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APPENDIX D
NOTE CONCERNING THE MISINTERPRETATION OF THE DEATH OF CHRIST
Nowhere in the Scriptures does it say that Christ died to pay the penalty of man’s sin and satisfy God’s justice. Not in the three passages ( Rom. 3:24-25; II Cor. 5:21; Gal. 3:13) usually cited to support this doctrine does it say explicitly that Christ paid the penalty of sin or He satisfied the justice of God. In the Rom. 3:24-25 passage, propitiation is not the satisfaction of God’s justice; neither is redemption the paying the penalty of sin.
“24 Being justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God set forth to be a propitiation, through faith in His blood ….” (Rom. 3:24-25 ERS; see also Isa. 32:17)
The redemption that is in Christ (Rom. 3:24) is deliverance from sin by the payment of a price, a ransom, which is the blood of Christ, that is, His sacrificial death. The price is not the payment of a penalty but it is the means by which the redemption from sin is accomplished.
“18Knowing that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your vain manner of life handed down from your fathers; 19but with the precious blood, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot, even the blood of Christ.”
(I Pet. 1:18, 19 ERS; see also Heb. 9:14-15).
Redemption is deliverance from sin as a slave master by means of the death of Christ [His blood] as the price or ransom.
“In Him we have redemption through His blood, the deliverance from our offences, according the riches of His grace …” (Eph. 1:7 ERS)
“In whom we have redemption, the deliverance from sins. (Col. 1:14 ERS)
According to the English translations of Eph. 1:7 and Col. 1:14, redemption is made equivalent to forgiveness of sins.
“In Him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according the riches of his grace …” (Eph. 1:7 RSV)
“In whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. (Col. 1:14 RSV)
But the basic meaning of the Greek word aphesis here translated “forgiveness” is “the sending off or away.” Hence to redeem from sins is to send them away, to deliver from sin. Jesus “was manifested in order to take away sins” (I John 3:5 ERS). He is “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).
Salvation is not just forgiveness. It is more than forgiveness of sins; it is also deliverance from death; it is the resurrection of the dead. Forgiveness of sins is not enough; man needs to be made alive to God because he is spiritually dead. And he is dead, not because of his own sins, but because of the sin of another, Adam. So the forgiveness of a man’s sins does not take away spiritual death because the spiritual death was not caused by that man’s sins. Thus forgiveness of sins does not remove spiritual death. But the removing of spiritual death does removes sins. Salvation as resurrection from the dead is also salvation from sin and thus it is also the forgiveness of sins. Thus to be made alive to God means that sins are forgiven.
This redemption from sin was accomplished by the death of Jesus Christ because His death is also the means by which we were delivered from death, the cause of sin. Since spiritual death leads to sin ( Rom. 5:12d ERS), sin reigns in the sphere of death’s reign (Rom. 5:21). And since Christ’s death is the end of the reign of death for those who died with Christ, it is also the end of the reign of sin over them. They are no longer slaves of sin, serving false gods. Sin is a slave master (Rom. 6:16-18) and this slave master is the false god in which the sinner trusts. We were all slaves of sin once, serving our false gods when we were spiritually dead, alienated and separated from the true God, not knowing Him personally. But we were set free from this slavery to sin through the death of Christ. For when Christ died for us, He died to sin (Rom. 6:10a) as a slave master. Sin no longer has dominion or lordship over Him. For he who has died is freed from sin (Rom. 6:7). That is, when a slaves dies, he is no longer in slavery, death frees him from slavery. Since Christ “has died for all, then all have died” (II Cor. 5:14). His death is our death. Since we have died with Him and He has died to sin, then we have died to sin. We are freed from the slavery of sin and are no longer enslaved to it (Rom. 6:6-7). But now Christ is alive, having been raised from the dead, and we are made alive to God in Him. His resurrection is our resurrection. “But the life He lives He lives to God” (Rom. 6:10b). This is the life of righteousness, the righteousness of faith. And so we, who are now alive to God in Him, are to live to righteousness. For just as death produces sin, so life produces righteousness.
“And He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.” (I Pet. 2:24)
Christ bore our sins to take them away (to redeem us from sin) so that we might die to sin with Christ and be made alive to righteousness in His resurrection. Having been redeemed from the slavery of sin through the death of Christ, we who are now alive in Him have become slaves of righteousness (Rom. 6:17-18), that is, slaves of Christ who is our righteousness (I Cor. 1:30). Redemption is salvation from sin to righteousness.
