WHAT DOES “JESUS DIED FOR US” MEAN? Q's and Responses

My previously posted sermon (Feb. 10, 2026) on the above topic raised some good questions that were directed to me personally.  It is likely that others had the same type of questions.  This post consists of the questions and my responses.  I say "responses" rather than "the answers" because the latter sounds too definitive.  I am a finite person with limited understanding, studying the Bible as well as I can.  These are my responses.  As abbreviated as they are, they are still quite lengthy, but I hope that they are helpful. 

Q #1: I really appreciate the distinction between covenant language and atonement language.  God's grace again is the driving force.  But I don't really understand the transition to the blood sacrifice after genuine repentance.  Comments? 

Response: Here is an analogy.   God is beyond this world and our comprehension (God is super-natural).  In a sense, then, we can only speak about God metaphorically, using the language of our world, the natural.  Religious ritual is a richer, more dramatic, more complex way about communicating the nature of God and relationship with God.  Example: ancient temples and sites divided places into more and less sacred space, something which has carried over the architecture of many churches.  The closer one came to a sacred object (altar, inner chamber, image, etc.), the more one was encroaching on the dangerous sacred space of the god and had to be "cleansed," sanctified, and prepared to do so -- often as a priest.  

Most of the religious rituals of ancient Israel were picked up from the cultures around them, but the Israelites de-mythologized them, stripping them of their polytheism and literal beliefs in magic meant to encourage or manipulate the gods.  The adapted Israelite rituals become dramatized, symbolic acts rather than acts of coercive magic.

In Israel, the Temple symbolized God's dwelling place.  Israelites knew God did not literally live there.  Moreover, since sin has a real consequence in terms of impeding our relationship with God, sins were dramatically represented as polluting areas of the Temple, such that people would be alienated from God, and God would eventually "leave" (Ezekiel's messages).  Note that the emphasis was on sin polluting God's place, not the sinner.  The penetrating effect of sin varied: inadvertent sins of the individual did not penetrate into the more sacred areas/parts of the Temple as deeply as deliberate sins of the individual and community.  While there are many different offerings and sacrifices, the ones dealing with sin required a ritual that symbolically cleansed the place/object of pollution such as the outer altar, the holy chamber, or the ark of the covenant (Day of Atonement) in the holiest chamber.  In these rituals, blood is the main symbol.  The polluting effect of sin is uncleanness, chaos, and death.  However, blood, particularly that of a “pure” animal without blemish, was a tangible, manipulable symbol of life that is more potent than death.  Note, too, that the death of the animal is not focal point; an unblemished animal provided the blood necessary for the cleansing atonement.  That "life" sprinkled or poured or wiped on a sin-polluted altar/object of God, symbolized it being cleansed and then reconsecrated, with the result that there was no longer an impediment in one's relationship with God, atonement had occurred. 

My point was about how confession (repentance) is what results in God's graceful forgiveness.  However, to represent that restored relationship, the sin offering had to be offered and the blood applied to remove  symbolically, not magically, the pollution and to return the state of things to normal -- atonement.

The NT authors talk about Jesus bearing/lifting sins just as the Old Testament does about God/Yahweh lifting/bearing sins as a metaphorical expression for forgiveness -- one of many metaphors.  I cannot imagine that a trained rabbi like Paul, when using the sacrificial language of the Temple believed in pagan magic of sins being put onto a scapegoat or person who then "pays the price" to fool or appease the gods

Q #2:  NT:  God has made possible a new covenant in which I am not only forgiven of sin but the way to him has been forever made open through the cleansing blood of the Lamb.  But doesn't, in this case, the cleansing come before the confession, repentance, and forgiveness?  A new relationship to God has been offered to those who entrust their lives to him.  And that new relationship is really new life, a life like the original human life was meant to be and a life that even now we know will go on forever.  Jesus' death is more like the passover lamb shed for the covering and freeing of the Israelites in Egypt, but somehow this all fits together.

Response:  Great insight, question, and observations.  I cannot give a proper reply without giving it the depth it deserves, but superficially I would answer your question about cleansing being first with a qualified "no" that is somewhat covered by your own following comments about a new life. 

