Atonement

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THE ATONEMENT by George E. Fifield

Text: "Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted." Isaiah 53:4.

In one brief scripture there are here concisely stated, and placed in contrast the true, and the false views of the sacrifice of Christ, and therefore of the atonement. The first part of this scripture is what was; the last part is what we thought was. The first part of it is the truth; the last part is what we esteemed the truth, or thought to be true, but was, in reality, false. The first part of it is Christianity; the last part is paganism.

"Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;" and if we ask why, Peter tells us, "That He might bring us to God," that is, reconcile us, and restore us to unity with the Father. Yet we supposed that He was "stricken of God” and so suffered under the Father's wrath that He might pay the price demanded, appease the divine anger, and reconcile God to man.

There is no harmonizing these two concepts; they are in irreconcilable contradiction one with the other, just as the scripture has here placed them.

The ordinary orthodox (?) or evangelical (?) view is that God created man and gave him a law which was to be a rule of life, saying, "Do this and you shall live; but if you transgress this law, you shall be damned." Man transgressed the law and so was doomed by God to eternal death. But Christ intervened, beseeching the Father to accept of His sacrifice and death, in the place of man's death, permitting him, instead of man, to pay the price demanded, that so the divine wrath might be satisfied and appeased, and God become reconciled to man.

This theory, as stated, is logical throughout; but a thing may be logical and still false; and tested by the scripture, this view is false at every point. There are many in the church who realize this, and who, therefore seek to modify the theory. They tell us it was not God who demanded the price, but the inexorable law; forgetting that the law of God is simply the thought or will of God.

They tell us it was not the wrath of God that needed to be appeased, but it was His sense of justice that must be satisfied; forgetting that that which can be satisfied by the suffering of the innocent for the guilty, is not justice at all, but the blindest kind of anger and wrath.

They tell us that God is not reconciled to man, but only so satisfied by the sacrifice of Christ that He can receive man, and permit man to be reconciled to Him. But this is only saying in other words that first of all, God had to be reconciled to man before He would receive man, or permit man to be reconciled to Him.

In fact, no possible modification of this theory can help matters at all. All of these modifications of the theory amount, in the end, to exactly the same thing as the original theory. They only succeed in making the theory illogical and self-contradictory, without in the least bringing it into harmony with the scripture. Let us then, from the scripture, see a few reasons why this must be false and wrong.

I.

IMMANUEL GOD WITH US.

This theory separates entirely between the Father and the Son, making the Father so stern and hard and inexorable that He demands His full pound of flesh, and must have His demand satisfied to the letter; while it makes Christ so kind, and loving and merciful that He gives His innocent life to satisfy the Father's demand.

This view thus antagonizes the teaching of Jesus, who often said, "I and my Father are one," "He that seeth me, seeth the Father also." "My doctrine is not mine, but His who sent me." "I came not to do my own will but the will of Him who sent me." "I can do nothing of myself, but the Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works."

There is no denying the fact that the whole New Testament teaching is that Christ, in all His wonderful love and mercy, and compassion, is a revelation of the Father; and that He is never presented as in contrast with God. Yet this teaching places Father and Son in the strongest possible contrast, making the Father exactly what we all know the Son was not. It has ever been the supreme effort of Satan to hide the satisfying thought of the Father God, from the hungry human heart. That you may see how well Satan has accomplished his purpose in this devilish doctrine, look each one of you, into your own heart and recall how from childhood up you have thought of God as hard and cold and of Christ only as loving and kind.

Look also into the hymnology of the world and see how there are a hundred hymns and songs praising Christ to one that gives any glory whatever to the Father. Then remember that Christ was simply Emmanuel, God with us; and that He, Himself, said, "Neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal Him."

II.

God, the Source.

This view makes Christ the source of the atonement, and even the source of it in opposition to the original will of the Father. God, by the intercession of Christ, had to be brought to a state of willingness to accept the temporary death of the sinner, so that the sinner might be admitted to pardon and salvation. The Bible never makes Christ the source of the atonement, but it makes Christ the means, and God, Himself, the source.

"All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ."

"God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." II Corinthians 5:18-19.

It is perhaps hardly necessary to say that the words for Atonement and for Reconciliation are the same in the original, just as the thought expressed by the two English words are the same. In fact, the original word, is never but once in the New Testament, translated "Atonement," but always elsewhere "reconciled" or "reconciliation."

Again, Paul tells us, "For it pleased the Father that in Him (Christ) should all fulness dwell; and having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto Himself." "And you, that were sometimes alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled." Colossians 1:19-21. These scriptures hardly need comment. Nothing could be plainer than that they are in utter and irreconcilable contradiction with any conception of the atonement or reconciliation which makes Christ the source of it. In each one of them it is clearly stated that God is the source and Christ is the means through which God works.

In the well-known passage in the epistle to the Romans, Paul says, "I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth."

III.

Heathen Sacrifice, vs Christian Sacrifice.

This theory of the atonement has put the heathen idea of sacrifice in the place of the Christian idea and applied it even to the sacrifice on the cross, thus paganizing the concept of Deity in almost the whole Christian world until Christianity itself has been corrupted at the fountain head.

There is in every human soul an intuitive inner consciousness of OUTNESS with God, and, therefore of a need for reconciliation or atonement. All religions, therefore, have sought to readjust the relations of the human soul with Deity, and so bring about the needed reconciliation or atonement.

