PSA...Found this on X today

[Zaatar71]

A propitiatory sacrifice removes the wrath of God. So the Arminian who tries to hold a PSA is saying it doesn't remove the wrath of God until man does X, Y, or Z. Now you say, oh, but you're doing the same thing because you think that we're under the wrath of God until regeneration. But the point is, from the Reformed understanding, and I believe the biblical understanding, The elect are united with Christ in his death. Now, God regenerates them at a point in time in their lives in accordance with his will and his purpose, but the certainty of their regeneration and salvation is right there in front of us. It's certain. But the Arminian is saying, no, it's not certain. It's provisional. It's put out there, but it's up to us.
Modern evangelicals who are Arminians just don't know their history and so they don't know that by holding to PSA they're literally holding to a belief that, and I said to some people they didn't understand why I was saying this, when you combine penal substitution atonement with synergistic, non-election-based concept.

James White

 

[Zaatar71]

What about, can man's actions determine what's the nature of God's knowledge of future events, and Molinism, and all the rest of that kind of wacky stuff comes in. But the point is, PSA requires atonement to be propitiatory, and propitiation means it has to be personal, which means the object of the propitiation has to be known to God. So if I'm to be united with Christ in the effect of his sacrifice, then there's a theology that has to exist behind that. God can't be running around just trying to react to man and make things work out in the end. That doesn't work.
There is a massive, the law was just back then, it's irrelevant now, Old Testament's sort of only semi-canonical, so, the penal aspect, where the holiness of God is in view, just isn't a part of much of that. So, Arminians don't have, they came up with the governmental theory of atonement, moral influence theory, Christus Victor stuff, there's all these other quote-unquote theories, which in most instances have an element of truth to them. Christus Victor, Christ is victorious over his enemies That's just a part. And moral influence?

James White

 

[Zaatar71]

 

[JonC]

Greetings JonC


I understand that you (1) differentiate the view of Penal Substitution with what the exact words of the Bible state. I also understand that you (2) believe the Atonement is a foundational doctrine. What I don't know is "how" you differentiate between the two, i.e., between P.S. and what is written.

I preached a sermon on the atonement. It went well. I woke up the next morning convicted I has traded God's Word for man's philosophy. I was a Calvinist at the time. I bought a couple dry erase boards, wrote out the Penal Substitution Theory of Atonement along with supporting passage (took quite awhike). Then I erased every passage that did not actually support the theory. I was left with no passages.

"Jesus died for our sins, Jesus died for us." Penal Substitution theorists add to that "instead of us".

But the reason is what they assume.

The Penal Substitution Theory of Atonement is a reformed version of Thomas Aquinas' theory (of Roman Catholic doctrine). It replaces merit with justice and Aquinas' satisfactory punishment with simple punishment. It applies a 16th century judicial philosophy to divine justice.

Does God have to punish each sin? Not according to the Bible, but He does in order to be just according to a secular philosophy that has been dismissed and only survives in religious theories.

Penal Substitution Theory holds that it is actually impossible for God to forgive sins. God can allow the sinner to escape punishment but only if somebody else is punished for the sins. Forgiveness in Scripture is very different.

 

[Zaatar71]

Yeah, Christians used to believe that, but we've grown up, we've had the Enlightenment, so we don't believe things like that anymore.

But Steve Chalke in a pseudo-evangelical pastor in the UK identified penal substitutionary atonement as cosmic child abuse. Cosmic child abuse. So what they'll do is they will present PSA as if Jesus is the unwilling victim of a tyrannical God the Father, who grabs his innocent child and throws the sins of the world on his back and then curses him and beats him and kills him on the cross and then after all that raises him from the dead. It is necessary that the Son of Man go to Jerusalem, be betrayed into the hands of men, crucified, buried, rise again the third day. It's necessary. I have to do it. This is the Father's will for me. This is why I have come. And so the Son is not some unwilling participant.........James White.

 

[Zaatar71]

For the Muslims, they don't understand why Jesus was afraid to die. But Jesus wasn't afraid to die. The great burden that Jesus could see coming and understood was bearing the wrath of the Father in the place of his people. Or as Paul put it, He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. He was made to be sin. He was treated It was imputed to him. Just as Christ's righteousness is imputed to us, though we did not perform those righteous deeds, it is imputed to us. Our evil deeds were imputed to him.

James White

 

[Zaatar71]

All right, back to Isaiah 53. He was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chasing for our peace fell upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. So there is suffering on the part of the suffering servant. that results due to our transgressions, our iniquities, chastening that is needed for our peace, and by his wounds we are healed. All of us, like sheep, have gone astray. Each of us has turned to his own way, that is, apart from the purposes and ways of God. But Yahweh has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him. What is that? What is that? I mean, how much more obvious does it have to be? Yahweh has caused the iniquity of us all to fall. All right, back to Isaiah 53. He was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chasing for our peace fell upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. So there is suffering on the part of the suffering servant. that results due to our transgressions, our iniquities, chastening that is needed for our peace, and by his wounds we are healed. All of us, like sheep, have gone astray. Each of us has turned to his own way, that is, apart from the purposes and ways of God. But Yahweh has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him. What is that? What is that? I mean, how much more obvious does it have to be?

