bling,
That doesn't answer my questions to you: What do you consider is a more accurate biblical teaching of the atonement? Or, don't you agree with the doctrine of atonement?
What happens if the Bible + Spirit for you comes to a different conclusion than the Bible + Spirit for me?
Oz
That cannot happen if we are following the same Spirit.
You can start by reading my post 104 which just briefly explains Is. 53.
But also:
Yes I very much believe in atonement, but Jesus only provided the atonement sacrifice and was the High Priest in the atonement process.
What ever atonement explanation, you wind up accepting, has to agree with the fact Christ's sacrifice was a literal ransom payment and not just like a ransom payment. Jesus, Paul, Peter, John and the Hebrew writer all describe Christ's torture, humiliation and murder as a ransom payment.
This does not mean the Ransom Theory of Atonement is correct since this "theory" has God paying the ransom to an undeserving satan. God owes satan
nothing and since God could just as easily and safely take His children without paying satan, it would actually be wrong for God to pay satan.
We can all agree on the payment being the torture. humiliation, and murder of Christ.
We can all agree on Deity making this huge sacrificial payment.
We can all agree on the child set free to enter the Kingdom and be with God are Christians (you must enter like a child only).
The issue than is who is the undeserving kidnapper being paid this huge ransom payment and how does this ransom payment have value to the kidnapper?
We already said it could not be satan so we agree on that.
Some have tried to say he is death, sin or evil but those are intangibles and cannot value Christ's crucifixion and really need nothing paid to them.
Some say the analogy does not go that far, but it is not an analogy and it makes no sense without a kidnapper.
Some say God takes the payment, but that means God is the criminal (kidnapper) which means He would be undeserving. So those that believe this turn around and say: "God is deserving", but that means it is not a ransom payment. Even beyond this issue: what value would God get out of the torture, humiliation ands murder of Christ, unless God is blood thirsty? Who and why have this as a payment? Does God have a problem?
If you think about it there is another person running around in this whole scenario and that is the rebellious disobedient sinner himself, who certainly does not deserve anything and cannot go to God without first becoming as another person (a child). Think about the prodigal son: was it the same rebellious disobedient young son who left home, the one who returned home the same way he left? Who dragged that son away from his father forced him to do wicked things and ended up holding the son in a pigsty (the rebellious disobedient prodigal son himself)? When you talk to a nonbeliever who are you trying to convince to let go, take the ransom and become a new person?
The problem with believing the nonbeliever is the kidnapper is the fact all the popular theories of atonement do not address that possible conclusion.