But since Adam threw the blame for his sin on "the woman thou gavest to be with me," and Eve passed the blame on to the serpent God had made, thus both of them seeking, in reality, to place the responsibility for all the difficulty upon God, humanity in every age, and in every land has ever sought to place the blame of its outness with Deity upon God, Himself. In all heathenism sacrifice is used in the effort to make atonement, but the idea in need of atonement is that God is angry with us and His wrath must be appeased, and He must be propitiated, and brought to look at things more reasonable from our standpoint.

If it is an ordinary case of an offended god, a lamb or a bullock will do for a sacrifice; but if the gods are exceedingly angry, an innocent child, or a spotless virgin must die. When the gods smell the blood of the slaughtered victim they will be satisfied and will let us off. So, in all heathenism, sacrifice speaks of the anger and wrath of the gods that must be appeased lest they break forth upon us and destroy us.

But the Christian idea of sacrifice is, "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son." And why did God give His Son? Was it to appease His wrath? Or satisfy His sense of Justice? Or to pay the price He had demanded? No, emphatically no. It was that "Whosoever believeth on Him should not perish," should not go down in sin unto destruction, but should be saved from his sins, and so "have everlasting life."

The true Christian idea of sacrifice is therefore in absolute contrast with the heathen idea. While the heathen sacrifices spoke of the wrath of the gods that must be appeased, in true Christianity, sacrifice means the "love of God that must be expressed." It tells us of the outreaching of the heart of divine and infinite love that is willing to give itself and sacrifice that which is most dear in order that the lost and sinning and straying may be redeemed and brought back into unity with God.

The sacrifice on the cross was intended to be a manifestation of divine love that should make the whole universe wonder and worship. This false view of the atonement has so paganized the concept of this sacrifice as to make it speak of divine wrath that needed to be appeased and that demanded a price.

What a terrible triumph of Satan this is; and can only be realized when we understand that all true righteousness is simply love fulfilling the law of love, every commandment of which is righteousness. But the human love that can so fulfill this law, is born of the divine love. God's only power to make us righteous, is His power so to manifest His love to us, as to win in us, a returning love that outflows to Him and to all His creatures.

Paul tells us that when "with unveiled face we behold the glory of the Lord, we are transformed into that same image from glory to glory." And Jesus said, "This is life eternal that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent."

Whatever men may think of the original condition of man on the earth, and though there is evidence that civilizations have been lost as well as gained, yet history does present individuals and races of men struggling upwards from low, grovelling, fear born thoughts of God, into higher, purer, more uplifting, more transforming concepts of Deity. To aid men in this struggle that we might reach the utmost heights of purity of heart, where only we can see God as He is, Our Father sent His Son, to be "God with us."

Satan's counter-move to this supreme manifestation of divine Love was to place the heathen concept of sacrifice in the minds of men, instead of the Christian, and so apply it to the sacrifice on the cross, as to make even that sacrifice on the cross, a means of hiding God from the hungry heart, instead of a means of revealing His transforming love and power.

IV.

God's Love A Result Or A Cause.

This theory makes the Love of God a result of the atonement, whereas the scriptures always teach that the Love of God for us was the cause of the atonement. We are taught that God loves us now because Christ died for us and paid the debt, and so God has been propitiated and reconciled. Not in all the scripture can a single text be found that even hints at the idea that God loves us because Christ died for us. Always it is stated in just the opposite way because God loved us, Christ came to save. "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son."

Paul makes it very clear just when God loved us. "But God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us even when we were dead in sins, has made us alive together with Christ."

And John says, "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." The scriptures nowhere represent that God's love for us or His regard for us was of one kind before man sinned, and of still another kind after Christ died. On the contrary, the Bible represents God as saying, "I, the Lord change not; therefore, ye sons of Jacob are not consumed," -- "with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." "Because I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn you." "God is love." The very word God means "good", the supreme good, the supreme love; and the Psalmist says, "From everlasting to everlasting thou art God."

Therefore, as Waldenstrom observes, "Paul does not say that God increased His love to us by Christ dying for us, but He does say this: 'God commendeth His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.'" And John does not say, By Christ laying down His life for us the love of God has been restored to us. No, he says this: "Hereby perceive we the love of God because He laid down His life for us." And again: "Herein was the Love of God manifested in us (that is, in our case) that God hath sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him."

Always it is the same in the scriptures. The whole scheme of salvation is simply the OUTREACHING OF GOD'S INFINITE LOVE, through Christ, by the Holy Spirit, to find the lost and straying, and bring them repentant back to the Father's House.

V.

Denies the Forgiveness of God.

The false view of the atonement teaches that God forgives us because Christ paid the debt. But when Christ would teach how the Father forgives, He said: "There was a certain creditor which had two debtors; the one owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty. And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both." In the beautiful story of the prodigal son, the father, who here plainly represents God, waits to freely forgive the repentant wanderer, and place upon him the best robe, and give him the best the house affords.

The whole Bible teaches that God, through Christ, by the Holy Spirit, ever reaches out after the sinning and wandering soul, that he may bring him to repentance so He may pardon him freely. "Him (Christ) hath God exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins."