Since in those days of the Old and New Testament, slaves were also sold at the market, to buy a slave at the slave market could also be called “redemption.” The context of the verbs translate “to redeem” is not the law court but the slave market and has nothing to do with “paying the penalty.” The purchase price or ransom is not the penalty for breaking the law but is the means by which the purchase is accomplished. A ransom is given instead or in place of those who are to be redeemed or delivered; it has nothing to do with a substitute paying the penalty of sin to satisfy the justice of God. The context of the words translated “to redeem” or “redemption” is not the law or the courtroom but slavery and the slavemarket. The redemption of Israel from bondage in Egypt has nothing to do with a substitute paying the penalty of sin; and neither does the redemption in Christ Jesus by His death [His blood] have to do with a substitute paying the penalty of sin, but with delivering us from bondage and freeing us from the slavery of sin. In the II Cor. 5:21 and Gal. 3:13 passages, the phrases “made to be sin” or “a curse” do not mean paying the penalty of sin. In his second letter to the Corinthians Paul writes,
“He who knew no sin was made to be sin for us, in order that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (II Cor. 5:21 ERS)
Historically, there has been three interpretations of the phrase “made to be sin” in this II Cor. 5:21 passage:
1. When Christ in His incarnation took on human nature, which is “in the likeness of sinful flesh” (Rom. 8:3), God made Him to be sin.
2. Christ in becoming a sacrifice for sin was made to be sin, the word “sin” (harmartia) meaning a “sacrifice for sin” (Augustine and the NIV margin “be a sin offering”).
3. Christ is treated as if He were a sinner, and as such Christ became the object of God’s wrath and bore the penalty and the guilt of sin (the traditional Protestant interpretation).
In the first interpretation, it is assumed that Christ’s death is a participation, on the behalf of and for the sakes of sinful humanity.
And in the second interpretation the basic concept is sacrifice, but the sacrifice has been usually assumed to be a substitution, not as a participation.
In the last interpretation, it is also assumed that Christ’s death is a vicarious act, a substitution, in the stead of sinful humanity.
But these substitution interpretations must here be rejected because it is contrary to the explicit statement in the verse which says that He was made sin “for us”, that is, “on our behalf” (huper hemos, NAS; see verses 14-15, and 20). Christ was made to be a sin-sacrifice for us to save us from sin, to take away our sin (John 1:29). And Christ was made a sin sacrifice to take away our sin “in order that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”
That is, that we might be set right with God in the risen Christ. As we shall see, the righteousness of God is the activity of God to set us right with God; that is, to save us from sin (trust in false god) to righteousness (trust in the true God). Christ participated in our spiritual death to save us from sin (trust in a false god), so that we could participate in the risen Christ, being saved from death to life and hence being saved from sin to righteousness (trust in the true God). The substitution interpretation of Christ’s sacrifice does not understand this participation and just assumes a legalistic substitution interpretation of Christ’s death as a paying the penalty of sin for us. And when Apostle Paul writes to the Galations,
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us — for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who hangs on a tree'” (Gal. 3:13),
he does not mean that Christ paid the penalty of sin as our substitute, but that Christ’s death was to deliever us (“redeemed”) from our sins and to save us from the wrath of God (“the curse of the Law”, see Gal. 3:10). And Christ being made a curse for us, does not mean that Christ died as a substitute, in our place, paying the penalty of our sins, but that Christ’s death was “for us”, on our behalf (huper hemos), The Scripture that Paul here quotes (Deut. 21:23) does not mean that being made a curse was for another’s sins but because he was being hung on a tree for his own sins (Deut. 21:22). And since Christ was hanging on the tree (the cross) was not because of His own sins (He was without sin – II Cor. 5:21) but it was on our behalf to redeem us from our sins and from God’s wrath against our sins (Rom. 1:18). Paul does not say that Christ took our curse but that He became a curse for us to redeem us from the curse of the law. Christ’s death sets us free from the law and from its curse.
The introduction of these legalistic concepts into the interpretation of these passages has obscured their meaning and interpretation. Apart from the clear and explicit statement of Scripture, it cannot be assumed that this is what these verses mean. This legalism is contrary to the clear and explicit statements of Scripture.
“8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, 9 not as a result of works, that no one should boast.” (Eph. 2:8-9 NAS)
Thus any interpretation employing these legalistic concepts is suspect. In fact, the Scripture explicitly rejects the principle of vicarious penal sacrifice upon which this interpretation depends.
“The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.” (Ezekiel 18:20 NAS; see also Deut. 24:16; Jer. 31:30).
Adam acting as a representative brought the old creation under the reign of death. But Christ acting as our representative, on our behalf, brought a new creation in which those “who have received the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness will reign in life” (Rom. 5:17).
“21 For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” (I Cor. 15:21-22)
“Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature: the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new.” (II Cor. 5:17)
[Jesus said] “Because I live ye shall live also.” (John 14:19 KJV)
Acting through our representative, God has reconciled us to Himself through Christ, that is, God has brought us into fellowship with Himself.
“18 But all things are of God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ … 19 to wit, that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself ….” (II Cor. 5:18-19; see also Rom. 5:10-11; I Cor. 1:9; I John 1:2-3).
This representative work of Christ should be understood, not as a vicarious act, instead of another, but as a participation, an act of sharing in the condition of another. Christ took part or shared in our situation. He entered, not only into our existence as a man, but also into our condition of spiritual and physical death.
