Did God Need to Kill His Own Son? - by Cory Brock

Found here. Our comments in bold.

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The author spouts boilerplate Calvinist/Reformist doctrines with facility as if they were self-evident truth. But he never actually explains them. In fact, we're not entirely sure why he mentions some of them, because they don't really come to bear on the question asked in the title.

But here's the thing. The author probably feels obligated to draw in various Calvinist/Reformed doctrines because that's what these Bible teachers do. They never will explain the Bible unless they can explain their doctrines. Over and over again. So they don't really teach so much as they enforce the doctrinal narrative.

The author does quote some Scripture (a refreshing thing considering these Bible teachers too often never bother), but he gets so lost in the weeds we must deem this Bad Bible Teaching.

We explain the sacrificial death of Jesus in detail here.

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The question is evocative. That’s by design.

The way this question gets asked matters. Words like “need” and “kill” carry emotional freight. In popular usage, “kill” evokes a sense of arbitrariness, motivated by anger, revenge, or irrational emotion. We must understand that our theological language requires distinction from everyday language, or we may accidentally paint a picture of God the Father acting against the will of God the Son at the cross, which is certainly not true. But the emotional power of the language can shut down careful thinking before it starts.

That’s often the point. Critics of penal substitutionary atonement (Unexplained phrase. The author use this phrase only once and will never explain any component of it.

And by the way, people are not criticizing PSA specifically, they are criticizing the need for Jesus to die. This is critical, because it is the necessary component to effecting salvation. 

The author will never explain the connection.)

prefer stark language because it is provocative. For example, the phrase “cosmic child abuse” is designed to strike disgust, not to illuminate. We need to resist the emotional setup and think carefully. We need to be as precise as the Bible. (Yes, the Bible. Let's see the author's biblical case. If he has one.)

Let’s slow down and make some distinctions. Was the cross of Christ necessary—and necessary for what? Is God free to give His only begotten Son? Is He free not to? Can we even speak of God having a “need”? What force could require God to do anything? And is it right to say God “killed” His own Son at all?

So, let’s look at our question from multiple angles, like examining a diamond. (So the author is going to focus on the particular phrasing of this question, parsing the meaning of individual words.) 

Does God need?

No. God has no needs.

By that, I mean God isn’t constrained by any external agent. There is no abstract moral law hovering outside Him like a Platonic form. God is utterly free—free to be who He is. He is eternal, unchanging, impassible, not composed of parts. He needs nothing to survive. He is free to create or not to create; free to give His only begotten Son or not.

God doesn’t save us because sinners demand it or because some cosmic law requires it. The cross flows from His loving nature as pure gift. He has, from eternity, determined to save sinners.

Could God save in another way than the cross?

Here’s where it gets tricky.

God’s gift of grace through the cross isn’t grounded in external constraint. But it is grounded in the reality of His own nature. While God is free not to save, because He chooses to save, He acts consistently with His eternally just and holy being.

Could God forgive sins without substitutionary justice? ("Substitutionary justice" is a contradiction in terms. There is no human court of law [let alone the Father's execution of perfect justice] that accepts the idea of someone volunteering to receive the punishment of a guilty party. It simply does not happen. 

But it's this false idea of justice upon which the author's doctrine is built. It's certainly not found in the Bible.)

We have a desire to say “yes” because God, we surmise, can do anything. But God cannot lie. True freedom isn’t doing whatever you want willy-nilly. True freedom is being able to do consistently and perfectly what is true, good, and beautiful according to your nature and purpose.

God is free. Therefore, He does and must act according to His nature. ("Must?" It sounds like God is at the mercy of His own nature. But God as God decides His own nature. He is God, and He chooses for Himself who He is and what constitutes His nature.)

He pursues justice. He lavishes love. In the cross, He lavishes love on sinners by enacting substitutionary justice upon His Son. (There's that phrase again.)

The alternative—just forgiving without addressing justice (This is not the only alternative. The Biblical alternative is blood sacrifice to wash away sin.)

—would be morally arbitrary. It would contradict who God is.

So, did God need to give His only begotten Son? No—not in any sense of an external constraint to save. And yes—because once He decided to save, He acted according to His holy nature.

The only “need” is that God must act according to His own righteous character. (Remember when the author told us "God has no needs?" So apparently He does have one need.)

He needed to give His Son unto death so that He could satisfy His desire to save sinners while remaining just. (Need number two.)

In brief, since God has determined in His free love to save sinners, He must meet the demands of His justice (Hmm. Now God is at the mercy of His own justice.)

through the substitutionary death (The author keeps mentioning "substitutionary," but he will never show us where the Bible says this.)

of a sinless sacrifice if He is to offer forgiveness to the unjust.

Did God “kill” His Son?

