Averagefellar, thanks for referring me to John Owen’s “For Whom Did Christ Die.” I did read it. This subject is interesting and important.
Timothy George stated the following:
“Since the Middle Ages, many theologians, including Thomas Acquinas and John Calvin, have made this distinction: Jesus’ death is sufficient to save all, but it is efficient to save only those who repent and believe the gospel.”
(Timothy George, Amazing Grace: God’s Initiative – Our Response, page 81)
Tom Nettles, a five-point Calvinist and professor at The Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville, commented:
“Historically, two streams of thought emerge from the writings of those who have defended limited atonement. We must not confuse either with those who purposefully rejected limited atonement. One stream, represented by such Baptists as Fuller in England and Boyce in the United States, affirms both the sufficiency of the atonement in its nature to save all men and the limitation of the atonement to the elect only in its intent. This probably represents a majority view among Calvinists. The second stream, represented by Abraham Booth in England and John L. Dagg in the United States, affirms that it is the nature of the atonement to save all for whom it is sufficient, and therefore its limitation in intent is necessarily a limitation of its sufficiency. (For the remainder of this chapter, I will argue for the second option in understanding limited atonement.) . . . The proper combination of these elements should encourage Calvinistic Baptists (and Calvinists of all sorts) to reexamine the traditional formula of ‘sufficient but efficient’ and perhaps question its aptness as an accurate description of effectual or limited atonement – for, in actuality, such a phrase does not distinguish this view from the view of general atonement.”
(Tom Nettles, By His Grace and for His Glory, pages 302, 319 )
Jim Ellis stated:
“To say that Christ's death on the cross provided an atonement sufficient for all is to specifically suggest that He has atoned for the sins of all men, which is essentially a universal atonement. This is a false conception and makes us, along with those who hold to a universal atonement, say the opposite of what we mean.”
(Jim Ellis, “Sufficient for All”)
www.the-highway.com/sufficiency.html Phil Johnson argued against Dr. Nettles’ view:
“Nettles’ argument is this: if Christ’s death was substitutionary then He died for particular sins of particular people. And if He died for particular sins than He didn’t die for other sins than those. And so Nettles seems to see such a one for one equivalence between our sins and the price of their atonement that he denies the sufficiency of the atonement to save anyone but those for whom it was designed to save. Nettles apparently holds the view that some would call equivalentism. It’s the notion that Christ suffered just so much, a finite amount, in relation to the sins of the elect. