Category: Theology & Themes

Christians are obsessed with the idea of salvation. Fair enough, salvation is essential. The problem, however, is that everyone has different opinions on what salvation actually is. Different traditions tend to emphasise and even make exclusive claims to their own definition of salvation at the expense of others. So in this series, I aim to explore the different facets of salvation so that we may better understand what it really is. Here are the salvific themes we’re going to explore:

1. Liberation and Exile
2. Sin and Judgement
3. Substitution and Sacrifice
4. Recapitulation
5. Vocation
6. New Creation

Each motif plays a pivotal role in demonstrating what salvation is, how it is achieved and received, and how it is lived out by the believer. In this post, we will be exploring substitution and sacrifice.

So far, we’ve explored some essential themes. However, substitution and sacrifice sit right at the centre of all these themes as it is how exile and liberation, sin and judgement are dealt with. Without sacrifice and substitution, there would be no forgiveness of sin, there would be no freedom from guilt, death and the satan, and there would be no new creation.

“With the other New Testament writers, Paul always points to the death of Jesus as the atoning event, and explains the atonement in terms of representative substitution – the innocent taking the place of the guilty, in the name and for the sake of the guilty, under the axe of God’s judicial retribution”
– J. I. Packer

Like every other theme, substitution and sacrifice first appear on the first few pages on the Bible. In Genesis 3, Adam and Eve are presented with a choice to either eat from the Tree of Life or to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Bad. In the form of the serpent (Genesis 3:1), temptation draws humanity to eat from the Tree of Knowledge which they were told to not eat from (Genesis 2:17) and as a result, they’re cursed, the earth is cursed, and they are exiled from the Garden of Eden (God’s presence). Now sin has entered the world (Romans 5:12; 1 Corinthians 15:21) and corrupts all things (Romans 8:19-23). However, instead of leaving humanity to its own devices God promises that there will be a seed from the woman that will crush the head of the serpent while the seed is wounded by the serpent (Genesis 3:15). Before throwing them out, God clothed them in animal skins (an apparent reference to substitution and covering) and then drives them eastward (Genesis 3:20-24).

Next, we find Cain and Abel offering up gifts and sacrifices to God (Genesis 4:1-7). Strangely, at this point in the narrative, God hasn’t required any sacrifice to be made. Yet Cain is offering fruit and grain (a clear connection to Leviticus 2), and Abel offers up the firstborn of his flock. The idea of offering and sacrifice is a recurring theme throughout the biblical narrative, where we next see it with Noah:

• The earth is increasingly sinful and wicked, God destroys the planet with a flood (Genesis 6-9) yet saves humanity through one family and an ark. After the flood, Noah sets up an altar and offers up sacrifices of clean animals which leads God to make a covenant with humanity to never destroy the earth again (Genesis 8:20-22).
• God promises that through Abrahams seed all the nations will be blessed (Genesis 12:3, 18:18, 22:18), yet as a test of faith, God asks Abraham to offer up his firstborn son as a sacrifice to Him (Genesis 22:1-2). However, instead of Isaac dying, God provides a substitution (Genesis 22:10-14).
• Through Moses, God sets free His people by sending plagues on the Egyptians finally culminating in the Passover (Exodus 12). Because of the lamb’s blood being painted on the doorpost of Israelites God’s people are identified, their firstborns are spared, God’s people are literally passed over by the angel of destruction, and eventually, they’re lead into the wilderness to worship God.
• We also see examples of substitution in Numbers 3:12-13; 1 Samuel 17:9; 1 Kings 20:42; Ezekiel 4:4 and of course famously in Isaiah 53. Here we have one of the most prominent passages of substitution and sacrifice foreshadowing the Messiah.

Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have turned—every one—to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
yet he opened not his mouth;
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he opened not his mouth.
By oppression and judgment he was taken away;
and as for his generation, who considered
that he was cut off out of the land of the living,
stricken for the transgression of my people?
And they made his grave with the wicked
and with a rich man in his death,
although he had done no violence,
and there was no deceit in his mouth.

Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him;
he has put him to grief;
when his soul makes an offering for guilt,
he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days;
the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.
Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied;
by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant,
make many to be accounted righteous,
and he shall bear their iniquities.

– Isaiah 53:4–11

Moving words. This passage prophetically sheds light on the meaning of the coming Messiah’s mission. In light of Jesus, it becomes clearer that even the New Testament authors considered Jesus to be the lamb of God that was to take away the sins of the world (John 1:29, 3:17; Acts 2:23–24; Romans 6:9; 1 Corinthians 15:4; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Ephesians 1:5, 9; 2 Thessalonians 1:11). As one author explains:

The old-covenant-era hearers would have understood what this meant, for guilt offerings were sacrificed to God as substitutes in place of those who had sinned against him, so that the sinners themselves would not bear God’s righteous anger. And the old covenant foreshadowed the new covenant (Jeremiah 31:31; Luke 22:20; Hebrews 12:24), where the great Servant, the great Propitiator, would offer himself as the final once-for-all substitutionary sacrifice in the place of sinners (Hebrews 9:26).

– Jon Bloom

• Finally, we see the Lamb of God, Jesus, who was our substitute and sacrifice being worshipped and praised (Revelation 5:6-12, 7:9-17, 15:3, 17:14, 22:1-3).

Every other theme in the Bible hangs off the idea of sacrifice and substitution for it is how every other facet of salvation is achieved. Our King gave up His life willingly so we wouldn’t have to. He died to forgive sins, to set us free from our exile, to lead us into our new humanity, vocation, and new creation.

Christians are obsessed with the idea of salvation. Fair enough, salvation is essential. The problem, however, is that everyone has different opinions on what salvation actually is. Different traditions tend to emphasise and even make exclusive claims to their own definition of salvation at the expense of others. So in this series, I aim to explore the different facets of salvation so that we may better understand what it really is. Here are the salvific themes we’re going to explore:

1. Liberation and Exile
2. Sin and Judgement
3. Substitution and Sacrifice
4. Recapitulation
5. Vocation
6. New Creation

Each motif plays a pivotal role in demonstrating what salvation is, how it is achieved and received, and how it is lived out by the believer. In this post, we will be exploring sin and judgement.

Sin is often understood in a few different ways. Sin is breaking the rules and rebellion (1Jn 3:4 See also 1Sa 13:13-14; 1Ch 10:13; Ne 9:29; Mic 1:5; 7:18; Ro 2:23; 4:15; 5:14-17; Jas 2:10-11). It can be understood as falling short or missing the mark (Rom 3:23 – this is the most common use of the word in both the OT and NT). Fundamentally, however, sin is idolatry. What is idolatry? G. K. Beale writes that:

Martin Luther’s larger catechism discussion of the first commandement (“You shall have no other gods before Me” [Ex 20:3]) included “whatever your heart clings to and relies upon, that is your God; trust and faith of the heart alone make both God and idol.” I might add here, “whatever your heart clings to or relies on for ultimate security.” “The idol is whatever claims the loyalty that belongs to God alone.”

One New Testament professor of mine always used to say that idolatry is the root where sin is the fruit. In other words, the reason why we do bad things like commit adultery, tell lies, cheat and steal is because of the things we either wittingly or unwittingly worship. For all of us, there are little gods in our lives that lay claim to our hearts and turn us away from wholly giving ourselves to Yahweh. This was essentially the primordial sin of Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 they trusted in the serpent and in themselves over and above Yahweh, which is a picture of us all. Each day, perhaps in each moment we’re faced with a test to trust in God or to trust in idols. To allow Yahweh to rule over us or the things of this world to rule. Yet even if we passed 99/100 of the tests, sin can not be overlooked.

What we worship matters because we become what we worship. Consider Psalm 115:4-8

Their idols are silver and gold,
the work of human hands.
They have mouths, but do not speak;
eyes, but do not see.
They have ears, but do not hear;
noses, but do not smell.
They have hands, but do not feel;
feet, but do not walk;
and they do not make a sound in their throat.
Those who make them become like them;
so do all who trust in them.