“14 Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same nature, that through death he might destroy him that has the power of death, that is the devil, 15 and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong bondage.” (Heb. 2:14-15)
On the cross, Jesus died not only physically but also spiritually (“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Matt. 27:46), sharing in our spiritual death. We are reconciled to God through the death of Christ (Rom. 5:10) because He shared in our death (Heb. 2:9). But He was raised from the dead, and that on behalf of all men (II Cor. 5:15). He was raised from the dead so that we might participate and share in His resurrection and be made alive with Him.
“4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in offenses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus;” (Eph. 2:4-6 ERS).
His resurrection is our resurrection. He was raised from dead for us so that we might participate in His resurrection and have life, both spiritual and physical. Thus the representative work of Christ is a participation, an act of sharing in the condition of another. He participated in our death so that we could participate in His life.
Since spiritual death is no fellowship with God (it is the opposite of spiritual life which is fellowship with God), then being made alive with Christ we are brought into fellowship with God. Hence we are reconciled to God (Rom. 5:10; II Cor. 5:17-19). The Greek word katallage, which is translated “reconciliation” in our English versions, means a “thorough or complete change.” Hence it refers to a complete change in the personal relationship between man and God. Because man is dead, he has no personal relationship with God, no fellowship with God. When a man is made alive to God with Christ, he is brought into a personal relationship with God, into fellowship with God. His personal relationship to God is completely changed, changed from death to life. Reconciliation can, therefore, be defined as that aspect of salvation whereby man is delivered from death to life. And the source of this act of reconciliation is the love of God. It is a legalistic misunderstanding of reconciliation to say that God was reconciled to man. The Scriptures never say that God is reconciled to man but that man is reconciled to God (Rom. 5:10; II Cor. 5:18-19). The problem is not in God but in man. Man is dead and needs to be made alive. Man is the enemy of God; God is not the enemy of man. God loves man, and out of His great love He has acted to reconcile man to Himself through the death and resurrection of Christ. It is true that God in His wrath opposes man’s sin and in His grace has provided a means by which His wrath may be turned away. But this aspect of salvation is propitiation, not reconciliation. Reconciliation should not be confused with propitiation. God in reconciling man to Himself has saved man from death, the cause of sin, and hence He has removed sin, the cause of His wrath – no sin, no wrath. Christ’s death is a propitiation because it is a redemption and it is a redemption because it is a reconciliation, salvation from death to life.
If Christ did not die to pay the penalty for man’s sin and satisfy God’s justice, then why did Christ have to die to save man? Why then do men need to be saved? An examination of the Scriptures (John 10:10; Eph. 2:4-5; Heb. 2:14-15; I John 4:9; etc.) clearly shows that the answer to this question is that man needs to be saved because he is dead.
“4 But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in offenses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),” (Eph. 2:4-5 ERS).
By His grace, God has saved us from death to life. Man is separated and alienated from God (Eph. 4:17-18). He is spiritually dead. He does not know God personally, and because he does not know the true God, he turns to false gods – to those things which are not God – and makes those into his gods.
“Formerly, when you did not know God, you were in bondage to beings that by nature are no gods.” (Gal. 4:8)
The basic sin is idolatry ( Ex. 20:3; Rom. 1:25), and man sins (chooses these false gods as his god) because he is spiritually dead – separated from the true God. That is, all men have sinned because they are spiritually dead. This is what the Apostle Paul says in the last clause of Romans 5:12 [ERS]: “because of which [death] all sinned.”
Spiritual death which “spread to all men” from Adam along with physical death is not the result of each man’s own personal sins. On the contrary, a man sins as a result of this spiritual death. He received that death from Adam, from his first parents. The historical origin of sin is the fall of Adam – the sin of the first man. Adam’s sin brought death – both spiritual and physical – on all his descendants ( Rom. 5:12, 15, 17). This spiritual death inherited from Adam is the personal, contemporary origin of each man’s sin. Because he is spiritually dead, not knowing the true God personally, he chooses something other than the true God as his god; he thus sins.
This is why a man needs to be saved. He is dead spiritually and dying physically. Man needs life – he needs to be made alive – to be raised from the dead. And if he receives life, if he is made alive to God, death which leads to sin is removed. And if death which leads to sin is removed, then man will be saved from sin. Thus salvation must be understood to be primarily from death to life and secondarily from sin to righteousness, the righteousness of faith. And since God’s wrath – God’s “no” or opposition to sin – is caused by sin (Rom. 1:18), the removal of sin brings with it also the removal of wrath – no sin, no wrath. Salvation is then thirdly from wrath to peace with God (Rom. 5:1).
