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Reading Classics Together - Redemption Accomplished and Applied (IV)
- 12/05/09
- 9
I am running late with this week’s entry in Reading Classics Together. I blame the Leadership series I was writing as I did not want to disrupt it by posting off-topic. I’ve asked Rebecca Stark who blogs at Rebecca Writes (her blog was one of the first I ever started reading on a regular basis) if she would provide this week’s summary. Polite Canadian that she is, she kindly agreed. So this week’s summary comes via Rebecca.
Summary
This chapter is a discussion of the extent of the atonement and makes the case for limited atonement (also called particular redemption or definite atonement). Murray starts out by noting and giving examples to prove that the use of universal terms (like all, world, etc.) in relation to the atonement doesn’t settle the question because those terms are frequently used in scripture to mean something less than every person who has ever lived.
Then he goes on to frame the question that is considered in this chapter, first laying out what it is not:
The question is not whether many benefits short of justification and salvation accrue to men from the death of Christ.
The death of Christ is designed, says Murray, to bring to all people certain benefits in this life. He doesn’t list these specifically, but I understand them to be all the things that come from common grace: God’s life-sustaining provisions and the indiscriminate proclamation of the gospel, for instance.
Rather, the question under discussion is this:
On whose behalf did [Christ] propitiate the wrath of God? Whom did he reconcile in the body of his flesh through death? …In whose stead and on whose behalf was he obedient unto death, even the death of the cross?
The saving efficacy of the atonement, Murray argues, applies to Christ’s own people. Christ did not come to merely make people redeemable, but to actually redeem. You’ll recognise this, of course, as the doctrine of limited atonement.
Once common objection to limited atonement is that it undercuts the offer of the gospel. Murray argues that this is not true; but rather, it is this efficacy of Christ’s atonement that gives the gospel its force.
It is because Christ procured and secured redemption that he is an all-sufficient and suitable Saviour. It is as such he is offered, and the faith that this offer demands is the faith of self-commitment to him as the one who is the eternal embodiment of the efficacy accruing from obedience completed and from redemption secured.
In the second section of this chapter, Murray looks at two scriptural arguments for limited atonement. First, there is Romans 8:31-39, where Paul connects the giving of Christ to the giving of all the gifts that come from saving grace, including justification, Christ’s intercession, and security in the love of Christ. Since these things are not given universally, Christ’s atonement cannot be universal.
And second, there are all the places in Paul’s writings where Christ’s death for believers is connected with their death with him and then with their being raised with him.
We have, therefore, the following sequence of propositions, established by the specific utterances of the apostle. All for whom Christ died also died in Christ. All who died in Christ rose again with Christ. This rising again in Christ is a rising to newness of life after the likeness of of Christ’s resurrection. To die with Christ is, therefore, to die to sin and to rise with him to the life of new obedience, to live not to ourselves but to him who died for us and rose again. The inference is inevitable that those for whom Christ died are those and those only who died to sin and live to righteousness.
I remember reading this chapter many years ago and finding these two scriptural arguments for limited atonement to be very strong ones. I still do.
And then, to end the chapter, Murray considers two texts used to argue against limited atonement. One is 2 Corinthians 5:14-15, which says that Christ died for all. But this is one of the passages like those mentioned directly above where Paul connects Christ’s death to dying with him and rising with him, so rather than arguing against limited atonement, it actually argues for it.
There’s also 1 John 2:2, which is one of the most commonly used texts in support of unlimited atonement. Murray gives several reasons why “for the whole world” in this verse should not be taken universally.
To sum up and end the chapter:
[W]hen we examine the Scripture we find that the glory of the cross of Christ is bound up with the effectiveness of its accomplishment. Christ redeemed us to God by his blood, he gave himself a ransom that he might deliver us from all iniquity. The atonement is efficacious substitution.
Next Week
For next Thursday please read the next chapter. This moves us into the heart of the book—a look at the application of the atonement.
Your Turn
The purpose of this program is to read classics together. So if there are things that stood out to you in this chapter, if there are questions you had, this is the time and place to have your say. Feel free to post a comment below.
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Comments (9)
Thanks for the summary Rebecca. Like you, I found this chapter convincing and well-argued.
