"Regenerate" to "Natural Man" in 1 year!!!

[Zurich]

Zurich, God's word states over and over that He is angry at sin, and angry with unrepentant sinners who willfully defy Him and refuse to submit to His Lordship over their lives. God's anger is righteous though-- unlike our human anger much of the time. If God's own word says that He is angry at sin, and angry with unrepentant sinners (and that they will be punished with His wrath unless they repent of sin and turn to Christ), who are you going to believe-- God or certain church fathers and theologians?

Well, would you really say that a sinner who invites God to consume him with his wrath, desiring to be purified from his sin and transfigured by God is "refus[ing] to submit to His Lordship over their lives"? Because it seems that such a person is showing a lot of trust and faith in God and wishes to be corrected and led into all righteousness. They expect that God's wrath with have this as its end.

I would have to wonder if you are really understanding what it is I am describing if you characterize such a person as "unrepentant ." They do indeed wish to repent. They believe that God's punishment is the loving guidance by which he helps them to repent -- to leave their sin. Repentance, restitution, confession, prayer for forgiveness, righteous dealing thereafter, is the make-up for sin.


As for the Bible, isn't this up for interpretation? In C.S. Lewis's Anthology of George MacDonald, Lewis quotes MacDonald:

Is not God ready to do unto them even as they fear, though with another feeling and a different end from any which they are capable of supposing? He is against sin: insofar as, and while, they and sin are one, He is against them-against their desires, their aims, their fears, and their hopes; and thus He is altogether and always for them.

That thunder and lightning and tempest, that blackness torn with the sound of a trumpet, that visible horror billowed with the voice of words, was all but a faint image ... of what God thinks and feels against vileness and selfishness, of the unrest of unassuageable repulsion with which He regards such conditions.

When we say that God is Love, do we teach men that their fear of Him is groundless? No. As much as they fear will come upon them, possibly far more. . . . The wrath will consume what they call themselves; so that the selves God made shall appear. It is the nature of God, so terribly pure that it destroys all that is not pure as fire, which demands like purity in our worship. He will have purity.

It is not that the fire will burn us if we do not worship thus; yea, will go on burning within us after all that is foreign to it has yielded to its force, no longer with pain and consuming, but as the highest consciousness of life, the presence of God. The man whose deeds are evil, fears the burning. But the burning will not come the less that he fears it or denies it. Escape is hopeless. For Love is inexorable. Our God is a consuming fire. He shall not come out till he has paid the uttermost farthing.

​

C.S. Lewis: "George MacDonald, An Anthology." (Lewis: "In making this collection I was discharging a debt of justice. I have never concealed the fact that I regarded him as my master. This collection, as I have said, was designed not to revive MacDonald's literary reputation but to spread his religious teaching.")

 

[PapaLandShark]

Last year at this time, I was a devout Reformed Christian. I cherished the doctrines of Grace and loved God as he is presented.

By "presented" I will assume you mean Biblically?

But then slowly over the past year I began to become disturbed by this theology. I wished to be united with God,

United? How could a believer be separated? Tsk Tsk.

but DO NOT WISH to believe the presentation of him -- that he would lay penalties upon non-believing sinners for their sin,

Wait wait wait...Since when was God interested in what we, the created, wish to be? We are His creation...not the other way around.

that he would lay pain on the innocent Christ in the name of "justice" or "holiness,"

Pardon?! Did you somehow miss Jesus is God the Son? Who, exactly, do you think Jesus is? What did He go to the Cross for? What did He do there, for who, and why?

or that he would discriminate among humans -- pardoning some but penalizing others, or that the attribute of his character that we call "holiness" is anything other than a boon for the non-believing sinner when it operates full-force upon him. I wish to be united to God, but do NOT want to accept the theories of God-man relations presented.

Am I supposed to be impressed by a man made god here? I assure you that the Lord is not.

</snip> Great galloping galoshes. I cannot even begin to address the rest of this hogwash. Brother...I am deeply deeply worried for you.

