"Christ died for our sins"

[Sudsy]

Just got back from Good Friday church service at our MB Anabaptist church and heard a sermon explaining the atonement in penal substitutionary (PS) terms. Was quite surprised as I think the most popular view of the atonement amongst Anabaptists is or would be (for those who care to study it) the Christus Victor view. I will be curious to find out what kind of feedback the pastor gets on this.

I take it that a main reason for Anabaptists rejecting the PS view is that it is considered a violent view of God pouring out His wrath on His Son instead of on us. Am I correct ?

If so, I would like to ask further questions beginning with God's wrath and how the God spoken of in the OT and again in the NT book of Revelation, appears to be at odds with Christ's teachings on loving our enemies and turning the other cheek.

The PS view on the atonement, I think, is a primarily a Reformed view and one that some Anabaptists are quite intolerant of hearing. Almost a heresy and perhaps for some it is heresy.

This thread open to all.

[MaxPC]

Great idea for a thread, Sudsy.

[Josh]

Great question, Sudsy.

Conservative Anabaptists are heavily influenced by outside evangelical thinking. A lot of evangelical thinking is in turn heavily influenced by Calvinism. (Anabaptists themselves drew many of their original ideas from Zwingli, as did the Reformed movement, so Calvinists and Anabaptists are really just second cousins - albeit ones who don't run into each other at their family reunions.)

Within conservative Anabaptism, there are a lot of people who embrace a PSA view, especially those from an Amish background who have abandoned Amish views of salvation in exchange for the evangelical view.

My own personal view on the right doctrine atonement is that of N. T. Wright's: "All of them". Jesus definitely did wash our sins away. But it is a mystery how he did that. I personally draw the most spiritual encouragement from the Christus Victor view. But I can understand that, for someone who has lived his whole life under a heavy burden that his sins aren't really forgiven, knowing his sins did die with Jesus on the cross can bring victory and new life.

I am quite wary of embracing PSA to the exclusion of a lot of other things I see in scripture.

[Sudsy]

Great question, Sudsy.

Conservative Anabaptists are heavily influenced by outside evangelical thinking. A lot of evangelical thinking is in turn heavily influenced by Calvinism. (Anabaptists themselves drew many of their original ideas from Zwingli, as did the Reformed movement, so Calvinists and Anabaptists are really just second cousins - albeit ones who don't run into each other at their family reunions.)

Within conservative Anabaptism, there are a lot of people who embrace a PSA view, especially those from an Amish background who have abandoned Amish views of salvation in exchange for the evangelical view.

My own personal view on the right doctrine atonement is that of N. T. Wright's: "All of them". Jesus definitely did wash our sins away. But it is a mystery how he did that. I personally draw the most spiritual encouragement from the Christus Victor view. But I can understand that, for someone who has lived his whole life under a heavy burden that his sins aren't really forgiven, knowing his sins did die with Jesus on the cross can bring victory and new life.

I am quite wary of embracing PSA to the exclusion of a lot of other things I see in scripture.

So Josh, do you see the PS view to be in conflict with Jesus teachings and an Anabaptist understanding of what it means to not return evil with evil ? That all violence is ungodly ? God would never be violent towards His Son ?

[Josh]

So Josh, do you see the PS view to be in conflict with Jesus teachings and an Anabaptist understanding of what it means to not return evil with evil ? That all violence is ungodly ? God would never be violent towards His Son ?

I think the Old Testament, and the people who wrote it and who it was written to it, thrived on a lot of symbolism. I think 1st century Jewish people did too. The picture all throughout scripture is that of a sacrificial lamb.

I don't think it makes sense to say that God was really angry and wanted to kill people because he was mad, but then if he went and killed himself, he gave himself such a thorough beating that he wasn't mad anymore.

I don't agree with progressive Anabaptist views that all violence is ungodly. God says, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay." Violence must be accompanied with justice. The message in the New Testament is that human beings aren't very good at justice, and our attempts at fall short. So Jesus teaches us a new way, and he showed us how even God himself can accept being wronged, and accept injustice being perpetrated against him. But in the end, God wins and enacts perfect justice.

The ultimate justice was Jesus rising from the dead after being unjustly executed.

[Sudsy]

Great idea for a thread, Sudsy.

I found this Max. Would you say this is a satisfactory explanation to you of the Roman Catholic view-

The Catholic conception of Christ’s Passion and Atonement is that Christ offered Himself up in self-sacrificial love to the Father, obedient even unto death, for the sins of all men. In His human will He offered to God a sacrifice of love that was more pleasing to the Father than the combined sins of all men of all time are displeasing to Him, and thus made satisfaction for our sins. The Father was never angry with Christ. Nor did the Father pour out His wrath on the Son. The Passion is Christ’s greatest act of love, the greatest revelation of the heart of God, and the glory of Christ. So when Christ was on the cross, God the Father was not pouring out His wrath on His Son; in Christ’s act of self-sacrifice in loving obedience to the Father, Christ was most lovable in the eyes of the Father. Rather, in Christ’s Passion we humans poured out our enmity with God on Christ, by what we did to Him in His body and soul. And He freely chose to let us do all this to Him. Deeper still, even our present sins contributed to His suffering, because He, in solidarity with us, grieved over all the sins of the world, not just the sins of the elect. Hence, St. Francis of Assisi said, “Nor did demons crucify Him; it is you who have crucified Him and crucify Him still, when you delight in your vices and sins.”The Passion is a revelation of the love of God, not the wrath of God.

