Topic: Protestants: Please Explain How Folks are Saved by the Blood of Jesus?

[David Young]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

 We in Orthodox can't accept Penal Substitution or Atonement theories because they are too legalistic for our tastes.

I doubt that you really mean "for our tastes", for I am sure you agree that truth is not tailored to our tastes, but antedates and supersedes them. Anyway, be that as it may, I want to home in on your use of the word "theories". I prefer the word "teaching", but let us also leave that aside.

If our "theory" of penal substitutionary atonement is incorrect, or if your - dare I say it? - "theory" of the Blood, and thus the virtue of it, being received at the Lord's Table, is incorrect, does it not remain true that your theory and ours both move us to trust the benefits of Christ's death alone for our rdemption? I sometimes preach that it is not our understanding of how Calvary worked, but our trust in the fact that it did, that saves the soul.

I am sure that both 'theories' can lead to an empty religious practice without faith, and Evangelicals form an impression of Orthodox thinking they will be saved because they take Communion (sort of, ex opere operato). I believe you would strenuously deny that such is the true nature of your religion: are you not taking Communion because you believe that "the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin"? And have you not thus attached, to your trust in the power of the Blood, a theory about how it works?

Well, you may say that we do the same: that we trust the shedding of his blood, and we attach a theory about how it operates. Our "theory" has helped untold thousands to reach a point first of despair at ever being able to overturn the effects of their sin, and then to a point of placing all their trust in the Son of God, "who gave himself for me" as it is somewhere written. Consider the popular hymn Rock of Ages, cleft for me:

Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to thy Cross I cling

Finally, we are not unaware of the passages in John 6 and perhaps elsewhere, which lead you to your eucharistic beliefs; surely, you are also aware of the passages in scripture which lead to our belief in penal substitution as the means of the Atonement? But do we not all both love and trust the One who died for us?

[Ashman618]

How does a person know they love the true Christ and not some Christ fabricated in the mind?

[David Young]

How does a person know they love the true Christ and not some Christ fabricated in the mind?

That is a very important question. It depends whom you mean by "a person". If you mean, How does one try to assess someone elses's state of grace, so as best to be able to help him find assurance, I suspect this would lead to a different, though related, set of answers from,  How does one try to assess whether or not one is, oneself, in a state of grace? Putting it a different way, if you were to ask me as a pastor how to help you "know you love the true Christ and not some Christ fabricated in the mind," I might find different answers from examining my own heart to see whether I myself am in the faith or am in fact deceived.

[HabteSelassie]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

If our "theory" of penal substitutionary atonement is incorrect, or if your - dare I say it? - "theory" of the Blood, and thus the virtue of it, being received at the Lord's Table, is incorrect, does it not remain true that your theory and ours both move us to trust the benefits of Christ's death alone for our rdemption? I sometimes preach that it is not our understanding of how Calvary worked, but our trust in the fact that it did, that saves the soul.


Well, you may say that we do the same: that we trust the shedding of his blood, and we attach a theory about how it operates. Our "theory" has helped untold thousands to reach a point first of despair at ever being able to overturn the effects of their sin, and then to a point of placing all their trust in the Son of God, "who gave himself for me" as it is somewhere written. Consider the popular hymn Rock of Ages, cleft for me:

My question is ontological, how does the Blood do such? Is it through penal substitution? Did the sacrifice of Jesus Christ shedding His Blood at the moment of the Cross open some kind spiritual flood gate for future generations? In Orthodox, we continually cleansed by the literalness of the Blood in the Holy Communion, so I am just trying to figure out the ontology of the Protestant approach.  To be sure again, some folks can indeed be saved aside from the Holy Communion, however when we say Saved by the Blood in Orthodox we are referring specifically to such.

Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to thy Cross I cling

Finally, we are not unaware of the passages in John 6 and perhaps elsewhere, which lead you to your eucharistic beliefs; surely, you are also aware of the passages in scripture which lead to our belief in penal substitution as the means of the Atonement? But do we not all both love and trust the One who died for us?

The catch is Atonement/Penal Substitution portrays a radically different view of God and the nature of God than is found in Orthodox.  Penal Substitution teaches a vengeful God that was obligated to punish somebody, so He punished Himself through Christ.  In Orthodox, God loved humanity so much that He sacrificed Himself, not to Atone for humanity's punishment for sin, but to abrogate such punishment in the first place.  He shed His Blood to open the doors for Grace, as indeed you've alluded to as well, however it was not to bear mankind's punishment, but simply to demonstrate His effective love for us.

stay blessed,
habte selassie

[David Young]

a radically different view of God and the nature of God

This of course is a more worrying matter than speculation as to how the shedding of Christ's blood achieved our ransom. I shall ponder your words.

[David Young]

a radically different view of God and the nature of God

 I shall ponder your words.

I think that to the Evangelical your statement seems to contain a whiff of the Gnostic, the Manichee, or the Cathar - of dualism: the notion that God as portrayed in the OT and God as portrayed in the NT are not the same person. Now I am sure this is not your intention; I say only how I think it comes across to us who are not familiar with your modus credendi. We believe that the Bible is a unity, and that the characteristics of God as he is portrayed in both Testaments are all true and must be held together in as complete a picture of his character as man has access to. Thus, the God whose wrath burns against sin, who is Judge of all, who created the fire of hell and declared that "the soul that sinneth, it shall die," and who sent his Son and "laid on him the iniquity of us all" as "the chastisement of our peace", must be the same God who is depicted as a loving Father in the parable of the Prodigal Son, and of whom it is written, "God is love."

[Ashman618]

I often wonder Is the fire of hell created? Where can I find that in the scriptures?

[David Young]

I often wonder Is the fire of hell created? Where can I find that in the scriptures?

Our Lord (Matt. 25:41) spoke of "the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels." I cannot imagine who would have "prepared" it, except the Almighty.

[neon_knights]

The catch is Atonement/Penal Substitution portrays a radically different view of God and the nature of God than is found in Orthodox.  Penal Substitution teaches a vengeful God that was obligated to punish somebody, so He punished Himself through Christ.  In Orthodox, God loved humanity so much that He sacrificed Himself, not to Atone for humanity's punishment for sin, but to abrogate such punishment in the first place.  He shed His Blood to open the doors for Grace, as indeed you've alluded to as well, however it was not to bear mankind's punishment, but simply to demonstrate His effective love for us.

This strawman is really getting old.

[HabteSelassie]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

The catch is Atonement/Penal Substitution portrays a radically different view of God and the nature of God than is found in Orthodox.  Penal Substitution teaches a vengeful God that was obligated to punish somebody, so He punished Himself through Christ.  In Orthodox, God loved humanity so much that He sacrificed Himself, not to Atone for humanity's punishment for sin, but to abrogate such punishment in the first place.  He shed His Blood to open the doors for Grace, as indeed you've alluded to as well, however it was not to bear mankind's punishment, but simply to demonstrate His effective love for us.

This strawman is really getting old.

I grew up Baptist so sorry, that is not a strawman. However, if you disagree with either Atonement theory in general, or with my interpretation you are free to chime in anytime with alternative explanations, but NBA fans like myself have word for calling a foul when there is no foul, quit flopping

stay blessed,
habte selassie

[Ashman618]

So then we understand hell as a place that one is sent to by Christ for punishment? And heaven vice versa?

[Ashman618]

The catch is Atonement/Penal Substitution portrays a radically different view of God and the nature of God than is found in Orthodox.  Penal Substitution teaches a vengeful God that was obligated to punish somebody, so He punished Himself through Christ.  In Orthodox, God loved humanity so much that He sacrificed Himself, not to Atone for humanity's punishment for sin, but to abrogate such punishment in the first place.  He shed His Blood to open the doors for Grace, as indeed you've alluded to as well, however it was not to bear mankind's punishment, but simply to demonstrate His effective love for us.

This strawman is really getting old.

What is the proper understanding of penal/atonement one should have?

[Melodist]

What is the proper understanding of penal/atonement one should have?

A jailbreak. We don't get out of our sentence only because Christ took on our sentence, but because he took on our sentence and then was found innocent and released, negating the sentence.

[Delphine]

From the Canon of Preparation for Holy Communion:

The Lord is good: O taste and see! For of old He became like unto us for our sake, and offered Himself once as an offering to His Father, and is ever slain, sanctifying them that partake of Him.

In what way was Christ "an offering to His Father"?

[Nephi]

From the Canon of Preparation for Holy Communion:

The Lord is good: O taste and see! For of old He became like unto us for our sake, and offered Himself once as an offering to His Father, and is ever slain, sanctifying them that partake of Him.

In what way was Christ "an offering to His Father"?