So in short, in one year I moved from the belief that God enforces his law by rendering penalties against the non-believing sinner or Christ as his substitute, to the belief that God enforces his law by remedially judging and thereby correcting the sinner. To put it quite simply, using Spurgeon's analysis, I moved from being a regenerate man to a natural man in 1 short year.

What do you think?

2 Timothy 4
1. I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom:
2. preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.
3. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires,
4. and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths.

 

[Zurich]

What did He go to the Cross for? What did He do there, for who, and why?

Again, Byzantine theology understands the work of Christ as "Christus Victor" only rather than "penal substitution." Am I right to assume that you are familiar with these different ways of conceiving of the work of Christ?

 

[strengthinweakness]

Well, would you really say that a sinner who invites God to consume him with his wrath, desiring to be purified from his sin and transfigured by God is "refus[ing] to submit to His Lordship over their lives"? Because it seems that such a person is showing a lot of trust and faith in God and wishes to be corrected and led into all righteousness. They expect that God's wrath with have this as its end.

I would have to wonder if you are really understanding what it is I am describing if you characterize such a person as "unrepentant ." They do indeed wish to repent. They believe that God's punishment is the loving guidance by which he helps them to repent -- to leave their sin. Repentance, restitution, confession, prayer for forgiveness, righteous dealing thereafter, is the make-up for sin.





As for the Bible, isn't this up for interpretation? In C.S. Lewis's Anthology of George MacDonald, Lewis quotes MacDonald:

Is not God ready to do unto them even as they fear, though with another feeling and a different end from any which they are capable of supposing? He is against sin: insofar as, and while, they and sin are one, He is against them-against their desires, their aims, their fears, and their hopes; and thus He is altogether and always for them.

That thunder and lightning and tempest, that blackness torn with the sound of a trumpet, that visible horror billowed with the voice of words, was all but a faint image ... of what God thinks and feels against vileness and selfishness, of the unrest of unassuageable repulsion with which He regards such conditions.

When we say that God is Love, do we teach men that their fear of Him is groundless? No. As much as they fear will come upon them, possibly far more. . . . The wrath will consume what they call themselves; so that the selves God made shall appear. It is the nature of God, so terribly pure that it destroys all that is not pure as fire, which demands like purity in our worship. He will have purity.

It is not that the fire will burn us if we do not worship thus; yea, will go on burning within us after all that is foreign to it has yielded to its force, no longer with pain and consuming, but as the highest consciousness of life, the presence of God. The man whose deeds are evil, fears the burning. But the burning will not come the less that he fears it or denies it. Escape is hopeless. For Love is inexorable. Our God is a consuming fire. He shall not come out till he has paid the uttermost farthing.




​

C.S. Lewis: "George MacDonald, An Anthology." (Lewis: "In making this collection I was discharging a debt of justice. I have never concealed the fact that I regarded him as my master. This collection, as I have said, was designed not to revive MacDonald's literary reputation but to spread his religious teaching.")

You mention a sinner "inviting God to consume him (or her) with His wrath." The Bible never speaks of sinners "inviting" God into their lives, their "hearts," or anywhere else. Biblically speaking, God is the one who seeks out lost, God-resistant sinners and changes their hearts so that they want to come to Him. His word clearly states that no one seeks Him. He seeks sinners out, brings them to Himself, and then, after they have been established in a relationship with Him, they seek to know Him better and more deeply. Before He initiates and establishes a relationship with a lost sinner though (again, changing that person so that he/she will want to come to Him), that sinner does not seek Him or want anything to do with Him. That is how God's word presents things, relationally, between God and man.

As for God's wrath, for the Christian, God's wrath is not upon him/her at all, as it was put upon Christ on the cross in his/her place. Again, this is Biblical-- the doctrine of substutionary atonement is found all throughout the Bible. Animal were sacriced as a type of substitute for sinful man in the Old Testament, but ultimately, they could not form the sort of absolutely perfect sacrifice that was needed to pay for sins and to reconcile lost sinners to a perfectly holy God. Only the death of a sinless person could make up such a perfect, truly substitutionary atonement for lost, sinful people. This sinless person was/is Jesus Christ. This doctrine of substitutionary atonement is not the invention of man. Again, it is found all throughout the word of God. For sinners who repent of their sins and truly submit to Christ as Lord and Saviour, there is no fear of God's wrath. For the sinner who does not do so, there is no true rest from fear of God's wrath. God's wrath constantly hangs over unrepentant sinners who reject Christ. Christians are safe from God's wrath. He is displeased with their sins, and He will chastise them at times for those sins, but they are free from His ultimate wrath. They did not get to such a place by "inviting" God into their hearts though. God intervened and changed their hearts from stone to flesh, so that they would truly want to have a relationship with Him.