This is where the emotional setup reaches its peak. Claims of “cosmic child abuse” depend on emphasizing God the Father as the aggressive agent killing the passive Son. But that misconstrues what the Bible teaches.

First, notice that the Bible doesn’t use this language: “God the Father killed God the Son.” Instead, Scripture holds together two truths: (1) Christ freely offered Himself, and (2) God the Father gave His only begotten Son so that whoever believes might not perish.

“He . . . did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all” (Rom. 8:32). (Hooray! Our first Scripture.)

But this is a complex question. Who killed Jesus Christ? (No, it's not a "complex question." The author in the next couple of sentences easily answers it.)

Of course, the Roman state did. The high priest did. The crowd that yelled, “Crucify Him!” did. And Peter says to the assembly at Pentecost, shockingly, “You crucified him” (Acts 2:36). By extension, all sinners who hear the gospel with saving faith realize that we crucified Him. (This "extension" is not a logical proceeding, the author simply pulls it out of thin air.)

But did God? Yes. God poured His wrath upon the Son (This did not happen. We refute this idea in some depth here. And we examine PSA as a whole here.

Suffice to say, there is no Bible verse that tells us the Father punished the Son. Not one. 

In actual fact, because the OT sacrifices were insufficient [Hebrews 10:4], The Son offered Himself to spill His blood [Revelation 1:5] as a better sacrifice [Hebrews 12:24]. 

The Father was totally satisfied by the blood. There is no further need to punish the Son.)

—a death even beyond what eyes can see. God the Father gave Jesus over to death and punished Him fully with divine wrath. (This did not happen. The Father never punished the Son.)

And the Son willingly, for the joy set before Him, endured the cross and received the wrath (This did not happen. The Father never punished the Son.)

of the triune God (Heb. 12:2). (Let's quote: 

He. 12:2 Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

There is no mention of God's wrath or Him punishing Jesus in this verse.)

Let’s say it in Scripture’s own language:

We esteemed him stricken,

smitten by God, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions,

he was crushed for our iniquities. (Isa. 53:4–5)

God put [him] forward as a propitiation by his blood. (Rom. 3:25)

This Jesus [was] delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God. (Acts 2:23)

(None of these verses mention God's wrath or Him punishing Jesus.

The Isaiah quote has an important word: "But." We thought He was smitten and stricken by God, "but." Isaiah corrects a mistaken idea with a "but," then goes on to explain the correct view.)

To deny that God punished Jesus according to the wrath our sins deserve (This did not happen. The Father never punished the Son.)

or to ignore that the Son of God gave Himself voluntarily is to ignore the plain teaching of Scripture. ("Plain teaching." Oh really. That's quite a claim. So we presume that the author is going to cite the Scriptures that teach this. He's not? Oh.)

Why isn’t this “cosmic child abuse”?

Let me offer three reasons: First, the death of Jesus is voluntary. The Son chose this in love for us. Second, the cross is the historical fulfillment of Trinitarian agency according to the one will of the one God (the pactum salutis). (Unnecessary and unilluminating theological posturing. The author is citing a Calvinist/Reformist doctrine with a fancy Latin title that complicates a simple concept. It seems obvious that the three persons of the Trinity agree in purpose to save.)

The Father, Son, and Spirit are not at odds in their purposes. Third, the resurrection vindicates Jesus Christ, confirming that He deserved to be freed from death. ("Deserved?" What? Jesus somehow had to qualify for resurrection? Where do we find this odd and offensive idea in the Bible?)

God’s justice was satisfied, so Jesus must rise from the dead.

The Father did not “kill” the Son against the Son’s will. God poured out the wrath we deserved upon the Son, (This did not happen. The Father never punished the Son.)

and the Son chose to give Himself for us. That’s an altogether different picture than cosmic child abuse. It is divine love, amazing love. (??? The author just stated that God poured out His wrath on Jesus then immediately claims it's not "cosmic child abuse." Where did this assertion come from, since there has been no intervening discussion?)

We can only say, “How can it be?”

God satisfied His own justice at His own cost. It is not vindictiveness but love that motivated the whole plan. With all those distinctions in place: Yes, God gave His Son over to death. God poured out His wrath on His Son. (This did not happen. The Father never punished the Son.)

God did not spare Him. Thus, justice and love met at the cross for our sake.

Dr. Cory Brock is the minister at St Columba’s Free Church of Scotland in Edinburgh and a lecturer in systematic theology and preaching at Edinburgh Theological Seminary. He is the co-author of Neo-Calvinism: a Theological Introduction and author of Orthodox yet Modern: Herman Bavinck’s Use of Friedrich Schleiermacher. He is the co-editor of the T and T Clark Handbook of Neo-Calvinism and co-translator of Herman Bavinck’s Christian Worldview and Christianity and Science.