit or forgive sins themselves and had the right to set up penances and punishments for infractions. But that in no way makes it untrue.

This happens in other areas too. The early reformers and the Puritans were not big on evangelism or missionary work. The fact that others "found" these things in later years in no way suggests they were newly discovered novelties. Instead I think that these groups were living in a time where this was impossible, they had other important issues that took priority, and that they were probably just wrong to some extent.

I do think that penal substitution is a core belief that was generally accepted without needing to go into it by almost everyone who got access to a complete canon of scripture and had an opportunity to look at Old and New Testament writings. I like Richard Baxter, and even though he had some views on justification that were not reformed and supposedly embraced a governmental view of the atonement, if you read his writings he constantly refers to the blood of Christ being shed in a way that indicates a deeply held core belief in penal substitution.

What I mean by "not in Scripture" is "not in the actual text of the Bible". And it isn't. You have demonstrated, one must systematically work through passages and develop ideas about what the Bible teaches in order to arrive at the Penal Substitution Theory of Atonement.

 

[kyredneck]

Jon keeps asserting a falsehood as though he was right when he is not.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/penal-substitution-early-church/?amp

"When a single ray of light shines into a prism, it refracts into the colors of the rainbow. No one color is more prominent than the others, but each contributes to the beauty of light.

We might liken the doctrine of the atonement in the early church to a single ray that enters a prism and refracts into many colors of doctrine. These fathers and mothers of the church appreciated and exhausted the various ways Scripture speaks of Christ’s work on the cross. Penal substitutionary atonement—the idea that Jesus was punished in our place—is certainly one of those colors, even if it’s no brighter than the other colors in their writings...."

Excellent illustration, excellent article. I liken 'the many synonymies within scripture' to a multi-faceted gem with each facet looking into the center and 'contributing to the beauty of the whole'.

"...We end where we began, with the colors of the rainbow. This is fitting since the fathers squeezed out meaning from every word of Scripture, including color. One image they used repeatedly for the atonement was Rahab’s scarlet thread, hung from her window for her salvation (Josh. 2:18), which many in the early church took as the blood of Christ.

To cite Clement once more, “And in addition they gave [Rahab] a sign, that she should hang from her house something scarlet—making it clear that through the blood of the Lord redemption will come to all who believe and hope in God” (1 Clem. 12:7–8)...."

Yea.

13 And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and there shall no plague be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt. Ex 12

 

[JonC]

"When a single ray of light shines into a prism, it refracts into the colors of the rainbow. No one color is more prominent than the others, but each contributes to the beauty of light.

We might liken the doctrine of the atonement in the early church to a single ray that enters a prism and refracts into many colors of doctrine. These fathers and mothers of the church appreciated and exhausted the various ways Scripture speaks of Christ’s work on the cross. Penal substitutionary atonement—the idea that Jesus was punished in our place—is certainly one of those colors, even if it’s no brighter than the other colors in their writings...."

Excellent illustration, excellent article. I liken the 'synonymy of scripture' to a multi-faceted gem with each facet looking into the center and 'contributing to the beauty of the whole'.

"...We end where we began, with the colors of the rainbow. This is fitting since the fathers squeezed out meaning from every word of Scripture, including color. One image they used repeatedly for the atonement was Rahab’s scarlet thread, hung from her window for her salvation (Josh. 2:18), which many in the early church took as the blood of Christ.

To cite Clement once more, “And in addition they gave [Rahab] a sign, that she should hang from her house something scarlet—making it clear that through the blood of the Lord redemption will come to all who believe and hope in God” (1 Clem. 12:7–8)...."

Yea.

13 And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and there shall no plague be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt. Ex 12

I often hear it compared to a diamond (looking at it in different angles or different lighting). But sometimes that's just a way to keep the peace by saying all are correct.

The problem is that the early church writings present the Cross in such a way as to oppose the Penal Substitution Theory of Atonement. Both cannot be true. Either Christianity for the first millennia and a half got it wrong and a couple of Reformers got it right or the Early Church had it right and the Reformers got it wrong. But Early Church theology and the Penal Substitution Theory of Atonement cannot both be correct as they are at odds.