This salvation (from death, sin and wrath) is exactly what God accomplished through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, His Son. This is why Christ died, that He might be raised from the dead. Jesus entered into our spiritual death in order that as He was raised from the dead, we might be made alive in and together with Him ( Eph. 2:5). And by saving us from spiritual death, Christ saves us from sin. It is by taking away the spiritual death, which leads to our sin, that God takes away our sin. Jesus died for our sins – literally – to take them away (John 1:29). What the Old Testament sacrifices could not do (Heb. 10:1-4), the death of Christ has done. The blood of Jesus (His death) cleanses us from our sins (I John 1:7). We are delivered from sin itself. We were saved from our trust in false gods when we put our trust in Jesus Christ and the true God who sent Him. We “turned from idols to serve the living and true God” (I Thess. 1:9). When we were spiritually dead, we trusted in and served those things that are not God – money, power, sex, education, popularity, pleasure, etc. But when we turned to the risen Christ, we entered into life, leaving behind those false gods. The risen Jesus Christ is now our Lord and our God (John 20:28).
The death and resurrection of Jesus was the means by which God removed death – the barrier to knowing God personally and knowing His love. In the preaching of the Gospel, God reveals Himself to us making us spiritually alive to Himself when we receive Jesus Christ who is the life (John 14:6; I John 5:12). To be spiritually alive is to know God personally, and to know God personally is to trust Him. For God is love (I John 4:8, 16) and love begets trust. The trust that God’s love invokes in us is righteousness ( Rom. 4:5, 9); it relates us rightly to God. Thus by making us alive to Himself, God sets us right with Himself through faith. Life produces righteousness just as death produces sin.
Both Calvinism and Arminianism see the need for salvation in legalistic terms. According to their theology, man needs to be saved because he is a guilty sinner and a sinner by nature. Although disagreeing over the doctrine of Total Depravity, they both hold to a doctrine of the sinful nature. But even here they understand the sinful nature differently. Calvinism defines it in such a way that man cannot do anything to save himself and thus God must sovereignly choose who will be saved and who will be lost (Unconditional Election). Arminianism defines the sinful nature in such a way to allow for man’s free will and thus as only a tendency to sin and a hindrance to doing good. In order to allow for man’s free will, Arminianism teaches that man’s sinful nature does not determine his choices, but it is only a tendency to sin. The sinful nature only hinders man from doing the good; thus man falls short of divine perfection, the holiness of God. But in spite of these differences they both see that man needs to be saved because he is a guilty sinner, a sinner by nature.
Although Arminianism rejects and modifies all of the Five Points of Calvinism, it does not reject the legalistic assumptions of the Calvinistic theological system. Arminianism, like Calvinism, defines sin and righteousness in terms of law. They both understand sin to be basically a transgression of the law, the breaking of the rules and a falling short of the universal divine standard of perfection. Sin is considered to be a crime against God, and the penalty for these crimes is spiritual, physical and eternal death. Until this penalty is executed at the last judgment, man is under the burden of an objective guilt or condemnation which must be punished. Thus man needs to be saved because he is a guilty sinner. But man also needs to be saved because he does not have a righteousness which God can reward with eternal life. This righteousness is conceived legalistically as merits, that is, that quantity of righteousness which entitles its owner to a reward of eternal life. Thus man needs to be saved, not only because he is a guilty sinner liable to eternal death, but also because he does not have this legal righteousness which entitles him to eternal life.
Calvinism is based on two basic assumptions which are legalistic in character. The first assumption is about man and the second is about God. Calvinism assumes that man cannot save himself because he is not able to do the good works necessary to earn salvation. This assumption is clearly legalistic. It assumes that salvation is by meritorious works but man is not able to do those works.
The second assumption is about God and follows from the first. Since man cannot earn salvation himself because of sinful nature, God must earn it for him. Augustine believed that God gives His grace to enable man to earn the meritorious works which would save him. The Calvinist deny this view of grace and sees grace as the unmerited favor of God in which God gives to the elect the righteousness or merits earned for them by Christ’s active obedience. That is, God in Christ has earned for them eternal life that they themselves cannot earn because of their sinful nature. The truth is that salvation is not something that is earned by merits, but a personal relationship to God that God offers to man by the grace of God as a gift and man enters into by faith in God, receiving eternal life as a gift. Man cannot save himself by works, not because he cannot do the works, but because salvation is not by meritorious works; it is a gift of life, a personal relationship given by God in His love and grace and entered into through faith ( Eph. 2:8-9). But the Calvinist is wrong; the righteousness from God (Phil. 3:9) is not the merits earned by Christ’s active obedience but is a right personal relationship to God through faith: faith reckoned as righteousness, the righteousness of faith.
“Abraham believed God, and it [his faith] was reckoned unto him for righteousness.” (Gen. 15:6)
“3 For what does the scripture say? ‘Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.’ 4Now to one who works, his wages are not reckoned as a gift but as his due. 5And to the one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness …. 13The promise to Abraham and his descendants, that they should inherit the world, did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith.” (Rom. 4:3-5, 13) (See also Rom. 4:9b; Rom. 10:9; Phil. 3:9).