Instead of Christ being the price paid to the Father to purchase our pardon, He is the infinite price the Father pays so to reveal His love as to break down the barriers sin has lifted between us, and bring us back repentant to Him, that He may pardon us freely. Instead of demanding a price, God paid the price out of His heart's dearest treasures. Could the prince of all evil more misrepresent Our Father than has been done in this false teaching?

VI.

Be Ye Righteous as I am Righteous.

This doctrine makes the Bible require of us a righteousness which it denies to God himself. We are told, "If a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such a one in the spirit of meekness." That is, when my brother sins against me, if I am spiritual, I will not want to put him down or exalt myself above him, or demand from him a price; but I will put myself out to restore him. In other words, I will pay a price to bring him back.

That is what God requires of us as spiritual sons of His; and this is exactly what the Bible teaches God did for us. He paid the price to bring us to repentance and restore us. He is only asking us to be righteous as He is righteous, holy as He is Holy. But this false doctrine teaches that when we sinned against God, He stood back on His dignity and refused to receive us until another had paid the price. We can only say with the poet Whittier: "The wrong that pains my soul below, I dare not throne above."

VII.

Man Reconciled and Propitiated, Not God.

Every passage of the scripture that speaks of the atonement, or the reconciliation makes it very plain that it is we who must be reconciled to God. But this heathen doctrine, with everything else, has turned this around and teaches that God had to be reconciled to us; as the old hymn sings, "My God is reconciled." And a well-known confession of faith says: "Christ died to reconcile the Father to us."

The word "atonement" means at-one-ment, implying that the persons, or parties atoned for have been out of harmony, and in antagonism with each other, but now have been reconciled, and brought into unity of feeling and purpose. The word "reconciliation" means the same, that the persons or parties concerned have been at outs, but now have been reconciled, or brought into harmony, and made one.

It is well here to ask what made an atonement necessary? We read in Genesis of a blissful time when God said of all that He had made, man included, "Behold it is very good." And God walked with man, and man walked with God in the garden. Almost it seems to linger in our memory, that time of rest and joy, so like is the childhood of the individual to the childhood of the race. Then God and man were in harmony and had that harmony continued no atonement or reconciliation would have been necessary. God made man "for His pleasure," Infinite Love seeking so to express itself through creation that He might love and be loved.

In infinite Wisdom and infinite Love God sought to reveal to man and in man, His Law, which was not arbitrary, but was simply the eternal principles accordance with which is happiness and life, and discordance with which is misery and death. But God did not want a forced service, neither did He wish to make man a slave, so He left him free to obey or to disobey, seeking to do so reveal His wisdom and so to manifest His love, as to bring man freely into full accord with these necessary precepts. But man sinned, transgressed this necessary law, and so coming into discordance with the principles of happiness and life, brought upon himself misery and death. Every throb of pain, every wail of anguish that has cursed the world has come into the world through sin.

Since misery and death have come through transgressing God's law, it is proven that that law was not arbitrary, but that its commands and restrictions were necessary, and it was Wisdom wedded with Love that said "Thou Shalt" and "Thou Shalt not." But man has never thus rightly interpreted his misery but instead has ever charged it up to the supposed anger and wrath of God. This was Satan's great scheme so to misrepresent God as to lead man into this misunderstanding of Him.

Satan first led man to doubt God's love in His Law, and to think the Law arbitrary, designed to keep man from some greater possible joy; and thus, he led man to transgress. When our first parents saw through Satan's eyes that the forbidden tree was "good for food, and a tree to be desired to make one wise," they lost the true image of God out of their hearts, and from that on they saw a fiend instead of a Father.

When, therefore, misery came through transgression, they charged up to the supposed anger and hatred of God, that which really, and inevitably resulted from their own acts. Thus, they came to believe God hated them and so to hate Him in return.

Now Love is the fulfillment of the whole law unto all righteousness and joy; and ever-increasing love; and contrariwise hatred is the transgression of the whole law unto all unrighteousness and misery and ever-increasing hate. So, to man, through sin, came misery, and through misery came misunderstanding and hatred of God. And through this hate came ever more sin, and more misery and increasing misunderstanding until the true image of God was entirely blotted from the human heart and in all lands, God was thought to be a Being of perpetual anger only to be propitiated by flowing blood.

All this while the heart of the Father God was yearning in infinite love and pity over His wandering, misunderstanding, and suffering children. The scriptures make it very plain that the heart of God, a God who is Love, experienced no change because of the hatred of man. The Love of God is the one unchanging quantity in a universe of change. Fathers and Mothers do not teach your children that you will love them if they are good. The world will do that. Teach them that Father and Mother still love them no matter what they do, but that love will be grieved if they do wrong. This is like God, who is "Our Father."

A man once said to me, "even love, when outraged, turns to hate." I said I knew one Love that did not turn. Was ever Love so outraged as on the cross of Calvary? The very people Love came to save were mocking at the foot of the cross and saying, "If thou be the Son of God, come down and save thyself and us." Yet, dying of a broken heart in grief because of their sin, Love remained unchanged and prayed, "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do." This was Christ, He who said, "He that seeth me, seeth the Father also."

The waters of the flood might roll high above earth's highest mountain peaks, but they could not obscure the glory of the sun in the heavens. So the turbid waves of human hate might dash high above every summit of human affection, and make man hateful and hating each other, but one thing they could not do, they could not change the heart of Him who said, "Because I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore, with loving kindness have I drawn you." Here then is the condition stated exactly as it was. God's love for man unchanged, but this wondrous and eternal Love was hidden from man by the black barriers of hate which his own sins had raised.