 

[kyredneck]

Both cannot be true.

Did you read the article?

 

[Martin Marprelate]

That is nonsense.

If your child kicks the dog ate you angry at "kick the dog" and your child for kicking the dog?

No, of course not. That does not make any sense.

False comparison to go with the false dichotomy.

 

[JonC]

Did you read the article?

Yes.

 

[JonC]

False comparison to go with the false dichotomy.

No. You said that God is angry at sins and sinners.

Abusing animals is a sin, and it happens every day.

But let's look at another example

Suppose a minister gossips about people he has interacted with.

You are saying God is angry at "gossip" as well as the gossiper. That dies not make sense. Gossip is the sin, but the issue is the heart of the man who gossips. God's anger would be against the person - gossipping being a manifestation of that person's sinfulness - , not "the act of gossipping".

 

[percho]

Did God the Father sacrifice, his only begotten Son, as an appeasement unto Himself because of wrath toward the ungodly?

Am not sure I can answer myself but methinks I lean toward the affirmative.

Is the above what God was showing Abraham in his only begotten son Isaac, that he God was going to do in his only begotten Son, Jesus the Christ, the Lamb of God?

And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering: so they went both of them together. Gen 22:8

 

[Martin Marprelate]

No. You said that God is angry at sins and sinners.

Abusing animals is a sin, and it happens every day.

But let's look at another example

Suppose a minister gossips about people he has interacted with.

You are saying God is angry at "gossip" as well as the gossiper. That dies not make sense. Gossip is the sin, but the issue is the heart of the man who gossips. God's anger would be against the person - gossipping being a manifestation of that person's sinfulness - , not "the act of gossipping".

This is rubbish as you must surely know.
Example 1. The father is angry at the sin, dog-kicking, which is a transgression of his righteous standards.. Therefore his righteous anger is directed at the sinner, his son.
If the father doesn't care about dog-kicking, or kicks the dog himself, he will not be angry with his son and will not punish him.
Example 2. God is angry at the sin, gossiping Leviticus 19:16), which is a transgression of His righteous standards. Therefore his righteous anger is directed at the sinner, the minister.
If God were not angry at gossiping, He would not warn against it in His word or punish those who commit it.

 

[JonC]

This is rubbish as you must surely know.
Example 1. The father is angry at the sin, dog-kicking, which is a transgression of his righteous standards.. Therefore his righteous anger is directed at the sinner, his son.
If the father doesn't care about dog-kicking, or kicks the dog himself, he will not be angry with his son and will not punish him.
Example 2. God is angry at the sin, gossiping Leviticus 19:16), which is a transgression of His righteous standards. Therefore his righteous anger is directed at the sinner, the minister.
If God were not angry at gossiping, He would not warn against it in His word or punish those who commit it.

No. God's anger is against the sinner who committed the sin. God is not a child. He doesn't direct His anger at some metaphysical action. His anger is directed towards the person who sins.

This is why sins cannot be transferred. One can judge a person who did not commit the crime as guilty, but that simply makes the judge an abomination to God.

God does not acquit the guilty or punish the innocent as both are equally abominations.

 

[Martin Marprelate]

No. God's anger is against the sinner who committed the sin. God is not a child. He doesn't direct His anger at some metaphysical action. His anger is directed towards the person who sins.

That is what I said. God is angry at the sin, but His anger is directed against the sinner. If He were not angry at the sin He would not punish the sinner.
Ezekiel 7:10. Behold the day! Behold it has come! Doom has gone out; pride has blossomed, violence has risen up into a rod of wickedness.' God is angry at pride and violence. Is he going to punish them? No. 'None of them shall remain, none of their multitude.' Who is the 'them'? Those who are proud and those commit violence. It is against them that God is angry.
Malachi 2:16. 'For the LORD God of Israel says that He hates divorce.' How can God direct His anger at divorce? He doesn't, but He will punish those who divorce for no good reason and do not repent (c.f. Malachi 2:13).