As an introductory note, your example about the Passover Lamb, referred to in the Gospels at the Last Supper, is not a sin-cleansing ritual, but is an example of “somehow this all fits together.”  There are two allusions in those NT texts.  First, the Passover event was part of a pre-Mosaic, covenantal act of God, along with the plagues, that revealed to the Hebrew slaves in Egypt God’s sovereign nature and God’s commitment to the Abrahamic covenant by delivering them from Pharaoh.  Blood as symbolic of life (mentioned below) protected them from the Angel of Death.  Celebrating the Passover recalled that deliverance.  Secondly, Jesus refers to his blood as initiating a new covenant (Mark 14:24) such as in the ritual one finds in Gen 15:7-21.  Neither allusion is about cleansing from sin.  However, the “new covenant” will be viewed by the first Christians as including Gentiles.

To put things into a clearer perspective, we modern Christians need to back up a step from our typical Gentile point of view.  Paul thinks about Jesus as the Messiah for the Jews -- those who accept Jesus as Christ are/become the true Israel.  To explain PART of the work of Christ, Paul uses atonement language proper, such as Jesus being the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant (Rom 3:25, the physical "intermediary" between God and the Israelites, often poorly translated metaphorically as "sacrifice" or "propitiation;" but see YLT or NET) and, mixing metaphors, as Jesus being the sin-offering (Rom 8:3; 2Cor 5:21, with the latter sometimes poorly rendered as "sin").  A Jew, of course, would see sacrificial-atonement language as first calling for confession/repentance, a point made in my sermon. 

However, two further co-considerations complicate the matter.  First, Paul sees the total work of Christ (expressed by "faith/faithfulness of Christ") to have brought about, as you note, a new age and the ultimate expression of the "faith/faithfulness of God" and God’s righteousness (Romans 3).  (This is a similar line of thought to the Gospels' presentation of Jesus as inaugurating the Kingdom of God.)  For Paul, to be "in Christ" (participatory theology) means that a person is no longer under the reign of sin and death that has ruled since the time of Adam.  The one who "believes into Christ" belongs to the reign of the Spirit and life (see Romans 5-8).  In this reign, a person is no longer under the guidance of the Law/Torah including sacrificial ritual and the role of the Temple symbolism.  (Think of the participatory theology in the Book/Letter of Hebrews.)  The full work of Christ -- atonement in the technical sense AND much more -- has brought the believer/entruster into a new life and way of living. 

Second, the co-consideration is that the full work of Christ takes us back prior to Moses and the Law to fulfill the promises to Abraham of being a blessing to the nations/Gentiles.  It is important to Paul, regarding the inclusion of Gentiles, to explain to Jewish Christians that God receives people as "righteous" (in right relationship) simply by faith (entrusting oneself to God), citing Hab 2:4 (Rom 1:16-17) and alluding to Abraham and Gen 15:6 (see his discussion in Romans 4 and Gal 3:6-14).  So, again we see that God offers a covenant relationship to Gentiles, just as with Abraham, prior to any "cleansing."  The grace of God is always primary.  However, the notion now of "cleansing" is that it has been taken care of once for all for those in Christ who repent.  It appears to me that the author of 1 John is thinking the same way when he states, "But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous, forgiving us our sins AND cleansing us from all unrighteousness" (1 Jn 1:9 NET, caps is my addition).

WHAT DOES “JESUS DIED FOR US” MEAN?

Note: With Lent coming up soon, I decided to post a sermon that I gave to some lay pastors.  It covers points found in some previous devotions, but communicates them differently.

Opening:
Text: Romans 5:6-8.

First, let me offer a disclaimer about my false advertising.  I could never cover the full meaning of the statement, “Jesus died for us.”  What I want to do is address one model of understanding that statement that is popular, but, I believe is non-biblical; and then I want to point us in the right direction for understanding the language about his death.
    I have always warned ALPS students that I am a teacher and not a preacher, so this time will be no different.  But, I think it is OK, because thinking more deeply about Jesus is also worshipful and encouraging.
    I have a difficult topic tonight, but one that is important to me.  I help my wife teach a 1^st-2^nd grade SS class.  (She is the expert.)  It caught my attention that a couple of the children would say that Jesus died for their sins, when they had no clue what that meant.  I got to thinking about how many adults also probably could not give a good explanation.
    As an OT scholar, I try to look at the words of Jesus or of someone like Paul from a Jewish perspective.  I am always pursuing the issue of what the text meant to the original audiences.  But, as I finite and fallible person, my conclusions may be wrong.  So, please, bear with me, think about it, and particularly seek God about it.

