Blog - Page 52 of 318 - John H Armstrong

The Scapegoat Who Finally Removes All Our Sin, Part One

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:12-05:00September 24th, 2013|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Biblical Theology, Christ/Christology, Death, Forgiveness, God's Character, Gospel/Good News, The Church|

I hear numerous objections to what I’ve proposed about how to understand the atoning sacrifice of Jesus in his death. I know these objections quite well since I personally made most of them for decades. The only problem with these objections, at least to me, is that they can be answered quite clearly by a better, richer and fuller understanding of the Old Testament sacrificial system. If this understanding is correctly joined with the teaching given to us by the writer to the Hebrews, then we can make better sense of Jesus’ death and what happened at the cross.

I am referring to Hebrews chapter nine when I make this statement. (I will include the whole chapter here to create the context. I have also included some relevant translation notes in parentheses, notes which are particularly important to reading this chapter.)

Hebrews 9

Now even the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly sanctuary. 2 For a tent (tent=tabernacle) was constructed, the first one, in which were the lampstand, the table, and the bread of the Presence; this is called the Holy Place. 3 Behind […]

The Cruciform God

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:12-05:00September 23rd, 2013|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Biblical Theology, Christ/Christology, God's Character, Gospel/Good News, Incarnation|

When the concept of the atonement is primarily understood as divine forgiveness we have been given a clear way to understand how God can be both just and justifier. He can demand payment for an offense and yet at the same time he can provide forgiveness in himself as the person who pays for our offense. He can do both at the same time.

Be honest. No one enjoys suffering. In fact, if a person desires to suffer we seriously wonder if they are mentally healthy. But if the reason for our suffering is just and understandable, on other grounds that we might not readily see at first glance, then most of us can face it with some degree of strength. What makes suffering particularly hard to accept is this – if we are suffering because of an injustice done to us then it truly seems unbearable. The reason for this perplexity is that we rarely think of ourselves in a negative light. We believe that we do not deserve to suffer because we are not that guilty. […]

The Depth & Extent of God’s Forgiveness Displayed in the Atonement – Part 2

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:12-05:00September 19th, 2013|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Biblical Theology, Christ/Christology, Church Tradition, Creeds, Forgiveness, God's Character, Gospel/Good News, Incarnation, Love|

Over the centuries theologians have developed numerous models for expressing the saving significance of Jesus’ death. We have sketched out several of these models, ever so simply I freely admit, in several blogs the past few weeks. I have concluded, along with Joel B. Green, Professor of New Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary, that: “No interpretation of the atonement can be regarded as the only authentic one, not least because no one model or metaphor can exhaust the significance of Jesus’ crucifixion” (Fuller Theology, News & Notes, Fall 2012, 3, italics are my own). I urge you, friends and readers, to grasp the importance of Green’s statement. You should realize that by opposing the simple clarity of this conclusion that you are likely opposing other important Christian truths, especially the unity of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church.

Joel Green suggests that this was true even within the time in which the New Testament itself was written since several different models seem to clearly be at work in the apostolic texts. This was true as well in […]

The Depth and Extent of God’s Forgiveness is Displayed in the Atonement – Part 1

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:12-05:00September 18th, 2013|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Biblical Theology, Christ/Christology, Forgiveness, God's Character, Gospel/Good News, Jesus, Love|

Yesterday I wrote about atonement as forgiveness. I showed that there truly is a substitionary aspect of the atonement that must be grasped. This is because our sins actually require the paytment of a debt, or what has been called a ransom price. These elements are all clearly present in the ancient faith, both in the Old Testament system and in the New Testament Gospels and epistles. Debates about “how” this debt was paid, or “to whom” it was paid, generally tend to get us off track. Let me take this point a bit further.

I earlier referenced Matthew 18 and the payment that comes about through the canceling of the debt, or through forgiveness. But this debt theme in Matthew 18 seems to refer to money. The point of the story is clearly meant to take us beyond a monetary debt. Consider the sin of adultery as just one poignant and powerful example, especially since this particular sin demonstrates the whole aspect of violating and breaking a God-ordained covenant.

A person trusts their marriage partner deeply but they […]

The Atonement and the Grace of Forgiveness

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:12-05:00September 17th, 2013|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Biblical Theology, Church Tradition, Forgiveness, God's Character, Gospel/Good News, Love, The Church|

If you follow the idea of atonement that I began to develop yesterday, namely that the atonement is ultimately about divine forgiveness, then you can readily see that a payment is truly made to atone (lit: to make us one again). This payment, says Jim Danaher, is one that “God makes to himself, which means that he suffers the loss” (Eyes That See, Ears That Hear, 99). Let this claim sink in for a moment before you read on. In fact, please read this entire paragraph several times.