In other words, if we worship money, we become greedy if we worship popularity, we become arrogant if we worship darkness we become dark, lost and broken. However, if we worship God who is love (1 John 4:7), holy (Is 6:3; 1 Peter 1:6), patient (Num 14:18; Ex 34:6), and merciful (Ex 34:6-7; Eph 2:4-5) we will become like that as well. Therefore, whoever it is we worship deeply affects the world and the people around us. Sin perpetuates sin, and idols flourish among one another. Sin corrupts the world and destroys lives, it offends God as it disrupts His established order – His Kingdom in which He desires humanity to be a part of.

So then, this idolatry and sin cannot be overlooked. God might be love, but God is just (Is 61:8 ), and He will not let sin go unpunished (Is 13:11; 2 Thess 1:9). He will judge the world and give each one what they deserve according to their deeds (Rom 2:6; 2 Cor 5:10; Rev 20:12), He will punish and destroy the wicked (2 Peter 3:7). We see this pattern starting Genesis 3 where God curses humanity and the earth and removes them from the Garden of Eden, however, notice that God judges to restore not to simply pour out His wrath:

• God curses humanity and the earth, then He exiles them from Eden. Yet God makes a sacrifice, covers Adam and Eve in animal skin and as an act of mercy so evil cannot live eternally denies them access to the tree of life. Finally, God promises that through the seed of Eve, one will come who will crush the serpent (sin) and restore everything to the Edenic ideal (Genesis 3).
• Cain murders Abel, and God curses Cain as a result. Yet God protects Cain from ongoing murder. It was through Cains seed that “people began to call upon the name of the LORD” (Genesis 4).
• God floods and destroys the earth because of their great wickedness (Genesis 6:1-7). Yet He chooses Noah and his family to build an ark, to save the animals and as many people who’d hear the call of repentance. God judges and renews the earth with chaotic waters and starts over with Noah (a new type of Adam) as God gives him the command to be fruitful and multiply (Genesis 9:1).
• God judges and destroys Sodom, and Gomorrah yet saves Lot and his family (Genesis 19).
• God sends plagues on Egypt and kills the firstborns, yet saves His people out of slavery so that they may worship Him (Exodus 4-15).
• God sends Israel into exile under the Babylonian rule as judgement, but also to be a light to the nations and flourish (Jer 29).
• Jesus is judged in place of humanity. He takes on the full justice of God yet only to save humanity from God’s just judgement (Jhn 3:36; Rom 5:9; 1 Thess 1:10).
• God will judge the wicked and the righteous only to restore everything in the new creation (Rev 20-22).

Finally, sin is grave. God takes it seriously, and so should His Church. As my friend Alan Stanley explains:

Judgement is the natural outcome of idolatry. For example, Adam and Eve’s sin leads to an experiential separation from God before God removes them from the garden. In Romans 2, God’s wrath is described as his eschatological judgment. But in Romans 1 people experience judgment/wrath now by God handing them over to their desires. The more one becomes enslaved by their desires, the more one experiences death now because they do not know life. John 3:18 says that those who do not believe in Jesus stand judged already, and God’s wrath remains on him (3:36). In other words, those who worship idols do become like them: they become blind, etc., and are unable to experience the reality of God. This is judgment, in the present. The final judgment then is not so much God whacking his stick over his naughty and disobedient children, but it is punishment nevertheless; a punishment that people have chosen for themselves during this life.

Let us consider God’s judgement on sin and the ramifications of our idolatry on the world around us.

Christians are obsessed with the idea of salvation. Fair enough, salvation is essential. However, the problem is that everyone has different opinions on what salvation is. Different traditions tend to emphasise and even make exclusive claims to their own definition of salvation at the expense of others. So in this series, I aim to explore the different facets of salvation so that we may better understand what it really is. Here are the salvific themes we’re going to explore:

1. Liberation and Exile
2. Judgement and Sin
3. Substitution and Sacrifice
4. Recapitulation
5. Vocation
6. New Creation

Each motif plays a pivotal role in demonstrating what salvation is, how it is achieved and received, and how it is lived out by the believer. In this post, we will be exploring liberation and exile.