Prayer: “O God, you are aware of my foolish sins; my guilt is not hidden from you.  Let none who rely on you be disgraced because of me, O sovereign LORD and king!  Let none who seek you be ashamed because of me, O God of Israel! (Ps. 69:5-6, NET)

Overview
I have been thinking about how people look at the atoning work of Jesus.  Some of the early Church Fathers drew on concepts from their culture.  Anselm in 11th century drew on his model of the feudal system to explain that Jesus was a substitute for us to restore to God the honor he deserves.  In the 16^th cent. Martin Luther viewed Jesus as a substitute who bore our punishment for failure under the Law; and, John Calvin, a lawyer, further defined the atonement in terms of criminal law; Jesus bore our criminal penalties.  These models seem to me to be straying from what a 1^st century Jewish Christian would have thought.
    I want to make two main points.  The first is that the contemporary Church, particularly on a pop-level, focuses too much on the death of Jesus to the exclusion of the broader range of the whole work and ministry of Christ.  The second is that to better understand the meaning of the statement, “Jesus died for my sins,” we need to try to understand what a good Jew like Paul would have thought. 

Focusing on Death to the Exclusion of Jesus' Full Ministry
The first point is simple.  There is too much of a focus on the death of Jesus to the exclusion of his whole work.  Obviously, we talk about the resurrection, because without it Jesus’ death would be meaningless.  I am not minimizing that.  I am expanding.  There is more.  Scripture tells us that through Jesus, the Word of God, all things were created.  But, there is more.  Jesus emptied himself of his divine status, humbled himself, became incarnate and dwelt among us – the Light of the World in our midst.  But, there is more.  Jesus pronounced and taught about the newly inaugurated era of the Kingdom of God, in which you and I now participate.  God’s rule had begun in a new way.  And, Jesus performed signs and wonders that demonstrated that God’s Kingdom was indeed here in his person.  But, there is more.  He showed himself to be the perfect Adam, the perfect Israel, the perfect offering a new covenant, the perfect sin offering, and the perfect High Priest.  But, there is more.  His death was followed by the first fruits of the Resurrection, which proved his words, and which demonstrated his victory over death, sin, and Satan.  But, there is more.  Jesus dwells in believers through the Person of the Holy Spirit, and we dwell in Him as members of His Body.  But, there is more.  Jesus, in his humanity, having been tested and tempted in all ways, identifies with us in our weaknesses and at this very moment and intercedes for you and me before the throne of God.  His goal is that you and I might be made perfect in him and so be prepared for his Second Coming.
    A whole year’s worth of sermons could be preached on each of these points and this is a partial list.  So, I’m sure you get the point: the whole work and ministry of Jesus must be proclaimed to your congregations.

Better Understanding of “Jesus Died for My Sins”
The second point is to address the statement, “Jesus died for my sins.”  Again, we need to look view this wholistically.  Through the combined work of Jesus incarnation, his life and ministry, his death and resurrection, etc. Jesus receives a wide variety of titles that use the figurative language of the OT to capture who he is.  Jesus is savior, redeemer, one who pays a ransom, one who pronounces forgiveness, the seat of atonement, a sin offering, Passover lamb, perfect sacrifice, high priest, the new Man, the victor over death, victor over this world, victor over Satan and the principalities, etc.
    One issue that I repeatedly find in NT studies is that people tend to group most of those titles under the category of “atonement,” but atonement is used in a narrower sense in the OT.  The second issue is after having called most of that “atonement” some people try to settle on the mechanism of atonement in a very narrow way, and one that I do not find to be biblical. 

Penal Substitution
I want to address this model: Jesus is the penal substitute for my sins.  As I mentioned, this model, which has some antecedents that go back to Anselm, was mainly promoted by some leaders in the Reformation.  They held a legal notion of atonement that is foreign to the Temple language of atonement.  For them, God is a Judge, for whom every infraction against his holiness demands a legal penalty, which, because God is so holy, is the legal penalty of death.  In this view, our sins demanded our deaths; they were transferred over to the Son of God; and then God executed justice on Jesus by killing him.  As a result, this model holds, we can have a right relationship with God.  I understand that this model is supposed to show the grace of God: God is both the executioner and the victim.  However, as a scholar who reads the NT through the lens of the OT, my point that is that the NT writers, and particularly Paul, would not have thought about atonement in terms of penal substitution.