What was needed in order that a reconciliation or atonement be brought about? That God's love be so revealed and so manifested, in spite of sin and all the misunderstandings that sin had caused, as to shine away the shadows and warm the cold, suspicious heart of man into a new and true understanding of the Love of His Father God, and so reconcile man to God and bring Him back repentant to the Everlasting Arms. Exactly this last, and not the first, was the work of Christ. Christ came to show us the Father and was "God with us." He said, "No man knoweth the Father but the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him."

Here is the testimony of Christ that men had lost entirely the knowledge of the true God, and that He had come to restore that knowledge. In another place, Christ said, "No man cometh unto the Father but by me. If ye had known me, ye would have known my Father also; from henceforth ye know Him and have seen Him."

Philip saith unto Him, "Lord, show us the Father and it sufficeth us."

"Jesus said unto him, have I been so long with you, and yet thou hast not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father; how sayest thou, then, show us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself, but the Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works."

Thus "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us; we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God." II Corinthians 5:17-20

"For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fulness dwell; and having made peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself, whether they be things in earth or things in heaven. And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He (God) reconciled." Colossians 1:19-21. Notice how all these scriptures are in absolute accord with all we have said and are contradictory to the so-called orthodox theory of the atonement.

It is we who had become alienated from God and become enemies to God; and this had come about by our wicked works. It is God, the Father, who makes the atonement or reconciliation; and He does it by, or in Christ Jesus, and it is always we who are reconciled to God by the revelation of Himself in Christ Jesus, and NEVER GOD IN ANY SENSE RECONCILED TO US. It is the same with the word "PROPITIATION". It is we who are angry with God and at outs with Him because of our sin, and always the propitiation proceeds from God through Christ, and it is we who because of our sins, our hatred, are propitiated.

"Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that HE LOVED US, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." "And He (Christ) is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world." God, through Christ, was reaching out not only for the disciples, or the honest Jews, but for the whole world. So Paul tells us, "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God; being justified (made righteous) freely by His (God's) Grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus; whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins, that are passed through the forbearance of God."

Surely God has not sought, through Christ, to propitiate Himself, like a man trying by some means to help himself get over his anger. We will not think such unworthy thoughts of God. Nor are we here told that God accepts Christ's righteousness in a substitutionary sense, in the place of our sins, to let us off. We are told that God accepts, by His grace, His unmerited favour, and justifies us, makes us righteous, through the redemption in Christ Jesus.

It is in the Everlasting Covenant, of which Christ is the surety, that God, through the blood of Christ, —through the transforming eternal life power of Christ, —"makes us perfect to do His will, working in us that which is well-pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ."

When we come under this covenant relation with God, and Christ becomes the surety for the realization of the covenant in our lives, God "who calls things that are not, as though they were," counts the work as done, and we propitiated, and brought back into full understanding and reciprocation of His mighty love for us. The artist sees the picture on the canvas before his hand can put it there, and the sculptor sees the angel in the marble as soon as he begins to work on the rough block, else he never could bring it out so we could see it. So, God, through Christ, seals His covenant with us to take us, as we are, rough blocks out of earth's quarry, and work out in our lives the beauty of Christ's righteousness.

As soon as we come under this covenant relation with Him, and the work is begun, God sees us, as long as we remain in this relation with Him, as perfect in Christ. How could He see us otherwise? If He should find fault with us because we are not perfect yet, He would simply be finding fault with Himself, since He has taken the contract now, and the work is His, not ours. Thus we see that in absolutely every sense the atonement or reconciliation begins in God as the source and proceeds from Him, through Christ, by the Holy Spirit, reaching out after every lost and wandering soul; and it is we, and we only, never God, who are reconciled, made repentant, forgiven, cleansed, sanctified and glorified, and so brought back into perfect unity, or oneness with God. This is all, and this all is the at-one-ment.

VIII.

An illustration.

But says some objector, I believe in most of this, but God said, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die", and I believe someone had to die to make God's Word good. Suppose this is a new country to you, you are pilgrims just landed; but I am king of the country and familiar with it all. I meet you and welcome you to these shores. I tell you that almost all the fruits of the country are good, and pleasant to the taste and safe to eat, all these you may freely eat, but there is one exception, these beautiful bright red berries the vine of which you see climbing over this wall, are deadly nightshade berries. If you eat of these, you shall surely die. You must teach your children not even to touch them lest they perish.

At first, you believe me and avoid the forbidden fruit, but soon one of you more curious than the others get to looking at the vine on the wall and you observe how beautiful and glossy those berries really are. You cannot believe so beautiful a thing can be dangerous and deadly. You so express yourself to the others and lead them to agree with you. You all decide that since these are the most beautiful berries of all and not so plentiful as other kinds, I want these all for myself and so have forbidden you to eat them. So, you gather them and eat of them freely. Soon you are all sick and in great agony and a number are dead, and the others about to die. In your extremity, you come to me to see if I can find a means of saving you. What shall I do? Shall I say I can do nothing for you unless someone worth more than you all is willing to die for you? Must I kill someone to make my word good. What nonsense. And yet this is exactly as theologians reason (!) in a perfectly parallel case.

