The GOSPEL TRUTH

THE

ATONEMENT IN CHRIST

 By

JOHN MILEY, D.D.

 

CHAPTER IX:

SUFFICIENCY OF THE ATONEMENT.

 

I. THE HOLINESS OF CHRIST.
1. A Necessary Element.

2. Scripture View.

II. HIS GREATNESS.

1. An Element of Atoning Value.

2. An Infinite Value in Christ.

III. HIS VOLUNTARINESS.

1. A Necessary Fact.

2. Christ a Voluntary Substitute.

3. Atoning Value.

IV. HIS DIVINE SONSHIP.

1. Sense of Atoning Value.

2. Measure of Value.

(i) A Ground of the Father's Love.

(ii) A Revelation of his Love to Us.

V. HIS HUMAN BROTHERHOOD.

1. Mediation must Express an Interest.

2. The Principle in Atonement.

VI. HIS SUFFERING.

1. Extreme Views.

2. A Necessary Element.

3. An Infinite Sufficiency.

 

CHAPTER IX:

SUFFICIENCY OF THE ATONEMENT.

 

THE substitution of Christ in suffering answers for an atonement through a revelation of such moral truths as may give the highest ruling power to the divine law. It must, therefore, embody such facts as will give the necessary revelation. Only thus can the atonement have sufficiency. It is proper, therefore, that we specially note some of these facts of atoning value. Authors differ somewhat respecting them. This may arise, at least in part, from a difference in the doctrine. The vital facts are clear in the light of Scripture.

I. THE HOLINESS OF CHRIST.

1. A Necessary Element.

A criminal cannot be a proper mediator. Whoever dishonors himself and the law by his own transgression is thereby disqualified for the office of mediation in behalf of a criminal. If human government does not require moral perfection for such office, still, the mediator must not be amenable to penalty on his own account. And the higher his personal righteousness and moral worth, the more valuable will be his mediation as the ground of forgiveness. As a mediation, so accepted, must inculcate respect for law and enforce obedience to its requirements, so, much depends upon the moral worth of the mediator. And Christ, in the atonement, must be without sin and clear of all its penal liabilities. He must be personally holy.

2. Scripture View.

The Scriptures record, and with frequent repetition, the sinlessness of Christ, and ever hold the fact in vital connection with his redeeming work. It is emphasized as fitting and necessary in the atonement, and also as an element of special value. In all the force of its own worth it is a revelation of the truths and motives which constitute the best efficiencies of moral government. The vicarious sacrifice of the sinless Christ as the sole ground of forgiveness, scepters the divine law with a ruling efficiency, with a majesty of holiness, above all the power of punishment. Also, his holiness gives its grace to all other elements of value in the atonement.

II. HIS GREATNESS.

1. An Element of Atoning Value.

Whoever needs the service of a mediator is concerned to find one of the highest character and rank attainable. The minister of the law vested with the pardoning power is officially concerned therein. For the value of the mediation is not in its personal influence with him, but from its rectoral relations. He may already be personally disposed to clemency, but needing a proper ground for its exercise, so that law shall not suffer in its honor and authority. Such ground is furnished in the greatness and rank of the mediator. And the higher these qualities the more complete is the ground of forgiveness, or the more effective the support of law in all its rectoral offices. There is a philosophy in these facts, as manifest in our previous discussions. Beyond this the case may be appealed to the common judgment.

There is the same principle in the redemptive mediation of Christ. His greatness and rank go into his atonement as an element of the highest value. The Scriptures fully recognize and reveal the fact. It is with accordant reason and design that they so frequently and explicitly connect his greatness and rank with his redeeming work.

2. An Infinite Value in Christ.

In the Scriptures, to which reference was just now made as connecting the greatness of Christ with his redemptive mediation, he is revealed as the Son of God and essentially divine; as in the form of God and equal with him in glory; as the Creator and Ruler of all things; as Lord of the angels. In him, therefore, divinity itself mediates in the redemption of man. Thus an infinite greatness and rank give rectoral support to the law of God in the ministry of forgiveness to repenting sinners. This is a fact of infinite sufficiency in the atonement of Christ.