Covenant Language Vs. Atonement Language
The first point is that in the OT there is a difference between the language of God offering a covenant relationship and God providing a means of atonement for sin.  We must not overlook the language of covenant.  We need to separate the two.  When God offers a relationship to Abraham, God does not first cleanse him of sin.  There is no judicial punishment for his sinfulness.  God meets Abraham on his level and offers relationship.  It is all about grace.  God “cuts a covenant” with him.  In Gen. 15, the sacrificial animals are cut in half and placed opposite each other; and God, represented by a smoking fire-pot, passing through the bloody pieces to seal his covenant with Abraham.  Jesus, in the Eucharist refers to his blood as the blood of a new covenant.  This is not atonement language.  Then to keep his promises to Abraham, God later saves/rescues/ransoms/delivers Abraham’s descendants from slavery in Egypt.  This is not atonement language.  Then, later God offers a covenant relationship to the rescued Hebrew slaves without any punishment of sin, or sacrifices, or cleansing.  God lowers himself to their level to offer a relationship with him without precondition.  It is all about grace.
    This is important: What then made Abraham righteous in God’s sight?  It was not some substitutionary sacrifice.  We are told clearly in Gen. 15:6 that when Abraham believed God – or better, entrusted himself to God, God counted that as righteousness.  This becomes a key point in Paul’s argument about how the Gentiles, the nations, are included.  In Romans 3 and Galatians 3, Paul argues that those who are of the faith of Abraham, who entrust themselves to the God who raised Jesus from the dead, are children of Abraham, recipients of the promises.  The main point to remember is that God’s offer of relationship is purely by grace and not based on first punishing sins or cleansing someone.

Atonement Language
The second point is that atonement language follows covenant language.  Atonement language deals with our failure to be faithful to our relationship with God.  It is about restoring our covenant relationship with God when it is damage by our sin.  The atonement language of the Temple system was symbolic.  Sin is real, but it is not tangible.  Sin breaks our rapport with God, but again, it is not material.  The symbol system of the Temple was heuristic, educational; it graphically demonstrated the reality of sin.  The Temple represented God dwelling in the midst of his people, but God did not literally dwell there.  Sin symbolically polluted God’s dwelling place and threatened their relationship with God.  So, that pollution, or rot, symbolically had to be cleansed, and that was done through blood because it is the strongest tangible symbol of life.  Blood cleanses pollution.  The person providing the animal did so as a gesture of wanting to be forgiven and restored.  However, the killing of the animal is not the main part.  The main part was that first the sinner through public confession repented, having a heart-felt desire for a restored relationship with God.  Such repentance was greeted with God’s forgiveness, an act of grace.  Still, the Temple had to be cleansed from the pollution of sin to symbolize restored access by the individual or community to the Presence of God.  That is where the blood of the sacrifice comes in.  The animal was not a substitute being punished by death for the sinner.  Rather the pure, lifeblood of an unblemished animal provided the “cleansing agent” that was manipulated on the altar to cleanse away the pollution symbolically.  The whole process of forgiveness and a ritual offering communicated publicly and symbolically God’s mercy and grace.
    Let me give an example of another important ritual, that of the scapegoat on the Day of Atonement, a ritual which is mistakenly taken as a ritual of penal substitution.  Apparently, the Israelites borrowed this ritual from someone like the Hittites and changed it.  The Hittites believed that a person could magically transfer the sins of a person onto a goat, drive that goat into the desert, and fool the offended god or goddess who went chasing after that goat.  But, the Israelites did not believe that.  They did not believe that sins were somehow material and could be transferred by magic onto another person.  God is against such notions of magic.  God cannot not be fooled like demonic “gods.”  The Israelites adopted this ritual symbolically but adapted it to communicate the grace of God.  Again, repentance expressed by fasting and communal confession of sin was main part of the Day of Atonement.  Driving the scapegoat into the wilderness symbolized the removal of those sins to the realm where they belong, a place of chaos and death.  And, application of blood to the cover of the Ark of the Covenant (the mercy seat) symbolized the cleansing of the impediment of pollution between God and the people.
    In this sermon/teaching, I cannot go into all of the NT passages that speak about the death of Jesus and show how they are based on OT language and concepts, but I want to emphasize the symbolic nature of the language.  I am not minimizing sin.  Sin is real.  Sin has consequences.  But, God does not literally forget sins.  God does not literally move our sins as far as the east is from the west.  God does not literally cast our sins into the sea.  God does not literally cover over our sins.  God does not literally blot our sins out of the ledger.  God does not literally wash away sins.  God is not fooled by a goat carrying sins away into the wilderness.  This language was meant to help people realize the reality and seriousness of sin, and, most of all, to illustrate the unfathomable grace of God.
    In Isaiah 43, God is mad at Israel for not understanding this, and God say, “I, I myself, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake; your sins I do not remember.” (Isa. 43:25 Duke).  God forgives for God’s sake; God’s character is merciful and graceful.
    But, again, sin is seriously burdensome.  The main term in the OT that gets translated by the verb “forgive” is nasa.  It means to lift, to bear.  Our sins weigh us down and God lifts them; God bears them.  When Peter states in 1 Pet. 2:24 that Jesus bore our sins on the cross, he is not thinking some kind of magical manipulation of sins for penal substitution.  He is using good OT language.  [This also takes us into language that is borrowed from the Suffering Servant passages in Isaiah.  That is another concept.  Israel could see how the generation of those who suffered the Babylonian Exile bore the sins and punishment of many generations.  Paul picks up on that language as well in 1 Cor. 15:3-4 and Rom. 5.  But, I can cover the main concept but not every text.
    I want to come back to some atonement language in the NT and point out how rich the language is that Paul borrows from the Temple system.  For instance, in Rom. 3: 25, Paul calls Jesus the hilastarion.  Some translators have “expiation” or “propitiation,” but I am convinced that Paul knew the Jewish sacrificial system.  He is thinking of the Day of Atonement.  The hilastarion in the Greek version of the OT was the lid of the ark of the covenant, call the mercy seat.  It was the closest point symbolically connecting God to God’s people.  It was where the lifeblood of the sin offering was applied on the Day of Atonement to rid the pollution of the Israelites’ deliberate sin.  Paul is calling that hilastarion (mercy seat) Jesus.  However, later in Rom 8:3, Paul shifts his metaphorical language and refers to Jesus as the sin offering (hamartia) itself that provided the cleansing blood that was put on the mercy seat on the Day of Atonement.  [Depending on the context, hamartia can be translated generically as “sin” in many places, but in sacrificial contexts it was also the technical term for the “sin offering,” which is clearly what Paul means here.]  To blend language from John and Paul: Jesus, who is the Life, both provides the perfect, pure, cleansing lifeblood of the sin offering and is the point of mediation between God and humanity, the mercy seat.  That is wonderful language of grace. 