 

[PapaLandShark]

Again, Byzantine theology understands the work of Christ as "Christus Victor" only rather than "penal substitution." Am I right to assume that you are familiar with these different ways of conceiving of the work of Christ?

I've asked several important questions in my response to you Zurich. Why are you avoiding them?

 

[Zurich]

I've asked several important questions in my response to you Zurich. Why are you avoiding them?

Many of them were clearly rhetorical, e.g. "Do you expect me to be impressed." Give me three questions to answer, and then tell me if you are unfamiliar with the distinction between a "Christus Victor" understanding of the work of Christ and a "Penal substitution" theory.

 

[strengthinweakness]

Again, Byzantine theology understands the work of Christ as "Christus Victor" only rather than "penal substitution." Am I right to assume that you are familiar with these different ways of conceiving of the work of Christ?

Byzantine theology may "understand" the work of Christ as "Christus Victor only," rather than as "penal substutition." However, the question is, how does the Bible, which is God's word to man about God, speak of the work of Christ on the cross? The Bible clearly speaks of Christ on the cross as a substitutionary sacrifice, purchasing and securing redemption for lost, otherwise hopeless sinners. The Bible says that Christ endured God's wrath for sinners. Read what the Old Testament has to say, in so many places, about the animal sacrifices to God, and how the animals had to be without spot or blemish. Then read about Christ's death on the cross in the New Testament. Read what Paul has to say about it. He clearly presents Christ as our penal substitute on the cross. Paul's words about Christ in the Bible are no less inspired than the words of Jesus Himself.

 

[Zurich]

Byzantine theology may "understand" the work of Christ as "Christus Victor only," rather than as "penal substutition." However, the question is, how does the Bible, which is God's word to man about God, speak of the work of Christ on the cross?

I agree with C.S. Lewis that one can become converted to Christianity without assenting to the penal substitution theory; you can be a Christian without pretending to understand that theory:

Now before I became a Christian I was under the impression that the first thing Christians had to believe was one particular theory as to what the point of this dying was. According to that theory God wanted to punish men for having deserted and joined the Great Rebel, but Christ volunteered to be punished instead, and so God let us off. Now I admit that even this theory does not seem to me quite so immoral and so silly as it used to; but that is not the point I want to make. What I came to see later on was that neither this theory nor any other is Christianity.

The one most people have heard is the one I mentioned before -the one about our being let off because Christ had volunteered to bear a punishment instead of us. Now on the face of it that is a very silly theory. If God was prepared to let us off, why on earth did He not do so? And what possible point could there be in punishing an innocent person instead? None at all that I can see, if you are thinking of punishment in the police-court sense.

Theories about Christ's death are not Christianity: they are explanations about how it works. Christians would not all agree as to how important these theories are. My own church-the Church of England-does not lay down any one of them as the right one. The Church of Rome goes a bit further. I can only tell you, for what it is worth, how I, personally, look at the matter. . . . [Lewis proceeds to describe a purely Christus Victor theory of the work of Christ.]


​

Lewis: "Mere Christianity."

 

[strengthinweakness]

I agree with C.S. Lewis that one can become converted to Christianity without assenting to the penal substitution theory; you can be a Christian without pretending to understand that theory:

Now before I became a Christian I was under the impression that the first thing Christians had to believe was one particular theory as to what the point of this dying was. According to that theory God wanted to punish men for having deserted and joined the Great Rebel, but Christ volunteered to be punished instead, and so God let us off. Now I admit that even this theory does not seem to me quite so immoral and so silly as it used to; but that is not the point I want to make. What I came to see later on was that neither this theory nor any other is Christianity.

