Bird Michael F. - The Reconciling Wisdom of God Reframing the Doctrine of the Atonement

THE RECONCILING WISDOM OF GOD

REFRAMING THE DOCTRINE OF THE ATONEMENT

Snapshots

Michael F. Bird, Series Editor

Adam J. Johnson

The Reconciling Wisdom of God: Reframing the Doctrine of the Atonement

Snapshots

Copyright 2016 Adam J. Johnson

Lexham Press, 1313 Commercial St., Bellingham, WA 98225

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Print ISBN 9781577997252

Digital ISBN 9781577997269

Series Editor: Michael F. Bird

Lexham Editorial: Elliot Ritzema, Abigail Stocker, Joel Wilcox

Cover Design: Jim LePage

Back Cover Design: Liz Donovan

Father, Son and Holy Spirit,

grant a double share of your wisdom

to my three sons,

Reuben, Nathan, and Simeon,

to whom I dedicate this book.

Also in the Snapshots series:

Transformation: The Heart of Pauls Gospel

by David A. deSilva

Heirs of Promise: The Church as the New Israel in Romans

by P. Chase Sears

For updates on this series, visit LexhamPress.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS

T his short book on wisdom has progressed through a variety of stages. A number of friends, mentors, and publishers lie in its wake, deserving their respective tips of the hat.

The earliest version was a research paper for Prof. Sang Lee at Princeton Theological Seminary, and I thank both him and Prof. Daniel Migliore for their encouragement in this project.

Subsequently, this topic took shape as a paper presented at the Los Angeles Theology Conference in 2015 , co-written with Kyle Strobel. It was later published as part of the conference proceedings in Locating Atonement: Explorations in Constructive Dogmatics . I would like to thank Kyle for this great experience, as well as Katya Covrett, Oliver Crisp, and Fred Sanders for their help and encouragement, and for the excellent conference they have developed over the last few years.

A research fellowship at Biola Universitys Center for Christian Thought (CCT), made possible through the support of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation, provided me with the time to write this book. While the opinions expressed in this publication are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation or the CCT , I benefited greatly from the friendship, insight, and questions of the other fellows. I am particularly grateful for the leadership provided by Tom Crisp, Gregg Ten Elshof, and Steve Porter within the CCT , and from the friendship and help of Evan Rosa, the CCT assistant director. Laura Smit provided some exceptionally helpful recommendations and sources, and Kent Dunnington helped me appreciate the ways that the metaphysical and theological commitments of our religious commitments shape our understandings of different intellectual virtues.

Brannon Ellis, the acquisitions editor at Lexham Press, was the one who originally approached me about writing a short, yet (hopefully) creative, introductory text on the doctrine of the atonement, and then oversaw the editing and publishing of this book. Without his instigation and encouragement, I would not have embarked on this project.

As usual, a number of friends and students contributed in various ways to this project. I would like to think Glen and Susie Johnson, Scott Harrower, Matt Jenson, Ryan Peterson, Fred Sanders, Ben Sutton, and Jeremy Treat. Yet again Rachael Smith, my research assistant, was beyond helpful in a number of ways for this project. The broader community and culture within Biola University and the Torrey Honors Institute continues to push, encourage, and stimulate me. A greater contribution still lies with my wife, Katrina, and our sons, Reuben, Nathan, and Simeon: thank you for the balance and joy you bring to my life, which in turn gives me energy and joy for my work as a teacher and theologian.

And while this may be a little unusual, I would be utterly remiss if I did not express my profound thanks to Jonathan Edwards , whose set of sermons entitled The Wisdom of God in the Way of Salvation unlocked for me the doctrine of the atonement. I cannot imagine how my view of Christs saving work would look today were it not for his preachingmy debt of gratitude is insurmountable.

T here are any number of ways to tell a good story. It can begin with scenes of everyday life and gradually swell to epic proportions, as in Tolkiens Lord of the Rings. It can begin in the middle before looking back for context, as in Homers Odyssey . It can focus on a single individual or, like Hugos Les Misrables , weave together the lives of countless characters and families. Each has its limitations, and each has its way of gripping uspulling us in so that we find ourselves caught up in the movement and action. There is no one right way to do it.

The doctrine of the atonement, no less than the Battle of Gettysburg or the Adventures of Tom Sawyer , is a matter of telling a story, or retelling Gods story. One can do it any number of ways. At its heart, the atonement is a story, a history; and as with all stories, this telling is an art. The purpose of this book is to retell the story of Christs atonement in a way that energizes future tellings in ever new and faithful ways.do this, we will not begin at the beginningnot in Jerusalem with the death and resurrection of Jesusbut in Sweden in 1930 .

Gustaf Auln , a Swedish theologian, sought to move past the division he perceived between the rationalistic Lutheran orthodoxy and the liberal theology of his day. To do so, he developed a historical and theological account of the atonement, positing three major periods in the history of the church.

The next half millennium or more was dominated by versions of the satisfaction theory (developed by Anselm of Canterbury), in which Christ in some way satisfies the honor or justice of God through his death. This theory prioritizes the relationship between God and humankind, emphasizing that which we owed to God yet could not pay, whether that be honor, justice, or otherwise. The burden of the argument falls on the way or ways in which Jesus Christ restores to God that which we owe, that in him we might be restored to right relations with God. Penal substitution is a version of this theory, wherein Jesus satisfied God by enduring the punishment we ought to have suffered for our sin.

The third period owed much to Peter Abelards exemplarist or subjective theory, in which Christs death transforms us through its inspiring example. Abelards thought has been significantly reinterpreted in the last several decades, but this theory remains one of the most influential interpretations of the work of Christ, drawing our attention to the role of Christs life in our salvation. While few (if any) theologians would deny this aspect of Christs ministry, some (particularly during the Enlightenment and beyond) have made it the central or sole aspect of Christs work.