Someone else may be able to explain a bit more than I, but I'll note quickly that Christ being an offering to the Father simply refers to him being a sacrifice, and is irrelevant to him bearing the wrath of the Father or not. Too many people, perhaps unintentionally, associate the two as being different sides of a coin when they are not.

[Maximum Bob]

So then we understand hell as a place that one is sent to by Christ for punishment? And heaven vice versa?

I don't, and I know I'm not alone, I view Hell as the fiery presence of God as experienced by those who don't want to experience it and Heaven as that same fiery presence experienced as light and love by those who do want to be there.

[Ashman618]

So then we understand hell as a place that one is sent to by Christ for punishment? And heaven vice versa?

I don't, and I know I'm not alone, I view Hell as the fiery presence of God as experienced by those who don't want to experience it and Heaven as that same fiery presence experienced as light and love by those who do want to be there.

Yes but that would make the fires of hell uncreated, and the eternal fire "prepared" for The devil would be God Himself, so then to you hell is not a place we are sent but our perception of God's uncreated light?

[Ashman618]

What is the proper understanding of penal/atonement one should have?

A jailbreak. We don't get out of our sentence only because Christ took on our sentence, but because he took on our sentence and then was found innocent and released, negating the sentence.

This sounds more like Christ conquering death by death and to those in the tombs bestowing life then a reparation or atonment for an offense.

[Wyatt]

For most evangelical protestants, the way to receive the grace won for us on Calvary is to be "saved" (pray the sinners prayer). This is the way that evangelicals believe that we are saved by the Blood of Jesus. For the high-church, sacramental denominations like the Episcopalians and Lutherans, they would, for the most part, agree with Catholics and Orthodox that the Eucharist connects us to the redemptive power of the Blood of Jesus. I know this due to being a former protestant.

[Melodist]

A jailbreak. We don't get out of our sentence only because Christ took on our sentence, but because he took on our sentence and then was found innocent and released, negating the sentence.

This sounds more like Christ conquering death by death and to those in the tombs bestowing life then a reparation or atonment for an offense.

The bolded words don't mean "punishment" in a strict literal legal sense, not even in our human courts of law. Reparations are for repairing and undoing damage. Atonement is about reconciliation, that is healing broken relationships.

[Ashman618]

A jailbreak. We don't get out of our sentence only because Christ took on our sentence, but because he took on our sentence and then was found innocent and released, negating the sentence.

This sounds more like Christ conquering death by death and to those in the tombs bestowing life then a reparation or atonment for an offense.

The bolded words don't mean "punishment" in a strict literal legal sense, not even in our human courts of law. Reparations are for repairing and undoing damage. Atonement is about reconciliation, that is healing broken relationships.

Ok so then it's safe to say that any type of atonment that has to do with satisfying God need for justice or anything related to that line of thinking is just way off? I dare say even plain wrong?

[Nephi]

Ok so then it's safe to say that any type of atonment that has to do with satisfying God need for justice or anything related to that line of thinking is just way off? I dare say even plain wrong?

One comment I've heard said that the entire event of the atonement and reconciliation is God's justice, and so justice is satisfied by creation being reconciled with its creator.

[Maximum Bob]

So then we understand hell as a place that one is sent to by Christ for punishment? And heaven vice versa?

I don't, and I know I'm not alone, I view Hell as the fiery presence of God as experienced by those who don't want to experience it and Heaven as that same fiery presence experienced as light and love by those who do want to be there.

Yes but that would make the fires of hell uncreated, and the eternal fire "prepared" for The devil would be God Himself, so then to you hell is not a place we are sent but our perception of God's uncreated light?

Yeah, that's a pretty good summary of what I'm saying and not just me I've seen threads on it here, read about it in other literature even got it from our Priest. Regarding the "prepared" it's been awhile since I've read the in depth stuff on it someone else may be able to address that better. Still it's not dogma, my main point is simply that not everyone would agree that Hell is about punishment.

[Melodist]

Ok so then it's safe to say that any type of atonment that has to do with satisfying God need for justice or anything related to that line of thinking is just way off? I dare say even plain wrong?

It's more the absence of the resurrection than anything else that bothers me about the penal substitution that is commonly taught by Protestants. Christ's death and resurrection can be found together in the apostles preaching in Acts and in references in the epistles.

He was delivered for our offenses and raised for our justification.

Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:

Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.

