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Was Christ really punished for our sins?

chris4243

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What's the punishment for the worst of the forgivable sins, if the person in question refused to let Jesus take the punishment on his behalf? In the Old Testament it would seem it was just death. But how I was brought up, the punishment would be an eternity in hell.

Now, the Scriptures tell of how Christ bore our sins, all of them, and was punished for them. This meant he was crucified, died, spent 3 days in the tomb, and rose again. It doesn't quite seem like he spent an eternity in Hell. Did Christ spend an eternity in Hell? Is an eternity in Hell really the punishment for sin? If the punishment for sin is nothing but physical death, what need have we of Jesus?
 

Mark_Sam

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Since God is eternal, and every sin is done against Him, they must be punished eternal. Look at these Scriptures:

And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake,
Some to everlasting life,
Some to shame and everlasting contempt. -Daniel 12:2

These shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, -2 Thessalonians 1:9

Here are Jesus' own words:
“Then He [the Son of Man] will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels: -Matt 25:41

Yes, our Lord Jesus Christ was punished for our sins. Since He is God incarnate, fully human and fully God, He could suffer an eternity in a few hours on the cross. When he said "It is finished!", He was done suffering.

What do you believe happens to a humen being after physical death? That in death, their ransom is paid, and they go straight to heaven? Since both believers and un-believers die physically, this would render Christ's atonement in vain, and God never does anything in vain.
 
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MrPolo

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Did Christ spend an eternity in Hell? Is an eternity in Hell really the punishment for sin? If the punishment for sin is nothing but physical death, what need have we of Jesus?

To answer your first question, substitutionary atonement is a false doctrine. If it was true, we wouldn't even experience physical death, which as you point out, is a consequence of sin, and still exists after Christ's work.

Remember, Scripture describes Christ as a ransom. In antiquity this is something given in exchange for something owed, and does not need to be an exact duplicate of the debt. In other words, Christ doesn't have to go to hell for eternity in order to be a full ransom for mankind. As Mark_Sam pointed out, Christ is also an eternal being of infinite innocence, and in that sense, covers any eternal sin of a temporal human being.

Rather, the perspective I think we must focus is that God sent His only Son because He so loved the world---not because He demanded an exact punishment. Christ's sacrifice is an act of infinite love. If substitutionary atonement was required, then how can one say God is merciful when His wrath was supposedly entirely "appeased"?

As for your second question, sin has more consequence than temporal death. For example, when you wrong your neighbor, not only do you sin against God, but your neighbor. There's 2 consequences. And you damage your own soul because sin causes habit (i.e. as Scripture says, he who sins is slave to sin). So there are all kinds of consequences to sin that weaken us and stain our souls. Fortunately, before entering the perfection of heaven, those true children of God will be completely purified by His blood.
 
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walterquez

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If the punishment for sin is nothing but physical death, what need have we of Jesus?
God did not create us to die for that would defeat creating us in His image. Why would God let His image be trampled by death? He came to set us free from death and restore us back to Himself.
 
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Hillsage

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You are asking good questions Chris. And you are right about the OT. Reread the beginning in the Garden and see what the punishment is. The answer is temporal pain and suffering in childbirth for the woman along with being ruled by her husband, and for Adam...cursed ground and hard work because you are going to be eating the plants of the field because they got kicked out of the garden. And because you're kicked out of the Garden you aren't going to have access to the tree of life, so you're going to DIE physically. No mention anywhere there, or in the OT, about going to hell for eternity. Also no mention of "dying spiritually" like we hear of from so many.

Now, the Scriptures tell of how Christ bore our sins, all of them, and was punished for them. This meant he was crucified, died, spent 3 days in the tomb, and rose again. It doesn't quite seem like he spent an eternity in Hell.
Another good observation and question IMO. He never changed the bill for sin...he became the required price (by becoming perfect) and paid it, with his life...in three days. If the bill was suffering now and then death, and death is truly supposed to be defined as 'eternal torture in hell' then that price doesn't appear to have been paid scripturally. Your only dilemma is the traditions and commandments of men, both of which are spoken against in the NT.

Did Christ spend an eternity in Hell? Is an eternity in Hell really the punishment for sin? If the punishment for sin is nothing but physical death, what need have we of Jesus?
Many bibles don't have the word 'eternal' in them. They are translated according to faithfulness to the Greek and not to the doctrines of orthodoxy. I would recommend reading some of them and see what they say. Some translations are Rotherham's, the Concordant literal Version and Young's Literal Translation. Young's was written by the same person who wrote Young's concordance which is also highly respected by many. I must warn you, they are not 'easy' reading. They are translations which which were written to be more consistent according to the Greek and the laws of grammar.
 