The one most people have heard is the one I mentioned before -the one about our being let off because Christ had volunteered to bear a punishment instead of us. Now on the face of it that is a very silly theory. If God was prepared to let us off, why on earth did He not do so? And what possible point could there be in punishing an innocent person instead? None at all that I can see, if you are thinking of punishment in the police-court sense.

Theories about Christ's death are not Christianity: they are explanations about how it works. Christians would not all agree as to how important these theories are. My own church-the Church of England-does not lay down any one of them as the right one. The Church of Rome goes a bit further. I can only tell you, for what it is worth, how I, personally, look at the matter. . . . [Lewis proceeds to describe a purely Christus Victor theory of the work of Christ.]




​

Lewis: "Mere Christianity."

Zurich, the "penal substituion theory" that you speak of is no theory at all. It is simply how Christ's death on the cross is presented to us in the Bible. You may not completely understand it; I don't completely understand the Trinity (and who does?). However, God's word teaches that He is one God-- the Bible is emphatic in its monotheism-- and yet within Him, there are three distinct "persons," the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. I don't completely understand it, but as the Bible teaches it, I am bound to accept. The Bible also teaches that Christ endured God's wrath on the cross for lost, depraved sinners who would repent of sin, submit to Him as Lord and Savior, and trust in Him for eternal life. You and I may not understand every exact detail or implication of the fact that Christ endured God's wrath for such sinners-- but the Bible teaches that it is a fact. Christians are bound to accept what His word says about Himself.

 

[Zurich]

As I said in my original post, I do not accept the penal substitutionary theory of the atonement. What thoughtful and reflective man can believe that blood can appease a God? And yet the penal substitution theory is based upon that belief. The Jews gave Jehovah the blood of animals, and according to the penal substitution theory, the blood of Jesus rendered possible the pardon of a fortunate few.

It is hard to conceive how the human mind can give assent to such a terrible idea.

Thankfully, the Nicene Creed neither states nor requires assent to this theory. Moreover, there are many denominations, including Lewis's Anglican Church, as well as Eastern Orthodox Churches, where this theory is not taught, and in some cases denied.

For example, Father Thomas Hopko, Dean Emeritus of the premiere Orthodox seminary in the US, St. Vladimir's, states:

When you die and enter the presence of love and you resist it that becomes a torture to you. St. Mark of Ephesus, a great Church father, refused to sign the council of Florence because of the papacy, the filioque, and because of the Latin teaching on material hellfire. He said that our Church tradition has no teaching on material-hellfire. We have no such teaching; God is not a punisher.

Jesus on the Cross was not punished for our sins. Jesus on the Cross loved and trusted God so He can destroy death by death. When I speak with that nuance I say that there is no such thing as punishment. The punishment comes from our own evil and the love of God upon us when we reject it. God is not torturing or punishing us.
http://home.it.net.au/~jgrapsas/pages/afterdeath.htm
​

 

[Jon_]

What do you think?

I think you don't know Christ and never did, but desperately need to.

It is written, "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God" (Rom. 3:20). Even so, because all men are sinful from the womb, as David testifies: "The wicked are estranged from the womb" (Ps. 58:3); his wise son, Solomon, concurring: "There is not a just man on earth that does good and sins not" (Ecc. 7:20). And the "wages of sin is death" (Rom. 6:23a). "But the gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ" (Rom. 6:23b), "who died for our sins according to the scriptures" (1 Cor. 15:3), for Christ "came to save that which was lost" (Matt. 18:11). Even more, he saved "his people from their sins" (Matt. 1:21). And, "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). Therefore, "Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins" (Acts 2:38), "for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved (Rom. 10:13). "But he that believes not is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God" (John 3:18).

Soli Deo Gloria

Jon

 

[Zurich]

You quote the Bible saying "The wages of sin is death" and by this mean that there is a penalty for the infraction of God's law that God would render upon the non-believing sinner or Christ as his substitute.


