On the Penal Satisfaction Theory of Atonement

 The question must be answered,

WHY IS THE ATONEMENT NECESSARY?

Who or what demanded it? We pass by the first answer, that it was necessary to satisfy the claim of Satan, who had captured the sinful race of men, and was holding them as his prisoners. For more than a thousand years this was the common answer. I do not say the only answer, because here and there one, like Athanasius, and John of Damascus, declared that the satisfaction was paid to God the Father. But under the stimulus of the Gospel quickening the intellect, this theological crudity of a tribute to Satan was outgrown, and the way was opened for a thorough discussion of the necessity of Christ's atoning death, for He must be lifted up, He must needs have suffered. Out of the various answers we shall have time to speak of only three: first, God's essential justice; secondly, man's obduracy in sin; and thirdly, the requirements of a Divine government, offering conditional pardon to a race of sinners. The first and the last locate the necessity on the Godward side, while the second locates it wholly on the manward side.

Among Those For Whom Jesus Prayed

"Father, that which thou hast given me, I will that, where I am, they also may be with me; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world" (John xvii. 24 R.V.)

Our text is a part of the high-priestly prayer of Jesus. It is its tenderest strain, revealing the human heart of the Son of God which he has carried with him "into the heavens," a heart magnetic with human sympathy and love. It always touches my heart; it dips a bucket into the deep fountain of my tears. Whenever I read this text it raises in me a flood of mingled emotions — astonishment at the condescending love of Christ for me, then love responsive to his self-sacrificing love, followed by an adoring gratitude to my divine benefactor.

Penal Satisfaction Implies Limited Atonement

In Dr. Steele's discussion of the theology of Dispensationalism, he remarks:

[A Limited Atonement] the inevitable outcome of the doctrine that sin was punished on the cross.

Whose sin? If it be answered, that of the whole human race, then universalism emerges, for God cannot in justice punish sin twice. It must be, then, that the sins of the elect only were punished. Hence at the bottom, this system of doctrine rests upon the tenet of a particular, in distinction from a universal atonement.

The fact that [in Dispensationalism] this basis is not avowed, and that the terminology of hyper-predestinarianism, such as "the elect," "the reprobates," "special call," "irresistible grace," "perseverance of the saints," and salvation by "Divine Sovereignty," is studiously avoided, makes this system of doctrine still more dangerous, because these offensive features are concealed with Jesuitical cunning.

We cannot resist the suspicion that this is designed, so as to make it palatable to those educated in the Arminian faith, in order to catch them with guile. Some unreflective Arminians are thus unawares entrapped into the reception of that unmitigated scheme of doctrine which Christendom is almost universally shaking off.

— A Substitute for Holiness or Antinomianism Revived, Chapter 6.

On the Temptation of Jesus

QUESTION: (1) Does temptation imply a desire on our part to do wrong? (2) If so, was Jesus tempted in that manner? (3) Had Jesus freedom of will, so that he could have fallen? 

ANSWER: Temptation is an appeal, not to any desire to do wrong, but to our wish for immediate happiness and for the avoidance of present suffering, as hunger in the case of Jesus in the wilderness. His desire for food was innocent and his gratification of it by miracle would not in itself have been sinful if it had not been in violation of his Father's purpose that his Son should exactly observe our human conditions of service and put forth no more power to shield himself from pain than we have. Hence he wrought no miracle for himself even on the cross, when he could have commanded to his rescue more angels than the Roman Emperor had soldiers. To deny perfect free agency  to Jesus would degrade him below the lowest man he came to save. It would divest him of all his moral attributes and make him a machine. His holiness while on the earth was certain, but not the result of necessity. He was holy not because he could not sin, but because he would not. God's holiness is the same. He is a free agent, always abstaining from wrongdoing. There is no risk to the universe in the perfect freedom of the Father and the Son to violate the moral law grounded not on the will of either, but in the very nature of things. When it is said, "god cannot lie," it is not a natural "cannot," but a moral one like that of Joseph when solicited by Mrs. Potiphar (Gen. 39:12). The distinction between a Calvinist and an Arminian lies in answer to this question, "Is a thing right because God does it, or does he do it because it is right?"

— Steele's Answers pp. 82, 83.

Can Repentance Based on Fear be Genuine?

QUESTION: Can repentance be genuine, if based upon hope of reward or fear of punishment? Is the following sentence true, "Virtue founded on fear is only vice in a fit of dejection"?

