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Yesterday we looked at the idea of God as a divine scapegoat. We pick up with this idea today, showing how Jesus also was a divine scapegoat. He not only revealed to us what God had been doing all along, but also unmasked the scapegoat mechanism for all to see. Through Jesus, we see the truth of violence, that it comes from us, and not from God.

The way many Christians have come to understand and explain the crucifixion of Jesus, it almost seems as if God Himself was to blame for this violent act as well.

Did God Need an Innocent Victim To Suffer for the Sins of the World?

A large swath of Christian theology teaches that God sent Jesus to die on the cross, that it was God Himself who wanted an innocent victim to die for the sins of the whole world. Many forms of traditional Christianity even state that the only reason the death of Jesus could atone for the sins of the whole world is because He was an innocent victim.

In other words, one prominent and popular explanation for the crucifixion of Jesus was that God needed an innocent victim to pay for the sins of the world, and since the innocent victims of bulls and goats could not perfectly accomplish what God desired, God instead had to send the ultimate innocent victim, His only Son Jesus Christ, to pay for the sins of the whole world.

This interpretation of the cross makes God once again the violent perpetrator of this most violent of crimes. According to this view, God ordained the death of His Son because God demands the blood sacrifice of an innocent victim to appease His anger toward sin.

The Scriptures, however, paint a quite different picture.

We Killed Jesus as a Scapegoat for our own Sin and Shame

Jesus came to occupy an all-too-humanly constituted place of shame, violence, and death, and not hold it against us. There is an angry deity in this equation, and it is us, in whose midst God, quite without violence, manifests the depth of his forgiving love by plumbing the depths of, and thus defanging, our violence (Alison, We didn’t invent sacrifice).

Instead of God demanding a blood sacrifice to satisfy His wrath toward sinful humanity, Scripture indicates that it was mankind who put Jesus to death on the cross.

It was we who continued our age-old crime of scapegoating an innocent victim to appease our own guilty conscience.

We were the violent ones, and Jesus submitted Himself to our violence to both expose it and neutralize it once and for all.

Jesus went willingly to the cross, not because a blood sacrifice was necessary to pay the penalty for sin, but because going to the cross unmasked the scapegoat mechanism, revealed the violence inherent within the heart of men, exposed the myth of redemptive violence, and brought an end to the war that men had waged on God for centuries.

Unveiling the Power of Sin

On the cross, Jesus removed the veil from the power of sin.

On the cross, Jesus laid bare for all to see the lie that violence toward an innocent victim helps alleviate the curse of sin and constant spiral of violence.

On the cross, Jesus showed us once and for all that God is not violent, but, quite to the contrary, has been taking upon Himself the violence of the whole world.

In Jesus, “God is revealed as the ‘arch-scapegoat,’ the completely innocent one who dies in order to give life. And his way of giving life is to overthrow the religion of scapegoating and sacrifice” (McDonald, Violence & The Lamb Slain).

How can a God who says "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44) be the same God who instructs His people in the Old Testament to kill their enemies?

These are the sorts of questions we discuss and (try to) answer in my online discipleship group. Members of the group can also take ALL of my online courses (Valued at over $1000) at no charge. Learn more here: Join the RedeemingGod.com Discipleship Group I can't wait to hear what you have to say, and how we can help you better understand God and learn to live like Him in this world!

God as the Divine Scapegoat

By Jeremy Myers

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The biblical symbol of the scapegoat helps us understand what God was doing when He allowed (or inspired) Old Testament authors to attribute violence to Him.

When we understand that God Himself is the primary scapegoat in Scripture, it helps us see that God is not violent, but He allowed violent people to attribute violence to His name so that He could bear their shame and guilt.

“God Himself reuses the scapegoat mechanism, at his own expense, in order to subvert it.” (Girard, One By Whom Scandal Comes, 43-4). To put it another way, God “allowed himself to be expelled so as to make of his expulsion a revelation of what he is really like” (Alison, “Girard’s Breakthrough”).

God Takes On our Violence

Though innocent of all violence attributed to Him, God allowed the violence committed by others to be laid upon His head so that He might take the blame and thereby rescue and deliver mankind from most of the self-destructive consequences of their sin, and reveal Himself to mankind as a loving Father who takes our sin upon Himself for our deliverance from the consequences of sin and for the sake of our relationship with Him.

God “is always ready to pay with his own person in order to spare men the terrible destiny that awaits them” (Girard, Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World, 208).