But I believe that, while it is true that evil choices lead to further evil (the wages of sin is death), the operation of God's fires upon the sinner is life! As St. Symeon the New Theologian said:

"God is fire and when He came into the world, and became man, He sent fire on the earth, as He Himself says; this fire turns about searching to find material &#8212; that is a disposition and an intention that is good &#8212; to fall into and to kindle; and for those in whom this fire will ignite, it becomes a great flame, which reaches Heaven.... this flame at first purifies us from the pollution of passions and then it becomes in us food and drink and light and joy, and renders us light ourselves because we participate in His light" (Discourse 78).

​

Divine judgment is corrective. I am not sure how I would "know Christ" more by believing contrarily. But I certainly see how I could get caught up in your discursive system by which to explain why Christ must die, what were the necessities and designs of God in permitting his death.

 

[strengthinweakness]

As I said in my original post, I do not accept the penal substitutionary theory of the atonement. What thoughtful and reflective man can believe that blood can appease a God? And yet the penal substitution theory is based upon that belief. The Jews gave Jehovah the blood of animals, and according to the penal substitution theory, the blood of Jesus rendered possible the pardon of a fortunate few.

It is hard to conceive how the human mind can give assent to such a terrible idea.

Thankfully, the Nicene Creed neither states nor requires assent to this theory. Moreover, there are many denominations, including Lewis's Anglican Church, as well as Eastern Orthodox Churches, where this theory is not taught, and in some cases denied.



For example, Father Thomas Hopko, Dean Emeritus of the premiere Orthodox seminary in the US, St. Vladimir's, states:

When you die and enter the presence of love and you resist it that becomes a torture to you. St. Mark of Ephesus, a great Church father, refused to sign the council of Florence because of the papacy, the filioque, and because of the Latin teaching on material hellfire. He said that our Church tradition has no teaching on material-hellfire. We have no such teaching; God is not a punisher.

Jesus on the Cross was not punished for our sins. Jesus on the Cross loved and trusted God so He can destroy death by death. When I speak with that nuance I say that there is no such thing as punishment. The punishment comes from our own evil and the love of God upon us when we reject it. God is not torturing or punishing us.
http://home.it.net.au/~jgrapsas/pages/afterdeath.htm


​

Zurich, you write that "Lewis's Anglican church" does not accept the doctrine (it is no theory-- it is a doctrine that the Bible teaches) of penal substitution on the cross. Now, C.S. Lewis himself did not accept this doctrine, and he did belong to the Anglican church. However, by not accepting this Biblical doctrine, I believe that he was not being faithful to what his own church held, in its confession of faith. Read the Thirty-nine Articles of the Anglican church. You may be very surprised. They are much more "Calvinist" than Lewis ever was. Lewis also strongly implied that he believed in purgatory, which is an unBiblical concept. Man is destined to die once, and then, to face judgment. No waiting period, no time of "purification." Christians are counted as "pure" through Christ's perfect sacrifice on the cross. For sinners who reject Christ, purgatory (if it existed) woud not save them from God's just wrath anyway.

You continue to make reference to certain church fathers. Why not start with what the Bible itself says about God, and about Christ's death on the cross, and have those authoritative statements as your grounding in truth and ultimate reference point? The saying of certain church fathers are worth nothing-- I say it again, nothing-- if they conflict with God's own word to us about Himself. His word very clearly teaches that Christ endured God's wrath on the cross for all sinners who repent of sin, submit to Him, and trust in Him for eternal life. Again, do you want to believe what God's own word says about Himself, or do you want to follow a church and/or theologian who makes more "sense" to you, but contradicts the clear teaching of the word?

 

[Zurich]

Lewis also strongly implied that he believed in purgatory, which is an unBiblical concept. Man is destined to die once, and then, to face judgment. No waiting period, no time of "purification." For sinners who reject Christ, purgatory (if it existed) woud not save them from God's just wrath anyway.

Strength,

You don't seem to understand what it is that certain theologians of the Christian church have said about the nature of the operation of divine judgment -- it is purgatorial punishment which shall have the effect of transfiguring the sinner.