And God puts man into this right personal relationship to Himself by His grace, not by vicarious meritorious works earned for them by another. The grace of God is not just the unmerited favor of God, but it is the love of God in action to save man from death to life ( Eph. 2:4-5).
Calvinism’s view of salvation is monergistic, that is, God alone is active in salvation, because it believes that since man’s nature is sinful and man does what his nature is, then all the acts of man are sinful and he cannot do any righteous act to earn salvation. Therefore, God alone must do it for him. Calvinism, denying the Augustinian view that God does these meritorious acts by the grace of God that man receives from God through the sacraments, asserts that God alone does these meritorious acts through the active obedience of Christ; Christ has earned salvation for us. God alone is active in man’s salvation. Not only is the grace of God the work of God but so is faith, since salvation is “by grace through faith” ( Eph. 2:8). According to the Calvinistic doctrine of Irresistible Grace, the faith that receives the grace of God is also the work of God. But the phrase in Eph. 2:8, “and this not of yourselves, it is a gift of God”, refers to salvation and not to faith. In the Greek of this verse, the demonstrative pronoun translated “this” agrees in gender (masculine) with the verbal participle translated “have been saved”, and not with the noun translated “faith” which is feminine. On God’s side, God gives (“by grace”) salvation and on man’s side (“through faith”) man chooses to receive that gift. Salvation is the gift which is received by faith, not earned by meritorious works. Even though faith is the act or choice of man, it is not a meritorious work which can earn salvation.
Calvinism’s view of salvation is legalistic, because it assumes that all the acts of man are meritorious, either earning merit by his righteous acts or losing it by the demerit of his sinful acts. This view of man is thoroughly legalistic. It views the relationship of man to God as based on merit that the justice of God demands and requires. The righteousness of God is misinterpreted as the justice of God. On this view, the justice of God rewards the merit of righteous acts and punishes the demerit of sinful acts. Because man does what his nature is and because of his nature is sinful, all the acts of man are sinful and cannot earn any merit. Therefore, no man can save himself. If he could do any righteous or good acts or works, then he could earn salvation and save himself. But since all men have sinned, no man can save himself and all men are condemned to eternal punishment for all their sins or demerits.
Even though this view sounds biblical, it is not. Nowhere in the Bible does it teach that salvation is earned by righteous or good works, even in the Old Testament. On the contrary, it teaches just the opposite: man is saved by grace through faith and not by works (Eph. 2:8-9). Righteousness is right personal relationship to God through faith (Gen. 15:6; Hab. 2:4; Rom. 4:4-6). The righteousness of God is not justice in the Greek-Roman sense of rendering to each what is due to them according to merit, but God acting to put right the wrong and to set man into right personal relationship to Himself, that is, it is a synonym for salvation (Psa. 98:2; Isa. 56:1). The basic sin is not just breaking the law earning demerit, but faith and trust in something other than the true God (Ex. 20:3-4; Deut. 6:4, 14-15; Rom. 1:22-25; 14:23); it is idolatry, trust in a false god. And man does not sin because of a inherited sinful nature, but because of spiritual death received from Adam.
“12 Therefore, as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death passed unto all men, because of which all sinned: — 13 for until the law sin was in the world; but sin is not reckoned when there is no law. 14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned after the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is the type of him who was to come.” (Rom. 5:12-14 ERS).
Man’s nature is not sinful or good, but is what he choose it to be; if he chooses a false god as his ultimate criterion of his choices, his choices will be sinful. Since men are spiritually dead, that is, not spiritually alive in a personal relationship to God, they will choose a false god as their ultimate criterion of their choices of how they will think or act. God opposes man’s basic sin of idolatry and the sins that follow from it; this opposition is the wrath of God. And if a man continues to serve his false god, refusing the gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ, he will receive eternal death, the wages of this slavemaster. This has nothing to do with merit or demerit, nor with the execution of justice in paying the penalty for law breaking. Romans 6:23 is about the slavery of sin and its consequences; the word “sin” in the singular there refers not to the sinful nature but to sin as a slavemaster, who pays the wages of eternal death. And this eternal death is not the penalty of sin, but is the wages paid by sin as a slavemaster.
“The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom. 6:23).
Sin as a slave master is the false god that a man chooses as his ultimate criterion of all his choices. Thus all men sin in choosing a false god and from this false god as their slavemaster they receive the wages of this slavemaster, eternal death. God does not choose just some to be saved, leaving the rest to be damned. But each man chooses his god and lord; if he chooses a false god that becomes his slavemaster, then he will receive the consequence of that choice, eternal death. But if he chooses to receive the true God as his God and His gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ, His Son, acknowledging Him as his Lord, he is saved. God has chosen to save all men, if they will receive that salvation. God has not chosen just a few to be saved, but all men. But not all men will be saved, not because God has not chosen them, but they have not chosen Him. Each man must make his own choice of which god he will have as his ultimate criterion of choice, to be his god and lord. God does not make that choice for him. In the preaching of the Gospel, the Holy Spirit opens the eyes of the spiritually blind and sets their wills free from the slavery of sin to their false god, so that they can choose the true God. Then if they refuse to choose the true God and to receive His gift of life, they are left in spiritual death and in their sin.