God Rescues Mankind from Violence

By being the scapegoat for natural and human violence, God thereby rescues, redeems, and delivers mankind from the disastrous consequences of owning up to what is truly in our hearts. If given a true and complete glimpse of the blackness that resides in our own hearts, some would fall into deep despair and depression from which there is no escape, while others would embrace the evil as a justification for further evil actions toward others. When men get an honest glimpse of the evil that resides in our hearts, we either sink down into death or seek to incarnate the evil even further. When faced with the depths of our own depravity, some die and some kill.

God wanted to rescue humanity from either possibility and so He actively allowed men to blame Him for the evil of their own hearts. He bears the burden that no human being can bear. He became the scapegoat for their sin, allowing humanity to lay their sins upon Him so that He might carry their sins away.

In order to achieve God’s purposes, God will in effect “get his hands dirty.” It is necessary for God to enter into compromising situations, and work with whatever potential there is, in order to move forward God’s salvific goals. But God, too, will suffer violence in such situations. God will not only absorb the effects of the human misuse of power, but will “look bad” in the eyes of those who think that God’s possibilities should not be so limited (see 1 Cor 1:26-31) (See Fretheim, The Suffering of God, 76).

God as the Scapegoat and Leviticus 16

The imagery of the scapegoat comes from the description in Leviticus 16 of the goat chosen on the Day of Atonement to carry the sins of Israel out into the wilderness. On the Day of Atonement, the priest would select two goats and present them before God, and then cast lots to see which would be chosen as the scapegoat.

The goat which was selected by lot was offered to God as a burnt offering, while the one which was rejected became the scapegoat (Lev 16:7-10). The priest was to lay his hands upon the scapegoat, symbolically passing all of Israel’s sins upon the goat, and then the goat was to be sent away into the wilderness, where it (presumably) died, taking all the sins of Israel with it into the grave.

That God allows Himself to be the scapegoat for our sin is seen partly in the fact that the practice of “scapegoating” is found, not just in Leviticus 16, but in all cultures and all religions throughout history. From sacrificial animals to human sacrifices, all societies sought, in one way or another, to alleviate their own guilt and shame by laying this guilt upon someone or something else.

While this often took the form of blood sacrifice, the practice of “scapegoating” is also seen when a culture blames some person or people group within their society for all the woes that fall upon that society. This person or people group is then killed off, enslaved, or sent into exile, bearing the sins of society on their back. Those that remain are able to continue their lives as normal, thinking that the root cause of their problems has been eliminated.

The real problem, of course, is within each and every human being, and so it is only a matter of time before problems resurface and the quest for a new scapegoat must begin again.

The Scapegoat Mechanism

Sociologists, anthropologists, and psychologists have noticed this “scapegoat mechanism” in various societies and cultures around the world and have attributed it to an evolutionary necessity for the survival of human society. Humans need someone else to blame for their sin so that humanity can continue. The practice of blaming others for our behavior enables the survival of society (See Girard, The Scapegoat).

Without the scapegoat mechanism, inter-personal violence only continues to escalate on an ever-increasing spiral of retribution and destruction until society collapses upon itself. By bringing blame upon a scapegoat, two warring enemies are able to put aside their differences and unite in the common goal of destroying the scapegoat. The scapegoat bears the blame for what was done, even though the scapegoat is usually innocent of the wrongdoing for which it receives blame.

Whether one accepts the evolutionary hypothesis or not, it cannot be denied that the scapegoat mechanism exists in all societies and cultures, and that God Himself used it to help rescue and deliver Israel from the disastrous consequences of her own sin.

Could it be that in using the scapegoat imagery, God was not only giving Israel a way of escape for their own violent tendencies, but was also revealing to them (and us) what He Himself was doing about the violence of Israel, and indeed, the violence of the whole world?

Could it be that the scapegoat imagery of Leviticus 16 that God wasn’t just telling Israel that their sins were carried away into the wilderness by a goat, but that He Himself was bearing their sin on His own being, so that they might be delivered from the ever-increasing spiral of violence that threatened to consume them?

Yes, it seems entirely possible. When people wrote that God told them to kill and slaughter others, they were scapegoating God, but He was letting them do it—even inspiring them to do so.

Why?

For their own deliverance.

The Deliverance of God

God knew that without the violence of the scapegoat mechanism, mankind would only spiral into ever-increasing violence, which ultimately would end in our complete destruction. Without an innocent victim on which to pour our wrath and guilt, mankind metes out its violence upon each other in an ever-increasing spiral of violence. God knew this in the Old Testament (and even today), and so allows people to blame Him for the most horrendous actions, not because He has done these things, and not because He has commanded that such things be done, but because He knows that if He does not act as the scapegoat, we will destroy ourselves.

God has chosen to bear the people’s sins rather than deal with them on strictly legal terms. For God to assume such a burden, for God to continue to bear the brunt of Israel’s rejection, meant continued life for the people (Fretheim, The Suffering of God, 148).