You can join Lewis in calling this "Purgatory" if you would like, but the purpose of purgatory is not to "save sinners from God's wrath," but rather to expose the sinner to the operation of God's wrath. As St. Gregory of Nyssa taught:

The body is subject to various sorts of illness. Some are easy to treat, others are not, and for the latter recourse is had to incisions, cauterization, bitter medecine. We are told something of the same sort about the judgment in the next world, the healing of the soul's infirmities. If we are superficial people, that amounts to a threat, so that the fear may lead us to fly wrong wrongdoing. But the faith of deeper minds regards it as a process of healing and a therapy applied by God in such a way as to bring back the being he created to its original grace.

In fact those who by incisions or cauterization remove boils or warts that have formed contrary to nature on the surface of the body, do not bring about the healing without pain; but it is not to do harm to the patient that they carry out the incision. It is the same with the 'warts' that have formed on our souls. At the moment of judgment they are cut out and removed by the ineffable wisdom and power of him who is, as the Gospel says, the physician of the sick.
​

Gregory of Nyssa "Great Catechetical Oration." 8 PG 45, 36-37

 

[Zurich]

Why not start with what the Bible itself says about God, and about Christ's death on the cross, and have those authoritative statements as your grounding in truth and ultimate reference point?

I acknowledge no authority calling upon me to believe a thing of God, which I could not be a man and believe right in my fellow-man. I will accept no explanation of any way of God which explanation involves what I should scorn as false and unfair in a man. God may do what seems to a man not right, but it must so seem to him because God works on higher, on divine, on perfect principles, too right for a selfish, unfair, or unloving man to understand. To say on the authority of the Bible that God does a thing no honourable man would do, is to lie against God. But least of all must we accept some low notion of justice in a man, and argue that God is just in doing after that notion.

 

[strengthinweakness]

Strength,

You don't seem to understand what it is that certain theologians of the Christian church have said about the nature of the operation of divine judgment -- it is purgatorial punishment which shall have the effect of transfiguring the sinner.



You can join Lewis in calling this "Purgatory" if you would like, but the purpose of purgatory is not to "save sinners from God's wrath," but rather to expose the sinner to the operation of God's wrath. As St. Gregory of Nyssa taught:

The body is subject to various sorts of illness. Some are easy to treat, others are not, and for the latter recourse is had to incisions, cauterization, bitter medecine. We are told something of the same sort about the judgment in the next world, the healing of the soul's infirmities. If we are superficial people, that amounts to a threat, so that the fear may lead us to fly wrong wrongdoing. But the faith of deeper minds regards it as a process of healing and a therapy applied by God in such a way as to bring back the being he created to its original grace.

In fact those who by incisions or cauterization remove boils or warts that have formed contrary to nature on the surface of the body, do not bring about the healing without pain; but it is not to do harm to the patient that they carry out the incision. It is the same with the 'warts' that have formed on our souls. At the moment of judgment they are cut out and removed by the ineffable wisdom and power of him who is, as the Gospel says, the physician of the sick.


​

Gregory of Nyssa "Great Catechetical Oration." 8 PG 45, 36-37

Zurich, I know all too well what certain church fathers have said about the nature of God's wrath and God's punishment of sin and sinners. I used to be a Catholic, and I studied Catholic theology. I have also read Orthodox theology. On the subject of God's wrath and the nature of Christ's death on the cross, God's word is clear. Certain Catholic church fathers and Orthodox theologians may have their own ideas and theories about these subjects, but I am interested, first and foremost, in what God's word has to say. His word teaches Jesus's penal substitution on the cross. Jesus, who had no sin, became sin for lost sinners, and suffered God's wrath that they rightly deserved (and still deserve), so that they would be counted righteous by God, only by virtue of His death in their place. This is what the Bible teaches. You refer to the writings of church fathers repeatedly. Why not go to the Bible itself, and read Isaiah 53 (a "predictive prophecy" portrait of what Christ endured in the place of sinners on the cross), Romans 5:9, and 2 Corinthians 5:21, as just a start?

 

[Zurich]

Well, I guess then, we are switching places, because I have been Reformed all my life. When the heart recoils, discovering how horrible it would be to have such an unreality for God, it will begin to search about and see whether it must indeed accept such statements concerning God; it will search after a real God by whom to hold fast, a real God to deliver them from the terrible idol. In Byzantine theology I have found God.

