The Atonement: Cosmic Child Abuse? With Mike Winger (Part 1) — The Alisa Childers Podcast #53

​Today's podcast centers around a book by Brian Zhand called, "Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God," in which Zhand suggests that substitutionary atonement makes God into a divine child abuser. Mike Winger joins me to talk about the book, different atonement theories, and why substitutionary atonement is not only biblical, but beautiful.

​Recommended books: 

Hi Jared, thanks for your comment. I believe all of your concerns were addressed in the podcast. Like Mike said, you can find all kinds of articles highlighting the church father's views regarding substitution. Here's one of many: https://thinktheology.co.uk/blog/article/substitution_in_the_church_fathers

I actually agree with Jared. I checked out the website you mentioned in response. "In our stead / place" could just as well be understood as "for our sake". Further such statements / phrases don't take away from the Ransom theory of atonement. To claim that such terminology was teaching 'penal substitution' is to be anachronistic. I'm a huge fan of Mike Winger and I hope his ministry continues to be blessed. However, trying to justify penal substitution by foisting it backwards onto the Church Fathers seems a little unfair and unnecessary. While I personally don't agree with penal substitution, I also believe that there are certain truths that continue to be progressively revealed even in our days because our focus and prerogatives and priorities face a different set of challenges and heresies than the ones the Church Fathers faced. May God bless Mike Winger and his work

Alisa, thanks for the 2-part on PSA. As you know, a ton of resistance by Progressive Christian Theologians (which are really none of the 3 sub terms if you dig deep) and I see an irony I wanted to ask you about:

Progressives abhor evangelical and fundamentalist philosophies that interpret the Bible literally. Well, guess what the Progressives are guilty of? Yes, ironically, they are guilty of also reading the Bible literally, with a literalistic hermeneutic.

For instance, with PSA they’ll say the term was not used in Bible (or by early Fathers, etc), as you discussed. But same with word “homosexual” which they say wasn’t in Bible and wasn’t invented until the last century or so.

By doing this, disingenuous as it is, all that they are doing is coming at the Bible with LITERALISTIC hermeneutic. So, If terms aren’t literally used, even if inference or other definition is there, they won’t allow it.

It’s a problem of ironic literalism. Do you think so? Take care, thanks for helpful podcast.

Hey Jared, there are a number of problems with your comment.

First, while it is definitely somewhat of an overstatement to say that the full blown Penal Substitution theory was the view of the early church, it is nevertheless true that the doctrine was in germ form with most of the basic elements from a very early age. And what is absolutely the view of the church from the earliest days is the concept that Christ in some sense is our substitute in the place of God's righteous and holy wrath. It is true that the early Fathers were often not very precise here, but this was true of every doctrine of the faith as is to be expected. But the early Fathers did not make a sharp distinction between the Ransom theory and the Christus Victor model as you imply and as many others imply as well. Christ was our victor over sin, death, hell, and Satan precisely because He had paid the ransom to Satan. But what is often overlooked is the fact that the Fathers taught that the entire reason we were under the yoke of Satan was because of the punishment of our sin and this punishment was rooted in the wrath of God, which was itself rooted in God's holiness, justice, and righteousness. Hence, all subjective views of the atonement have been rejected from the earliest days. In that sense Penal Substitution is indeed the historic position of the church, albeit not in its fully developed definitional sense. Also, the difference between Anselm's view and the Reformers is very, very slight despite what is so often portrayed.

Second, you are quite mistaken regarding Abelard. Abelard was a vehement opponent of the view of Anselm and taught the Moral Influence theory of the atonement, which is blatantly heretical.

Third, it is medieval and not mid-evil, which is not a term.

Before you accuse anyone of being dishonest, please make sure to get your facts straight. Thanks.

"The NT writers think of Christ’s death as both expiatory and propitiatory. With regard to the expiation of sin, the author of Hebrews hammers home the point that in contrast to the OT sacrifices, “which can never take away sins” (10.11), Christ, “having been offered once to bear the sins of many” (9.28), “remove[d] sin by the sacrifice of himself” (9.26), so that “we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (10.10). John presents Christ as a Passover lamb whose death, in contrast to the original Passover sacrifice, is expiatory: “Behold, the Lamb of ​God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (Jn 1.29). Paul uses technical Levitical terminology to refer to Christ as “a sin offering” (peri hamartias) (Rom 8.3; cf. Heb. 10.6, 8). Those who have believed in Christ “have been justified by his blood” (Rom 5.9). Christ’s righteous act of obedience “leads to acquittal and life for all men. For … by one man’s obedience many will be made righteous” (5.18–19)."
Craig, William L. (2018) The Atonement, Cambridge University Press. Cambridge, UK.