One of the most important questions for the Church to come to terms with today is what it means that “Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world”, as John the Baptist hails him at his first appearance in John’s gospel. The most common understanding of our atonement in Christ is that God offered his Son as a sacrifice to himself to repay the debt owed God due to humanity’s sin, which couldn’t repay. Or some would say God had Jesus endure the punishment for violating divine law in our place. This idea of substitutionary atonement was not part of the Christian story until the early 1100’s and it never has been part of Eastern Christianity. Plus, there is no scriptural evidence for such an understanding of God or his own purpose by Jesus and considerable evidence to the contrary. Blood sacrifice was a human invention meant to control violence by the threat of violence projected onto God (“sanctified”), pure and simple. God ultimately revealed this in Jesus’ unholy death (our doing) and resurrection (God’s doing). At the same time God in Christ broke open our mechanism for ordering society by violence He also bestowed the Holy Spirit of forgiveness on us so we could live in a peace the “world” cannot give. Do we have eyes to see and the willingness to be led into a whole new Way of Life -- one that doesnt require mental gymnastics to make a violent god palatable?
Posted on: Tue, 21 Jan 2014 18:06:48 +0000
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