Summary
Let me summarize the main points.  The first simple point is that we need to preach the fullness of the work and ministry of Jesus, the fullness of his identity and roles.  Second, when we distinguish between the language of covenant relationship and that of atonement, we see the biblical model that God offers relationship with himself as pure grace.  He does not cleanse the person first.  There is no judicial punishment.  God, in humility condescends to offer himself in communion with us.  When people entrust themselves to God in that relationship, that is considered “righteousness.”  Third, when we do talk about the NT atonement language borrowed from the OT, we must be careful and ask what it meant to a Jew of that time.  When many people outside of the Church hear a pop-cultural, Christian model that everyone’s sins have been transferred to Jesus, who was then executed to exact the price of justice, they do not hear the Good News.  They do not hear a God full of grace.  The bottom line of what I am saying is that the language of the NT that draws on the sacrificial system in the OT was meant to communicate God’s grace and mercy in Jesus.  It is grace from the beginning to the end.

CONFESSION IS IMPERATIVE: WHY?

 I read the following statement in a devotion today, “Nothing new happens without apology and forgiveness.”#  The subject was confession.  (“Confession” both in the OT and NT has the basic sense of acknowledging something.)  I suppose most Christians are familiar with, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1John 1:9).  Why is confession imperative?  It is necessary for cleansing/forgiveness.

I was reminded of a mystery of the OT atonement system, about which I wrote earlier.*  In that system, the symbolic pollution of non-high-handed” (inadvertent) sins that impedes relationship with God may be purified and the relationship restored through God’s forgiveness.  “High-handed” (deliberate) sins cannot be addressed.  Technically, a purification offering cannot be made for them, so there is no forgiveness.  However, once the people confess their sins, then a purification offering becomes acceptable!  (See Lev 5:5-6a).  The mechanism of confession is not discussed.  (Numbers and Leviticus often relate what is done in a ritual but not why, probably because the actions were grounded in a cultural symbolism system that was apparent to the Israelites.)  The amazing implication, though, is that confession “reduces” the level of sin so that it can be addressed through the atonement system.  The above observation lends itself to speculate on the theology of confession. 

