The following piece introduces a several-part series of posts that venture to answer a celebrated lecture delivered at Tyndale House, Cambridge University, 48 years ago today–on July 17th, 1973–and published the following year in the Tyndale Bulletin. This date, coincidentally, is also the first anniversary of the death of that esteemed author, Dr. J. I. Packer. This introduction is non-polemical, intended to lay out the basic components of a substitution-free account of the Atonement as sufficiently articulated in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. Prof. Packer did not suppose it possible to advance such an account of the doctrine, and certainly not while avowing faithfulness to the Bible.
Indeed, my fortuitous rediscovery of premial (rewarding, restorative) justice as actuating the Atonement wholly apart from the necessity of invokeing penal sanctions was what finally got the ball rolling to dismiss the notion of substitution as playing any logical role in the process, sentimentality aside. As the approved Mediator of all the blessings of the ancient covenant with Israel by virtue of his perfect obedience, the Lord Jesus Christ was awarded directly from God the promises there announced by divine oath, conditioned on Christ’s faithfulness as a human being. What he thereby procured by his labors, Christ, in turn, is authorized to give away as a pure gift to all who exercise a like faith in this powerful proclamation of God’s Kingdom. Such a Mediator need not add “Substitute” to his resume of qualifications; that would only derogate from his glory as Mediator (as, indeed, it does from every other Messianic title it tends to displace).
Prof. Packer, however, threw down a beckoning gauntlet by asserting point-blank that “the mere presence of problems is not enough to prove a view distorted; true views in theology also entail unsolved problems, while any view that was problem-free would certainly be rationalistic and reductionist. True theories in theology, whether about the atonement or anything else, will suspect themselves of being inadequate to their object throughout. One thing that Christians know by faith is that they know only in part.” “What Did the Cross Achieve? The Logic of Penal Substitution,” in Celebrating the Saving Work of God: The Collected Shorter Writings of J. I. Packer, Volume 1. (Carlisle, UK: Paternoster Press, 1998) 90.
I accept the reckless challenge, but sadly. Oh that Dr. Packer had known the other part of justice–the premial part, which nullifies any necessity whatsoever of actuating the penal part for the sake of achieving a universal atonement, fully effectual to release from sins without further qualification except faith within whoever hears the good Word of the Gospel and receives the Seed into their heart (and with “no skin off Christ’s back” if they willfully, foolishly decide to reject the good Seed, to their own final peril, since all penal-payment theories fail regarding the “final punishment” of the incorrigible no less than they fail concerning the alleged “vicarious punishment” of the Messiah [9/14/21]). God’s Word alone is everywhere credited with being the power for salvation; it contains the proof that generates faith solid enough to endure inevitable trials and finally win the prize.
This happy rediscovery (though it was there all the time for any with eyes to see) I myself long (for decades!) viewed with due suspicion until, one by one, the many problems I raised got resolved to my own satisfaction. Naturally, after such gratifying results, I was eager to uncover any remaining inadequacies that various astute scholars might perceive as still unsolved by the premial explanation. Thus far, none have been raised that I am aware of. If this problem-free status endures for much longer, I fear I am liable to start being accused of rationalism and reductionism! Unless, of course, Prof. Packer should happen to have been incorrect on this score. But since he could be expected ipso facto to suspect his own theory, provided it is “true,” of “being inadequate to [its] object throughout,” I have nothing to fear from that quarter. Ironically, I am becoming increasingly convinced that I have already passed through the horns of the dilemma: either an explanation that is true, with unsolved problems and possible distortions, or an explanation that is problem-free (even substitution-free), though rationalistic and reductionist. You have a Bible, you be the judge.
Now, given the likelihood that the premial angle on the justice that achieved atonement is just possibly neither rationalistic nor reductionist, then do the problems that Packer’s own view, by contrast, still poses in abundance (or he would surely not have felt the need for recourse to this awkwardly compromised rationalization in the first place) perhaps “prove” his own view “distorted” after all? In truth, this conclusion is, I submit, inescapable. The following installment establishes a baseline for future comparison with penal substitution.