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chris4243

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Yes, our Lord Jesus Christ was punished for our sins. Since He is God incarnate, fully human and fully God, He could suffer an eternity in a few hours on the cross. When he said "It is finished!", He was done suffering.

I'm not sure how this is consistent with being fully human, nor even how it could possibly follow from Jesus being fully God. God can exist outside of time, so the passage of time is rather irrelevant to Him. But Jesus was in this world, inside of time and so a few hours for Jesus is a few hours for us.
 
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James1979

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Jesus died in body and soul to pay for the sins of his people, as the required payment for sins is written in Romans 6:23. The wages of sin is death. At the same time though, the Spirit of God raised up the Son the Lord Jesus Christ so that death would no longer have dominion over him (Romans 6:9, Romans 8:11) and that he can share the same glory and honor along with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

So for those who don't become saved, the body and soul will no longer exist once the person has died physically and the soul departs from the body because the wages of sin is death and death will always have dominion over the body and soul as long as eternity exist. That's why salvation is so needed by the sinner from God. It's mind-bending and scary at the same time that you might never wake up ever again and not even know that you're dead!!
 
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kelc09

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God is the one who set the atonement for sin. Leviticus is filled with how that atonement was made during OT times. Many sacrifices were made year after year because no one sacrifice could cover all there sins. Jesus was sent to be that perfect sacrifice, the perfect lamb. So yes His death does cover the eternal punishment for our sins. Anyone who doesn't accept His gift that person's punishment is spiritual death, not physical. A physical death is just a reminder of the brokenness in this world.
 
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holyrokker

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An atonement, essentially, is an offering made by a guilty person as a symbol of repentance. It's an acknowledgement that the offering cannot "make up" for the wrong, but is a plea for forgiveness.

Christ is our atonement. He is the offering for our repentance. This offering doesn't "make up" for our sin, but is a plea for our forgiveness.

If Christ "paid the penalty" for our sin, then nobody is forgiven.
 
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chris4243

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An atonement, essentially, is an offering made by a guilty person as a symbol of repentance. It's an acknowledgement that the offering cannot "make up" for the wrong, but is a plea for forgiveness.

Hm, I've never considered it like that. However, I don't think that Jesus is an offering made by a guilty person as a symbol of repentance. The people who killed Jesus seem to have been quite happy to do so, and I saw no evidence that they were repentant, either, nor do I think they acknowledged their wrongs nor Jesus as a sacrifice for them. And given that Jesus was already sacrificed, the rest of us can't sacrifice Him.

Christ is our atonement. He is the offering for our repentance. This offering doesn't "make up" for our sin, but is a plea for our forgiveness.

If Christ "paid the penalty" for our sin, then nobody is forgiven.

But if God can forgive part of the penalty, why not forgive the whole penalty?
 
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hlaltimus

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Jesus was both properly divine and properly human together in one entire person. Now as being divine, he had an inherently infinite and direct value to the scale of inifinity, which directly infinite value he did not honestly possess as a typical Jewish man, when considered as a common man and as a man alone. However, since the "Son of David" (his humanity) was joined to the same entire person that the Son of God (his divinity) was joined to, that humanity enjoyed an associate or indirect value to the scale of infinity, by virtue of the fact that his manhood was a part of the whole person in which his proper divinity was still placed. So, when Christ the Messiah died, he did not die in his divinity, (an utter impossibility,) but he died only in his humanity, but this humanity was reckoned as though it were infinite in value, since it was still a part of the entire person in which was a truly infinite, divine, peerless and now highly unique being.

Therefore, since Christ had an indirect or associate infinite value as a common Jewish man, when he died, that death accrued an infinite valuation to redeem any proposed infinite number of sinners, regardless of the cost involved in their redemption. This is why the Lord only needed to "descend into the heart of the earth" for 3 days: Since this unique being was indirectly infinite in personal value, the loss involved in his death was likewise a truly infinite loss, and so no further punishment was requisite subsequent to his death, since no further punishment could ever exceed the value of the death which he had already accomplished upon the cross. Christ descened into the nether world of the dead not so much to suffer further for sins as some think, but only to fulfill the procedural requirement of the law for a sinner to go to the place of death for sins, and the cross of calvary was not really the place of death, only access to the place of death...Sheol.

