The GOSPEL TRUTH THE
ATONEMENT IN CHRIST
By
JOHN MILEY, D.D.
CHAPTER X:
A LESSON FOR ALL INTELLIGENCES.
1. Atonement for Man Only.2. Broader Relation to Moral Beings.
3. One Moral Constitution of All.
4. The same Moral Motivity in All.
5. The Cross a Power with All.
6. Higher Orders Interested in Redemption.
7. Universal Lordship of Christ.
8. Grandeur of the Atonement.
CHAPTER X: A LESSON FOR ALL INTELLIGENCES.
1. Atonement for Man Only.
Speculative and fanciful minds, forgetting the verities of Scripture, may reach the thought not only of the sufficiency, but also of the actuality, of an atonement for moral beings other than men. The Scriptures, however, limit it to the human race. Nor would any superabundance of its grace, nor any further prevalence of sin, warrant the inference of a wider extension. There are other orders under the power and curse of sin. Here is the prostration of lofty powers, the corruption of once holy natures, and an awful lapse of moral beings from the highest happiness into the profoundest woe. Nor have they any power of self-recovery. There is, therefore, in their case all the need of redemption arising out of an utter moral ruin. Nor will the divine love allow the supposition that, however just their doom, they have fallen below the reach of its pity. Yet the Scriptures give no intimation of an atonement for them, but a contrary one. Christ becomes our brother by an incarnation in our nature, that through death he might redeem us. And we have this significant utterance of limitation: "For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham."
The passage, viewed contextually and in its own terms, clearly limits redemption in its directness and actuality to the human race.
2. Broader Relation to Moral Beings.
An atonement in the sacrifice of Christ, while for man only, may yet have a lesson of profound moral truth for other and for all intelligences. It is such a truth, and of such moral significance, that it must deeply interest all moral beings to whom a knowledge of it may come.
And the notion of a wide extension of such information is no conjecture, nor even a mere rational idea. Rational it is; for the atonement is too great a truth, and too broad and intimate in its relations, for any narrow limitation. The long preparation for the redeeming Advent was known in heaven as on earth. Angels often appear amid the scenes of that preparation. The redeeming Lord comes forth from the midst of their adoring myriads. Many are with him in the lowly scenes of his humiliation, deeply interested in him and in his great work. They form his triumphal escort in the ascension, and all their hosts, in glad acclaim, welcome his return. Here are means and evidences of a widely extended knowledge of our redemption. And the fact of such a knowledge has a sure ground in the Scriptures. The references given are sufficient for the point made, though there are many other texts and facts of like import.
Nor need we have any perplexity respecting either the possibility or the means of such universal information. Moral beings, ever steadfast in holiness and obedience, cannot be in entire isolation, however remote their dwelling-places. They have a common center of union and intercourse in God, as the one Creator and Father of all. "What, then, can He who made them be at any loss how to instruct them? Does one sun dart his beams above, below, around, as well as upon a single spot of earth; and cannot the central light of God convey revelation to others as well as to us? Is there no angel to bear the news? no prophet among them to receive the inspiration? To them, then, as to principalities and powers in heavenly places, may be made known the manifold wisdom of God in the Church."
While, therefore, the lesson of the atonement surely opens its pages to the reading of all intelligences, the fact itself, and the great truths which it reveals, cannot fail profoundly to interest and impress all minds. A little attention will give us the facts for the full verification of this position.
3. One Moral Constitution of All.
Divine revelation makes known to us the existence of other orders of moral beings. With this knowledge even reason hears, respecting each order, the one creative fiat of Godhead: "In our image, after our likeness." And, formed in the one image of God, they have a oneness of moral constitution. As made known in the Scriptures, they clearly have a moral nature like our own, and, therefore, in the likeness of each other.