[David Young]

It's more the absence of the resurrection than anything else that bothers me about the penal substitution that is commonly taught by Protestants.

You have (in my view) picked up on something important here. I have long said that we Evangelicals put far too little emphasis on the victory of Christ's Resurrection. I am not saying for a moment that we should emphasise the penal substitution less, but I believe our week-by-week preaching and hymn-singing have an imbalance between these two true themes. We need to read Aulen's Christus Victor.

I do attempt to rectify the balance in some measure in my own preaching and teaching.

[Mivac]

I often wonder Is the fire of hell created? Where can I find that in the scriptures?

Our Lord (Matt. 25:41) spoke of "the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels." I cannot imagine who would have "prepared" it, except the Almighty.

It would seem that prepared is not speaking of as something being built or made, but something provided e.g. the eternal fire. 

[JamesRottnek]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

The catch is Atonement/Penal Substitution portrays a radically different view of God and the nature of God than is found in Orthodox.  Penal Substitution teaches a vengeful God that was obligated to punish somebody, so He punished Himself through Christ.  In Orthodox, God loved humanity so much that He sacrificed Himself, not to Atone for humanity's punishment for sin, but to abrogate such punishment in the first place.  He shed His Blood to open the doors for Grace, as indeed you've alluded to as well, however it was not to bear mankind's punishment, but simply to demonstrate His effective love for us.

This strawman is really getting old.

I grew up Baptist so sorry, that is not a strawman. However, if you disagree with either Atonement theory in general, or with my interpretation you are free to chime in anytime with alternative explanations, but NBA fans like myself have word for calling a foul when there is no foul, quit flopping

stay blessed,
habte selassie

I can just as easily say the Orthodox God is a masochist because He sent His Only-Begotten Son into our world to be brutally tortured by the Romans, and then nailed to a cross, where He died under the most unpleasant of circumstances.  And before you start talking about how it was out of love for man, let me ask you, could God only have accomplished what He did through the death of Christ?  Is God so weak He was unable to accomplish salvation (in all the many meanings that word holds for the Orthodox) without His son dying?  Could He not have destroyed death by His very decree, just as He brought into existence, existence itself?  Yet, for some reason, the Father ordained that His son should die.  That is reality for any Christian theology.

[Ashman618]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

The catch is Atonement/Penal Substitution portrays a radically different view of God and the nature of God than is found in Orthodox.  Penal Substitution teaches a vengeful God that was obligated to punish somebody, so He punished Himself through Christ.  In Orthodox, God loved humanity so much that He sacrificed Himself, not to Atone for humanity's punishment for sin, but to abrogate such punishment in the first place.  He shed His Blood to open the doors for Grace, as indeed you've alluded to as well, however it was not to bear mankind's punishment, but simply to demonstrate His effective love for us.

This strawman is really getting old.

I grew up Baptist so sorry, that is not a strawman. However, if you disagree with either Atonement theory in general, or with my interpretation you are free to chime in anytime with alternative explanations, but NBA fans like myself have word for calling a foul when there is no foul, quit flopping

stay blessed,
habte selassie

I can just as easily say the Orthodox God is a masochist because He sent His Only-Begotten Son into our world to be brutally tortured by the Romans, and then nailed to a cross, where He died under the most unpleasant of circumstances.  And before you start talking about how it was out of love for man, let me ask you, could God only have accomplished what He did through the death of Christ?  Is God so weak He was unable to accomplish salvation (in all the many meanings that word holds for the Orthodox) without His son dying?  Could He not have destroyed death by His very decree, just as He brought into existence, existence itself?  Yet, for some reason, the Father ordained that His son should die.  That is reality for any Christian theology.

I'll put myself out there and say no there was no other way, God forgive me, but I don't think that makes Him week AT ALL

[HabteSelassie]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

I can just as easily say the Orthodox God is a masochist because He sent His Only-Begotten Son into our world to be brutally tortured by the Romans, and then nailed to a cross, where He died under the most unpleasant of circumstances.  And before you start talking about how it was out of love for man, let me ask you, could God only have accomplished what He did through the death of Christ?  Is God so weak He was unable to accomplish salvation (in all the many meanings that word holds for the Orthodox) without His son dying?  Could He not have destroyed death by His very decree, just as He brought into existence, existence itself?  Yet, for some reason, the Father ordained that His son should die.  That is reality for any Christian theology.