The slavery of sin is not a sinful nature but the choices made in following a false god; it is not a determinism by one’s nature but the self-determinism by one’s personal choice according to one’s false ultimate criterion. And salvation is not a determinism by God that overrides the determinism of the sinful nature. God’s sovereignty in salvation is not a determinism but is the setting of man free from the bondage of sin to a false god so that he is free to choose the true God. Biblical theology is not deterministic in either sense. Calvinism misinterprets God’s sovereignty deterministically in such passages of Scripture as Rom. 8:29.
“Those whom he foreknew, he also foreordained to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.”
The Greek verb here translated “foreknew,” proginosko, means “to know beforehand.” It is used in general to refer to knowledge that is previously had (Acts 26:5; II Pet. 3:17). The Greek verb is used only 5 times in New Testament, two times in the letter to the Romans; here in Rom. 8:29 about believers and in Rom. 11:2 about Israel. The fifth occurrence is in I Pet. 1:20 about Christ “having been foreknown before the foundations of the world.” The Greek noun, prognosis, translated “foreknowledge,” occurs twice in the New Testament, in Acts 2:23 about Christ and in I Pet. 1:2 about believers as the elect or chosen ones. Paul uses the verb here to refer to God’s knowledge of believers before they knew God. It is equivalent to choosing beforehand someone as God did Israel (Rom. 11:2). It does not refer to the omniscience of God whereby God knows all things before they happen. Paul is here talking about God’s personal knowledge and not His objective knowledge of all things. The Greek verb here translated “foreordained,” proorizo, literally means “to set boundaries beforehand,” hence, “to decide upon beforehand, to appoint, designate, and choose beforehand.” It is used 6 times in the New Testament, twice in chapter 8 of Romans (in verses 29 and 30) twice in Ephesians 1 (in verses 5 and 11), Acts 4:28 and I Cor. 2:7. In none of these places does it mean a causal determinism that makes free will impossible. As Paul says in Eph. 1:11, God “works all things according to the counsel of his will.” Although some theologians have interpreted these words as teaching such causal determinism, Paul’s choice of words do not say that all things are causally determined by God. The translation of this Greek verb proorizo as “predistined” makes Paul seem to teach this determinism.
Calvinism is wrong in interpreting the slavery of sin as a determinism of the sinful nature and Arminianism is wrong in not taking the slavery of sin seriously in their stress on the freedom of the will. Neither of them recognize the Biblical truth that the basic sin is idolatry and that man sins in choosing a false god as his ultimate criterion of all his decisions because he is spiritually dead. They both distort the Biblical theology of salvation in their dispute about man’s free will. Salvation is neither a monergism on God’s part nor a monergism on man’s part; it is the free gift by grace on God’s side that is received through faith on man’s side ( Eph. 2:8-9).
Both Calvinism and Ariminianism misunderstand the meaning of the death of Christ. They see Christ’s death as dealing basically with the consequences of sin, paying the penalty of sin. They do not understand that Christ’s death dealt basically with death, and secondarily with sin because men sins because of (spiritual) death ( Rom. 5:12cd ERS; etc.). Christ entered into our spiritual death on the cross
(“My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?”) so that we could be made alive with Him in His resurrection ( Eph. 2:4-5). By saving us from death to life God saves us from sin to righteousness. This salvation that is basically from death to life, and hence from sin to righteousness, was accomplished by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God’s Son, for all men. He died, not just for some men, but for all men.
“But we see Jesus, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that he might taste death for every one [pantos].” (Heb. 2:9; see also II Cor. 5:14; I Tim. 2:3-6; Titus 2:11; I John 2:2).
He entered into death for us, both spiritual (“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Matt. 27:46) and physical, so that we could be made alive to God in His resurrection.
“4 But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),” (Eph. 2:4-5; see Rom. 6:8).
“6 Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin; 7 for he who has died is freed from sin. 8 But if we believe that we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, 9 knowing that Christ having been raised from the dead. no more dies, death no more has dominion over Him. 10 For the death He died, He died to sin, once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. 11 So also you should reckon yourselves indeed to be dead to sin, but also alive to God in Christ Jesus.” (Rom. 6:6-11 ERS).
He became what we were that we could become what He is. But this death and the resurrection of Christ for all men must be received by faith in order for them to be saved.
“8 The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart (that is, the word of faith which we preach); 9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For man believes with his heart unto righteousness, and he confesses with his mouth unto salvation. 11 The scripture says, ‘Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.’ 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and bestowes his riches upon all who call upon him. 13 For, ‘every one who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.'” (Rom. 10:8-13 ERS).
