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Monday, August 30, 2021

For Whom Did Christ Die? - by Daniel R. Hyde

Found here. Our comments in bold.

This author is going to attempt to explain the "L" from the calvinistic TULIP - Limited Atonement. Not only will he fail, but he will end up misrepresenting the Bible in an egregious way.
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“For you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth” (Rev. 5:9–10). 

What a song. What a Savior! Jesus Christ is the object of our praise because we were the objects of His passion. He gave Himself for us, and so we give ourselves for Him. And we should go on singing this song to this Savior for this reason forever and ever. And we will. Yet in this age, there is controversy. Not all Christians believe that Jesus died intentionally and efficaciously for His people alone. As we come to the end of this series on Christ’s death to satisfy the justice of God, the big question is, for whom did Christ die? I want to examine with you how this song of the saints in heaven answers this complex theological question.


THE BIBLICAL DESCRIPTIONS

Notice two things described in Revelation 5:9–10 that are described by many other biblical passages as well. First, the Bible describes Jesus Christ as dying to accomplish every aspect of our salvation. The heavenly choirs praise the Lamb. And in their praise we see the connection between what Christ did—“For you were slain . . . you ransomed people for God”—and what it has accomplished—“you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God”—and what it will accomplish in the future—“they shall reign on the earth.” The eternal song does not say merely that Jesus died. The song also does not say that Christ died only to make redemption a hypothetical for all who choose to believe or a potential salvation for every single man, woman, and child. In other words, this song does not say Jesus died with the intent to make all people savable but to save no one in particular. No, the reason for praise is that Jesus “ransomed people for God.” He actually paid the price to set particular captives free, to release specific prisoners. Jesus actually “made them a kingdom and priests to our God.” (Let's see if the author can demonstrate these calvinistic claims. If he manages to do so, we would then expect him to also explain how these teachings are relevant to the faith and to being obedient to God's commands. Unfortunately, he will do neither.)

Jesus’ death definitively accomplished something.

There are several more descriptions akin to this one. For example, Jesus Christ’s death is described in the following ways throughout Scripture:
The second aspect to the description of Jesus Christ’s death in Revelation 5:9–10 is that He actually died in the place of particular people. Let me illustrate. It’s hard for us to make the connection between what happened decades ago on D-Day on the beaches of Normandy and ourselves today. That is, we have a hard time thinking of those men so long ago as dying in our place. (These men did not die in our place.)

For the most part, we don’t know them, and they didn’t know us. But when someone in our lives actually steps in front of a car, comes between us and a bullet, or enters a fire to rescue us, it’s personal and it’s powerful. That’s what Jesus did. (Jesus did not die in our place, He died for us as the sacrificial lamb to take away our sin. We must die, too, so Jesus' death was not substitutionary, it was propitiationary.)

He is not an abstract person who died for an abstract, faceless mass of people He did not know personally and individually. No, He personally died for each and every one of those He loved from before the foundation of the world. (Did He really die only for those He loved? What does the Bible say about the Father's love? 
1Jn. 2:2 He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.
Jn. 3:14-18 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. 16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
"World" is kosmos, the world, universe; worldly affairs; the inhabitants of the world; adornment. 

Kosmos is used many times in the NT, including:
Jn. 1:29 The next day John saw Jesus coming towards him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
Jn. 4:42 They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”
Jn. 12:19 So the Pharisees said to one another, “See, this is getting us nowhere. Look how the whole world has gone after him!”
Jn. 12:47 “As for the person who hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge him. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save it.
Jesus died for the love of the kosmos, to take away the sin of the kosmos, to save the kosmos. The kosmos is the world arrangement, the order of creation, all that was corrupted by Adam's sin. 

His kingdom is not of this kosmos [Jn. 18:36], so His life, crucifixion, resurrection, and the poured out Holy Spirit are interventions of His Kingdom into the kosmos. It's this intervention that advances [Mt. 11:12] in our physical place, the earth, and this intervention is for the salvation of all men [Jn. 1:7])

We hear this in the heartfelt cries of heaven praising the Savior who actually “ransomed people for God,” but notice how specific this ransom was for particular people. The song goes on to say that the ransomed people come “from every tribe and language and people and nation.” Literally, the text says the Lamb redeemed “out of every tribe and out of every language and out of every people and out of every nation.” He gave His life for those people specifically, and not others. (The author jumps to a unwarranted conclusion. He correctly notes that people are saved from every group, but this does not imply they were selected from every group or limited within the group. 

This verse is expansively describing salvation, but the author wants to take it back down to a Limited Atonement. In doing so he completely misses the point of the Scripture, that salvation is not restricted to the Jews, but rather has gone out to the four winds [Mk. 13:27], to every corner of the earth [Lk. 13:29].

The author, steeped in calvinism, is filtering his reading of Scripture through a lens. This imposes an understanding that colors the ordinary reading. 

Also, "the saved" is a specific group of people by definition. There is no way to talk about the saved apart from the fact that they are different than the lost. No selective or limitation process is implied by talking about the saved vs. the lost. Everyone is one or the other.