However what you are saying is not representative of the Fathers.  The Church has favored a love instead of punishment approach. After all, Christ IS GOD, so when GOD dies on the Cross, its not like God is punishing Himself.  Rather, God is demonstrating effectively, dynamically, physically (i.e. created rather than uncreated/Divine) His Love for Mankind.  He is not bearing our punishment, He is God! Is it really painful for God to die? That is the catch, perhaps sometimes we get Passion of the Christ about it, and begin to propose in our minds' eye a vision of a purely Human Christ.  When Christ was on the Cross, His Body was Human, but He is God.  The pain He felt and endured in His Body was very real, and the place of Hades/Sheol/Death to which His Soul entered into the Resurrect the Old Testament Saints was also very real, however HE IS GOD! So is God truly pained in an existential sense by that experience? Or in fact, as the Fathers teach, rather then being victimized or pained by Death, rather did Christ SANCTIFY Death, making it Holy?

stay blessed,
habte selassie

[Melodist]

It's more the absence of the resurrection than anything else that bothers me about the penal substitution that is commonly taught by Protestants.

You have (in my view) picked up on something important here. I have long said that we Evangelicals put far too little emphasis on the victory of Christ's Resurrection. I am not saying for a moment that we should emphasise the penal substitution less, but I believe our week-by-week preaching and hymn-singing have an imbalance between these two true themes. We need to read Aulen's Christus Victor.

I do attempt to rectify the balance in some measure in my own preaching and teaching.

I know you have similar posts on here regarding the importance of the resurrection. Unforunately, it's not uncommon to hear a preacher preach a gospel of salvation and omit the resurrection becasue it's not necessary because everything is accomplished in Christ's death (that's just not true and it's not biblical). I have a hard time finding the right words to express what's wrong with that because Christ died and death is the punishment for sin, which can be found defined in scripture as the transgression of the law. When Christ is crucified, he represents the putting to death of the "old man" (to use another biblical term). So legal language can be applied, and it's hard to draw distinctions when the same words are used to describe two different things. But we're not released from our sentence simply because it was put on someone else. Christ's resurrection is His release from that sentence that nullifies it and allows us to be released from that same sentence. It is in Christ's death that the "old man" is put to death, but it is in Christ's resurrection that the "new man" receives life. Both are essential for our salvation, not just one or the other, and they both work together.

This isn't necessarily aimed at you, I know you've expressed your views on this here before. It's just an observation of what I've seen and heard in my experience in (as a Protestant) and encounters with (since becoming Orthodox) Protestantism. It's just been recently over the last few years that I've been able to begin to notice this after years of Orthodox church services, prayers, reading scripture, and reading On The Incarnation really helped to put things into perspective and then hearing a Protestant preacher preach salvation without mentioning the resurrection in the simplest terms he could that it just clicked.

[David Young]

reading On The Incarnation really helped to put things into perspective

As you know, before retirement I was Director of an Evangelical mission which works in Albania. I got Athanasius' On the Incarnation translated into Albanian and published in Tirana. It circulates not only among us Evangelicals, but was gratefully received also at the Orthodox seminary. A very good book indeed.

[JamesRottnek]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

I can just as easily say the Orthodox God is a masochist because He sent His Only-Begotten Son into our world to be brutally tortured by the Romans, and then nailed to a cross, where He died under the most unpleasant of circumstances.  And before you start talking about how it was out of love for man, let me ask you, could God only have accomplished what He did through the death of Christ?  Is God so weak He was unable to accomplish salvation (in all the many meanings that word holds for the Orthodox) without His son dying?  Could He not have destroyed death by His very decree, just as He brought into existence, existence itself?  Yet, for some reason, the Father ordained that His son should die.  That is reality for any Christian theology.

However what you are saying is not representative of the Fathers.  The Church has favored a love instead of punishment approach. After all, Christ IS GOD, so when GOD dies on the Cross, its not like God is punishing Himself.  Rather, God is demonstrating effectively, dynamically, physically (i.e. created rather than uncreated/Divine) His Love for Mankind.  He is not bearing our punishment, He is God! Is it really painful for God to die? That is the catch, perhaps sometimes we get Passion of the Christ about it, and begin to propose in our minds' eye a vision of a purely Human Christ.  When Christ was on the Cross, His Body was Human, but He is God.  The pain He felt and endured in His Body was very real, and the place of Hades/Sheol/Death to which His Soul entered into the Resurrect the Old Testament Saints was also very real, however HE IS GOD! So is God truly pained in an existential sense by that experience? Or in fact, as the Fathers teach, rather then being victimized or pained by Death, rather did Christ SANCTIFY Death, making it Holy?