This is especially seen when we consider that much of the scapegoat imagery is carried over into the New Testament and applied to Jesus Christ on the cross. By teaching Israel about the scapegoat, and indeed, implanting the scapegoat mechanism into the hearts of people around the world, God was preparing people for the ultimate scapegoat of human history—Jesus Christ. Jesus, the innocent victim, bore our sins on His own body, taking them with Him into the grave, so that we might not fall into death but might experience the life God intended for His creation. We will look at Jesus as the divine scapegoat tomorrow.

Until then, have you ever heard of this “scapegoat mechanism” in studies outside of Scripture and how it serves to allow the survival of human society? What do you think of this idea? Where do you see it functioning in your culture today?

How can a God who says "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44) be the same God who instructs His people in the Old Testament to kill their enemies?

Why God Appears Violent in Scripture

By Jeremy Myers

21 Comments

The reason that God appears so violent in Scripture (and in nature) is not because He is violent, but because He allows human and natural violence to be attributed to His name for our own sake. There are numerous reasons God allows violence to be attributed to His name, but we must begin by understanding the origin of violence itself.

The Origin of Violence

Throughout history and around the world, people have noticed that violence permeates everything. From birth to death, from galaxies down to sub-atomic particles, violence is omnipresent. Whenever people recognize this, they are left with only two basic options for the existence and origin of violence.

First, as I discuss in my book, (#AmazonAdLink) The Atonement of God, some people decided that violence and evil were eternal and that God was constantly at war against this violence and evil, but would never overcome it. This view has come to be known as dualism, and while dualism is prevalent in many Eastern religions and has attached itself in various ways to most Western religions (including Christianity), most Christians would not say that evil is eternally co-existent with God.

The second option for the origin of violence is that somehow or another, violence and evil originated with God (or the gods). Though many in the ancient world had no problems with such an idea (just look at how the gods of Egyptian, Persian, Greek, Roman, and Egyptian mythology behave) such a suggestion is not acceptable to most people today. Ever since the time of Plato (and as a result of his ideas), the gods are supposed to behave in morally superior manner, and not simply be extreme manifestations of humanity’s deepest emotions and desires.

God and the Origin of Violence

Since neither option for the origin of evil and violence appeals to most Christians, numerous theories have been proposed for how violence and evil can exist in God’s good creation while not being eternally existent with God nor having its origin in God.

Some say the violence came directly from God, while others said its origin was in evil spiritual beings who rebelled against God, or even in mankind ourselves, but such options beg the question about why God would create beings who were capable of such evil.

Others argue that violence and evil are not always identical, so that what is violent may not always be evil. Though this is true, the origin of violence and evil must still be considered.

Regardless of which view people today hold regarding the origin of evil and violence, it cannot be denied that civilizations of earlier eras believed that since all creation was violent, and since all creation came from God, that therefore, God also was violent. How else, they thought, could violence exist? If God did not will it, want it, or command it, violence would have no place in the world.

Such a view is not surprising, for many people today believe the exact same thing.

The Origin of our OWN Violence

But more than the origin of violence, people needed an object on which to blame their own violence. For while everybody hates violence in others, we always seek to justify the violence that we ourselves exhibit.

Whenever we ourselves commit violence, we almost always find some way to blame it as a necessary response to the actions of others against us. Sometimes, when our violence has no one else to blame, we place blame upon God.

If we deny that God is the source of our violence, then we are left with only two options: either we must call our violence “good” or we must accept that we ourselves are terribly and inherently violent.

Though some theologians take the first option and some warriors take the second, the vast majority of mankind prefers to blame their violence on God. The violent God of a violent creation is the perfect target for our own violence. The word “target” is used intentionally. When we blame God for the violence we ourselves commit, God becomes both the justification for our violence, and the victim of it.

So why does God appear violent in Scripture? Because we have blamed God for our own violence. (See my book, (#AmazonAdLink) The Atonement of God, for a longer explanation.)

God appears violent in the Bible because humans would rather blame God for our violence than admit that we ourselves are violent. And as we have seen in previous posts, and will see in future posts, God willingly accepts the blame (or responsibility) for our violence because He is seeking to rescue and deliver us from it.

How can a God who says "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44) be the same God who instructs His people in the Old Testament to kill their enemies?

Can a Christian lose salvation?

By Jeremy Myers

94 Comments

A reader recently sent in a question about whether or not she could lose her salvation. I searched my blog high and low for somewhere that I had answered this before, and much to my shock, could not find that I had previously written about this anywhere. I am certain I have written about it, but since I couldn’t find it, decided to write about it anyway. Here is the question she sent in:

I m getting real confused on the subject of salvation as I am doing my bible study. I would be grateful if you could take out some time and clear my confusion.