By way of example, if a promoter is offering tickets to a concert, we cannot infer who is going to get a ticket. We also don't know how big the venue is, in that there is no need to limit the number of tickers.

We can say it takes a ticket to see the concert, but we cannot say that the tickets are being offered only to a selected group of people.

Propitiation is not portioned. There is no Scripture that says Jesus' sacrifice was scaled, limited, or allocated.)

Even more, the song celebrates this with the pronouns: “You have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth” (Rev. 5:10, emphasis added).

Again, there are many more descriptions just like this one throughout the Bible. Read the following passages and see how they describe Jesus as dying effectually for a particular people:

Jesus did not just make salvation possible for all, but those He saves, He effectually saves: “The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost” (Luke 19:10). ("The lost" is not limited, for we all were lost.)

“If while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life” (Rom. 5:10). (We all were enemies.)

“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21). (No statement of Limited Atonement found here.)

Jesus “gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father” (Gal. 1:4). “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses” (Eph. 1:7). (Hmm. None of these Scriptures illustrate the author's assertion. 

Again, it is impossible to refer to the saved without describing them as different from the lost. And doing so in no way limits the category who is or would be saved.)

Jesus laid down His life for His people: “And you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21). “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people” (Luke 1:68). (Jesus' people are the Jews... Salvation first for the Jews, then for the gentile [Ro. 1:16]. This is the author's first major error.)

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). (If the scope of the atonement is limited to "us" and not "them," then this verse also must be "me" is atoned for and no one else.)

Jesus laid down His life for His sheep: “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. . . . I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep” (John 10:11, 14–15). (Now the author is cherry-picking. Read the whole passage, not just the author's selected verses. One verse you'll find is
Jn. 10:9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture.
"The sheep" are those who have entered through Jesus, not those who Jesus selects. The literal translation is
I am the entranceway or passage; an unspecified one come in I save...
The narrative after this point, which is the part the author cites, is referring to Jesus guarding those who are already His sheep.)

Jesus gave His life for many, not all: “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matt. 20:28). (polus simply means a great number.  But it does not imply a limit.)

“This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matt. 26:28). (polus.)

Jesus laid down His life for His church: “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood” (Acts 20:28). (Notice that Jesus obtained his church, and they became His church because He obtained them. This does not suggest Limited Atonement.)

“Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” (Eph. 5:25–27). (We have little to say here. This is an instruction to husbands to love their wives. The woman is ALREADY a wife. Jesus's example of love for His bride, those he ALREADY saved, is our model as husbands.)

Jesus laid down His life for His elect: “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” (Rom. 8:32–35). (Another verse that has to be read through the lens of calvinism. Again, it is impossible to talk about the saved apart from the fact they are not the lost. That does not imply that the atonement is limited to the saved.)

Jesus prays for His people, not for the world: “I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours” (John 17:9). (Now the author's failure is complete. Not content to make errant claims about the atonement, he now misuses Scripture in pursuit of his false doctrine. 

Jesus' prayer at this point in John 17 is for His disciples! He doesn't begin praying for others until Jn. 17:20:
My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message...
The author is now demonstrated to be a false teacher.)

All this shows us is that Jesus’ death was a substitution. (NONE of these verses indicate this.)

If He died in the place of all people, then all people will be saved. (No, this is incorrect. Did the D-day soldiers, cited by the author above, die only for some Americans?)

If He was substituted for some, then those will be saved.

THE BIBLICAL OBJECTION

What about all the “all” passages in the Bible that, some say, suggest Jesus died for everyone without exception? There are several passages, but what I want to say is that the “all” passages must be read with their context in mind as well as with all the rest of Scripture in mind. (Actually, the author needs us to read these things through the lens of calvinism.)

As I mentioned before, “all” doesn’t always mean all people without exception, or every single individual who has ever lived. Sometimes “all” means what it means here in Revelation 5:9–10, where all kinds of people are being described as redeemed. Other times, “all” means all nations—the Jews along with the gentiles. Alongside the passages that speak of the particularity of Christ’s death, you can see that the best reading of Scripture is that Jesus gave Himself as a ransom for all kinds of people, Jews and gentiles, “from every tribe and language and people and nation.”

Look at John 3:16–17. Notice that the purpose of God’s sending His Son is explained with two purposes clauses: “that whoever believes in him should . . . have eternal life” and “in order that the world might be saved through him” (emphasis added). If the “world” in verse 16 is every human being, then every human will be saved, because verse 17 says He saves the world. (No, it doesn't mean this.)

We know that cannot be the case because not everyone is saved. So, the “world” must refer not to all people but to something else. (Why? the author makes assertions based on his preconception, so it must mean "something else.")

What is the “world?” It’s the “world” of darkness and unbelief (see John 1:10). (No, this is wrong. We cited the actual Greek above. 

The author continues to deceive us with undocumented claims. Let's quote John 1:10:
He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.
Jesus was incarnated. He created "the world" [the kosmos]. The kosmos did not recognize the savior.)

God loved this world of fallen and rebellious sinners despite its hatred of Him. (Hmm. The author walks back his prior claims.)