In Australia, refugees, asylum seekers and displacement are huge issues. People are fleeing their homes in search of a safer place to live and to flourish because of war, famine and hunger. A recent study suggests that as many as 70.8 million people worldwide have been displaced as they desperately seek to find greener pastures. However, this isn’t anything new. Being forcibly removed from one’s country by foreign powers has been a recurring theme throughout the history of the people of Israel, starting on just the first few pages of the Bible.

Exile begins with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:24). Humanity sins by eating from the tree of knowledge of good and bad; they’re expelled from the presence of God as a consequence. They’re driven eastward, and as the archetypal figures of Israel and indeed of all humanity, they represent the state of us all, separated and exiled from our true home with God. Throughout the rest of the Bible, we see this theme recurring to highlight the consequence of sin, rebellion, and even God using exile for restoration.

• God calls Abraham out from his own land into another (Genesis 12).
• Abraham and his descendants are in the promised land, yet they trust in Egypt and are enslaved (Exodus 1).
• Moses is driven from Egypt into the wilderness only to come back and set free God’s people (Exodus 2:11-22).
• Israel is liberated from Egypt (Exodus 12-15) only to wander the wilderness before finally settling in the promised land, but not before they have to take it by force (Joshua).
• The nation of Israel is formed, but because of their sin and idolatry, they are retaken into exile under the oppression of foreign countries (2 Kings 17:6; Jeremiah 52:28-30).
• Eventually, Israel was allowed to return to their homeland, but it never was the same (Ezra and Nehemiah).
• Israel was later taken over by Alexander the Great and became a part of the Greco-Roman empire (332 B.C.). Israel still dwells in the land, yet they feel like exiles in their own homes. This is not the perfect life the Old Testament Scripture seemed to promise.

As N. T. Wright says

Most Jews of this period, it seems, would have answered the question of ‘where are we?’ in language which, reduced to its simplest form, meant: we are still in exile. They believed that, in all the senses which mattered, Israel’s exile was still in progress. Although she had come back from Babylon, the glorious message of the prophets remained unfulfilled. Israel still remained in thrall to foreigners; worse, Israel’s god had not returned to Zion.

• However, Jesus, God incarnate, arrives and preaches the coming of the Kingdom of God (Mark 1:14-15). He fulfils (Matthew 5:17) and rightly interprets (Luke 24:27; John 5:39) the Old Testament, claiming that, in a sense, everyone is separated from the Kingdom because of their sin and is exiled regardless of where they live.
• Jesus lives, dies and rises again to set us free from the greatest powers that truly keep us enslaved in exile from God’s Kingdom, sin (Romans 6:22), satan (1 John 3:8) and death (Romans 8:2; Galatians 5:1-15).
• The Kingdom has come, the Spirit has been poured out onto God’s people (Acts2), and we’ve been brought out of the Kingdom of darkness and into the Kingdom of light (Colossians 1:13). Yet a strange tension remains. We await our King to return to bring history to completion (1 Corinthians 15). The Church wanders as exiles in the now and not yet (1 Peter 1:1, 2:11) in hopeful anticipation of a new creation where not only the penalty and power of darkness have been removed but its presence as well (2 Corinthians 5:17; Revelation 21-22).

We desperately yearn for our real home, that Garden that tugs at our heartstrings. Christian or not, every one of us has this deep sense of displacement. We know things aren’t what they’re supposed to be; we’re never truly settled. There is a constant lack of contentment, and the road beckons us, calls to us with glints of answers for our restless hearts. There’s a reason why the open road seems so compelling. Travelling and experiencing what the world offers are more popular today than ever. However, more often than not, we end up back where we started, perhaps with more questions and more discontentment than ever before. As the preacher in Ecclesiastes says, “I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind” (Ecclesiastes 1:14). Behold salvation. Salvation is liberation. It is liberation from our exile, from that which enslaves us (the powers of this world – satan, sin, and death), from that which unsettles us. It brings us into the light and gives us a grand hope for a settled and whole world with God dwelling in our midst.