Can a born again christian lose salvation? If yes, does that mean we can preserve our salvation by following some rules and doing good works? I personally dont believe in salvation by works but what confuses me is if we can lose salvation than we can protect it too which means we remain saved by works.

But if we can’t lose salvation, then what happens if we keep on enjoying worldly pleasures like fornication, orgies, adultery, drunkenness etc? The bible tells us that “such will not inherit the kingdom of heaven.”

This is a great question which millions of Christians around the world ask all the time. Can a Christian lose salvation?

Confusion about Losing Salvation

The reason there is so much confusion surrounding the question about whether or not Christians can lose salvation is mostly because of the word “salvation” itself.

As long as we think that the word “salvation” refers to forgiveness of sin, eternal life, escaping hell, and going to heaven when we die, we will always be confused about whether or not Christians can lose salvation.

Why? Because there are numerous texts in the Bible which talk about “saving” the soul from death, “saving” the life, being “saved” by works, faith alone doesn’t “save,” and so on throughout the Bible. If we read these passages thinking they are talking about how to receive eternal life, we will get very confused.

This is why I wrote an article a while back about the word “saved” in the Bible. Before you read further, you should go read that post, because I am not going to restate here what I wrote there. The bottom line idea, however, is that the “salvation” word family rarely refers to receiving eternal life. When the Bible wants to talk about eternal life, it uses terms like “eternal life” or “everlasting life.”

It would be wise for us to do the same …

Confusion about the Kingdom of God/Heaven

The second area of confusion that causes people to think they can lose their “salvation” is when they equate the Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven with “heaven” or with eternal life. Just as with “salvation,” the Kingdom of God/Heaven are not the same thing as eternal life. The Kingdom of God/Heaven refers to the rule and reign of God in our lives. As we learn to follow Jesus, His rule and reign expands in our lives, and we exhibit the values and goals of His kingdom through our words and actions.

The same goes for inheriting the Kingdom, or even “inheriting” eternal life. Inheriting is different than receiving. Inheritance is something given to those who are “in the family” and so the only way to receive God’s inheritance is if you are already in God’s family, which happens by faith alone in Jesus Christ. Again, I have written about this here: The role of faith and works.

So Can a Christian Lose Salvation?

Well, if you are asking, “Can a Christian lose eternal life?” the answer is no. If everlasting life can be lost, it has the wrong name. Besides, Jesus promises everlasting life to all who simply and only believe in Him for it (John 3:16; 5:24; 6:47), and if we believe that everlasting life is not everlasting, then we are doubting the words and promises of Jesus.

But if a Christian cannot lose eternal life, then why should we not just go sin all we want? Because although we cannot lose eternal life, there is much to lose by sinning!

For example, we can lose our experience of the rule and reign of God in our lives (that is, lose our experience of the Kingdom of God). We can lose our fellowship with God (1 John). Since sin is so destructive, we can lose our health, wealth, and emotional well-being. We can lose our spouses, our children, and our jobs. We can lose contentment, joy, and satisfaction in life. We can lose peace.

So while there are all sorts of things a Christian can lose by sinning, eternal life is not one of them.

Here is another post which might help as well: Once Saved, Always Saved?

By the way, if you want to read more on this topic, I strongly recommend these books:

Eternal Security by Charles Stanley
Secure and Sure by Robert Wilkin
Final Destiny by Joseph Dillow

The Kingdom of God is at Hand

By Jeremy Myers

4 Comments

Ever wonder what Jesus meant when He said “The Kingdom of God is at hand”?

THIS:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=632CHpeHYZE

When God Pled Guilty

By Jeremy Myers

6 Comments

I tend to write my books on my blog. I do this for various reasons, one of which is that I desire input, questions, and suggestions from readers. The following posts are from my book When God Pled Guilty, which is an examination of how to understand the violent actions of God in the Old Testament in light of Jesus Christ, and especially, Jesus Christ dying for His enemies on the cross.

So read through the posts below, and join the conversation on each post. Also, invite others to read these posts by using the sharing buttons at the bottom, because many people struggle with how to understand the violence of God in the Bible.

When God Pled Guilty

Introduction: God is Guilty

Theories on the Violence of God in the Old Testament

My Proposal for Understanding the Violence of God in the Old Testament

Theological Chaos Theory

The Violence of the Flood

More Coming Soon! Subscribe to the Blog to Keep Updated!

Miscellaneous Posts on the Violence of God in Scripture

What is “Soul Sleep”?

