By his resurrection from the death of the cross, Jesus ipso facto condemned the sin that was depicted by that cruciform sin-offering (hamartia), for he was now alive forevermore, and the sin of theocide was itself thereby rendered null and void—dead. And that’s how the mercy and graciousness of God made peace with outright criminal types and conciliated (at least some of) them back into royal fellowship and full dignity as sons and heirs of God, now fruitful seed, bearing fruit of righteousness unto wholesomeness. For since “sin reigns in death” (Romans 5:21), when Jesus was taken down from the cross and rose up from the grave, death was taken down to Hades, and along with it, sin was condemned as accessory to the crime of the Cross. And, in turn, we who trust God in Christ are rendered dead to sin and forever alive to God, through that resurrectionary deliverance which is in Christ Jesus! [3/29/09]
To the related questions, “Does God suffer [abuse]?” And “Does the Lord Jesus continue to suffer [abuse] even after his trial and cross?”, a counter question may serve to answer: “Do parents suffer [abuse] when their children (whether young or adult) are suffering [abuse]?” Consider even the passage in Acts 9:4 where the risen Lord Jesus speaks to Saul the persecutor of the church: “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.” [3/31/09]
The German New Medicine (GNM) has demonstrated how mammals suffer in their own bodies the hurts of those they hold dear, nurture, love, and cherish. If this is true of “living souls,” and especially of human beings, how must it hold also and even more profoundly for the Lord Jesus Christ, the Head of the body which is his assembly! Moreover, the GNM has persuasively established the link between the brain phenomenon termed a “Hamer focus” and the correlated cell duplication/diminution in respective organ tissues of the body. Thus a perceived injury or trauma is experienced simultaneously and proportionately in both body and head (brain)! And since this is the way our Creator made us, is it hardly possible that such links do not exist between the body of Christ and Christ the Head? This leads us to believe he must somehow literally suffer [abuse] right along with us, and this will not—can not—end for him until it ends for us at our glorification as sons and daughters. [3/31/09]
Some tricks can only be played on a fool. The crucifixion of the Son of God was such a “trick”—and what a Fool sauntered up to the plate! His legendary criminal record made him the ideal victim for such a ruse! He had fooled Adam and Eve. He fooled Cain and Lamech. He fooled Pharaoh, Balaam the prophet, king Saul, Absalom, Rehoboam, Jeroboam, Ahab, Sennacherib, Haman, yes and a host of notable saints as well. He was at the peak of his game when Jesus came along. [3/31/09]
All the strutting and fuming and fussing of preachers talking up the so-called “moral law” is starting to sound like an excuse for not growing up into the “Law of Christ.” The apostle Paul, on the other hand, almost never refers to the Law of Moses (Torah) except to argue for leaving it behind as something fine for little children and helpful to convict lawbreakers of their sin, but hardly suitable to bring saints to full maturity. For this they have the inestimable boon of the very Spirit of wholesomeness—a positive power not only to energize doing the full-bore desire of God, but in addition to inform us as to the actual elaborated and ramified contents of that desire…along with whatever else we may need from “the depths of God” (1 Corinthians 2).
How strange, even foreign, it should sound to the ears of seasoned saints to hear preachers harping on “the Decalogue of Moses” as exposing “the whole world” of sin, but never hear that the Holy Spirit of God is more than qualified to “convict the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment” (John 16:8). Such aberrant, deficient, doctrinaire pulpiteering risks actually quenching the Spirit of God, rebuffing our heavenly Life Coach, disdaining “God’s unspeakable Gift”—the just deserts of Christ’s faithfulness! Let’s grow up and stop retarding God’s kids from attaining their full potential…full power! [4/01/09]
The Premial Atonement 