Shall I not rather recognize at once as you have already recognized that my word to you has been made good. The very fact that you are all dead or about to die, proves that I spoke the truth to you and in love. Now if I am half a man and know any antidote or any means of saving you, I will give it to you at once. And if even a man would do this, will not God, who is love, do as much? The whole Bible teaches that just under those circumstances, God withheld not His only begotten Son but gave Him from the beginning, to live His holy life in our corrupted lives, restoring us to health and harmony with the transgressed law, and therefore to life.

But God did not, in Christ change the law that says, "The soul that sinneth it shall die." That is ever yet, ever, and eternally true. It is not even true because God said so. On the contra, He said so because it is so. It is inevitably true that sin means death. Not even God Himself can change that law or let the sinner off. But all glory to His name. He does something infinitely better. He changes the sinner, and saving him from his sins, he is a sinner no longer and so is no longer under the law.

IX.

The Atonement Internal Not External; Spiritual, Not Ceremonial.

This false view makes the Atonement or the Reconciliation an external, ceremonial thing, done once for all for the whole world, two thousand years ago, either on Calvary or in Heaven after Christ ascended, or both. The scriptures, when properly understood, both in the Old Testament, and in the New, invariably teach that the atonement or the reconciliation is an internal, spiritual thing, wrought out by the blood or the indwelling life of Christ personally in each soul that yields to Him.

We have already seen that the change that made the atonement necessary, took place absolutely and only in the heart of man; God remaining the same eternal and infinite Love. But if the change that made the atonement necessary took place in man's heart, the opposite change that will reconcile man to God, and make him one with the Infinite Love, must also take place in the heart of man.

God is supreme and selfless Love, the fountain of life outflowing ever for all His creatures. Nothing that took place two thousand years ago, however, great and splendid that thing may be and nothing that can take place externally, even now, can possibly make man at one with such a God, while he (man) is hateful and hating God and hating his brother, and seeking, unlike God, to keep his life to himself. The change that can reconcile us to God and make us at one with Him must be wrought out in us now and here, when and where we are.

Every scripture that speaks of the atonement recognizes this fact, and it is only because these scriptures are not understood that this is not clearly seen. Both the sin-offering and the trespass-offering are said to be for an atonement. This is because the sin offering and the trespass offering represented the beginnings of those spiritual changes in the one who brought them, that are necessary in order that the sinning, trespassing soul may be made at one with God. These offerings represented the one who brought them as coming to God just as he was, trusting only in God's mercy; yielding up his carnal nature, his flesh, to be crucified and destroyed as unholy; and presenting his life to God, to be renewed by God's divine power, and so made fragrant and beautiful and then poured out in His service.

Of the burnt offering when brought by a man's "Own voluntary will to the door of the tabernacle, it is said, "It shall be accepted for him to make an atonement for him."

But the burnt offering was the consecration offering. It represented the forgiven, renewed soul as consecrating his whole life to the service of God, to be consumed in this service as a sweet odour unto God, —consumed by the sacred love fire which God Himself had kindled on the altar of the heart. We can understand how this experience of consecration wrought out by God in the soul, could bring that man into oneness with God, who is the fountain of life, and who therefore lives and suffers and sacrifices in us all.

Jesus prayed, "Sanctify them through Thy truth -- That they all may be one as Thou, Father, art in me and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us -- And the glory which thou hast given me I have given them that they may be one even as we are one; I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and that thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me."

Surely if any text in the scripture is speaking about the atonement, —at-one-ment, —this is it; and it recognizes clearly that it is brought about not by any change on the part of God, but by a spiritual experience of sanctification wrought out in our lives. All the scriptures on propitiation and reconciliation already given on other points only need to be read over again, for one to see clearly that in each case, they represent an individual spiritual experience wrought out in the life of the believer, and never some magic change in God, wrought once for all for the whole world.

The making of the atonement on God's part, therefore, has been the outreaching of His heart of infinite love, through Christ, by the Holy SPIRIT, after every lost and wandering son and daughter of Adam, to bring that wanderer back into harmony with God and with the heavenly family. The atonement has been a personal effort of love on the part of God, for each saved soul.

On the part of man, the atonement is so personal and individual a thing that two men cannot receive it collectively, far less a whole church or a whole world of men. These two men must each receive the atonement for himself by yielding up his life to God's pardoning, renewing, creative transforming power until he is made over into harmony and oneness with God.

How worse than useless then to argue about whether the atonement was made at the crucifixion or at the resurrection or at the ascension. All these teachings are equally wrong and equally injurious for they all take the mind away from the inner spiritual experience which only can make any man at one with God and centre the hope on some external and ceremonial thing.

X.

God's Eternal Love Revealed. Suffering with Us and in Us.

Finally, we desire to call the reader back to the text and to show how wonderfully and beautifully in harmony with that scripture, God, through the life, and death of Jesus answered the supreme argument and objection by which Satan has ever sought to hold the hungry human heart away from God and to hide his satisfying love. "Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows." This is what Jesus was doing while we esteemed him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted to appease the Father's wrath.

Notice the grief that crushed the life out of Christ, and broke his heart, was no new strange sort of grief, unlike what we have to bear. If God, in some mysterious, unaccountable way had placed or put off the sins of the whole world onto Christ and punished them in him for us all that would have been something entirely different from anything that any other person ever has had to bear. Certainly then, Christ would have been stricken and afflicted of God. But He was not. He was bearing our griefs and carrying our sorrows.