I also conjecture or propose that you will find upon your perfecting study of the death of the Messiah in eternity, that the angels guarded the corpse of Jesus within his cold and cheerless tomb, as that was where the divinity of Christ was temporarily stored for further use. Christ the Messiah had descended into the realm and state of death, in which state he could never be properly considered as "dead" himself, were he still in possession of his divinity. Oh ponderous and omniscient Being! When Christ the Messiah died, he lost his physical life as a common man, but still needed his divine life not only to indirectly valuate that human loss to the infinite, but furthermore he needed to retain his primary, untouched and perfect divine life to ascend by, since he could not ascend purely as a man as that life had been properly lost upon the cross. He needed to be a true man to fulfill the letter of law, a true man to die as though he had disobeyed that law...needed to have an infinite valuation placed upon an otherwise finite human loss...and yet still needed his divinity not in order to descend into Sheol, but rather to escape from it.

What this priceless, matchless and beneficent Being did would be absolutely impossible for anyone other than a being who was both properly human and divine, and so avoid like a black plague from gehenna any teaching that robs Christ of his full manhood and full divinity. Such a preposterous, so called "redeemer", would be absolutely useless for our redemption, but praise God, he who is the "Son of David" is likewise the "Son of God".
 
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holyrokker

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God can, and DOES forgive. Jesus offered an atonement, not a payment. It's neither a full payment, nor a partial payment. It's not a payment of any type.

There was no atonement that we could make ourselves for the depravity of our sins. Jesus became a man, so that as a man, He could become our atoning sacrifice.

The atonement allows us to come before the Father and humbly beg for forgiveness.

An atonement is a symbol of the guilty person's repentance. By accepting Christ's sacrifice as our own atonement, we are identifying with Him. We are crucified with Him, thereby He can be our atonement: Our pledge of full and complete repentance.

God will not, and cannot forgive us without that full and complete repentance.
 
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holyrokker

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A few years ago, Kobe Bryant was publicly shamed for cheating on his wife. He begged for her forgiveness, and brought an atonement in the form of a multi-million-dollar diamond ring.

She forgave him, not because of the ring, but because the ring represented his repentance.

Likewise, the Father forgives us because our identifying with Christ's sacrifice represents our repentance.
 
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CryptoLutheran

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This largely hinges on how we understand "died for our sins". I take some issue with the idea that Jesus was a "penal substitute", that doesn't particularly seem to jive much with Scripture or the historic teaching of Christianity. This doesn't necessarily mean there isn't a penal (or perhaps more accurately, judicial) dimension.

Of course, in Christ, there is true forgiveness of sins. It's real forgiveness, when Christ died we all died; sin was crucified and crushed, He is true Victor over sin, hell and death. It's not simply a potential for forgiveness, it's real forgiveness.

-CryptoLutheran
 
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*Enigma*

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It doesn't quite seem like he spent an eternity in Hell. Did Christ spend an eternity in Hell? Is an eternity in Hell really the punishment for sin?

No, obviously He did not spend an eternity in Hell. Acts 2:27 validates that, "For you will not leave my soul in Hades (Grave),... Not the "Hell" - Gehenna Fire where the fate of the incorrigbly wicked will be destroyed.

"Is an eternity in Hell really the punishment for sin?" Would a merciful Eternal God punish unrepentant sinners in hell for all eternity? Ponder it for a moment, really would He? Seriously I can't find any evidence that endorses it. In Matt 10:28 ".....But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell (Gehenna). Notice it does not state people would be subject to perpetual torment Jesus said that God can destroy - annihilate both soul & body in Gehenna (Hell). They die -cease to exist not still living in eternal torment.



 
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*Enigma*

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If the punishment for sin is nothing but physical death, what need have we of Jesus?

If you desire eternal life - the need for Jesus is paramount.
We have all trangressed God's laws - sin. He had to die for us because that was the only way God could mercifully forgive our sins. Sin is the violation of God's law 1 John 3:4. Our disobedience results in the death penalty Rom 5:12,six:23. If Christ had not paid the death penalty for our trangressions the consequences are death without hope, true goal & purpose, not be resurrected to Eternal Life in the Gods wonderful Kingdom to come.
 
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chris4243

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So you say annihilation is the punishment for our sins. Was Christ destroyed/annihilated/ceased to exist as punishment for our sins?
 
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