The death and resurrection of Christ was not limited just to a few men (the Elect), but was for all men. But they must believe in their hearts that God raised Jesus from the dead and confess with the mouth Jesus as Lord in order for them to be saved (Rom. 10:9-10). God chose before the foundations of the world to save all men in Christ, but only those who believe are in Christ and thus are saved (Eph. 1:4, 13). Calvinism is correct when they affirm that God’s choice or election is not based on or conditioned by any foreknowledge of man’s works; salvation is not by works. But they are wrong when they affirm that only some, not all, are chosen to be saved. On the contrary, God has unconditionally chosen to save all men rather than not to save them. God did not have to save man, but He sovereignly chose in His love to save all men. But not all men will choose to accept that salvation and thus they will perish.
“16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that all of those believing in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.
17 For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”
(John 3:16-17 ERS)
God did not love just some men (the Elect), but the world, all men. But only all those who believe in His Son, accepting the gift of His love, have eternal life and are saved through Him. They are saved unconditionally by grace [God’s love in action] through faith, not by works lest any man should boast ( Eph. 2:8-9). Salvation is a gift that is received through faith. The phrase in Eph. 2:8, “and this is not of you, it is a gift of God”, refers to salvation and not to faith. In the Greek of this verse, the demonstrative pronoun translated “this” agrees in gender (masculine) with the participle translated “are saved”, and not with the noun translated “faith” which is feminine. Salvation is the gift which is received by faith, not earned by meritorious works. On God’s side, God gives (“by grace”) salvation and on man’s side (“through faith”) man chooses to receive that gift. Calvinism is correct in asserting that God’s grace is irresistible; man’s refusal of the gift does not nullify the grace of God. For in the preaching of the Gospel, the grace of God does set free those enslaved to sin, so that they then can choose to receive the gift of life.
“For I am not ashamed of the Gospel: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” (Rom. 1:16 ERS)
But Calvinism is wrong in asserting that only those chosen by God in eternity are enabled to accept the gift of God and cannot resist and refuse the gift. On the contrary, man does not have a sinful nature that must be changed by God’s grace in order that the man chosen by God in eternity can accept the gift of God. The grace of God is not a divine determinism that must overcome the determinism of the sinful nature. God sovereignly created man in His own image, giving him free will (the ability to choose between good and evil) to exercise his dominion over the rest of creation (Gen. 1:26). And at the fall of man, when Adam sinned by choosing evil, God did not take away that freedom nor corrupt his nature so that he can only choose evil. Death, spiritual and physical, was the result of the fall of man. Spiritual death is not the sinful nature, but is the separation and alienation of man from God. Death is a power (“death reigned”, Rom. 5:14, 17) that separates man’s spirit from God (spiritual death) and separates man’s spirit from his body when he dies physically (physical death). Because of this condition of spiritual death, all men have sinned by choosing a false god as their ultimate criterion of their choices. All men have sinned, not because they have sinful nature, but because they are spiritually dead ( Rom. 5:12cd ERS). Man needs to be made alive, and that is what God has provided through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. That is what the law cannot do (Gal. 3:21); it cannot make man alive.
“Is the law then against the promises of God? Certainly not; for if a law had been given which could make alive, then righteousness would indeed by the law.” (Gal. 3:21).
God did not give His law to Israel to make them alive but to show them what sin is; “through the law is the knowledge of sin” (Rom. 3:20b); the law was not given for salvation from sin. Man cannot earn salvation by keeping the law, by the works of the law, because that law can not make him alive to God. For if man could be made alive to God through the law, then Christ died in vain (Gal. 2:21).
The problem with Calvinism is that it assumes that man can be made alive by the works of the law, and that eternal life can be earned by the works of the law. Hence, Calvinism reasons that man must be totally unable because of his sinful nature to do those works, since the Scripture says that salvation is not by works ( Eph. 2:9). But eternal life cannot be earned; it is a gift. Salvation is not by the works of the law, not because man cannot do them, but because salvation is a gift of life that is to be received through faith, having nothing to do with the meritorious works of law. Salvation is not something earned by meritorious works, but is the gift of life in Christ to be received and entered into through faith. When that gift of life is offered in the preaching of the gospel, a man can choose whether or not to receive that gift. That choice of faith is not a meritorious work, but the choice to accept the gift of life in Christ. One’s acceptance of that gift does not earn for him the gift. Eternal life is not a thing, an “it”, a quantity of merit imputed to one’s account, but a person, the Son of God, Jesus Christ (John 14:6). And a human person is made alive to God and has eternal life when he or she chooses to accept that Person, Jesus Christ, acknowledging Him as their Lord, thus entering into a personal relationship to Him.
“11 And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. 12 He who has the Son has life, and he who has not the Son has not life.” (I John 5:11-12).