By Jeremy Myers

72 Comments

Several readers have recently submitted questions about “soul sleep.” I have probably received 5 or 6 such questions in the span of two weeks. I am not sure why, since I have never received this question before on this blog. I wonder if maybe there was a prominent radio or television pastor who spoke about it recently, and so that is why I all of a sudden got so many questions about soul sleep, or maybe it was just pure coincidence.

Anyway, here is one example of the questions which have been submitted regarding what the Bible says about soul sleep:

Preachers teach when we die, we go to heaven. I was told my mother was in heaven. Yet the bible says she is asleep and waiting for Christ to return (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18).

Here is my response:

The Basic Teaching about Soul Sleep

The basic idea behind soul sleep is that when a person dies, they do not immediately go to heaven to be with God, but enter into a state of unconscious limbo. They are no longer alive, but they are not in heaven either. They are not conscious of being dead, but they have not ceased to exist. Instead, they are “asleep.”

In other words, it is believed that after death but before the resurrection, all people who have died are in a state of waiting for the final resurrection and the judgments that follow. They are not conscious of waiting, but are “sleeping.” When they are resurrected, it will seem as if they had just died mere moments ago, when it reality, it may have been thousands of years since their death.

One of the primary Scripture passages used to defend the idea of soul sleep is 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, where Paul uses the term “asleep” to describe those who have died. Another text used to defend soul sleep is Ecclesiastes 9:5, which says that the dead do not know anything.

Is Soul Sleep Biblical?

I do not believe the Bible teaches soul sleep.

First, Ecclesiastes 9:5 should not be taken as a reference to whether or not the dead are “conscious.” Ecclesiastes is written for those who are “under the sun,” that is, for those who are alive (Eccl 1:1-3). As such, Ecclesiastes 9:5 is telling those who are alive that it is vanity and folly to seek help from the dead, for we will get no answers or help from them.

Secondly, though Paul does use the word “asleep” in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, this is not a reference to “soul sleep” but simply pictures how a dead person appears to one who is living. To someone who is alive, a dead person looks like they are “asleep.” This imagery is used elsewhere in Paul’s writings to describe death (cf. 1 Cor 11:30). So again, the term says nothing whatsoever about the consciousness (or lack of consciousness) of the dead.

Thirdly, we see various places in the Bible where people talk about what happens after death, and there does not seem to be any “unconscious waiting period” of soul sleep at all. When the thief on the cross asks Jesus to remember Him when He enters into glory, Jesus says, “Today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). Can it really be imagined that Jesus actually meant, “Today you will die, and then enter into a state of soul sleep, so that thousands of years from now when you are resurrected from the dead, you will be with me in paradise”? I don’t think so.

Then there is the Mount of Transfiguration in Matthew 17:1-8 where Moses and Elijah appear and talk with Jesus. If they are talking to Jesus, they certainly are not in some sort of unconscious soul sleep.

And of course, we mustn’t forget 2 Corinthians 5:8 where Paul says that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. This once again seems to teach that as soon as our spirit departs from our body, it is immediately present with God.

There are a few other texts as well (feel free to include them in the comments below), but I think you get the point: Soul sleep is not taught in the Bible.

Here is (in my understanding) what happens after death

After a person dies, I believe their soul/spirit goes to the place where they will spend eternity. People who have believed in Jesus go to heaven. They are conscious and awake, but they do not have physical bodies.

At some point in the future there will be a physical resurrection of all people, at which point, everybody will receive incorruptible bodies. After this there will be a final judgment, and then an eternal existence with our new bodies.

I know, I know … I left out a lot of details. I left the question of hell unanswered. I left out almost everything the End Times and the various judgments that are talked about in the Bible. I left all that out because for the purpose of discussing soul sleep, none of that matters.

Bottom line: I do not believe in soul sleep. I believe that after a believer dies, they are immediately with God in heaven, and are conscious of it, and are conscious of other people there as well. They do not yet have bodies, but will receive them at the future resurrection.

In Killing Jesus, Satan Cast out Satan

By Jeremy Myers

15 Comments

In Part 1 and Part 2 of this 3-Part series on how Satan casts out Satan, we learned that Satan uses violent religion to attack and kill the messengers of God, and thus, appear to be “casting out Satan” while in reality, he is only solidifying his own power and influence in the world.

In this post, we see how Jesus used this ploy of Satan to truly cast out Satan.

Satan Cast out Satan

In killing Jesus, Satan cast out Satan for real and his kingdom crumbled around him in ashes and ruin. The great victory of the cross is that in killing Jesus, Satan unwittingly handed the dominion over the earth back to Jesus.

In seeking to prey upon Jesus, Satan had fallen prey to the “deep magic” which C. S. Lewis writes about in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. By refusing to retaliate, by refusing to resort to redemptive violence, by refusing to play the devil’s game, Jesus beat the devil at his own game and revealed Satan’s scheme to the entire world. Jesus showed that there is no power in violence, but only more slavery.

