Only the Proclamation of a Resurrectionary Justification, i.e., of God’s Restorative Justice, and an understanding of the Atonement that accords with it, can provide sufficient discernment to judge among the composite options that have come down to us in the whole history of theology and credology.
The Socinians, it turns out, in spite of their serious errors, nonetheless displayed astonishing insight into the work of Christ that it behooves every serious Berean of a Bible student to analyze with care and due appreciation. Likewise Abelard, the Anabaptists, the Amyraldians and many other minority positions must be mined for their nuggets of wisdom and gems of truth. But God’s rewarding (not penal) justice is the indispensable criterion. [03/02/08]
Utterly foundational to the Protestant (i.e., Lutheran and Calvinistic) doctrine of “forensic justification,” by which they always mean “the imputation of Christ’s own righteousness to the believing sinner” is a shearing of this ostensibly “objective” justification, forgiveness, and reconciliation from whatever the Holy Spirit does, allegedly, “subjectively” within the believer, which is commonly termed “sanctification,” and which, they assert, always comes “afterward.” This shearing of “objective” from “subjective” (their distinction and terminology), paralleled or at least echoed in their distinction between Christ’s “active” and “passive” “righteousness” or obedience, constitutes a pernicious dualism that sabotages an integral apostolic ethic again and again. The Holy Spirit is said to do a “subjective” work in us—not including justification, forgiveness, or reconciliation!—only after and subsequent to the “objective” accomplishment of those three aspects of salvation “on the cross.”
This was an overreaction to the Roman Catholic error of making justification, forgiveness, and reconciliation subsequent to the lifelong operation of the Holy Spirit. Thus Protestantism is an overreaction to Roman Catholicism; neither is truly apostolic at this pivotal point. The truth is that all of those three (and much more) are continuously operative or true so long as faith exists and even reinforce faith, but do not guarantee continued faith since our increated (although restricted and mortal) sovereignty and authority resulting from our being made in the image and after the likeness of God always exists and remains inalienable until death. God’s forceful and heavily corroborated Proclamation of His Kingdom must be given the credit for keeping and preserving us in safety by its power to induce faith.
Moreover, this characteristic Protestant disconnect between “Christ’s work on the cross” (not a pattern of sound explanation found anywhere in Scripture) and “the Spirit’s work in the heart,” in effect, virtually snips the vital conduit that empowers ethical fruit or productivity. They may teach otherwise, indeed, the Holy Spirit may get a great deal of work done in spite of the erroneous doctrine, especially in those who are tutored in it less than they are in Scripture alone (which has power to override errors for those who stay in it faithfully and regularly). Nevertheless the Protestant doctrine is subversive of sound teaching by its very nature and needs to be exposed, confronted, and rejected in favor of the apostolic literature in the New Testament. [03/02/08]
SATISFACTION vs. RESURRECTION
The notion of “satisfaction” at the Cross cannot be dispensed with unless and until the Resurrection is grasped in its full justifying significance. This is why all attempts to deny and nullify the Anselmian notion of “satisfaction” have tended to be unsuccessful. For unless God’s justice can be clearly read out of Messiah’s resurrection, it will invariably be read into his crucifixion, where, to be sure, none whatever is to be found. Yet the opponents of the notion that the Cross is in any way “just” have routinely failed, one and all, to perceive God’s saving, rewarding, restorative justice in his resurrection and hence have denied the centrality of the “juridical metaphor” and, consequently of divine justice. But this loss only weakens the meaning of the Atonement as a whole and thus actually guts the full glory of God’s graciousness, which is, amazingly and wonderfully, the just outcome of Messiah’s unjust crucifixion via resurrectionary reversal!
Medieval cataracts concerning justice as seemingly purely penal (by the time of the Reformation of the 16th century) all but blinded theologians concerning the ancient Hebrew assumptions about justice as avenging evil to restore good, i.e., eviscerating the vicious in order to enrich the righteous. [03/02/08]
The Premial Atonement 