From my experience, the psychological aspect of confession sheds light on the theological.  I recall an experience as a young Christian.  I was a passenger in a car trip with a friend whom I knew I had offended.  I knew I needed to apologize and ask for forgiveness, but I just could not get the words out.  The drive went on and on in silence.  Each time I was determined to speak, it was too hard.  It felt almost self-destructive.  Finally, when I did speak up, there was an immense sense of relief, and a healing of our relationship.  That effort actually was self-destructive – in a good sense.  I would propose this analogy.  My “heart” (the OT sense includes self-awareness, conscience, reflection, and volition) was “hardened” by layers of accreted callouses.  My act of confession, in which I acknowledge my sin and asked for forgiveness, was an act of tearing away a layer of the callouses of a hardened heart.  It hurt; but, this act opened my heart a little more to the Presence of God.

The theological implication to me is that the unrepentant heart of the person who commits deliberate sins is not in a state that allows for relationship with God.  God is full of grace and mercy and willing to restore relationship, but it takes two people in accord for a healthy relationship to take place.  The person who is truly repentant, a state present when confession is sincere, has the kind of heart that is necessary, one that submits itself in entrustment to God.  God always honors that "soft" heart and responds with forgiveness and restoration.  So, the statement that caught my attention today is correct, “Nothing new happens without apology and forgiveness.”  Confession results in something new, a new state of one’s heart and a new openness to restored relationships.

Lord, Jesus, I recognize that confession is imperative in my life to continue to walk with you.  It is hard for me to do.  I confess that I am daily prone to wander from you and at times deliberately do what is contrary to your will.  Expose all of those times by the light of the Holy Spirit.  Make me as uneasy as the time I spent in the car with my friend.  I want to see and acknowledge all of those transgressions before you.  I want to stay close to you. Amen.

LENT: FORGIVENESS, NOT JUSTICE, IS OUR CALLING

In response to the previous post on forgiveness, I received the following question that would not post.

Question: “Part of what makes this sort of forgiveness (lifting the other person's load of injustice) so difficult is that it seems to let the injustice and the unjust person eternally off the hook. Can you comment sometime about whether the forgiven person really does "get away with it"?”

My understanding of biblical teaching:
1) In terms of the human-divine relationship as represented in the atonement system, “Yes.”  Forgiveness is not at all just; it is mercy.  That is difficult.  It is not natural to me to be merciful; I want justice.  However, the Israelite atonement system is not about justice.  (The sacrificial animals were not put to death as a substitute penalty for the one seeking forgiveness.)  Assuming that the Israelites understood the seriousness of the symbolic ritual and their confession was sincere, God allowed the blood of the sacrificial animal to cover/remove the symbolic miasma of sin and restore unimpeded relationship with God.  That is the mercy of forgiveness that we are to show toward others.  (In a sense, asking for forgiveness is asking for justice to be set aside for mercy.  Example: Although Joseph’s brothers are duplicitous when they ask for forgiveness, he does not execute justice in Gen 50:15 – 21.) 

2) Those who remain in a state of rebellion/defiance toward God will not be forgiven – they do not really seek it.  However, their state is not for me to determine. 

3) There are occasions, for example, in which Moses intercedes for the people for breaking covenant, God accedes and maintains God’s faithfulness to the covenant in response to Moses, but there are still consequences for the rebellious people (Exod 32:31 – 38 or Num 14:17 – 25 in which the word “forgive” is salach and probably here has the nuance of “forebear”).  In cases like this “justice” serves its appropriate role for maintaining social order and discipline within the human community – here, the covenant community.

4) Related to #3): Today, within our criminal justice system, we sometimes hear of victims who have forgiven their transgressor but the person still is held societally accountable.  Judges have some, but little, latitude to forgive.  Justice is necessary to maintain social order in a world of chaos.  In that sense, God as a good King (one of many biblical metaphorical titles of attributes), does intervene as Judge for justice on earth, and in eternal matters will always divide good from evil.  However, in our descriptive metaphors of God as a good King, Judge is not the overruling attribute.  That leads to my last thought. 

5)  Well prior to the knowledge gained about the Israelite atonement system through the rediscovery of the ancient Near East in the last 100 years or so, Christians in some theological traditions developed a model of Jesus’ atonement based on a substitutionary, penal, criminal-justice model.  (This has been a successful communicative model since people understand justice so well.)  In this system, there is no mercy analogous to a subject appealing to a gracious king and receiving not justice but forgiveness.  Rather, in this system, Jesus is put to death so that God may be viewed as the just Judge.  The obvious deficit of this model is that it would like a king forgiving his repentant subject only on the grounds of then killing an innocent person (even a self-Triune representative), and all because the king is somehow bound to carry out an abstract model of “justice” and has no freedom to forgive.  More importantly, this is not the model of the Israelite atonement system that expresses God’s nature.  God is not bound by an overruling abstraction of justice.  In the New Testament, in terms of atonement language proper – and not the many metaphors for the salvific work of Christ – Jesus, the Perfect sacrifice, provides the cleansing blood of atonement, expressing once for all divine mercy and establishing “righteousness” (right-relating).  Yes, Jesus dies for all,# just as the Israelite sacrifice was killed for its blood of atonement, but not in terms of some penal, substitutionary “justice.”*