Under the criticism of Arminianism, many Calvinist have modified their Calvinism and have accepted the Unlimited Atonement (that Christ died for all men) and the Conditional Elect (that God choose those who are to be saved on the basis of His foreknowledge of who will believe). This modified Calvinism still accepts the Total Inability (that all men have a sinful nature), the Irresistible Grace (that God regenerates only the Elect so that can believe in Christ), and the Perseverance of the Saints (the eternal security of the believer). This modified Calvinism like the original or “hyper” Calvinism also asserts the Perservance of the Saints; that is, that the Elect (those that God choose in eternity to be saved and for whom Christ died paying the penalty of their sins and who are called by God’s irresistible grace) shall be preserved unto eternal life in heaven. Both these forms of Calvinism argue that since Christ died to pay the penalty of the Elect’s sins, whether committed before or after their conversion, they cannot be lost nor can they lose their salvation by any of their sins. This doctrine is often expressed as “Once Saved Always Saved” (OSAS). Arminianism denies this doctrine and holds that the one who has accepted Christ as his Savior and is saved is able (though unlikely) to renounce his faith and be lost. Arminius was of the firm conviction that all men are free moral agents both before and after they were converted. Calvinism replies to this denial of their doctrine that their doctrine is based upon Scripture. Then they argue for it from a series of Scriptures (Phil. 1:6; John 17:2; John 6:39; John 10:28; Jude 1), giving them a Calvinistic interpretation.
Many modified Calvinist saw that the penal satisfaction theory of atonement is Biblically inadequate because it does not include the Biblical doctrine of the believer as being in Christ. They saw that the Apostle Paul, after setting forth the truth of justification through faith in Christ’s death for us in chapters 3 through 5 of Romans, went on to set forth in chapter 6 of Romans the believer’s identification with Christ’s death. In chapters 3 to 5, they believed that Paul presented Christ’s death as for us; but in chapter 6 they believe that Paul presented our death with Christ. According to their interpretation, in chapter 6 of Romans our justification is no mere formal or legal transaction (although it is essentially a legal matter), but that it is an union with Christ. In justification, God declares the ungodly just by the imputation of the righteousness earned by Christ’s active obedience during His life before the cross where in His passive obedience Christ paid the penalty of our sins. This legal declaration and imputation is made apart from a real and deep life-union of the believer with Christ. In chapter 6 of Romans, Paul sets forth our identification and our union with Christ in His death which our baptism pictures as the likeness of Christ’s death and burial. Since we have been united to Christ crucified, our position must be one of death “in Him”. The death of Christ for all involves the death of all. We therefore died in Christ to sin. Paul asks in Romans 6:1,
“Shall we therefore continue in sin?” Perish the thought. “In Christ” and “in sin”? What an ethical contradiction! Christ dying for my sin involves inevitably my death with Christ to sin. Christ in His incarnation being identified with us as a man, having taken upon Himself the penalty of our sin, He took us unto Himself, making us one with Himself. Thus we believers are legally and ethically involved in Christ. We have been sentenced to death in Christ for our sins, and at the same time we have automatically died to sin with Christ. As an old theologian put it, I am “born crucificed” (that is, when I was born again) [1].
As we saw above, this view of the atonement is a legalistic interpretation of Christ’s death. The penal substitutionary theory is a legalistic misunderstanding of the sacrifical aspect of the death of Christ. This view attempts to combine the Biblical doctrine of our death and resurrection with and in Christ with the legalistic penal substitutionary theory. It leaves the believer under law and is unable to deliever the believer from the slavery of sin.
“For sin shall not have dominion over you: for you are not under the law, but under grace.” (Rom. 6:14).
This legalistic interpretation of Christ’s death is based on a misinterpretation of Paul’s letter to the Romans. According to this interpretation of Romans, there are two aspects of salvation that are presented in first eight chapters of Romans. First, the forgiveness of our sins, and second, our deliverance from sin. In the first part of Roman chapters 1 to 5:11, we are presented with the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ shed for salvation (Rom. 3:26); in the second part, chapters 5:12 to end of chapter 8, we are introduced to a new idea in 6:6 that we have been “crucified” with Christ. Thus an aspect of Christ’s representative work involves our union with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection. In the first part of Romans, the Blood deals with what has been done for us, and in the second part the Cross deals with what we are [2].
But according to the correct intrepretation of Romans, in the first part of Romans, from chapters 1:18 to 3:31, we are presented with the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ shed for our salvation from God’s wrath (Rom. 3:25 “propitiation by his blood”); in the second part of Romans, from chapter 4:1 to 5:11, we are presented with our salvation as from sin to righteousness (Rom. 4:5 “faith is reckoned as righteousness”); and in the third part of Romans, from chapters 5:12 to end of chapter 8, we are presented with our salvation as from death to life in Christ’s death and resurrection. In this third section, we are introduced to a new idea in 6:6 that our old man have been “crucified” with Christ and in 6:11 we are to consider ourselves “dead to sin and alive to God in Christ” risen from the dead.
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