When I first began to grasp this idea it seemed so completely right to me yet it was something that I had never heard before, at least heard so clearly stated. It answered a lot of questions, though I freely admit that it did not answer all of them. As I hope to show it has the power to give us a better, and more love-centered, explanation of what Jesus actually did in dying for us on the cross. He took our debt upon himself and then out of his […]

Atonement Demands a Payment

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:13-05:00September 16th, 2013|Categories: Uncategorized|

The Scriptures seem to be fairly clear in their teaching about the death of Christ – something like the concept of a payment is involved in Christ’s death for our sins. It is this concept that is at the center of almost every debate on the atonement I know, both historic or modern.

Take the moral influence theory of Christ’s death. This view, originally advocated by Peter Abelard (1079-1142) agreed with Anselm in his rejection of the idea that a ransom was paid to Satan. (We should realize that this notion of paying Satan was a development that grew out of the teaching of early church fathers about Christ’s ransom but it was not the clear and consistent teaching of most of them.) Abelard believed Anselm’s version of satisfaction portrayed God as angry and vengeful. (This concept seems to me to be retained by much of the conservative Reformed community, though it is rejected by most mainstream modern Reformed writers such as T. F. Torrance, etc. )

Abelard’s view was that human beings needed to see the full extent of God’s love so Christ died to reveal the […]

N. T. Wright on Paul and the Faithfulness of God

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:13-05:00September 15th, 2013|Categories: Biblical Theology, Books, Justification and the New Perspective, Theology|

If you have followed the theological project of N. T. (Tom) Wright then you will enjoy watching this video and then adding this magnum opus to the other three major volumes. If you do not know what the fuss is about you ought to watch anyway, if for no other reason than to see that Wright is one of the greatest biblical scholars of our time. Those who attack him have rarely read him, at least not carefully. Disagreement that respects his work is very welcome, and some of it is extremely profitable, but please do not resort to ad hominem arguments. Watch this twenty-four minutes and you will appreciate his easy-going human style and profoundly Christian scholarship.

http://youtu.be/sDHs8S1Se3E

What Does Christ’s Victory Mean for Understanding His Death?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:13-05:00September 13th, 2013|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Biblical Theology, Christ/Christology, Church Tradition, Death, God's Character, Gospel/Good News, Kingdom of God, Patristics, Personal, Postmodernity, The Church, The Future|

The New Testament is filled with material concerning the victory of Christ over the powers of evil, a victory finally accomplished, and announced, through his death and resurrection.

One of the seminal texts that comes to mind here is in Matthew’s Gospel.

22 Then they brought to him a demoniac who was blind and mute; and he cured him, so that the one who had been mute could speak and see. 23 All the crowds were amazed and said, “Can this be the Son of David?” 24 But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, “It is only by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons, that this fellow casts out the demons.” 25 He knew what they were thinking and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and no city or house divided against itself will stand. 26 If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then will his kingdom stand? 27 If I cast out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your own exorcists cast them out? Therefore they will be your judges. 28 But if […]

How the Enlightenment Took the Church Away from Jesus & Him Crucified

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:13-05:00September 12th, 2013|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Biblical Theology, Church Tradition, Faith, Gospel/Good News, Jesus, Kingdom of God, Patristics, Postmodernity, The Church, The Future|

The ancient church did not debate ideas about “appeasing the wrath of God through Christ’s death.” The Christ they worshiped, as we’ve seen, was the victor over the powers. They expressed this in their worship. This can also be discovered in their hymns, in baptism, in their preaching, at the eucharist, and in the recorded prayers of the earliest Christians. It runs like a scarlet thread throughout. If this were understood at all I believe the present evangelical wars about the atonement would be stopped almost instantly.

Many examples of my point about the early church can be offered but one that has helped me is found in the oldest prayer of thanksgiving we have that was said over the bread and wine in the eucharist. It is the prayer preserved for us by Hippolytus in The Apostolic Tradition, a work written around A.D. 215. This particular prayer points to the theme of Christ’s victory. Here is an important sample of this ancient faith congregational prayer:

Fulfilling your will and gaining for you a holy people, he […]

The Danger of a Book-oriented Approach to Faith

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:15:13-05:00September 11th, 2013|Categories: Uncategorized|

The Book-oriented approach to Christian faith, an approach that became particularly central during the Enlightenment, has several major presuppositions for Christians. Robert E. Webber has underscored the three that I think are worthy of our particular concern.

The Bible is the mind of God written.
The mind is the highest faculty of our creation in the image of God.
Truth is known as the human mind meets the mind of God and this happens in the study of the Scripture.

While I could never have articulated these three concerns this clearly twenty-five years ago I sensed for several decades before that time that something was profoundly wrong with my formative years of theological training at the graduate level in the 1970s. All the time I was debating for inerrancy, and with that debate drawing the subsequent conclusions that most inerrantists hold about the certitude one can have so long as your arguments are rooted in careful biblical exegesis, I had a growing doubt about this foundation.

The idea behind this approach is simple really – the Bible as observable data is an […]