Theologians refer to something called the “penal substitutionary theory of atonement” (PSA), which is a complicated way of trying to explain that Christ died in the place of sinners, taking on himself the full sentence we deserved in order to fully satisfy God with respect to sin. PSA is the traditional way of understanding one aspect of what the Lord Jesus was doing on the cross.
A number of people have proposed alternative theories of atonement — offering, in effect, substitutes for substitution — primarily because they dislike the idea of an angry God displaying his wrath against sin.
Matthew Distefano is one of the more recent to do this, and since he’s writing a book about it, we’ve been examining what he has to say. But before we consider his alternatives to traditional atonement theology, we’d best go over what the Bible has to say about the subject.
Examining the Scriptures
In yesterday’s post, we defined “atonement”. The Hebrew word used for it in the Old Testament carried the idea of covering over sin, which is what the animal sacrifices offered under the Law of Moses were designed to do, albeit temporarily. The Greek words used in the New Testament to discuss the concept have more to do with paying a ransom or striking a deal, but the broader concept is the same: satisfying God with respect to a debt owed because of sin’s offensiveness. Only the offering of a perfect sacrifice could ever accomplish an atonement that would last for eternity, which is what humanity desperately needed. Christ provided that satisfaction to the Father when he offered himself on our behalf.
So then, let’s trace the idea of penal substitutionary atonement through our Bibles. I’m not looking to include every single reference, but just enough to establish clearly that the scriptures teach it from cover to cover. Note that all three of the required elements — the penalty, the substitution, and God’s satisfaction — are present in nearly every reference.
Penal Substitutionary Atonement Through the Bible
The first clear indication of substitution is found in Genesis 22. We have sacrifices before that (such as Abel’s acceptable sacrifice in Genesis 4, or Noah’s after the Flood) but no explicit teaching about the fact that the sacrifice covers over the sin of the person offering it. It might simply have been an act of worship, as opposed to an acknowledgement of the need for atonement. Prior to Abraham’s aborted sacrifice of Isaac, he correctly predicts, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So Isaac is spared, a replacement found, and the possibility of a permanent atonement provided by God broadly hinted at, in that God did not provide a lamb to substitute for Isaac, but rather a ram. Abraham was not wrong, he was just a little premature: the Lamb was still to come.
Then we come to the Levitical offerings: “Aaron shall offer the bull as a sin offering for himself and shall make atonement for himself and for his house.” Here it becomes clear that Aaron and his house are estranged from God and need to be brought near. They cannot serve God until they are purified. The same holds true for the nation and for the average Israelite. Bulls, goats and lambs bore the penalty for sin in place of the sinner, and God was satisfied … for the present. Even so, Hebrews explains the problem with these animal sacrifices. Their ability to cover over sin was temporary: “The law … can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near.” The problem lay both in the satisfaction of God and the purification of the worshiper’s conscience. Neither lasted.
Isaiah hints prophetically at a permanent sacrifice that God would provide through Messiah: “But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed”, and later, “He bore the sin of many.” Here the need for atonement is expressed in four different ways.
In the New Testament, John the Baptist identifies Abraham’s long-promised lamb: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” Jesus himself confirms that a redemption price is necessary: “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Paul expresses the work of atonement in this way: “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” Peter agrees: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.” Later, he adds, “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God.”
All these passages articulate the need for men and women to perfected in the eyes of God in order to be at peace with him for eternity and at ease in our own consciences, and the fact that the solution was for Christ to take the judgment due to us and bear it on our behalf. Taken together, I believe they demonstrate that the traditional theological position with respect to atonement is both biblical and pervasive.
Changing Our Way of Thinking
But the traditional view of atonement leaves Matthew Distefano dissatisfied. He strongly dislikes the idea that sinners need to be saved from the righteous wrath of God. Instead of sinners who have offended God with our sinfulness, he posits a world full of suffering souls who lack self-esteem. To avoid the penalty-paying aspect of Christ’s substitutionary sacrifice, he puts forth the following false dichotomy:
“The sacrifice of Jesus is not to be thought of as something that changes God and his mind, it is something that God does through Jesus that changes us and our ways of thinking. Thus, it saves us.”