Yahweh has caused the iniquity of us all to fall. That's not fair. No, that's called mercy. That's the whole point. That's what the gospel is about. Congratulations, welcome to Christianity. Christianity isn't fair. It's grace. It's mercy. He was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth like a lamb that is led to slaughter, like a sheep that is slain before its shearers, so he did not open his mouth. What? What is this? Even before that, surely our griefs he himself bore, our sorrows he carried. Whose? Ours, not his. Yet we ourselves esteemed him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. This is as clear a statement of one taking the punishment of others resulting in their forgiveness that you can possibly have.
James White

 

[Zaatar71]

And it's in the Old Testament. He made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteous of God in Him. In our place, hupere. The Greek term hupere is PSA. You can't get rid of it. Hupere means in the place of, in behalf of. And it's used over and over and over again of the death of Christ in behalf of sinners.
How can you say the Father condemned the Son? Because the Son voluntarily takes the place of God's people! And the triune God chose to do this in eternity past!
James White

 

[Zaatar71]

Have you listened to the Garden of Gethsemane discussions? Have you listened to the prayers of Jesus? Have you read John 17 recently? This is not acting against the Son. And that's one of the... Hey, I've tried to be consistent on this one for a long time, and a lot of people have criticized me for it. Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And what do you hear people do with that? That the Father has turned His back on the Son. That He's acting against the Son. And I go, no! That's a quotation from Psalm 22. Jesus wants us to finish the psalm, the justification, the vindication of that suffering servant in Psalm 22. This is the point of Jesus' ultimate obedience to the Father.
James White

 

[Zaatar71]

There is a scriptural truth being enunciated when we sing, my name was graven on his hands. It wasn't impersonal. It was personal. See, there are certain sins that need to be forgiven, not just peanut butter sins. Just spread them around, just sort of generic sin type thing. It's specific. It's personal. And yes, all of those that were elected in eternity past, before they came into existence, this is why Paul can say in Ephesians chapter 2, you're seated with him in heavenly places. What do you mean we're seated with him in heavenly places? How can that be the case? We're here on earth. We're in a fallen state.
We're trudging through ignorance and tradition and sin every day. How can you say we're seated it with him in heavenly places? Because the God of the Bible is going to accomplish what the God of the Bible says he's going to accomplish. If you've got a God who's just trying to, you know, respond and do this, that, and the other thing, and I'll do the best I can with this stuff, if you're a Molinist or, you know, whatever mess you're in, okay, you go deal with your stuff over there someplace.
You can't deal with it biblically because you jumped that ship for some philosophical foolishness. But the God of Scripture can say you already see the heavenly places in Christ Jesus because that is a certainty. It is not. It is not a we hope for. And it's not a, well, all election is is God chooses that those who choose him, he's going to do these things for them. That kind of impersonal, upside-down, backwards, man-centered stuff is a mess. So when it says, not punishment inflicted by one person of the Trinity on another ignores the reason why One of the divine persons took on flesh, and one did not. And the voluntariness of that action.
Penal Substitutionary Atonement is the beating heart of the gospel.....James White

 

[Zaatar71]

So penal, law, holiness of God, substitution, incarnation, voluntary coming of Christ, atonement, true propitiation, removing the wrath of God against sin. This is how we have peace with God. This is how we can be justified.

 

[JonC]

A propitiatory sacrifice removes the wrath of God. So the Arminian who tries to hold a PSA is saying it doesn't remove the wrath of God until man does X, Y, or Z. Now you say, oh, but you're doing the same thing because you think that we're under the wrath of God until regeneration. But the point is, from the Reformed understanding, and I believe the biblical understanding, The elect are united with Christ in his death. Now, God regenerates them at a point in time in their lives in accordance with his will and his purpose, but the certainty of their regeneration and salvation is right there in front of us. It's certain. But the Arminian is saying, no, it's not certain. It's provisional. It's put out there, but it's up to us.
Modern evangelicals who are Arminians just don't know their history and so they don't know that by holding to PSA they're literally holding to a belief that, and I said to some people they didn't understand why I was saying this, when you combine penal substitution atonement with synergistic, non-election-based concept.

James White

Where on earth did anybody get the idea that a "propitiatory sacrifice removes the wrath of God"?

Propropitiation is an appeasement. Wrath is turned aside, but Scripture does not speak of Jesus' death as a propitiatory sacrifice.

Jesus IS the propitiation for our sins. In Him we escape the wrath to come.
God put Him forth as a Propitiation to be received by faith.

When it comes to the Atonement I believe we need to stay closer to Scripture.

