'Atonement' Tagged Posts
The Cross
I have been grateful this week for our empty cross in the sanctuary. My life would be different if our cross had a sculpture of Jesus hanging in front of it every day and I’m not at all certain that I would continue to face it. Theories of Atonement are grounded in our human effort to understand the death of Jesus and in some way to face him as he hangs upon the cross. The theory of Substitutionary Atonement in which we say…
Substitutionary?
There are multiple schools of thought on Atonement. Substitutionary atonement, in which Christ takes the penalty instead of us is thought to secure our innocence before God. John Calvin, in his “Institutes ” (2.16.5) summarizes this classical understanding of Atonement: This is our acquittal: the guilt that held us liable for punishment has been transferred to the head of the Son of God. We must, above all, remember this substitution, lest we tremble and remain anxious throughout life — as if…
Toward Sunday
We continue this week in our Lenten worship series, Hope in Dying, by turning from reflection on our own experiences of grief to John 3.14-21 and considering the significance of Jesus’ death. Fred Craddock, in Speaking of Dying: Recovering the Church’s Voice in the Face of Death, writes, If we as the church are to carry out our ministry to the dying and if we ourselves are to die well, we need solid support and rich resources because this ministry…