The Problem-Free Atonement
A Friendly Answer to J. I. Packer’s
”What Did the Cross Achieve? The Logic of Penal Substitution” (1973-74)
R. L. Roper
PART 1—SUMMARY NARRATION OF PREMIAL ATONEMENT
The Atonement stands on the high ground of divine justice. The Word of God humbly emptied himself out of his celestial form and assumed mortal human flesh in order to acquire earthly property, the wrongful deprivation of which evoked God’s intervention as Judge to repay his losses with ultra-compensating magnitude. The resurrection of Christ from the dead was the revelation, manifestation, and display of the judicial act of God that executed justice for him in response to the paramount crime of his crucifixion, engineered by Satan, but within God’s limiting permission. Sin—supremely the crucifixion itself—was thereby condemned in Christ’s mortal flesh when his body was raised from the dead immortal—his redemptive Exodus—by God’s restorative justice. This justification of Christ brought an award of superabundant immortal life—God’s rightful compensation for His only-born Son’s lifelong perfect obedience to His desire in everything, remaining sinless even under the extreme provocation of crucifixion, including acceptance of a wrongfully invoked curse of Moses’ Law. For the Law also mandated over-compensating restitution to restore shalom. By his flawless faithfulness to God’s will in terms of Israel’s Covenant, Jesus nullified the late-coming curse of Moses’ Law and ushered in the prior Abrahamic promises via superior precedent, including a superseding priesthood after the order of Melchizedek. Christ thereby inaugurated the New Covenant, which privileged him as its qualified Mediator to redistribute his own rightful inheritance of covenanted blessings freely to others, on his own conditions.
At the cross, God forsook His Son to his tormentors so he could experience what it feels like for sinners to be forsaken by God. Jesus successfully endured this acute discipline of getting tried in all respects like us, apart from sin, hence apart from punishment in any degree, but much rather in God’s good graces throughout. Only such a dread experience could train him to sympathize with our plight, since in what he’s suffered by undergoing trial he’s able to help us who are being tried. Christ was made like his siblings in every essential so he might become a merciful and faithful High Priest toward God, making a protective shelter around the sins of the whole world through that faithfulness in his blood. Thus was Christ getting trained and qualified eminently for his mediatorial work of intercession.
Christ’s willingness, for the benefit of all humankind, to bear the abominable crime of wrongful crucifixion, rather than reviling, threatening, or retaliating, was the supreme revelation of God’s love for us. Only by doing so could he leverage the magnitude of God’s restorative justice to himself, thereby sparing us our own just deserts—namely, the ultimate death of extermination. Christ’s cross, suffering, and death saved no one—everyone at the Event could see that, the whole early church grasped that. Only his perfect obedience, even to such a horrible death, invoked God’s premial justice to save him, adding extraordinary legal damages in the bargain—sufficient to save the whole world. Thus, the Father and the Son shared the identical attitude toward us—one of love, not hostility or anger, much less revenge. God spared not His own Son—yet He wept; bravely, His Son spared not himself. The injustice of the Son’s crucifixion by Israel at the hands of the Gentiles is precisely what commended the justice of his Father’s raising him up to be Sovereign over all nations.
At the cross, Christ conquered Satan by drinking his cup of extreme affliction while remaining sinless and loving his enemies instead, that is, by practicing what he preached. But while Christ’s heel was bruised on Calvary that day, Satan’s head was bruised on the third day. Christ’s own people Israel, at Golgotha, committed their most monumental sin, which evoked the indignation of God after a merciful delay of 40 years. In the meantime, patience, forbearance, and kindness were generously extended so that even they could repent and be saved. His sinless blood, which they wickedly shed, could, by happy irony, buy back or redeem them for God if they humbly received this payment of life that God Himself justly repaid His Son in sweet exchange for their punishment. At the cost of Christ’s resurrection, plus a magnanimous judicial award beyond that, we are ransomed from sin’s enslaving clutches. To be sure, Satan was indeed tricked by the momentum of his career-long wickedness, which blinded him to the cosmic folly of crucifying God’s only-born Son, but the only deception involved was Satan’s own self-deception; there was no deal.
The blood of the ancient sacrifices ritually symbolized the living soul of a morally flawless victim, laid hands on by wicked authorities and slain unjustly, yet justly avenged by amplification of life through resurrection from the dead. Therefore, sacrificial blood represents the power of Christ’s resurrected life. Accordingly, blood is associated in Scripture with every word for salvation, without exception. Christ’s blood spoke better than Abel’s because his soul was without sin. Surrendering himself a human sacrifice, Christ became the culminating Sin-event to which every sin-offering pointed forward prophetically—the lawless execution of the Messiah. Christ’s single sacrifice terminated all literal sacrifices of symbolic animal substitutes, fulfilling their figurative prophetic significance literally, once and for all.
During Israel’s reprieve, God charged that forgiveness of sins be heralded not only to them but to all nations without discrimination. Jews who remained stubborn at the conclusion of that wicked generation experienced the desolation of their capital and its proud temple in 70 A.D. Those in Jerusalem who heeded the call were saved from God’s wrath by a prophetic warning to flee, while all the rest were destroyed in horrific avenging. However, from the standpoint of the demands of divine justice, their suffering of this devastation was totally needless, because God Himself had already remedied their murder of His own beloved Son by repaying him with resurrection to overflowing life. This filial death was God’s ultimate exhibit of nonviolent peacemaking to conciliate His enemies. It was judicially pointless for God further to exact a penalty from them for the heinous sin; they were simply suffering the sad consequence of deliberately rejecting God’s messianic justice and instead foolishly calling down a curse on their own heads. Consequently, they died in their own sins instead of getting baptized into Messiah’s wrongful death and rightful resurrection, which could have rendered them dead to sin and alive to God.