[KingdomBuilder]

I personally draw the most spiritual encouragement from the Christus Victor view.

I read much on this upon first coming across Anabaptism. I think it's the best "explanation" thus far.

[MaxPC]

Great idea for a thread, Sudsy.

I found this Max. Would you say this is a satisfactory explanation to you of the Roman Catholic view-

The Catholic conception of Christ’s Passion and Atonement is that Christ offered Himself up in self-sacrificial love to the Father, obedient even unto death, for the sins of all men. In His human will He offered to God a sacrifice of love that was more pleasing to the Father than the combined sins of all men of all time are displeasing to Him, and thus made satisfaction for our sins. The Father was never angry with Christ. Nor did the Father pour out His wrath on the Son. The Passion is Christ’s greatest act of love, the greatest revelation of the heart of God, and the glory of Christ. So when Christ was on the cross, God the Father was not pouring out His wrath on His Son; in Christ’s act of self-sacrifice in loving obedience to the Father, Christ was most lovable in the eyes of the Father. Rather, in Christ’s Passion we humans poured out our enmity with God on Christ, by what we did to Him in His body and soul. And He freely chose to let us do all this to Him. Deeper still, even our present sins contributed to His suffering, because He, in solidarity with us, grieved over all the sins of the world, not just the sins of the elect. Hence, St. Francis of Assisi said, “Nor did demons crucify Him; it is you who have crucified Him and crucify Him still, when you delight in your vices and sins.”The Passion is a revelation of the love of God, not the wrath of God.

I'll give a conditional maybe as it's not complete. Conditional, because I think it's important to read the entire context of the excerpt and its source reference. At first gloss it's similar to a small portion of our highly detailed and articulated definitions of God's Salvation plan. In Catholic World, we're attached to highly detailed definitions so that there's no room for misunderstanding.

In the Catholic Catechism the exhaustive and detailed explanation can be found in Part One, Section 2; Chapters 1-3. I'll spare you the cut and paste

If anyone has at least several hours of spare time, you can find the above reference to Part One at this link.
http://ccc.usccb.org/flipbooks/catechism/index.html

If you don't read it, no worries, I'm not offended. Our CCC can be a tough slog of a read.

[ohio jones]

Just ran across an article by Bruxy Cavey on the subject. More ways of looking at this than are often listed, and all of them true to some degree; it really takes all of them together to appreciate the scope of what Christ did for us.

[Sudsy]

Great idea for a thread, Sudsy.

I found this Max. Would you say this is a satisfactory explanation to you of the Roman Catholic view-

The Catholic conception of Christ’s Passion and Atonement is that Christ offered Himself up in self-sacrificial love to the Father, obedient even unto death, for the sins of all men. In His human will He offered to God a sacrifice of love that was more pleasing to the Father than the combined sins of all men of all time are displeasing to Him, and thus made satisfaction for our sins. The Father was never angry with Christ. Nor did the Father pour out His wrath on the Son. The Passion is Christ’s greatest act of love, the greatest revelation of the heart of God, and the glory of Christ. So when Christ was on the cross, God the Father was not pouring out His wrath on His Son; in Christ’s act of self-sacrifice in loving obedience to the Father, Christ was most lovable in the eyes of the Father. Rather, in Christ’s Passion we humans poured out our enmity with God on Christ, by what we did to Him in His body and soul. And He freely chose to let us do all this to Him. Deeper still, even our present sins contributed to His suffering, because He, in solidarity with us, grieved over all the sins of the world, not just the sins of the elect. Hence, St. Francis of Assisi said, “Nor did demons crucify Him; it is you who have crucified Him and crucify Him still, when you delight in your vices and sins.”The Passion is a revelation of the love of God, not the wrath of God.

I'll give a conditional maybe as it's not complete. Conditional, because I think it's important to read the entire context of the excerpt and its source reference. At first gloss it's similar to a small portion of our highly detailed and articulated definitions of God's Salvation plan. In Catholic World, we're attached to highly detailed definitions so that there's no room for misunderstanding.

In the Catholic Catechism the exhaustive and detailed explanation can be found in Part One, Section 2; Chapters 1-3. I'll spare you the cut and paste

If anyone has at least several hours of spare time, you can find the above reference to Part One at this link.
http://ccc.usccb.org/flipbooks/catechism/index.html

If you don't read it, no worries, I'm not offended. Our CCC can be a tough slog of a read.

Thankyou. Well, I won' be one that goes into that much detailed study and look for a summary, which I think is possible with all these theories. This view that the Father was not angry with the Son and poured out His wrath on the Son but rather the Son gave up His life as a sacrifice that God accepted as sufficient to cover all sin, is one that registers with my thinking. And viewing Christ death as coming from the one's who killed Christ and by association we killed Christ, I also believe is well supported by what Bruxy in his article shows us in Acts. I may not have summarized the RC view exactly but what I gathered from this summary makes more sense to me than the PS view when it comes to how I view the character of God.