The sorrows and griefs of Christ were the same, coming from the same causes as the sorrows and griefs that break the hearts and crush out the lives of millions of people all around us. He became one with us, that He might thereby make us one with Him and one with God.

But you say, He "Suffered the just for the unjust." Surely, He did and He did it under exactly the same law that makes it inevitable and unavoidable that the innocent, or innocent shall suffer for the guilty all the world over. This very scripture is almost always misquoted and misapplied to make it teach that the sufferings of Christ were entirely different from ours. The fact is those very words were uttered to show that Christ's sufferings were the same as ours. To see this clearly, it is only to read the context.

Peter first tells us, "But and if ye suffer for righteousness’s sake, happy are ye, and fear not their fear neither be troubled. For it is better, if the will of God be so, that ye suffer for well doing, than for evil doing. For Christ ALSO (hath once) suffered for sins, the just for the unjust that He might bring us to God." The words in parentheses are omitted by the Revised Version.

How plainly this tells us that Christ suffered the just for the unjust, the righteous for the unrighteous exactly as we have to suffer for doing well instead of doing evil, and therefore, in this He was bearing our griefs and carrying our sorrows. The law that makes the innocent suffer for the guilty is unavoidable and inseparable from the existence of sin itself. As long as one man kills another man will be killed. As long as one man lies another man will be lied about. The law is universal. The innocent has to suffer for the guilty.

You say, "This is unjust." Surely it is, but it is not the injustice of God; it is the injustice of sin. It is the reason why God wants to purge the universe of sin. The blood of the martyrs crieth to Him from the ground; the hire of the labourers kept back by fraud crieth. Every injustice and every wrong of earth come surging up to the heart of God for redress. But God waits until the last sinner repents or is separated from his sin, that will repent, for extermination of sin means extermination of the sinner unless he repents.

The book of God's providences is a sealed book written on the inside and sealed with seven seals and has not been understood because no one could read it; but the Lion of the tribe of Judah as a Lamb slain has prevailed to open the book and make it plain to every sorrowing heart. We cannot say that GOD does not love us because we suffer unjustly for, we know that God loved His only begotten Son.

The passages that speak of Christ suffering "for our sins," are translated by some of the best linguists in the world and rightly translated "by our sins." That is the sins of the world that put all these injustices upon you and me and that broke the heart of Jesus and crushed out His loving life, until His mighty faith was so matched by mighty temptations that even He was brought to the dizzy edge of doubt and cried, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me!" But Jesus did not go over the edge of doubt into unbelief, for immediately, grasping the fact of God's presence and love with Him, in perfect faith He said, "Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit."

God was never nearer Christ than at that moment when all seemed dark. God is never nearer us and never loves us more than when we suffer wrongfully. Jesus taught us this, and said, "Rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in Heaven." "He was pierced through by our sins, He was crushed by our misdeeds, the chastisement of our peace was upon Him and in His wounds, there became healing for us." Isaiah 53:5 Waldenstrom Translation.

If we understand that Jesus took our human nature upon Himself and came under the very laws and conditions under which we live, bearing our griefs and carrying our sorrows, and these griefs and injustices, in spite of God's omnipresent and mighty love for him broke His heart and made it seem at least once, to even Him, that God had forsaken Him,—if we understand this, which Jesus lived and died to show us, we can carry the constant consciousness of the love of God for us through every trial and persecution, even though we, too, should die misunderstood and hated and killed by those whom we love. No hatred of God can live in the presence of this understanding of the Father's love that Jesus came to reveal to us.

The heart of the sinner is reconciled and turned back repentant toward God, so that to the soul so yielded up there may inflow the divine Christ Life and make him one with Christ and one with the Father. "God is in Christ reconciling us unto Himself" and giving to us the ministry of reconciliation so that we now, as the meaning and intent of all this study, is, we "beseech of you, be ye reconciled to God."

Text: "For He is our peace who made both one, and brake down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; that He might create in Himself of the twain one new man, so making peace; and that He might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby." Ephesians 2:14-16.

When we understand it, this is a most precious scripture. It speaks of the reconciliation, or of the at-one-ment in such a way as to show how intimate and personal a part it is of the inner experience of each true believer in Christ.

In order to understand it we must keep in mind constantly the fact that in the New Testament the Gentile in the flesh is simply the natural, unspiritual man,—the man outside of Christ; and the Israelite is not after the flesh,—not the literal descendant of Jacob, but the man who had experienced the spiritual birth that Jacob had experienced when the Lord said to him, "You shall be called no more Jacob (supplanter) but Israel, Prince of God." "If ye be Christ's ye are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Galatians 3:29.

Paul first tells us in the eleventh and twelfth verses that we are to remember that "in time past we were Gentiles in the flesh"—"that at that time we were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and were without God in the world."

This is still the condition of each one of us when we are in the flesh and outside of Christ. It is still of infinite importance to remember this, for only he who remembers this will realize his true condition and know his utmost need of Christ. But if, by His unspeakable grace, we have been born again, born from above and so are in Christ, and not in the flesh, we are now to remember that "In Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ." Far off from God, wandering like the prodigal, in a far country, away from the light and the plenty and joy of the Father's House, seeking vainly to satisfy our souls on the husks the swine eat.