III. HIS VOLUNTARINESS.

1. A Necessary Fact.

The injustice of a coerced substitution of one in place of another would deprive it of all benefit in atonement for sin. But when the sacrifice is in the free choice of the substitute, its voluntariness not only gives full place to every other element of atoning value, but is itself such an element.

2. Christ a Voluntary Substitute.

On this fact the Scriptures leave us no reason for any question. And the frequency and fullness of their utterances respecting the freedom of Christ in the work of redemption give to that freedom all the certainty and significance which its truth requires. It is true that the Father gave the Son; that he sent him to be the Saviour of the world; that he spared him not, but delivered him up for us all; that he prepared for him a body for his priestly sacrifice in atonement for sin; but it is none the less true, that in all this the mind of the Son was at one with the mind of the Father; that he freely and gladly chose the incarnation in order to be our redemption; that he loved us and gave himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God; that, with full power over his own life, he freely surrendered it in our redemption. And the fact of this freedom is carried back of his incarnation and atoning suffering to the Son in his essential divinity and in his glory with the Father.

3. Atoning Value.

The voluntariness of Christ crowns with its grace all the marvelous facts of his redeeming work. His atoning sacrifice, while in the purest free-willing, was at once in an infinite beneficence toward us, and in an infinite filial love and obedience toward his Father. And the will of the Father, in obedience to which the sacrifice is made, so far from limiting its atoning worth, provides for its highest sufficiency by opening such a sphere for the beneficence and filial obedience of the Son. Both have infinite moral worth with the Father. So he regards them, not in any commercial valuation, but as intrinsically good. Now forgiveness on such a ground is granted only on account of what is most precious with God, and therefore a vindication of his justice and holiness, of his rectoral honor and authority, in the salvation of repenting souls.

IV. HIS DIVINE SONSHIP.

1. Sense of Atoning Value.

The nearer a mediator stands in the relations of friendship with an offended party, the more persuasive will his intercession be. But this is a matter of mere personal influence, not of rectoral service. The party offended is regarded simply in his personal disposition, not as a minister of the law, with the obligations of his office; and, so far, the case has more affinity with the Satisfaction theory than with the Governmental. According to this theory, God needs no vicarious sacrifice for his personal propitiation. His need is for some provision which will render the forgiveness of sin consistent with his own honor and authority as moral Ruler, and with the good of his subjects. Hence, while we find an element of atoning value in the divine Sonship of Christ, we find it not in a matter of personal influence with the Father, but on a principle of rectoral service. This value lies in the moral worth which the Sonship of Christ gives to his redeeming work in the appreciation of the Father. The nature of it will further appear in the treatment of its measure in the next paragraph.

2. Measure of Value.

The divine filiation of the Redeemer furnishes an element of great value in the atonement. This may be illustrated in connection with two facts of his Sonship:

(i) A Ground of the Father's Love.

The divine filiation of the Redeemer is original and singular. It is such as to be the ground of the Father's infinite love to his Son. On nothing are the Scriptures more explicit than on the fact of this love. Therein we have the ground of the Father's infinite appreciation of the redeeming work of the Son. And the truth returns, that forgiveness is granted only on the ground of what is most precious with the Father. By all this preciousness, as revealed in the light of the Father's love to the Son, his redemptive mediation, as the only and necessary ground of forgiveness, gives utterance to the authority of the divine law, and the obligation of its maintenance; to the sacredness of moral rights and interests, and the imperative requirement of their protection; to the evil of sin, and the urgency of its restriction. These are the very facts which give the highest, best ruling power to the divine law. And thus we have an element of sufficiency in the atonement.

(ii) A Revelation of his Love to Us.