True power and true victory lie in love for your enemies, in self-sacrificial service, in infinite forgiveness, and in bearing sin and shame for the sake of others.

As Jesus shuddered and died, Satan watched in horror as his death blow upon Jesus also caused his own kingdom to collapse and crumble. All of Satan’s power and Satan’s lies fell to dust and ashes.

With the death and resurrection of Jesus, a new green shoot of a new Kingdom sprouted up from the midst of the ashes of Satan’s kingdom, and has been growing ever since, even to this very day. This new Kingdom is the Kingdom of God, a Kingdom built upon forgiveness and mercy, grace and generosity, love and kindness, rather than a kingdom built upon blame, victimization, persecution, and violence toward others for selfish gain.

The Defeat of Satan in the Death of Jesus

The beauty and majesty of the cross is that just when Satan thought he had won his greatest victory, it is exactly then, as the last breath escaped from the lips of Jesus, that Satan realized to his complete horror what he had done. Satan had truly cast out Satan.

Though with every previous charade, Satan had erected a false Satan and then used society, culture, government, and religion to “cast out Satan,” when Satan turned that same ploy upon Jesus, it truly was Satan himself who got cast out, and as a result, his kingdom crumbled. “Christ’s death represents the loss of Satan’s kingdom: the Satanic circle is broken, and the truth and grace of Jesus can now descend on those who are not afraid of accepting it” (Girard, The One by Whom Scandal Comes, 62, cf. also p. 40, 53 ).

Up until the crucifixion of Jesus, and even in the minds of most today, humanity believed the essential lie of the devil, that if someone was attacking you, you attack back. If someone was threatening you, you strike first and strike hard.

But Jesus did none of these things. He did not defend Himself. He raised no objection. He brought forth no weapon. He did not resort to violence or to blame in the least little way. He died.

But most shockingly of all, in dying, Jesus won!

In this way, Jesus revealed the emptiness of Satan’s power, the futility of Satan’s lies, and the falseness of his claims. By killing Jesus, Satan cast out Satan, and his power over the earth was seen to be no power at all.

Jesus launched a full-out assault on the gates of hell and prevailed against them by dying at hell’s door. But much to hell’s surprise, when they opened their doors to drag his body in so that they might parade it through their bloody streets, Jesus rode through the wide-open gates as a victor over a defeated city. His robe, stained in His own blood, swept through the streets, and washed them white as snow.

Jesus died at hell’s gates so that He might ride through them in victory.

The poor were given good news, the brokenhearted were given hope, the captives were set free, the blind were restored their sight, and the oppressed were granted liberty. The first year of God’s favor had begun. “Mankind, thanks to the Cross, for the first time in its history, is no longer in bondage to Satan” (Girard, The Girard Reader, 206).

This again shows why God allows humanity to blame Him for the violence of the world. Throughout the ages, Satan thought that by turning God into a devil, Satan was defeating God. But on the cross, God finally revealed what had truly been going on all along. It was so that He could defeat sin, death, and devil by taking all the violence upon Himself without retaliating in any way, but forgiving and reconciling instead, thus showing the powerlessness and emptiness of the way of violence.

How can a God who says "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44) be the same God who instructs His people in the Old Testament to kill their enemies?

Salvation by Crucifixion

By Jeremy Myers

12 Comments

I know that when authors and publishers send out “review copies” of their books, they are hoping for positive reviews. As an author myself, I know how much negative reviews hurt. So whenever someone sends me a review copy of their book, I try my absolute hardest to write about everything good in the book, while downplaying or ignoring anything I didn’t like.

So when Christian Focus Publications recently sent me a copy of Salvation by Crucifixion by Philip Graham Ryken, I wanted to like it. I really, really did. Especially since I am a big proponent of “Cruciform theology” which places the cross of Jesus at the center of all theological thinking and Christian living. I hoped that this book by Ryken would emphasize and reiterate how critical the cross is for our thinking about God, Scripture, the church, and our role in this world.

I was severely disappointed.

I will explain why, but first, let me point out the positives of Salvation by Crucifixion.

Positives of Salvation by Crucifixion

First, I loved the emphasis on the cross. Every page had something to say about the cross, and clearly defends the idea that the cross is central to Christian life and Christian thinking.

It is when Christians fail to recognize the centrality of the cross that we fail to live as Christians and as the church in this world. Ryken did a decent job of pointing this out in Salvation by Crucifixion.

I was also glad to see Ryken describe the brutality of crucifixion (p. 76). I have written about this myself, and find it helpful to remember the pain and suffering that Jesus went through out of His great love for us.