stay blessed,
habte selassie

You are avoiding the point: It matters not whether it was love or punishment (and by the way, suggesting that if Christ was suffering the punishment of our sins, His death was not one solely born of love, is rather outrageous), unless your propose that God is not all powerful, that He was not able to accomplish what He accomplished through the death of Christ, without His Son undergoing excruciating pain (I'm not entirely sure in what sense you're using the term 'existential' when you ask whether or not Christ's pain was existential, but I think you'd be hard pressed to really find support for the idea that Christ did not suffer exactly as any human being would have suffered going through the same, unless you look to the Nestorians, or the Apocalypse of Peter), then you must concede that the Father chose for His Son to suffer brutally and die.  Christ Himself asked that the Father "let this cup pass" from him.  Protestantism's understanding (save perhaps the Calvinists) of the death of Christ is no more bloody or savage than Orthodoxy's, unless you can show me legitimate support for the idea that God is not omnipotent and was powerless to accomplish what He did, without Christ's death.

[walter1234]

What is the proper understanding of penal/atonement one should have?

A jailbreak. We don't get out of our sentence only because Christ took on our sentence, but because he took on our sentence and then was found innocent and released, negating the sentence.

Haha!! I am Protestant now, may be convert soon. This is exactly how Protestant Christians understand the salvation . They understand it in this way:
God sets and offers a number of harsh rules/laws which men cannot keep. Men cannot refuse His offer as well. If you reject God's offer, you deserve to be tortured by God forever.

Later,all men break the law of God and has to pay a divine payment to God. However, nobody is divine and able to repay this divine debt. Thus, God put all men in the jail and ready to torture all of them forever . Because God "love" all men, so He sent His only son to save them. Finally, God tortures and kills His only son on the cross. Thus, His justice and wrath is satisied. All the believers' debts are also repaid by Christ. So, God releases the believers from the jail and no longer want to torture them anymore!!

I often wonder Is the fire of hell created? Where can I find that in the scriptures?

Before I study the Orthodox,I have struggled with the teaching of hell in bible for a long time.Protestant Christians teaches that hell just like torture room in jail. They teaches that Hell is a place / torture room that God creates in order to show angry,take revenge, hate, abundon, burn, torture the unbelievers/ his enemies forever and forever. I cannot accept this notion of God(e.g. A God keeps asking us to love and even pray for our enemies, but He is the one who keep hating His enemies forover ).

Orthodoxy understanding of Hell really make me surprise. Its understanding of Hell does not distort God's love as well as denies the eternal torment.

[Ashman618]

It seems to me Walter that God has blessed you with wisdom to recognize truth!!!!! May His mercy and blessings continue to be with you!

[walter1234]

Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

I can just as easily say the Orthodox God is a masochist because He sent His Only-Begotten Son into our world to be brutally tortured by the Romans, and then nailed to a cross, where He died under the most unpleasant of circumstances.  And before you start talking about how it was out of love for man, let me ask you, could God only have accomplished what He did through the death of Christ?  Is God so weak He was unable to accomplish salvation (in all the many meanings that word holds for the Orthodox) without His son dying?  Could He not have destroyed death by His very decree, just as He brought into existence, existence itself?  Yet, for some reason, the Father ordained that His son should die.  That is reality for any Christian theology.

However what you are saying is not representative of the Fathers.  The Church has favored a love instead of punishment approach. After all, Christ IS GOD, so when GOD dies on the Cross, its not like God is punishing Himself.  Rather, God is demonstrating effectively, dynamically, physically (i.e. created rather than uncreated/Divine) His Love for Mankind.  He is not bearing our punishment, He is God! Is it really painful for God to die? That is the catch, perhaps sometimes we get Passion of the Christ about it, and begin to propose in our minds' eye a vision of a purely Human Christ.  When Christ was on the Cross, His Body was Human, but He is God.  The pain He felt and endured in His Body was very real, and the place of Hades/Sheol/Death to which His Soul entered into the Resurrect the Old Testament Saints was also very real, however HE IS GOD! So is God truly pained in an existential sense by that experience? Or in fact, as the Fathers teach, rather then being victimized or pained by Death, rather did Christ SANCTIFY Death, making it Holy?