The redeeming love of God toward us is most clearly seen in the light of his love for his own Son. Only in this view do we read the meaning of its divine utterances. Why did the Father sacrifice the Son of his love in our redemption? It could not have been from any need of personal propitiation toward us. The redeeming sacrifice, itself the fruit of his love to us, is proof to the contrary. He gave his Son to die for us that he might reach us in the grace of forgiveness and salvation. Why then did he so sacrifice the Son of his love? The only reason lies in the moral interests concerned, and which, in the case of forgiveness, required an atonement in their protection. But for his regard for these rights and interests, and, therefore, for the sacredness and authority of his law as the necessary means of their protection, he might have satisfied the yearnings of his compassion toward us in a mere administrative forgiveness. This he could not do consistently with either his goodness or his rectoral obligation. And rather than surrender the interests which his law must protect, he delivers up his own Son to suffering and death. Therefore, in this great sacrifice--infinitely great because of his love for his Son, and therein so revealed--in this great sacrifice, and with all the emphasis of its greatness, God makes declaration of an infinite regard for the interests and ends of his moral government, and of an immutable purpose to maintain them. This declaration, in all the force of its divine verities, goes to the support of his government, and gives the highest honor and ruling power to his law, while forgiveness is granted to repenting sinners.

V. HIS HUMAN BROTHERHOOD.

1. Mediation must Express an Interest.

A stranger to a condemned party, and without reason for any special interest in his case, could not be accepted as a mediator in his behalf. A pardon granted on such ground would, in respect of all ends of government, be the same as one granted on mere sovereignty. The case is clearly different when, on account of intimate relations of friendship, or other special reasons of interest, the mediation is an expression of profound sympathy. Forgiveness on such an intercession is granted, not for any thing trivial or indifferent, and so evincing an indifference to the law, but only for what is regarded as real, and a sufficient justification of the forgiveness. This gives support to law. It loses nothing of respect in the common judgment, nothing of its ruling force. And the profounder the sympathy of the mediator, the greater is the rectoral service of his mediation as the ground of forgiveness.

2. The Principle in Atonement.

Christ appropriates the principle by putting himself into the most intimate relation with us. In the incarnation he clothes himself in our nature, partakes of our flesh and blood, and enters into brotherhood with us. Herein is the reality and the revelation of a profound interest in his mediation. The love and sympathy of this brotherhood he carries into the work of atonement. They are voiced in his tears and sorrows, in the soul agonies of Gethsemane, in the bitter outcryings of Calvary, and are still voiced in his intercessory prayers in heaven. Men and angels, in a spontaneous moral judgment, pronounce such a mediation a sufficient ground of forgiveness, and vindicate the divine administration therein. No shadow falls upon the divine rectitude. The divine law suffers no dishonor nor loss of ruling power. Thus the human brotherhood of Christ gives sufficiency to his atonement.

VI. HIS SUFFERING.

1. Extreme Views.

In one view the suffering of Christ contains, in respect of our guilt or forgiveness, the whole atoning value. Only substitutional punishment so atones; and this just in the measure of the penal suffering endured. "This hypothesis measures the atonement not only by the number of the elect, but by the intensity and degree of the suffering to be endured for their sin. It adjusts the dimensions of the atonement to a nice mathematical point, and poises its infinite weight of glory even to the small dust of a balance. I need not say that the hand which stretches such lines, and holds such scales, is a bold one. Such a calculation represents the Son of God as giving so much suffering for so much value received in the souls given to him; and represents the Father as dispensing so many favors and blessings for so much value received in obedience and sufferings. This is the commercial atonement--the commercial redemption, with which Supralapsarian theology degrades the Gospel, and fetters its ministers; which sums up the worth of a stupendous moral transaction with arithmetic, and with its little span limits what is infinite." This is the atonement by equal, as well as by identical penalty. It is really the atonement by equivalent penalty, which varies the case by the admission of a less degree of penal suffering, but only on account of its higher value arising from the rank of the substitute, while an absolute justice receives full satisfaction in behalf of the elect. Such a doctrine has no lofty grandeur, nor profound philosophy. It blanks the grace of God in forgiveness. This is one extreme.

In another view, it is denied that the suffering of Christ, especially in the facts subsequent to the incarnation, is essential to the atonement. The author just cited purposely omits "intensity of suffering" as a necessary element of atonement, and does not hesitate to assert that the incarnation of the Son of God is in itself such an act of condescension in behalf of sinners, that, as the only ground of forgiveness, it is a higher revelation of the divine justice than could be given by their eternal subjection to the merited punishment of sin. Such is the other extreme.