Sins… were the chains by which the dark powers had enslaved the humans who had worshipped them. Once sins were forgiven on the cross, the chains were snapped; victory was won. – N. T. Wright

When I started to think through my Christian faith, I would do so in terms of fixed categories. For example, Calvinist or Arminian. The Trinity. Premillennial, Amillenial or Postmillennial. Baptist, Anglican, or Pentecostal. Cessationist or Continuationist and many, many more. These are all systematic categories, and they’re helpful because they help the Church to navigate the often muddied waters of theology (of what to believe and not to believe). This kind of approach to neatly defining the Faith is very Western. Starting with the early church fathers through to the reformation and into the modern age we often (not always) find systematicians heavily influenced by Western categorical approaches to Christianity. Despite the influence of deconstructionism, this has actually been a good thing. Faithful theologians like Augustine, Luther, Calvin and Zwingli have used systematics to both guards against heresy and to recover biblical Christianity. However, the use of these sorts of categories has not always been so helpful (at least in my experience.

Throughout my time studying theology and living the Christian life, I have encountered many people who have taken these systematic categories and formed an identity out of it. All of a sudden Calvinism or Arminianism is equated to true Christianity, and anyone else needs to repent and believe. Instead of one Faith, one body, one Spirit, other Christians become second class where they’re ostracised and considered unclean. Tribes within Christianity are formed, and instead of defending the walls, we turn on one another desperate for theological supremacy. Theology in many corners of the Faith has gone from serving the Church to destroying it all because of pride. I admit I have played my own part in this terrible ordeal and as I continue to move past it, I look back, and I can count three main things that helped me shed my theological prejudice and pride:

1. Biblical theology
2. Jesus’ commands to love others
3. The opportunity to love others

For me, biblical theology saved me from possibly years and years of tribalism and systematic theology supremacy. While categories were helpful, I began to learn that the Bible isn’t a systematic textbook. Instead, it’s a narrative leading to Jesus Christ and the salvation of humanity. Sometimes categories like free will, God’s sovereignty, the trinity, and total depravity, while correct weren’t so cut and dry. All of a sudden, I went from neatly coloured boxes to colouring just outside of the lines which actually unified the Scriptures for me better overall than ever before. This is where I began to hold “tensions.” Yes, humanity is totally depraved, yet we have stories such as Noah or Abraham, finding favour in God’s eyes because of their faith. Yes, God is sovereign over every atom and movement throughout history, yet we see God hold people accountable for their own free actions. Things weren’t so neat anymore, and I loved it. It was freeing to not bind myself to any-one camp or tribe instead I now strive to commit myself to biblical Christianity (yes I see the irony in that statement, you gotta draw a line somewhere). Now I have genuine friends whom I love in all sorts of camps that I love to float to and fro from. Which leads me to my next point…

The second thing that saved me from my theological pride was to take the command to love others seriously. This is, an ongoing journey, but until recently, I just hadn’t obeyed this command. For me being an Arminian was more important than loving my Calvinist brothers in Christ. It was more important for me to defend human free will then it was to bear their burdens, to weep with them and to rejoice with them. I thought “if only I could convince them that Jesus really did die for every single person and not just the elect then they’d be better Christians” when in reality what they needed was someone to pray for them and to minister to them in love. God placed one such person in my life that until recently was an ongoing struggle to love and be a brother too. For the longest time, we took every opportunity to one-up each other, to flex our theological minds until the Spirit broke us and bonded us in love. Now we can’t stop talking to one another as we bounce off one another in love for each other’s benefits to the glory of God.

Finally, biblical theology and systematic theology needs one another (sprinkled with a bit of love). Without biblical theology, systematics become rigid, demanding and inflexible. Yet without systematics, biblical theology can easily be led down the path of liberalism. Our categorised theological traditions safeguard the Faith and have done so for thousands of years. So let us study theology to our heart’s content. Let us do so with discernment and wisdom, the love of Christ and a spirit of worship.

The goal of theology is the worship of God. The posture of theology is on one’s knees. The mode of theology is repentance.  – Sinclair B. Ferguson