ANSWER: this kinds like the distant echo of the New England Hopkinsian doctrine that holiness is disinterested benevolence, that the least regard for our own well-being is inconsistent with true holiness, and repentance is not genuine if it does not include willingness to be damned for the glory of God. In the first quarter of the last century, a boy named Mark Traffon, in a Calvinian inquiry meeting in Maine, was asked if he was willing to be sent to hell forever for God's glory, and replied: "No, sir, I have decided objections." He went to hear an Arminian preacher, was converted, and became an eminent minister. Moses had respect to the recompense of reward, and Noah, moved by fear, prepared for himself an ark. In Christ's preaching he perpetually appealed to men's hopes and fears, especially to the latter. He uttered more alarm truth and said more about hell fire than any other person in the Bible. Many modern preachers seem to be wiser than the great Teacher. They think that the doctrine of retribution is not promotive of genuine piety, and for this reason drop it from their sermons, and then wonder why sinners are not converted, and comfort themselves with the declaration that "the times have changed and the age of revivals is past." Says Bishop Butler in his Analogy: "Veracity, justice, regard to God's authority, and our own chief interest, are coincident; and each separately, a just principle. To begin life from either of them, and persist, produces that very character which corresponds to our relations to God, and secures happiness."Repentance from the lowest motive leads to the higher and ultimately to the highest.

— Steele's Answers pp. 76, 77.

On The Penal Satisfaction Theory of the Atonement

The [penal satisfaction] theory [of the atonement] for three hundred years widely prevailed in both branches of orthodoxy — Calvinism and Arminianism — although it logically belongs to that branch which teaches an unconditional election and a particular or limited atonement.

It is grounded upon the necessity of satisfying that moral attribute of God called exact, or distributive, justice, defined by Webster as that "which gives every man his exact deserts." This principle of essential justice, or eternal right, demands punishment for violated law. If the sinner is exempted from penalty, it must be inflicted upon some substitute who is personally not worthy of punishment; otherwise, if himself guilty, he could not be a substitute for the guilty. He must suffer for his own sins.

Now there are several reasons why I have never been able to preach this theory of the atonement.

How Could Jesus Be Tempted?

QUESTION: Could Jesus be tempted in all points like as we are tempted without a sinful nature?

ANSWER: Exegetes disagree about the limitation of the phrase "without sin." Some say the temptation left Christ without sin; others say it found him without any inclination to sin and left him sinless. They say this phrase "without sin" is an expressed exception to the words "all points." Jesus was tempted, as we are in all points save one, having inherited no evil inclination. Yet his temptation was real because he was human, possessing those susceptibilities, which pure in themselves, may without the resistance of the free will, be incited to sin.  If this is objected to because it implies the possibility that the Son of God might have sinned, we reply that it was certain that he would not sin, just as certain that God will never sin. There is a great difference between certainty and necessity. God is a free agent. He has a conscience which discerns the distinctions between right and wrong, and he invariably cleaves to the right. This brings us to the ground of moral obligation. He who says God does a thing because it is right stands on the foundation of James Arminius. He who says that a thing is right because God does it, that his will is the ground of right, and that he is a law unto himself, and that he can reverse the ten commandments, if he pleases, takes his stand with John Calvin.

— From Steele's Answers pp. 34, 35.

Dogma Divides, Christian Feeling Unites

The language of Christian feeling can never be successfully counterfeited. The language of the dry intellect, the language of the head, may be misunderstood. Hence wherever religion has consisted in theological dogmas alone, fierce strifes have arisen.

But when the gospel has been addressed to men's hearts, and has been received by faith in its transforming power, the weapons of denominational warfare are cast away, and believers vie with one another in magnifying our common Saviour. Such, thank God, are the happy times upon which we have fallen. We live in a day when the Holy Spirit has come down upon the evangelical churches, and we now understand one another, because our hearts speak. In the eras of the warmest theological controversy this heart unison was not noticed amid the din and discord of clashing swords.

Professor Shedd says that:
"Tried by the test of exact dogmatic statement there is a plain difference between the Arminian creed and that of the Calvinist; but tried by the test of practical piety and devout feeling, there is little difference between the character of John Wesley and John Calvin. The practical religious life is much more a product of the Holy Spirit than is the speculative construction of truth."






The advance of spirituality will be the advance of that unity for which Jesus prayed in his wonderful high-priestly prayer in the seventeenth of St. John.

It is said that an Asiatic Christian convert met a converted Feejee on the deck of a ship. Ignorant of each other's native tongue and burning with new-born love to God and man the one exclaimed, "Hallelujah," and the other immediately responded, "Amen." By these words they recognized each other as brethren in Christ Jesus. But what are these but two Hebrew words transferred, not translated, into all our modern tongues, words which once resounded over the hills of old Canaan? They suggest the ease with which believers communicate when they have learned the language of New Canaan.

— From Jesus Exultant, Chapter 3.