Father, once again, the bottom line is your unfathomable mercy, by which you “cleanse,” “bear,” etc. (the many other biblical expressions) my sins in Jesus in order to restore me back to Life with you.  Help me to show such mercy to others.  Amen.

#If interested, I examine the "died-for-us" texts in “Gathercole’s, Defending Substitution: Why I Am Unconvinced and Concerned,” The Expository Times 129.10 (2018) 458-465.
*Note: NT atonement models should be brought into alignment with the biblical atonement system as we now understand it better; however, this is rather like asking people to exchange their KJV Bibles for ones that communicate in contemporary English.

CONFESSION: THE LOST ELEMENT OF CHRISTIAN ATONEMENT

Although rites of confession are in most forms of Christian practice, the heart of confession seems to be lost.  In ancient Israel’s priestly temple of system of atonement (better: “purgation”) for sins, remorse and confession were necessary.  The purgation offering for sin was only provided by God for inadvertent commission of transgressions.  Inadvertent sins were portrayed as symbolically polluting the altar outside the temple building for individual sins and penetrating into the first chamber of the temple for the sins of the community.  When people learned of their inadvertent sin, remorse was expected.  Even for these inadvertencies, reconciliation was not effected by walking through some ritual by rote; it was only efficacious by the gracious response of God.

What about deliberate transgressions?  These sins were portrayed as penetrating into the innermost chamber of the temple, the “Holy of Holies,” which symbolized the immediate Presence of God.  Technically, there was no means provided for cleansing God’s inner sanctuary and restoring a right relationship with God for deliberate transgressions.  The relational covenant with God had deliberately been broken.  However, that is where remorse and confession came in.  Sincere confession of sin was understood to be received by God so that deliberate sins were brought into a state in which their detritus could now be cleansed by the purgation sin offering and symbolically “removed” by the scapegoat ritual.  Confession was necessary as well.  (“And it will be, when an individual feels guilt [remorse] with regard to one of these things, he must confess that which he sinned against it [a command of God], and bring his reparation-offering to the LORD,” Lev. 5:5-6:a).

Interestingly, since the Book of Leviticus is more a guide for what ritual actions to take rather than why, there is no explanation about how confession “reduces” the offense to what is expiable.  But, we do have an older Hittite text that mentions that if a servant confesses guilt to his lord, the lord’s soul might be pacified.*  So, oral, public confession makes sense.  Although “to seek God” is not priestly language, confession involves the same humility and surrender to God as does “seeking God” and entrusting oneself to God.

Moreover, since the NT writers use OT priestly atonement language to describe, in part, the salvific work of Jesus, they would have been well aware of the need for, and significance, of confession for forgiveness and cleansing.

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1John 1:9).

It is presumptuous arrogance on my part – as well as hard-hearted blindness to the gravity of sin – when I take forgiveness for granted.  Or, when in church, I mechanically read a confession of prayer.  Humbly kneeling before God and acknowledging that I have sinned and have no automatic “right” to be forgiven is what confession is about.  The Eucharistic cup of the blood of the new covenant – that is, it is the life of Jesus’ blood as the purgation/sin offering – should remind me how serious my unconfessed state is before God.

Invitation:

Christ our Lord invites to his table all who love him, who earnestly repent of their sin and seek to live in peace with one another. Therefore, let us confess our sin before God and one another.

Prayer:

Most merciful God,
we confess that we have sinned against you
in thought, word, and deed,
by what we have done,
and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart;
we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.
We are truly sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
have mercy on us and forgive us,
that we may delight in your will,
and walk in your ways,
to the glory of your name. Amen.

*Page 302 in Jacob Milgrom’s Leviticus 1 – 16 (Anchor Bible, 1991), who mastered a massive wealth of Hittite and Mesopotamian cultic material as background from which the Israelites adopted and adapted their rituals, and from whom I have drawn much of my understanding of the Israelite purgation/atonement system.