God will never let a man off with any fault. He must have him clean. He will impute to him nothing that he has not, will lose sight of no smallest good that he has; will quench no smoking flax, break no bruised reed, but send forth judgment unto victory. He is God beyond all that heart hungriest for love and righteousness could to eternity desire.

 

[strengthinweakness]

God may do what seems to a man not right, but it must so seem to him because God works on higher, on divine, on perfect principles, too right for a selfish, unfair, or unloving man to understand.

This sentence in your post is very Biblically sound. It is exactly what I have been saying in this entire discussion. God is right to allow man to do those things which would be evil for God Himself to do. Again, as an example, God sometimes allows children to be hit by cars, when He, as God, could sovereignly keep such things from happening. If a human father allowed his child to be hit by a car, we would rightly say that he is either evil in doing so, or insane. However, God is neither evil nor insane, and He allows all sorts of things to happen to His children that human fathers would never allow. God does so because He has much larger, long-term (even eternal!), higher plans and purposes than we can begin to imagine or understand.

 

[strengthinweakness]

Well, I guess then, we are switching places, because I have been Reformed all my life. When the heart recoils, discovering how horrible it would be to have such an unreality for God, it will begin to search about and see whether it must indeed accept such statements concerning God; it will search after a real God by whom to hold fast, a real God to deliver them from the terrible idol. In Byzantine theology I have found God.

God will never let a man off with any fault. He must have him clean. He will impute to him nothing that he has not, will lose sight of no smallest good that he has; will quench no smoking flax, break no bruised reed, but send forth judgment unto victory. He is God beyond all that heart hungriest for love and righteousness could to eternity desire.

Zurich, you say that in Byzantine theology, you have found God. However, God has already spoken to us infallibly in the Bible. What about the Biblical passages that I mentioned, as just a start to look at the subjects of God's wrath and Jesus's death on the cross? Isaiah 53, Romans 5:9, and 2 Corinithians 5:21 speak to Jesus saving us from God's wrath by dying in the place of sinners. If you cannot accept what the Bible itself says about God's wrath and Jesus's death on the cross, does it really matter how much Byzantine theology appeals to you?

 

[Zurich]

Zurich, you say that in Byzantine theology, you have found God. However, God has already spoken to us infallibly in the Bible. What about the Biblical passages that I mentioned, as just a start to look at the subjects of God's wrath and Jesus's death on the cross? Isaiah 53, Romans 5:9, and 2 Corinithians 5:21 speak to Jesus saving us from God's wrath by dying in the place of sinners. If you cannot accept what the Bible itself says about God's wrath and Jesus's death on the cross, does it really matter how much Byzantine theology appeals to you?

I don't really understand the excitement that you have in this theory that God killed God to satisfy the so-called justice of God. I don't really get what it is about this theory that would encourage you to pore through the Bible for citations to it and then present it to others who have told you that they find it disturbing. It doesn't make sense that you would find it a joyful exercise to tell others these macabre and ghoulish theories of God-man relations. Is it some kind of pleasure to quote Bible verses to others that they wish they did not have to believe?

Now you came from a theological tradition that tempered this theology, and I don't know what would attract you to the Reformed church, having known something different. I, on the other hand, grew up in the Reformed tradition and only recently discovered that Christianity does not necessarily require belief in a God whom it is a horror to imagine. I am not so eager to reenter an iron cage of false metaphysics. Not when I know that there is something different.

Sad, indeed, would the whole matter be if the Bible had told us everything God meant us to believe. But herein is the Bible greatly wronged. It nowhere lays claim to be regarded as the Word, the Way, the Truth. The Bible leads us to Jesus, the inexhaustible, the ever-unfolding Revelation of God. It is Christ "in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge", not the Bible, save as leading to Him.

To believe in penal substitution, is to think to take refuge with the Son from the righteousness of the Father; to take refuge with his work instead of with the Son himself; to take refuge with a theory of that work instead of the work itself; to shelter behind a false quirk of law instead of nestling in the eternal heart of the unchangeable and righteous Father. Mercy belongs to God and needs no contrivance of theologic chicanery to justify it.