When Christ died, the curtain of the temple was torn from top to bottom, announcing that the way into the Holy of Holies had been pioneered by our Forerunner and God’s Kingdom brought near. Like the scapegoat, he was released free into the wilderness, where he stormed the gates of the Unseen and proceeded to proclaim to the dead his agelong victory over Azazel/Satan, which would be made public on earth the third day. Some who had recently died also returned to life that day, graves opened, to demonstrate the ramifying power of Christ’s resurrection for his saints.
After ascending to heaven, this son of humankind’s slain-but-now-living-again soul was brought before the throne of God, his Father, to receive the award for his heroically voluntary suffering of unjust abuse. This was the atoning moment—coronation, enthronement, everlasting jurisdiction that shall not pass away, surpassing glory, an unlimited realm, and conferral of Holy Spirit to disperse on earth as a pledge of full salvation for all who believe and get baptized. The cleansing of earth by that wholesome power therewith commenced in human hearts as a visible sign of things to come.
In this life, believers are privileged to walk in the exemplary footprints of our Master, to drink of the same cup of affliction by Satan, to be baptized similarly into Christ’s suffering of abuse, and so to win super-compensating rewards from God by bearing our own crosses faithfully and hence share his glory from the Father in Kingdom come. Therefore, in the midst of abuses we likewise experience the graciousness of God even as our Savior did, enduring evils worthily. However, God’s indignation still remains on all who stubbornly refuse to leave their sins behind and even dare add to the afflictions of His chosen people, for Christ was not commissioned to remove God’s anger against the incorrigible.
By winning from God the rightful prize of an extraordinary magnitude of the Holy Spirit of life—himself becoming a vivifying Spirit—Christ possesses divine authority to graciously give away everlasting immortality to whomever he pleases. Thereby he nullifies the death that passed through to all humankind resulting from Adam’s sin, whereby all generations were banned from the Tree of Life, and consequent evils wrongly befell his innocent descendants, whereupon, perforce, all sinned. Thus, Christ became a Second Adam, progenitor of a whole New Creation, already begun.
God chooses and is pleased to honor faith, which is not work at all but work-stoppage—a Sabbath—and thus accords with graciousness because it does not presume to place Him in our debt. Indeed, God Himself graciously absorbed the losses of our debt to Him, not counting our offenses against us. The Gospels especially memorialize those who forced themselves on Jesus in “violent” faith, desperate for healing, for they always received what they came for.
Faith is generated in the hearts even of sinners as they listen to and get drawn by the inherent power of the Gospel story, provided they do not resist. Those who do the truth love the light, so their actions manifest they have gotten produced in God. The testimonies of Scripture, human witnesses, and miraculous deeds of the Holy Spirit, although necessary, are not sufficient to generate faith in the Gospel, so are not coercive. God wishes to allow and honor authentic human agency and free initiative as creatures made in His own image and likeness. Human nature remains good ever since God created it, and thus stands as a witness against sin, alongside conscience, Moses’ Law, and the Holy Spirit. However, human flesh, being mortal, is deteriorating, resulting in lust, covetousness, and inordinate cravings that yield sinful behaviors contrary to nature unless withstood. Nevertheless, God peaceably conciliates the sinful world to Himself as its inhabitants one-by-one accept this winsome message and get begotten above as sons of God and citizens of the New Jerusalem. In fact, God regards our trust itself as justness, for it gives Him due credit for His amazing graciousness as nothing else can. Thereupon, God confers for free the blessings consequent from Christ’s perfection.
The unspeakable Gift of Holy Spirit cleanses believers from their sins, renders us sons and hence heirs of God’s coming Kingdom, and spreads God’s love abroad in our hearts in order to fulfill His desire on earth now as we learn obedience through discipline and thereby mature into His character. The Holy Spirit is our guide into all Truth, of which the Law of the Old Covenant was but a form and shadow. Miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit are bestowed on believers to empower them to testify boldly to the presence on earth of God’s Kingdom from heaven, comprising justice, peace, joy, and healing for our bodies, human relations, and created environment. Thus, its Proclamation gets corroborated before the world and effectively draws people out of Satan’s regime of darkness, sin, and death into liberation.
Whoever hears the Gospel but resists its directives and promises instead of repenting, believing, and doing, will be raised from the dead only to face final Judgment, but then be condemned and consigned to a lake of fire to lose existence forever in a second and final death. In contrast, those who keep trusting and obeying will be justified with everlasting life to inherit a New Earth where justice and peace shall reign forever. At last, God will be all in all who exist.
(Aug. 30-31, Sept. 1-3,5-7,11-12,14-18,24,30, Oct. 4,7-8,10-11,21, 2020; May 15, June 24, 2021)
The Premial Atonement 