Far off, too, from our brothers and sisters in the blessed homeland of our souls, exiles, and captives in an enemies' country, without, seeking to appear satisfied and joyous but within "Hanging our harps on the willows and weeping when we remember Zion." Far off even from our best selves, for this is always true when one is far off from God. God is the life of our life, the soul of our soul. He is nearer to us than we are to ourselves, for "In Him we live, and move, and have our being." It will be remembered that the wandering, far distant prodigal's first move was to "come to himself."

"Made nigh," here the process of the soul's wanderings are reversed. The wanderer first comes to himself and realizes his soul's dissatisfaction with the husks, which are the best that earth has to give for the soul's great need. To the hungry, homesick soul there comes a true glimpse of the Father's love, and of the light, and warmth and plenty of the Father's House, until he says, "I will arise and go unto my Father." So, coming to himself and being made nigh to his best inner self, he comes back to the Father and is made nigh to Him and then finds himself in true fellowship and nearness to all true, loyal members of the Father's household.

And all this is done "in Christ," by the blood of Christ. We must remember that "the Spirit, the water and the blood agree in one." God, in Christ, by the Holy Spirit, which is the "living water," "The blood of Christ," or the divine indwelling life of Christ, is reaching lovingly out for every wandering soul to bring them to their best selves and then back to Him, and to nearness and fellowship with all who are His.

This brings us down to our text which is in the next verse: "For He (Christ) is our peace who made both one, and brake down the middle wall of partition."

"Both one", who are the "Both" spoken of in this verse and the "twain" or "two" spoken of in the next verse? Someone will answer, "They are the Jews and the Gentiles." We are not disposed to deny this. We believe there is an application of these texts to the Jew and the Gentile. Paul tells us, "In Christ Jesus there is neither Jew nor Gentile, ye are all one." Christ speaking to the Jews, said, "Other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring and they shall hear my voice and there shall be one-fold and one Shepherd." The preceding chapter tells us, "That in the dispensation of the fullness of times He will gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in Heaven and which are on earth."

In the full realization of Christ in the soul there will come to ultimate humanity, oneness in God, till the prayer of Christ shall be answered. "Sanctify them through thy truth, thy word is truth, that they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me." But while this wonderful unity of humanity will be realized in Christ, and we believe this scripture includes this, still this scripture taken as a whole shows that something more individual and personal than this is here primarily intended. There is, that in the spiritual sense of the scripture, we have already seen, he that is after the flesh is a Gentile, no matter how accurately he may trace his descent back to Abraham; and he that is born of the Spirit is a Jew or an Israelite.

There is in us each individually the nature both of the Jew and of the Gentile. And these two natures are in antagonism each with the other, making each one of us conscious of a duality or twoness within us. Paul describes this antagonism of the inner life of each individual thus: "For the flesh lusted against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other, so ye cannot do the things that ye would." Galatians 5:17.

In another place Paul tells of the working of this same duality of the individual life; "For the good that I would, I do not; and the evil which I would not, that do I." And again: "For that which I do, I allow not; for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I."

This is no theory to be argued; it is a fact of the experience of each soul. To recognize its truth, we only need to look within. Stevenson's play, "Dr. Jekel and Mr. Hyde" was only an exaggeration of this universally recognized truth. It has seemed to every one of us, at times, that there were two different people inside of us, and these two were in antagonism each with the other; and were separated by a high wall, so that when we were acting in one of these characters we could not get to the other and give him control, even when we wanted very much to do so; or as Paul says "These are contrary the one to the other so that ye cannot do the things that ye would."

Just as the prodigal has to come to himself before he would go back to the Father, so, in the at-one-ment, it is the work of Christ to break down this middle wall or partition in each heart and to make us at one with ourselves before we can be at one with God. It is this restoration of unity and harmony, in the place of duality and discord in the soul of the individual of which this text is primarily speaking, when it says, "For He is our peace who made both one and brake down the middle wall of partition having abolished in His flesh, the enmity."

"The enmity." This brings us to the study of the enmity and may seem at first that we are wrong in our interpretation but in the end, we shall find the whole subject beautifully harmonious and full of spiritual illumination and of comfort. The enmity is first mentioned in the third of Genesis, just after man sinned. God said to the serpent who here impersonated Satan: "I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel." Genesis 3:15.

First let us clearly recognize the physical fact which is here the symbol of the spiritual truth God wants us to know. Everyone knows of the innate enmity of the human heart against a snake. The very first thought is to crush its head and kill it. By persistent effort, some people can overcome this feeling and make pets of a serpent, but this is an abnormal state, for the natural feeling is one of enmity toward a snake. This natural enmity against a serpent symbolizes the enmity that God placed in the human heart against Satan and evil. The soul of a normal man naturally starts back with horror at the presence or thought of crime or sin. This is especially true in the innocence of childhood. But the mind of man, by persistent thinking of evil may become accustomed to it until the fear of it is gone and they may finally come even to delight in it. We recognize this is abnormal to delight in evil. When the soul of a man rises up and crushes the head of the evil that tempts him and triumphs over it, all right minded men and women rejoice in his victory, and the soul of the tempted but victorious man comes to flower and fruitage on a new and higher plane of self-respecting manhood.