4. The same Moral Motivity in All.
However numerous their orders or vast the scale of their gradations, yet, with a oneness of moral nature, they are one in moral motivity. The same divine truths which impress one may impress another, or that interest and sway us may interest and sway all. The soul of each is open to the practical revelation of God in his justice, holiness, and love; in his marvelous works of creation and providence; in his universal Fatherhood; in all the behests of his will.
5. The Cross a Power with All.
The revelation of God and truth in the atonement may give to all their profoundest religious conceptions, and move them with a pathos of love and a power of moral influence above every other. In the marvelous adjustments of the infinite wisdom there is not wanting a masterly correlation of all moral natures to the grandest truth in the universe. All holy intelligences are open to the moral power of the cross.
6. Higher Orders Interested in Redemption.
The facts of this interest might be appropriated to a further illustration of truths previously given. The nature of the interest as made known, the facts which it regards, and the measure of it, all signify a likeness of moral cognition and motivity to our own, and, therefore, a capacity for the apprehension and practical realization of the great truths revealed in the atonement.
The sympathy of higher orders with us is made known by the Redeemer himself: "I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance." "Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth." These words are very direct and explicit, and entirely sufficient. Yet there are many other words and facts which convey a like sense. Angels often press into the scenes of human history, and not as curious spectators, but as deeply interested in human welfare. And their profounder sympathy, as evinced in their exceeding joy over our repentance, is given in an association with illustrative facts of human experience--as in the parables of the lost piece of silver, the lost sheep, and the prodigal son--which clothe it in the likeness of our own sympathies. Only, the sympathies of these higher orders are broader and deeper. Ours largely conform to the laws of our more special relationships, and are much subject to what is merely conventional, while theirs are free from such limitations. With them all intelligences are a common brotherhood. Hence their sympathies go out alike to all. So they come down to us. And, with the fullness of their love and profound apprehension of our miseries in sin, they have the deepest compassion for us. Hence their exceeding joy over our repentance. They view it as our escape from the misery and death of sin, and our entrance upon the highway of life, with its terminus amid their own thrones and glories. This is their exceeding joy.
But their joy has other impulses than such sympathy with us. It specially has an impulse in a profound love and loyalty to Christ. They know that our salvation is dear to him. Their whole nature is profoundly enlisted with him in the work of saving us. And when they witness his success and his own satisfaction in our salvation, they have exceeding joy--their joy welling up from the profoundest love and loyalty to him.
In such facts respecting the sympathy of higher orders with us, especially in its relation to our salvation and to Christ as the Saviour, we are assured of their knowledge of the great redemption in his blood, and of their profound interest therein. Chosen messengers from their own mighty hosts welcomed his redeeming advent, and in gladdest strains proclaimed him a Saviour. In the holy of holies skillfully wrought cherubim with intent gaze hovered over the mercy-seat, the place of atonement and symbol of the atonement in the blood of Christ; and thus they symbolized the profound interest of the angels in the study of the mysteries of redemption. Nor could they fail of such a knowledge of the atonement as would give them the practical force of its great truths.
7. Universal Lordship of Christ.
The exaltation of Christ in supreme Headship over the Church, and in universal Lordship over the angels, is a truth clearly given in the Scriptures. The passages noted in the reference are most explicit, and full of the loftiest utterances. Christ is Head of the Church universal, whether on earth or in heaven, and supreme Lord over all intelligences.
Such royal investiture of the exalted Christ is in reward of his humiliation and redeeming death. A recurrence to the texts given by reference in this connection will make this clear to any mind. We may cite one in illustration. With its connection its words are these: "Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
Such exaltation has not respect to Christ simply in his divinity. The texts which reveal it give a contrary sense. Nor is the idea of such an exaltation of divinity in itself simply at all admissible.
Much less may we hold this royal investiture simply in respect of the human nature of Christ. This is forbidden by the nature of the powers and prerogatives with which he is clothed. Saints and angels, principalities and powers, all holy intelligences, are made subject to him. They must render him the fullest obedience and the profoundest worship. His divine nature, therefore, must not be considered as separate from him in this marvelous exaltation, else Christianity be justly accounted the vastest system of idolatry ever established. It would be such a system, and not only on earth, but also in heaven, and throughout the universe.