 

[JonC]

That is what I said. God is angry at the sin, but His anger is directed against the sinner. If He were not angry at the sin He would not punish the sinner.
Ezekiel 7:10. Behold the day! Behold it has come! Doom has gone out; pride has blossomed, violence has risen up into a rod of wickedness.' God is angry at pride and violence. Is he going to punish them? No. 'None of them shall remain, none of their multitude.' Who is the 'them'? Those who are proud and those commit violence. It is against them that God is angry.
Malachi 2:16. 'For the LORD God of Israel says that He hates divorce.' How can God direct His anger at divorce? He doesn't, but He will punish those who divorce for no good reason and do not repent (c.f. Malachi 2:13).

Exactly. Sins, like guilt, cannot be transferred. Wrath remains on the one who sins as a sin is a manifestation (a fruit) of the person.

 

[Martin Marprelate]

Exactly. Sins, like guilt, cannot be transferred. Wrath remains on the one who sins as a sin is a manifestation (a fruit) of the person.

Except that the Bible says they can. Leviticus 16:21-22; Isaiah 53:6; 1 Peter 2:24. And if sin cannot be imputed, how can righteous be? Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3-5.

 

[JonC]

Except that the Bible says they can. Leviticus 16:21-22; Isaiah 53:6; 1 Peter 2:24. And if sin cannot be imputed, how can righteous be? Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3-5.

No. Even here you miss the mark.

"And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness." Does not prove sins are things to be transferred from men.

You do point out a difference in interpretation, though. Where you demonstrate the New Testament as interpreted by the Old Testament, I believe the New Testament is the fuller revelation and we view the OT through the lens of the NT.

Where you consider a goat as equivalent to Christ in terms of taking away sins (in the micro, anyway) I consider the OT as foreshadowing the NT (the goat was a symbol of what was to come). The issue was obedience, not the forensic removal of sins from a man to a goat.

Paul explains that this was a time God "bypassed" sins in anticipation of the New Covenant.

 

[Martin Marprelate]

No. Even here you miss the mark.

"And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness." Does not prove sins are things to be transferred from men.

I did not say it did.

You do point out a difference in interpretation, though. Where you demonstrate the New Testament as interpreted by the Old Testament, I believe the New Testament is the fuller revelation and we view the OT through the lens of the NT.

First of all, I did not 'demonstrate the NT as interpretated by the OT.' I illustrated my point by quotations from both Testaments.(Matthew 13:52). Secondly, I long to see any Scripture from you! In five posts, all I've had is your religious philosophy. Thirdly if you want to know what the purpose of the OT is in the NT age, the Scripture itself tells you. Go and look it up.

Where you consider a goat as equivalent to Christ in terms of taking away sins (in the micro, anyway) I consider the OT as foreshadowing the NT (the goat was a symbol of what was to come). The issue was obedience, not the forensic removal of sins from a man to a goat.

And now you are just being silly and offensive. I don't need to reply to this sort of nonsense. Please! Let's just stop replying to each other's posts. It always ends badly.

Paul explains that this was a time God "bypassed" sins in anticipation of the New Covenant.

Chapter and verse please if you are determined to continue.

 

[JonC]

I did not say it did.

First of all, I did not 'demonstrate the NT as interpretated by the OT.' I illustrated my point by quotations from both Testaments.(Matthew 13:52). Secondly, I long to see any Scripture from you! In five posts, all I've had is your religious philosophy. Thirdly if you want to know what the purpose of the OT is in the NT age, the Scripture itself tells you. Go and look it up.

And now you are just being silly and offensive. I don't need to reply to this sort of nonsense. Please! Let's just stop replying to each other's posts. It always ends badly.

Chapter and verse please if you are determined to continue.

Sure you did. You are interpreting the men as transferring their sins from them to a goat. If you considered the New Testament as a fuller explanation of the OT you would have realized that the sins were not transferred but rather that God "passed over" those sins in anticipation of the New Covenant.

Sins are actions that have been committed. They are not things to be transferred. What remains is the sinner (the person who committed the sin).

Guilt is the same. It is not a thing to be transferred but a state of having done something.

There is no need to post verses because we agree on Scripture. Our disagreement is over the ideas you bring into Scripture (like sins being transferred from men to animals).