Even further, God’s love extends not only to sinful Jews but to the entire world of sinners, including the gentiles in all corners of the earth (John 4:42; 11:51–52; 12:32; Rev. 5:9). (Hmm. He continues to abandon his previous assertions.)

The point of John 3:16–17 is that God’s love is so immense that any sinner who believes shall be saved. It speaks of the sufficiency of Jesus. (Indeed. We agree wholeheartedly. But we are puzzled now that the author has contradicted himself.)

Look also at 1 John 2:1–2. The nature of “propitiation” is to turn away God’s wrath. If this text means every human, then it means the wrath of Almighty God is no longer upon anyone. (Now the author wants to place God into the flow of time, where "this happens, then that, then something else." But God is above time. The Lamb was slain from the creation of the world [Re. 13:8]. Propitiation was already in existence before He made the kosmos. There was no human in existence from which wrath could be turned away. So this quibbling about who is atoned for is rather foolish.) 

 When John says, “and not for ours only, but . . . the whole world,” he is speaking either as he spoke in John 3:16–17 of the sufficiency of Jesus or as he echoed our Lord’s words in John 17:20: “I do not ask for [the disciples] only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word.”

Finally, look at 1 Timothy 2:4–6. The context is not Christ’s death but prayer in public worship. Paul commands prayer “for all people” (v. 1). His concern is not for every individual person, but for all “all sorts and conditions of men” (Book of Common Prayer). (The author's ignorance mounting, and is beginning to trouble us greatly, since he represents himself as a teacher of the truth.

First, let's quote the passage, since the author can't be bothered to do so: 
1Ti. 2:1-6 I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone — 2 for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, 4 who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all men — the testimony given in its proper time.
The author makes an assertion that God is not concerned for every individual person. So we can look up word meanings for ourselves. 

"All" is pás ("each, every") means "all" in the sense of "each (every) part that applies." The emphasis of the total picture then is on "one piece at a time." 365 (ananeóō) then focuses on the part(s) making up the whole – viewing the whole in terms of the individual parts.

When it comes to the salvation of all men, God looks at the whole in terms of the individual parts. This is exactly opposite of the author's assertion.)

He specifies prayer for government officials as if to say, “Pray for them so that we can continue praying for everyone else.” God does desire the salvation of “all people,” that is, all kinds of people. (The author substitutes his own words without justification.)

He is concerned not only with Jews but with gentiles, with the rich and the poor, with white and black, with aristocrats and workers, with men and women. If God’s will or desire here concerns every individual, then what about other texts of Scripture that speak of His will or desire in choosing some and not others? (How about the author quote and discuss those Scriptures?)

God is not confused, so His desire for the salvation of all is reconciled with His electing choice when we understand that He wants all kinds of people saved. (These subtle twists imposed by the author are getting tiring.)

THE BIBLICAL BENEFITS

Why does all this matter? (Yes indeed. Why does Limited Atonement matter? How will it change our lives, how will it change our obligations, how will it change Jesus' call to holiness, generosity, evangelism, loving the brethren, etc, etc? Well, it won't.)

I want to conclude by offering three biblical benefits to affirming the intentional and effectual satisfaction of God’s justice by Jesus Christ on the cross for His elect.

First, it gives us assurance and confidence that our Savior has been for us from eternity, on the cross, and into eternity. (But the alternate understanding does the same thing! Limited Atonement does not uniquely and exclusively do this!)

That assurance and confidence can say, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain” for me, “and by your blood you ransomed” me “for God from” this “tribe and” this “language and” this “people and” this “nation, and you have made” me “a kingdom and” a “priest to our God, and” I “shall reign on the earth.”

Second, it gives us reason to worship. He actually and personally died for me to actually and powerfully accomplish my redemption from the slavery of sin and the kingdom of Satan. (Once again, Limited Atonement does not uniquely do this.)

Third, it gives us reason to preach, evangelize, and bear witness in the world. (Sigh. The author has given us three reasons, but none of them distinguish his doctrine above other viewpoints. The other viewpoints achieve exactly the same thing.)

If Jesus Christ actually, personally, and powerfully died for some “out of every tribe and out of every language and out of every people and out of every nation,” then there are particular people in every tribe, every language, every people, and every nation who must come to repentance and faith.

What a song is being sung in heaven even now. Let’s make it our song here on earth. This part of the Canons of Dort ends with these words:
This plan, arising out of God’s eternal love for his chosen ones, from the beginning of the world to the present time has been powerfully carried out and will also be carried out in the future, the gates of hell seeking vainly to prevail against it. As a result, the chosen are gathered into one, all in their own time, and there is always a church of believers founded on Christ’s blood, a church which steadfastly loves, persistently worships, and—here and in all eternity—praises him as her Savior who laid down his life for her on the cross, as a bridegroom for his bride. (2.9)
The tribes, languages, peoples, and nations are right outside our doors. What are we waiting for? Jesus’ death is sufficient for an infinite number of worlds of sinners; tell them, knowing that God will effectually apply it to His people by His mighty grace. (A truly bad analysis. We are dismayed that this author thinks he's a teacher of the faith. Oh, my.)
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