It is the incarnate Son, the Christ in two natures, and yet in unity of personality, that is so exalted. It is the redeeming God-man, the veritable theanthropos who receives such royal investiture. As such he is worthy of it all; worthy in his divinity, and worthy because of his redeeming work. It is fitting that he who stooped so low should be exalted so high.
Such enthronement as the Saviour is the peculiar glory of the Son. There is thus claimed for him the obedience and worshipful homage of all intelligences. It is the peculiar glory of the Father that he is the Creator and Ruler of all things. When creation and providence are ascribed to the Son it is in the deepest truth and reality of both, but never excluding the idea of his subordination therein to the Father. And such facts are set forth in the Gospel, not as his peculiar glory, but specially in connection with his redeeming work, that we might be assured of its sufficiency.
This distinction of the peculiar glory of each is clearly given in the Scriptures. In the first passage noted in the reference, the words of the holy worshipers are: "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honor, and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created;" and in the second: "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing."
It may seem strange that Christ, as the Saviour of man and exalted in our nature, should be enthroned in sovereignty over angels as over saints. It is a noteworthy fact. Nor is it without its reasons. In his divinity he is worthy of such honor and glory. And it is fitting that in his exaltation he should receive a dominion reaching far beyond the immediate subjects of his redemption. Then his redeeming work touches the heart of angels, and of all holy intelligences, as nothing else can. They will ever find their highest reason for a worshipful loyalty to his throne in that he ransomed us from the power of sin by the sacrifice of himself. In the profoundest sympathy with us in the miseries of sin and death, they have the profoundest love and loyalty to him for our salvation.
Yet this is no monopolized glory on the part of the redeeming Lord. His royal investiture, the bowing of every knee to him, the confession of every tongue that he is Lord--all is "to the glory of God the Father." We have given two celestial scenes as opened in the Revelation: one, in which the Father receives universal homage as the Creator and Ruler of all things; the other, in which the Son receives universal homage as the Lamb slain. There is no dissonance here. Then in a third scene, as we behold the worshipers and listen to their devout strains, we catch the fullness of the divine harmony: "Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever."
Now, grouping the several facts under the universal Lordship of Christ, we are again assured that the knowledge of his atonement comes to all intelligences, and in a manner profoundly to interest them. Its marvelous truth and grace, its revelation of God in his justice, and holiness, and love, must occupy their minds and take profoundest hold upon all the practical forces of their moral being.
And we thus find that great ends are answered by the universal Lordship of the exalted Christ. As he is enthroned over all, so is he set before all. This gives to all a knowledge of his redeeming work. And the two facts of his humiliation and exaltation combine in a universal lesson of the highest moral and religious truth. There is such a lesson in the atonement. It is fraught with a manifold divine wisdom. We may here recall in mind the words of St. Paul, previously given by reference, "wherein he speaks of the work of redemption through Christ as containing a revelation, or exhibition, of the manifold--many-sided, or many-colored--wisdom of God--_ ____________ _____ ___ ____. The precise connection of thought in which the expression occurs it is not necessary to point out: it bears the stamp of a phrase coined by the apostle to embody the feeling produced in his mind by deep and protracted reflection on the gracious purpose of God in Jesus Christ. After long, rapt meditation on the sublime theme, Paul feels that the divine idea of redemption has many aspects. The pure light of divine wisdom revealed in the Gospel is resolvable into many colored rays, which together constitute a glorious spectrum presented to the admiring view of principalities and powers in heavenly places, and of all men on earth whose eyes are open to see it." But it is not simply for their admiration. The atonement has infinite treasures of most salutary truth. Such truth reaches all intelligences, specially through the universal Lordship of Christ, and rules them through the practical force of the ideas and motives which it embodies. This is the divinest moral government.
