Our destiny - and God's love is the reason for it all
Submitted by Jules on November 30 1999 at 18:57:30
In reply to Persons of sacred worth Submitted by Dirk Gently on November 28 1999 at 03:20:44
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Hey Dirk, you've certainly given us a lot to think about there! It's true that in the Western tradition we've tended to separate our salvation into three separate bits like this:
The problem with splitting it up like this is: What have any of these got to do with each other?! Why didn't God just go for glorification to start with? I think this is one reason why people don't stick at the Christian faith in the here and now - they can't see what it's for. We need to see the whole process in a more connected way. I don't know much about the Eastern tradition of theosis from my own study, but it seems to answer the problem like this:
which hangs together much better. The root of our problem is a poor understanding of the atonement. Especially since the Reformation, we've tended to think of the effect of the death of Jesus in a legal sense - being acquitted or declared innocent, even though we're really guilty. It's as though our sin had to be punished, but now that Jesus has been punished instead of us, we are let off. You know the classic line: God's justice demanded punishment, but God's love provided a substitute to be punished instead. "God's love overcomes God's justice through the worst injustice in history." Really? What sort of God would behave like that? Is that how parents treat their children? "It's okay, I'll forgive you because I've punished someone else instead." It's horrific! Would you believe that such a parent really knew what forgiveness was all about? Isn't this exactly why so many people, even Christians, find it so difficult to accept God's forgiveness - because the way it's been explained just doesn't ring true? When the Bible says that Jesus died for our sin, it means something much broader than this. It means that he died for the purpose of dealing with our sin. That's the picture of sacrifice that the NT takes from the OT. The animal killed as a sacrifice wasn't being punished, it was the means of getting rid of sin. So it is with Jesus. That's why Jesus is called a sacrifice, not that he was punished, but that he took the sin nature away and destroyed it. I love the way you put it: Our fallen nature has been assumed by Christ, and put to death on the Cross. But we must appropriate the new nature which is in Christ. Thinking this way helps us realise that God's justice and God's love are not opposed to each other at all. It's precisely because of God's love for us that he hates the sin that gets between us! So he provides a way to get rid of it! And what of God's justice? Well, there's a new wave of understanding Paul's letters I've been learning about recently, and it's this: The "righteousness of God" (in Romans 3:21 etc.) isn't so much his legal justice but his covenant faithfulness. In other words God's righteousness is what leads him to save people by getting rid of si n. I could write more, but I'll have to save it for another time. "Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." (1 John 3:2) With love, Jules |