My post can be seen here: http://quercuscalliprinos.blogspot.com/2009/12/reading-classics-with-challies.html
Thanks again,
Jude
Definitely a chapter to warm the hearts of 5-point Calvinists.
My summary and thoughts are available at my blog: http://reformedbookclub.blogspot.com/2009/12/redemption-accomplished-and-applied.html
I particularly liked these statements:
Christ did not come to put men in a redeemable position but to redeem to himself a people….Did Christ come to make the salvation of all men possible?…Or did he come to save his people?
The work was effective.
I admit a lot of this is new material to me. I’ve never even heard of “limited atonement.”I’ve still got lots of chewing to do…
I’m glad that Murray peppers lots of scriptures into his explanations; it helps me to see where he’s coming from.
I agree with you Lisa, still chewing. How can the doctrine of limited atonement give force to something it limits. Having lots of trouble with this chapter.
How can the doctrine of limited atonement give force to something it limits
The reasoning goes something like this: A limited (or definite) atonement is an atonement that actually propitiates God’s wrath on behalf of his people. The scope is defined (or limited), but the work is finished.
A universal atonement, on the other hand, only potentially propitiates God’s wrath for everyone who has ever lived or ever will live. The scope is wider, but there is no actual propitiation in the work itself. Actual propitation only occurs when someone someone believes: Our faith + Christ’s work = propitiation of God’s wrath.
I haven’t posted here in awhile but thought I would mention a writing by J I Packer that also helps to enlighten the teaching of limited atonement. Admittedly, when many of us first embraced what are called the doctrines of grace, this was the hardest nut to crack.
The essay is an introduction to John Owen’s work, the Death of Death.
http://www.all-of-grace.org/pub/others/deathofdeath.html
Packer wrote this…
Owen sees that the question which has occasioned his writing—the extent of the atonement—involves the further question of its nature, since if it was offered to save some who will finally perish, then it cannot have been a transaction securing the actual salvation of all for whom it was designed. But, says Owen, this is precisely the kind of transaction that the Bible says it was. The first two books of his treatise are a massive demonstration of the fact that according to Scripture the Redeemer’s death actually saves His people, as it was meant to do. The third book consists of a series of sixteen arguments against the hypothesis of universal redemption, all aimed to show, on the one hand, that Scripture speaks of Christ’s redeeming work as effective, which precludes its having been intended for any who perish, and, on the other, that if its intended extent had been universal, then either all will be saved (which Scripture denies, and the advocates of the “general ransom” do not affirm), or else the Father and the Son have failed to do what they set out to do—“which to assert,” says Owen, “seems to us blasphemously injurious to the wisdom, power and perfection of God, as likewise derogatory to the worth and value of the death of Christ.”
Tim—Do you know what the next book is going to be? I live out of the country and need to order it while I am back for Christmas. Thanks.
@Terry.A worthy Charles Spurgeon quote to consider: ‘We are often told that we limit the atonement of Christ, because we say that Christ has not made a satisfaction for all men, or all men wold be saved. Now, our reply is this, that, on the other hand, our opponents limit it: we do not. The Arminians say, Christ died for all men. Ask them what they mean by it. Did Christ die so as to secure the salvation of all men? They say, “No, certainly not.” we ask them the next question- Did Christ die so as to secure the salvation of any man in particular? They answer “No.” They are obliged to admit this, if they are consistent. They say “No, Christ has died so that any man may be saved if”- and then follow certain conditions of salvation. Now, who is it that limits the death of Christ? Why, you. You say that Christ died not die so as infallibly to secure the salvation of anybody. We beg your pardon, when you say we limit Christ’s death; we say, “No, my dear sir, it is you that do it.” We say Christ so died that he infallible secured the salvation of a multitude that no man can number, who through Christ’s death not only may be saved, but are saved, must be saved and cannot by any possibility run the hazard of being anything but saved. You are welcome to your atonement; you may keep it. We will never renounce ours for the sake of it.’
Limited atonement can be the hardest of the five points for many to grasp. Many like to consider themselves ‘4-point Calvinists,’ and can not come to grips with limited atonement. This chapter is one I will be referencing and recommending on this topic. I think the phrase ‘particular redemption’ has some value over using the phrase ‘limited atonement’ when talking about this. I think the phrase ‘limited atonement’ can be misleading or wrongly interpreted.