8. Grandeur of the Atonement.
We depart not from the position that the atonement is directly and actually for man only, but none the less hold that of an infinitely broader practical relation to intelligent beings.
Divine moral government is one and universal, as the law of gravitation is one and universal. This one law holds sway over the earth, and the planets, and all the stellar worlds. So moral law, in its deeper principles, is one over man, and angels, and all intelligences. The material and moral systems are widely different: in the one, a law of necessitating force; in the other, a law of obligation, with freedom of the subjects. Here the highest ruling forces are in the moral ideas associated with the law, and in the sanctions which enforce its duties. As previously stated, their governing power is conditioned on certain moral motivities in the subjects. As the moral constitution of subjects is so correlated to the moral law that there may be a profound realization of its obligation together with all the higher motives of duty, so, and only thus, has the moral law a high ruling power. Even penalty, as a salutary force of law, must take its place on such principles and in association with such facts.
The atonement in Christ takes its place in such a universal moral government. As an atonement for sin it has its application to the smallest segment of the moral system; but in its significance and ruling forces it has a universal application. And in the marvelous economies of his wisdom and love, God has provided for its highest benedictions in all such breadth of relation. Illustrations we already have in the universal information of the atonement; in its ruling force, by virtue of its own facts and the adjustment of all moral natures to its influence; in the universal Lordship of Christ as the special means of such information and influence. Thus as the highest revelation of God in his holiness, and justice, and love; in his invincible hostility to sin; in his immutable purpose to maintain his own honor and authority, and sacredly to guard the rights and interests of his subjects, the atonement takes its place in the universal moral system. With all the potencies of practical truth it addresses itself to all minds.
As the highest revelation of infinite love, the atonement will bind all holy intelligences in the deeper love to the one enthroned Lord of all, and so, with all their distinctions of order and grade, bind them in love to one another. "And the principle which shall harmonize this system is at once seen, if it be assumed that when the Eternal Word was made flesh--when He who was 'before all things and in whom all things consist' humbled himself to the level of mortality, and, 'passing by the nature of angels,' took upon him a nature 'somewhat lower'--there was a purpose involved which goes beyond the immediate results of the propitiatory work of the Redeemer. So that when his vicarious functions shall have reached their completion, the union of the divine and human natures shall continue to bear a relation to the social economy of the great immortal family in the heavens, and shall forever subsist as the principle or the reason of communication and harmony among all ranks." This view, so rational in thought and forceful in expression, is far clearer and more forceful when read in the light of such facts and principles as we have given in this chapter.
When, therefore, we assert a necessity for the atonement and set forth its benefits, we must, for any adequate conception, take an infinitely broader view than the present sphere of humanity, or even the eternal destiny of the race. Because the one law of gravitation is universal, the disorder of one world might, if uncorrected, become a far extended evil; while its correction might be a good extending far beyond itself, and reaching even to all worlds--except to any wandering star lost in the blackness of darkness forever. So the evil of sin in this world might, with the license of impunity, become a far extended evil; while its treatment under the atonement may become a far extended good, reaching even to all intelligences--except the incorrigible or finally lost, fitly compared to a wandering and forever lost star. And such treatment of sin, with forgiveness on a true faith in Christ, may be, and no doubt is, an infinitely higher moral good to other intelligences than its unconditional doom under the penalty of justice.
Thus all minds receive the great lesson of the atonement, with its potency of moral truth and pathos of love. And all intelligences, faithful or fallen, must bow the knee at the name of Christ. In the lesson of his cross all will learn the profoundest truth of the divine holiness and love; of the evil and hopeless doom of unatoned or unrepented sin; of the obligation and blessedness of obedience and love. All holy intelligences, bound in deeper love and loyalty to the divine throne by the moral power of the atonement, will forever stand the firmer in their obedience and bliss. And the cross, once the stigma of the most heinous crime and the sign of the deepest abasement of Christ, shall henceforth symbolize to all intelligences the sublimest moral truth in the universe.