2. A Necessary Element.

We are not honoring the divine love by an affected exaltation of one fact, however stupendous, in the work of human redemption. Nor should we omit, as a necessary element, what the Scriptures account to the atonement as the vital fact of its sufficiency. That the sufferings of Christ are so vital is clear from many texts previously cited or given by reference. They are even essential to the atoning service of other elements of sufficiency. The holiness, greatness, voluntariness, divine Sonship, and human brotherhood of Christ are, in themselves, but qualities of fitness for his redemptive mediation, and enter as elements of sufficiency into the atonement only as he enters into his sufferings. Without his sufferings and death there is really no atonement. This is the truth of Scripture.

3. An Infinite Sufficiency.

The sufferings of Christ, which go into the atonement as a revelation of God in his regard for the principles and ends of his moral government, and in his immutable purpose to maintain them, give to it an infinite sufficiency. We cannot fathom these sufferings. We get the deeper sounding only as we hold them in association with the greatness and rank of Christ himself.

The incarnation itself is a great fact of atoning value in the redemptive mediation of Christ. This is clear in our doctrine, however difficult it may be for that of Satisfaction so to appropriate it. It must go into such an atonement, if at all, either as a vicarious punishment or as a fact of vicarious righteousness. The scheme finds atonement in nothing else. Now the incarnation itself could not be a fact of penal substitution, because it could not be a punishment. Could it be a fact of vicarious obedience, and imputable to the elect? We know not the Scripture exegesis nor the philosophy of the fact which can so interpret it. It is not such because a fact of obedience. The subordination of the Son puts all his acts, even those of creation and providence, into the sphere of filial obedience. And we might as well account these acts an imputable personal righteousness in atonement for the elect as so to account his obedience in the free choice of the incarnation. So difficult, if not absolutely impossible, is it for the doctrine of Satisfaction to appropriate the great fact of the incarnation as an element of atonement. Our doctrine has no difficulty in the appropriation. We require it to be neither a fact of penal substitution nor one of imputable personal righteousness. It goes into the atonement as one of the great facts of condescension and sacrifice in the work of redemption.

The humiliation of Christ in the incarnation thus becomes a great fact of sufficiency in the atonement. His condescension to the form of an angel would have been much. How infinitely more the actual condescension! There are two marvelous facts: the self-emptying -- ______ _______ -- or self-divestment of a rightful glory in equality with God; and an assumption, instead, of the form of a servant in the likeness of men. The Son of God, the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and dwelling in the glory of the Father, condescends to the plane of humanity, and dwells here in the likeness of sinful flesh.

The incarnation is not the limit of the humiliation and sacrifice of Christ: "And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." What scenes are disclosed in Gethsemane and on Calvary! Burdens of sorrow, depths of woe, intensities of agony! An awful mystery of suffering! At such a cost the Saviour redeems the world.

Nor have we the truest, deepest sense of the sufferings of Christ, except in the fact that he endured them as the Theanthropos. With the doctrine of a union of the divine and human natures in a unity of personality in Christ, and that in the incarnation he was truly the God-man, we, know not either the theology or philosophy which may limit his sufferings to a mere human consciousness. And with the impassivity of his divine nature in the incarnation and atonement, many texts of Scripture, fraught with infinite treasures of grace and love, would be little more than meaningless words. On such a principle their exegesis would be superficial and false to their infinitely deeper meaning. The divine Son incarnate, and so incarnate in human nature as to unite it with himself in personal unity, could suffer, and did suffer in the redemption of the world.

Such are the facts which combine in the atonement, and, on the principles previously explained, give to it an infinite sufficiency. They are God's revelation of himself in his moral government, for the vindication of his justice and law in the ministry of forgiveness, for the restraint of sin, and for the protection of the rights and interests of his subjects. So much has he done, and so much required, that forgiveness might be consistent with these great ends. And now while on such ground, but only on such, repenting souls are forgiven and saved, he omits no judicial requirement, and surrenders no right nor interest either of himself or his subjects.

 

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