stay blessed,
habte selassie

You are avoiding the point: It matters not whether it was love or punishment (and by the way, suggesting that if Christ was suffering the punishment of our sins, His death was not one solely born of love, is rather outrageous), unless your propose that God is not all powerful, that He was not able to accomplish what He accomplished through the death of Christ, without His Son undergoing excruciating pain (I'm not entirely sure in what sense you're using the term 'existential' when you ask whether or not Christ's pain was existential, but I think you'd be hard pressed to really find support for the idea that Christ did not suffer exactly as any human being would have suffered going through the same, unless you look to the Nestorians, or the Apocalypse of Peter), then you must concede that the Father chose for His Son to suffer brutally and die.  Christ Himself asked that the Father "let this cup pass" from him.  Protestantism's understanding (save perhaps the Calvinists) of the death of Christ is no more bloody or savage than Orthodoxy's, unless you can show me legitimate support for the idea that God is not omnipotent and was powerless to accomplish what He did, without Christ's death.

The wages of Sin is death. Sin itself cause the suffering and death.

I would understand that Jesus took upon himself our sin and the sufferings which come from SIN itself (e.g. the pain, sarrow , curse, death,etc) on cross , but not God's punishment. SO, the sufferings which come from Sin would be removed. We can get healed and deliverance from Sin and the sufferings.

Through his Resurrection, He did not only take upon himself our sin and become sin.HE even conquered the SIN and the sufferings which come from SIN itself. HE defeated and won over all of them.

[Nephi]

A God keeps asking us to love and even pray for our enemies, but He is the one who keep hating His enemies forover

This is a really interesting point that I haven't heard before. I like it.

[Melodist]

God sets and offers a number of harsh rules/laws which men cannot keep. Men cannot refuse His offer as well. If you reject God's offer, you deserve to be tortured by God forever.

Later,all men break the law of God and has to pay a divine payment to God. However, nobody is divine and able to repay this divine debt. Thus, God put all men in the jail and ready to torture all of them forever . Because God "love" all men, so He sent His only son to save them. Finally, God tortures and kills His only son on the cross. Thus, His justice and wrath is satisied. All the believers' debts are also repaid by Christ. So, God releases the believers from the jail and no longer want to torture them anymore!!

What is the place of the resurrection in this?

[walter1234]

God sets and offers a number of harsh rules/laws which men cannot keep. Men cannot refuse His offer as well. If you reject God's offer, you deserve to be tortured by God forever.

Later,all men break the law of God and has to pay a divine payment to God. However, nobody is divine and able to repay this divine debt. Thus, God put all men in the jail and ready to torture all of them forever . Because God "love" all men, so He sent His only son to save them. Finally, God tortures and kills His only son on the cross. Thus, His justice and wrath is satisied. All the believers' debts are also repaid by Christ. So, God releases the believers from the jail and no longer want to torture them anymore!!

What is the place of the resurrection in this?

Protestant teaches that death is the punishment of GOd rather than a natural consequence after sin. To Protestant, Resurrection of Jesus did not only destroy death , but also imply defeating the punishment of GOd. On the other word. Jesus is more powerful than God/ God's punishment.

Jesus defeat God/God's punishment(e.g death). Indeed , it is totally nonsense. Thus, Protestant Christians do not mention  the resurrection when they peach the gospel

[Melodist]

God sets and offers a number of harsh rules/laws which men cannot keep. Men cannot refuse His offer as well. If you reject God's offer, you deserve to be tortured by God forever.

Later,all men break the law of God and has to pay a divine payment to God. However, nobody is divine and able to repay this divine debt. Thus, God put all men in the jail and ready to torture all of them forever . Because God "love" all men, so He sent His only son to save them. Finally, God tortures and kills His only son on the cross. Thus, His justice and wrath is satisied. All the believers' debts are also repaid by Christ. So, God releases the believers from the jail and no longer want to torture them anymore!!

What is the place of the resurrection in this?

Protestant teaches that death is the punishment of GOd rather than a natural consequence after sin. To Protestant, Resurrection of Jesus did not only destroy death , but also imply defeating the punishment of GOd. On the other word. Jesus is more powerful than God/ God's punishment.