GOD IS NOT JUST: ATONEMENT IN THE NEW TESTAMENT*

If by “just” one means a forensic, abstraction in which every crime/sin must receive appropriate punishment, then God is not just.  [This post follows up on my post of 8/25/23 in which I looked at some of the justice vocabulary in the Bible.]  Moreover, much of what people presume is atonement language about Jesus in the NT, particularly in Paul’s writings, is not atonement language.  It is not drawing on the atonement language and concepts used by ancient Israel in the OT, but on later foreign concepts (e.g. by Luther, Melanchthon, Calvin, Bede.)  And, it matters.  What is often lost as people conflate God’s gracious offer of salvation with the more specific category of atonement is the order, the sequence, of God’s outreach of reconciliation.

The sequence in the OT is this.  First, God condescends in grace and mercy to offer relationship to Abraham, to Moses, to the people of Israel.  There is nothing said about those people being righteously qualified, and there is no atonement for their previous sin/s.#  In fact, Moses tells the people that they were chosen NOT because they were more righteous or powerful or numerous – in fact, they are “stiff-necked” (Deut 9:1-6).  God offered a covenant relationship with them simply because God was faithful to the promise he made to Abraham.

Second, when Abraham entrusted himself to God, God reckoned that response as righteousness (Gen 16:5); that is, a right relationship.  There is absolutely nothing in God’s dealings with Abraham, Moses, or Israel in which God responds as a courtroom judge who must first exact punishment for sin in order to make things “just.”#  That forensic concept is not there and should not be projected into the NT!

The third step takes us into atonement language proper.  As people in relationship with the Holy God, they are called to be holy as well, but they, like us all, fail.  So, God established the symbolic atonement system.  This system was basically adopted from the sacrificial symbolism of the surrounding cultures, BUT was changed to remove polytheistic, magical, and nature-god elements.  In brief, the atonement system attempted to convey the seriousness of intangible realities such as sin and forgiveness through dramatic rituals.  The seriousness of sin, disobedience to God, was portrayed as a kind of miasma that polluted God’s dwelling place, the temple, and was such an impediment, if not removed, that God’s Presence would depart.  Blood, represented life and was manipulated around altars to symbolically overcome and remove the filth of sin.  This system symbolized God’s mercy and grace to forgive and to reconcile.  Of course, those making sin offerings were to be repentant, to desire reconciliation, and to want to be obedient in the future.
Here are a couple of key corrective thoughts about the sin offerings and scapegoat rituals for atonement:

·        Sins were not transferred or “imputed” from the person to the animal; that would involve forbidden magical thinking.  [To follow in a later post: This is why, for example, Paul does not say that Jesus became sin, but rather that Jesus became the “sin offering” in 2Cor 5:21 (see Rom 8:3) and why a common assumption that our sin could be imputed onto Jesus would be a foreign concept to Paul and other Jews.]

·        The death of the sin-offering animal is not key; the blood is.  The “life” in the blood (see Lev17:11) was greater than the deadly effects of sin.  Jesus provided the blood of a spotlessly pure sacrifice.  [Again, for a later post:  The actual death of Jesus is key symbolically for other reasons, but not as being punished for our sins to satisfy a god who is bound to an abstract system of forensic justice.]

Note: In Rom 4:18-25, Paul includes Gentiles in the “hope” of Abraham (18) and applies atonement language to all “who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered over on account of our sins [understood as the sin offering] and was raised for the sake of our righteousness/justification” (24-25).

Application: The order, the sequence, of God’s outreach of reconciliation always demonstrates the grace and mercy of God who does NOT execute abstract justice on people (or on Jesus) but, rather, who lifts/cleanses/buries/casts into the sea, etc. the sin of those who entrust themselves, who repent and seek forgiveness, who walk in obedience with God.

Lord, help me to always cherish your unfathomable mercy and grace such that you would allow me to abide in your Presence.  Help me to show that mercy to others.  Amen.

#Some interpreters and translators misunderstand a reference in Rom 3:25 to God “passing over” sins of the past as leaving “unpunished” (see NIV Original, but rendered better in the later version).  The term paresin used here is about remitting a debt rather than negligently forgetting it.  It is another image of God’s offer of forgiveness.  Actually, anyone who has really forgiven another person knows what it is like not to exact punishment, but to “pass over” the transgression.

*I have a detailed exegetical treatment of some of the key statements of Romans 3 in Part 2 of “Hope for the Future of New Testament Theology,” in Religions 2021, 12(11), 975; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel12110975