But why is all this true? It is because, through the gift of Christ, from the foundation of the world, - the Christ "that lighted every man that cometh into the world", God put enmity into the soul of a man against Satan and evil. Because of this enmity "the Spirit lusted against the flesh" so that the soul of a man cannot be at one with itself in doing evil. There is always a protest in the human heart against the wrong. The man who deliberately chooses to do evil, feels the protest, hears the soul's inner voice crying out against it, and knows that he is putting himself at outs with God and at outs with his own best self.

All this duality or twoness of nature of which Paul so often speaks, originated when God put enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent, or, in other words, when God placed Christ in the soul of every man uttering His protest against sin. Is it not a defect or evil thing for man to be at outs with himself; is not this duality of nature an evil thing? We must answer both, "No, and Yes". "No", because it is far better that a man should feel the duality of his nature and know that he is at outs with his best self in choosing wrong than that he should be able with undivided heart to go into sin without any protest from within against it. "Yes" because the best of all the ideal would be for him to be able, with perfect oneness of purpose to choose the right and perform it, recognizing within no desire for the evil.

Christ, in His experience realized this ideal, as stated in the text, by "abolishing in His flesh, the enmity." He did not abolish the enmity that God, by Christ, placed in the human heart against evil. He did abolish the enmity on the other side by silencing the protest that Satan placed in the mind against the good. Unity and harmony in the place of conflict was brought about, not by causing the Spirit to cease its lusting against the flesh, but by causing the flesh to cease its lusting against the Spirit, thus yielded the soul in perfect unity of purpose to the good.

This experience Jesus had in His life. At first, He was "tempted in all points like as we are", and "suffered, being tempted," and "resisted even unto blood, striving against sin". But He "condemned sin in His flesh", instead of yielding to temptation until even the root desire which made temptation possible was gone and He could truly say "Satan cometh and findeth NOTHING IN ME." Thus, He was at one with Himself and at one with God, the Supreme good, and all duality gone.

Now all that was done in the flesh of Jesus then was to show what Christ wants to do in our flesh now. If we yield wholly to Him, He will abolish in our flesh all enmity against the good and bring into our lives unity in place of discord. When we are at one with our best selves we shall be at one with God, the At-one-ment will have been accomplished in our souls.

This is progressive with us, as it was with Christ Jesus. We can all remember before we were Christians, we could be tempted to do certain things that now, having accepted Jesus as our Saviour, and having a desire to walk with Him, we can say that unity and rest abides within and in earth's darkest trial we may say "Father, into Thy hands I commit my Spirit."

How is it that the "enmity" is so closely associated with the "law of commandments contained in ordinances," as to be practically identified with it? Because all humanity has realized its need of readjustment, reconciliation, and atonement. Every human ordinance that men have invented outside of Christ have been the soul's effort to climb up some other way into unity and fellowship with God. Men have sought to do what only God, in Christ could do, make the atonement. O, the weary struggle, and futile effort of it all. To this end men have done cruel penance, gone on weary pilgrimages across desert sands, for hundreds of miles. How cruel the devil is and how he has tortured the human soul! All this futile human struggle Christ abolishes with the enmity that gave it birth.

"Which of you by taking anxious thought can add one cubit to your stature?" If God clothe the grass of the field -- how much more clothe you, O ye of little faith.

The enmity with all of its wearisome ceremonialism, slain, the freed soul, under the blessed everlasting covenant, is, like Jesus Himself, "Made, not after a law of carnal commandments, but after the power of an endless life."

In contrast with the noisy, visible externalism of all human religions, Christianity is the religion of the quiet, hidden, indwelling Christ life growing us into the image of God, the beauty of holiness. "That He might create in Himself of the twain, one new man, so making peace." This scripture plainly tells us that the new creation which God seeks to bring out in each of us is composed of both the elements of our hitherto dual human nature made one in Christ. The next verse tells us that this is done by slaying the enmity by means of the cross.

The cross-means crucifixion of self. Here we have come to the deepest thing of all in this wonderful scripture. Paul says: "I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I but Christ lived in me." The deepest spiritual truths can only be stated thus antithetically. In me, not apart from Christ, but lived in and inwrought by Christ, there are elements of character that are good, can be saved, and brought over into the final result. It is because of this fact that the transformation does not involve a loss of identity. The final man is I, yet not I, but Christ.

Everyone is familiar with the Baldwin apple, and the several varieties of Baldwins. There is one red, another green and another yellow, some large, medium, and small but all Baldwins. The graft has made them all Baldwin apples but there has been a come over from the original tree into which the grafts were placed that has made all this variety. So, when true believers are grafted into Christ and into the true Israelitish Olive Tree, there will be a come-over that shall bring every possible good thing that God can use into the final product and that shall so preserve the identity of the individual and the infinite variety of the final result.

Thus, of the twain, is made one new man in Christ and so peace is restored, peace with us and peace with God and peace with all who are God's. This is the reconciliation or atonement. It is a personal, individual thing, wrought out by God, through Christ, in each human life.

The method used by God with one would not do at all with another. In the Holy Spirit is infinite adaptability to the peculiar need of each one. And the final result, while retaining its own personality is at one with God, at one with Christ, at one with the best inner self, the duality and enmity all gone, and at one with every member of the body of Christ, the true living Temple of God.

"For ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone; in whom all the building, fitly framed together, groweth unto a holy temple in the Lord; in whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit."

May God, in His infinite grace, grant this be true of each of us, and let all His children say "Amen."

George E. Fifield