Now, atonement certainly changes our way of thinking, he’s not wrong about that. Redemption through the blood of Christ purifies the human conscience from dead works to serve the living God, as the writer to the Hebrews tells us, something animal sacrifices could never accomplish. The problem is with the way Distefano frames his alternative, as “something that changes God and his mind”. I don’t particularly like the phrasing, as if God needed to rethink his position on sin or the human condition, or to be persuaded against his better judgment to drop his case against the human race. I would rather say that atonement enables God to permanently and completely forgive sinners while remaining holy and just in the process, which is how Paul frames it (“that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus”). God’s mind didn’t change when his Son made atonement for sin, but atonement frees him up to respond to us in the way he always wanted to without compromising his character.
When we remember that atonement was God’s idea in the first place, framing it the way Distefano does seems inadequate and misleading.
But the bigger problem is with the idea that the primary purpose of atonement was to affect how with think and feel about ourselves. There is no reason that atonement could not accomplish both goals — peace between God and man, and peace for both God and man — and other things as well. So Distefano has no compelling reason to set the two goals of atonement in opposition, or to prioritize human feelings over God’s satisfaction with Christ.
Alternative Theories of Atonement
Here are the two options Distefano proposes to replace PSA. He prefers the second:
1/ The Moral Influence theory of atonement: that the life and death of Christ is the model for our own lives. In laying down his life, he set the example for us to lay down our lives for one another.
The defect in making this the primary theory of atonement is that it doesn’t deal with any of the verses that make the sin question an issue, and leaves God’s satisfaction out of the picture entirely. In short, it’s not really atonement at all.
2/ The Christus Victor theory of atonement: that Christ came to set humanity free from Satan’s power, conquering sin and death. This one at least has a few scriptures to commend it:
“Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.”
“He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.”
“The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.”
While conquering sin and death is yet another thing Christ’s death accomplished, it is not truly a theory of atonement. God is not really a substantial part of the equation, and the violation of his unutterable holiness not the primary issue. The problem with the Christus Victor theory is that it makes sin into an abstraction that can be conveniently viewed as separate from the sinners who perform it.
Having Christ conquer sin and death on my behalf is a lovely thought, and the scriptures teach it, but the fact is that the sin that he conquered came out of my own evil heart, and it wasn’t all a product of my fear of death and lack of self-esteem. I was just plain wicked at times, because I wanted to be and I could be. That aspect of things needed to be dealt with. It was not just my sins that offended God, it was my sinfulness at the core. It was not just that I was sick and had no peace, as Isaiah says, but as Isaiah also says, I was a transgressor and a committer of iniquities. Moreover, I had a history of accumulated guilt for which the righteous penalty was death, and the heavenly jury had already declared its verdict against me. That sentence had to be dealt with in some way.
Christus Victor doesn’t solve that problem for me. PSA does.
Indisputable Atonement
In the end, even those who prefer alternative theories of atonement admit the existence of PSA. Distefano’s last paragraph contains this telling admission:
“Could PSA still be the most correct understanding of the Cross? Sure. One can find substitutionary language all throughout the Scriptures. One can read about God’s wrath and judicial nature as well. This cannot be disputed.”
In the end, Distefano’s rejection of PSA boils down to this: “[PSA theology] caused me great grief and confusion. For a time, it even played its part in driving me to atheism.”
Welcome to the gospel, Matthew. It tells us things about ourselves that we really don’t like. For my part, I’m immensely grateful that Christ not only conquered sin and death for me, but he also conquered the part of me that embraced them. That’s the part of me that needed to go, and it’s the part that kindled the righteous wrath of God.
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