Jesus defeat God/God's punishment(e.g death). Indeed , it is totally nonsense. Thus, Protestant Christians do not mention  the resurrection when they peach the gospel

In the above messsage, is Christ's resurrection necessary for our salvation or are we saved by virtue of the fact that Christ is punished on the cross instead of us so there is no longer a need to punish us regardless of whether or not Christ is raised from the dead?

[walter1234]

God sets and offers a number of harsh rules/laws which men cannot keep. Men cannot refuse His offer as well. If you reject God's offer, you deserve to be tortured by God forever.

Later,all men break the law of God and has to pay a divine payment to God. However, nobody is divine and able to repay this divine debt. Thus, God put all men in the jail and ready to torture all of them forever . Because God "love" all men, so He sent His only son to save them. Finally, God tortures and kills His only son on the cross. Thus, His justice and wrath is satisied. All the believers' debts are also repaid by Christ. So, God releases the believers from the jail and no longer want to torture them anymore!!

What is the place of the resurrection in this?

Protestant teaches that death is the punishment of GOd rather than a natural consequence after sin. To Protestant, Resurrection of Jesus did not only destroy death , but also imply defeating the punishment of GOd. On the other word. Jesus is more powerful than God/ God's punishment.

Jesus defeat God/God's punishment(e.g death). Indeed , it is totally nonsense. Thus, Protestant Christians do not mention  the resurrection when they peach the gospel

In the above messsage, is Christ's resurrection necessary for our salvation or are we saved by virtue of the fact that Christ is punished on the cross instead of us so there is no longer a need to punish us regardless of whether or not Christ is raised from the dead?

Yes, to Protestant, "Resurrection of Jesus" only showed His  glory, nothing to do with our salvation.

[Melodist]

Yes, to Protestant, "Resurrection of Jesus" only showed His  glory, nothing to do with our salvation.

Are you or have you ever been a Protestant?

[walter1234]

Yes, to Protestant, "Resurrection of Jesus" only showed His  glory, nothing to do with our salvation.

Are you or have you ever been a Protestant?

I am Protestant now, but consider to convert to Orthodox. Protestant's 'God' is a dictator, ganster, murder ( who even kills His innocent and only begotten son) ,torturer ( who hates,burns and tortures His enemies forever)!

[walter1234]

It's more the absence of the resurrection than anything else that bothers me about the penal substitution that is commonly taught by Protestants.

You have (in my view) picked up on something important here. I have long said that we Evangelicals put far too little emphasis on the victory of Christ's Resurrection. I am not saying for a moment that we should emphasise the penal substitution less, but I believe our week-by-week preaching and hymn-singing have an imbalance between these two true themes. We need to read Aulen's Christus Victor.

I do attempt to rectify the balance in some measure in my own preaching and teaching.

I don't know how Protestant can emphasis the victory of Christ's Resurrection with its false teaching of ' Sin and death'. As what I mentioned before, Protestant teaches that death is the punishment of God rathan than the natural consequence after men sin. Then, "Resurrection of Christ" did not only destroy death , but also imply that Jesus defeated God and God's punishment. On the other word. Jesus is more powerful than God.

Jesus defeated God/ the punishment of God through His Resurrection  . It is absolutely nonsense.  I wonder how you can emphasis ' Resurrection of Christ " with Protestant's false teaching of 'Sin and Death'.

[David Young]

...also imply that Jesus defeated God and God's punishment. .... It is absolutely nonsense.

It is indeed: except that that's not what we say. We say he took our punishment. "With his stripes we are healed."

[walter1234]

It's more the absence of the resurrection than anything else that bothers me about the penal substitution that is commonly taught by Protestants.

You have (in my view) picked up on something important here. I have long said that we Evangelicals put far too little emphasis on the victory of Christ's Resurrection. I am not saying for a moment that we should emphasise the penal substitution less, but I believe our week-by-week preaching and hymn-singing have an imbalance between these two true themes. We need to read Aulen's Christus Victor.

I do attempt to rectify the balance in some measure in my own preaching and teaching.

Most Protestant Christians just avoid the victory of Christ's Resurrection because they cannot reconile that with their teaching of 'Sin and Death' and 'penal substituion '.

However, You also said and agreed that Protestant put far too little emphasis on the victory of Christ's Resurrection. Then, I am really very interested that how you can reconcile the victory of Christ 's Resurrection with Protestant's teaching of 'SIN and Death' and 'penal substitution'. Can you explain it to me?

You cannot just avoid it, like most Protestant Christians.