Finally, I really appreciated his explanation of how the practice of Roman crucifixion was reserved for the worst criminals of Roman civilization (p. 30-31). As I have mentioned frequently in the book I am currently writing, it is as a “criminal” on a cross that Jesus most clearly reveals God to us. Ryken didn’t take the imagery that far, but I was glad to see that he emphasized that crucifixion was for criminals.

So, what then did I not like about the book?

Negatives of Salvation by Crucifixion

I will try to be brief and not overly critical.

My bottom line disagreement is that Ryken is writing from a Reformed/Calvinistic perspective. As such, I would have loved this book 15 years ago when I was a Reformed 5-point hyper Calvinist. But no longer. I found myself disagreeing (sometimes quite strongly) with something Ryken wrote on nearly every page.

For example, his use of the word “salvation” is murky. Very rarely (probably never) does the Bible use the word “salvation” as an exact synonym for “eternal life.” But this seems to be the way Ryken used the word throughout his book.

Second, though there were places where Ryken said that “salvation” was by faith alone in Jesus Christ (that’s good!), he then went on to add various conditions to faith. Just one example: One page 25, he writes that we must not only believe in Jesus, but we must believe “that Jesus died for his or her sins on the cross … accept that Jesus Christ lived a real life and died a real death … acknowledge that you, personally, are a sinner … confess that you need Jesus Christ to save you … believe that Jesus died on that splintery old cross … accept that Jesus Christ is not merely a legend.” He want on to tell a story about a woman who apparently believed this (or most of it?), but didn’t realize that the cross had relevance for her own life, and therefore (according to him) didn’t have eternal life (p. 26).

Third, I am not a fan of the Penal Substitutionary theory of the atonement. I am a proponent of the Christus Victor view. Ryken’s book is overflowing with imagery, language, and themes from the Penal Substutionary view, and in my opinion, this perspective damages our view of God and what Jesus actually accomplished on the cross. This topic is so large, I cannot say anything else about it here.

Fourth, there is a strange statement on page 21 that God “purposed” the crucifixion (what does this mean), and then two paragraphs later that “the crucifixion of Jesus Christ was the most evil deed ever committed on the planet.” I know that my Reformed/Calvinistic friends place great emphasis on the sovereignty of God, but this is one of the areas that causes great problems to their view. How can God “purpose” the greatest evil in the world? I just have real trouble with this line of thinking.

Fifth, I was shocked to read this statement on page 81: “If God did not spare His own Son from His curse against sin (see Rom 8:32), then why would He spare us from that curse?” Aside from the fact that this is an example of that penal substitution view rearing it’s head, for in this view, God hates sin, and is angry at sinners, and so must kill His Son as a way to appease His own wrath against sin (which doesn’t make much biblical or theological sense), the real reason I was shocked to read this statement is because it is the exact opposite of what Paul actually says in Romans 8:32! Paul says that if God did not spare His own son, then will he not also freely give us all things? The fact that God did not spare His own son is not evidence that He will curse us, but quite to the contrary, evidence that He will freely bless us!

Anyway, I could go on and on (As I said, I disagreed with something on almost every page), but those are some of my most serious misgivings about this book. Obviously, I cannot recommend Salvation by Crucifixion. It is too Calvinistic in thinking, approach, and theology, and thus, distorts Christ, the cross, and the Gospel.

How Satan Uses Religion to Cast out Satan

By Jeremy Myers

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In Part 1 of this short series called “Satan Casts out Satan” we saw that although Satan stole dominion over the earth from Adam and Eve, Satan loves nothing more than to use violence to get rid of violence, and in so doing, consolidate and amplify his own power over the earth. One way he does this is through violent religion. This post looks a little more at this topic.

God’s Activity in Satan’s Dominion

God was not inactive during this endless cycle of Satan using religion to “cast out Satan.” He constantly sent messengers, individuals, people, and even nations in an attempt to spread light and love in this dark world. But it is in these instances where Satan’s power really worked. Satan loved nothing more than to use redemptive violence against those whom God had sent so that God’s messengers were killed in God’s name (Matt 21:33-46, 23:34-37). How did Satan do this? Through religion.

God’s message to the world has always been a message of grace, love, mercy, forgiveness, and acceptance. But Satan has always taken God’s message and perverted it so that it becomes a twisted set of rules, regulations, sacrifices, and laws by which mankind seeks to regain God’s love and favor.

But whenever God sent messengers and prophets to proclaim grace to the world, religion reared up to condemn God’s message of grace as false, heretical, contrary to God’s will, and of the devil. Then, having used religion to convert God’s messenger into a messenger of Satan, Satan used religious redemptive violence to kill and destroy God’s messenger in the name of God.