 

[Zaatar71]

Propitiation Vines nt.dictionary

[ A-1,Verb,G2433, hilaskomai ]
was used amongst the Greeks with the significance to make the gods propitious, to appease, propitiate," inasmuch as their good will was not conceived as their natural attitude, but something to be earned first. This use of the word is foreign to the Greek Bible, with respect to God, whether in the Sept. or in the NT. It is never used of any act whereby man brings God into a favorable attude or gracious disposition. It is God who is "propitiated" by the vindication of His holy and righteous character, whereby, through the provision He has made in the vicarious and expiatory sacrifice of Christ, He has so dealt with sin that He can show mercy to the believing sinner in the removal of his guilt and the remission of his sins.

Thus in Luke 18:13 it signifies "to be propitious" or "merciful to" (with the person as the object of the verb), and in Hebrews 2:17 "to expiate, to make propitiation for" (the object of the verb being sins); here the RV, "to make propitiation" is an important correction of the AV, "to make reconciliation."

Through the "propitiation" sacrifice of Christ, he who believes upon Him is by God's own act delivered from justly deserved wrath, and comes under the covenant of grace.

Never is God said to be reconciled, a fact itself indicative that the enmity exists on man's part alone, and that it is man who needs to be reconciled to God, and not God to man. God is always the same and, since He is Himself immutable, His relative attitude does change towards those who change. He can act differently towards those who come to Him by faith, and solely on the ground of the "propitiatory" sacrifice of Christ, not because He has changed, but because He ever acts according to His unchanging righteousness.

 

[Zaatar71]

Jesus was sent "to satisfy justice, to meet the demands of a broken Law, to pay the full debt, to satisfy the penalty. It all must be met; it cannot be ignored. God's love is also just -- love must be just -- and therefore, the only love that is worth talking about is a love that satisfies (ED: totally, fully placates or appeases) justice." (Stedman) Our (in for our sins) is genitive indicating a personal possessive pronoun, those sins we possessed! Jesus personally died for our personal sins, each and every one we personally committed! ....Matheson

The propitiation ("Satisfaction") (2434) (hilasmos akin to hileōs = merciful, propitious) in the NT (only here and 1Jn 2:2+) refers to a sacrifice that turns away the wrath of God and thereby makes God propitious (favorably inclined or disposed, disposed to be gracious and/or merciful, ready to forgive) toward us. Hilasmos means ‘propitiation’ and refers to the effect that Christ’s atonement had on the anger of God, fulfilling the requirements of His justice It is important to make the distinction that propitiation does not mean we must do something to appease God or to placate His anger, but that it refers to something He does to make it possible for men to be forgiven! Glory, Hallelujah!

 

[Zaatar71]

Steven Cole on propitiation for our sins - So that we don’t get our focus on ourselves, or get puffed up with pride over how loving we are (ED: It is also possible that those with the spirit of anti-Christ were making the claim with their "lips" that they love God, but their "life" proved their words to be a lie), John directs us back to God’s love as seen in His sending His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. ....“Propitiation” means to satisfy God’s justice and wrath toward our sin. His love didn’t just brush aside our sin, because His holiness and justice would have been compromised. Rather, His love moved God to send His own Son, who bore the penalty that we rightly deserved.

 

[Zaatar71]

John MacArthur - Hebrews 9:5+ translates a form (hilasterion or hilasterios) of this word (hilasmos) as “the mercy seat.” Christ literally became our mercy seat like the one in the Most Holy Place, where the high priest splattered the blood of the sacrifice on the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:15+). Christ did this when His blood, spilled on behalf of others, satisfied the demands of God’s holy justice and wrath against sin. (See The MacArthur Bible Commentary - Page 1964)

 

[Zaatar71]

Wuest - The English word “propitiate” means “to appease and render favorable.” That was the pagan meaning of the Greek word. The pagan worshipper brought gifts to his god to appease the god’s wrath and make him favorable in his attitude towards him. But the God of Christianity needs no gifts to appease His wrath and make Him favorable towards the human race. Divine love springs spontaneously from His heart. His wrath against sin cannot be placated by good works. Only the infliction of the penalty of sin, death, will satisfy the just demands of His holy law which the human race violated, maintain His government, and provide the proper basis for His bestowal of mercy, namely, divine justice satisfied. Hilasmos is that sacrifice which fully satisfies the demands of the broken law. It was our Lord’s death on Calvary’s Cross. Thus does this pagan word accrue to itself a new meaning as it enters the doctrinal atmosphere of the New Testament. (Wuest Word Studies- used by permission)

NET Note on hilasmos says "inherent in the meaning of the word translated atoning sacrifice ( hilasmos) is the idea of turning away the divine wrath, so that “propitiation” is the closest English equivalent. God’s love for us is expressed in his sending his Son to be the propitiation (the propitiatory sacrifice) for our sins on the cross… The contemporary English “atoning sacrifice” communicates this idea more effectively."

ESV Study Bible (borrow) says Hilasmos "means 'a sacrifice that bears God's wrath and turns it to favor" which is "also the meaning of the English word propitiation."