Satan turns God’s messenger into “Satan,” and then uses violent religion to destroy this newly minted “Satan.” It is in this way that Satan “casts out Satan,” and once again, protects and consolidates his own power in the world.

So by causing violence to be ascribed to God, and by using violent religion to “cast out Satan,” Satan had developed the perfect cycle of violence from which there seemed to be no escape. When bad things happened, it was God’s fault. And when God sent messengers to proclaim His truth and love, Satan vilified them until they too were killed in the name of God. This beautiful lie was perpetrated upon the world and carried out in plain view over and over and over since time began.

Satan Turned Religion against Jesus

But when Jesus arrived, He began to unmask the lie and pull back the curtains on Satan’s scheme. He told people what God was really like. He invited people to turn away from violence, and live in love and forgiveness. He set people free from sin, from darkness, from slavery, and from hate. He called people to a new way of living.

This, of course, was not something Satan could allow. It was not something Satan could permit. And so he resorted to the same ploy that had worked millions of times before. Every previous time that God had sent a messenger, Satan raised up religion to kill God’s messenger in God’s name. Satan did the same thing with Jesus, believing that such a plan would work as it always had before. He got religion to condemn Jesus as a son of Beelzebub, a blasphemer, an idolater, as one who was opposed to God and God’s Word. And then Satan got religion to kill Jesus in the name of God. Satan used religion to turn Jesus into a “Satan” so that religion could then kill Jesus in the name of God. Once again, Satan sought to “cast out Satan,” and thus solidify and consolidate his power even further.

And just as it had always done before, the plan worked beautifully.

Almost too beautifully.

One can almost feel the confusion of Satan in the end the Gospel accounts as Jesus, who has struggled and taught and healed against all the death and destruction and lies of the devil throughout His entire three years of ministry, now goes silently to the cross, like a lamb to the slaughter. Satan does not see the trap until it is too late.

For all of human history, Satan cast out Satan so that he might continually reinforce his own power, and reinsert himself into human structures and institutions, forever consolidating and expanding his own power and dominion over God’s creation. But when he tried it with Jesus, he failed to recognize that he was snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Jesus Beat Satan at his own Game

Jesus, of course, knew what Satan was about. This is why He asked earlier in His ministry: “How can Satan cast out Satan?” (Mark 3:23). Jesus asks this question, but never answers it. Why? Because the answer was the key to His victory over Satan. The initial answer to Jesus’ question seems to be that “Satan would not cast out himself. It would be foolish to do so. For if Satan cast out Satan, then his kingdom would crumble, his house would fall, and his power would come to an end.” But Jesus knew, as did Satan, that the key to Satan’s power was that Satan had been casting out Satan since the beginning of time, but blaming his violent overthrow upon God.

But in the crucifixion of Jesus, when Satan tries once again to use violent religion to “cast out Satan,” this time in the scapegoat of Jesus Christ, Satan did not realize that his plan would backfire.

When Satan attacked Jesus through the crucifixion, Satan believed he was conquering over Jesus and casting Jesus out of this world once and for all. But little did he know that Jesus, by submitting Himself as the willing scapegoat for all the violence, enmity, hatred, and evil of the world, was unmasking the power and dominion of Satan, and thus, defeating Satan even as Satan thought he was striking the victorious blow.

What do you think of this idea of Satan using religion to cast out Satan, which in reality, is nothing more than Satan using violence in the name of God to solidify his own power in this world? Include your own ideas in the comments below!

How can a God who says "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44) be the same God who instructs His people in the Old Testament to kill their enemies?

Did God Need an Innocent Victim To Suffer for the Sins of the World?

We Killed Jesus as a Scapegoat for our own Sin and Shame

Unveiling the Power of Sin

God Takes On our Violence

God Rescues Mankind from Violence

God as the Scapegoat and Leviticus 16

The Scapegoat Mechanism

The Deliverance of God

The Origin of Violence

God and the Origin of Violence

The Origin of our OWN Violence

Confusion about Losing Salvation

Confusion about the Kingdom of God/Heaven

So Can a Christian Lose Salvation?

When God Pled Guilty

Theories on the Violence of God in the Old Testament

My Proposal for Understanding the Violence of God in the Old Testament

Theological Chaos Theory

The Violence of the Flood

Miscellaneous Posts on the Violence of God in Scripture

The Basic Teaching about Soul Sleep

Is Soul Sleep Biblical?

Here is (in my understanding) what happens after death

Satan Cast out Satan

The Defeat of Satan in the Death of Jesus

Positives of Salvation by Crucifixion

Negatives of Salvation by Crucifixion

God’s Activity in Satan’s Dominion

Satan Turned Religion against Jesus

Jesus Beat Satan at his own Game

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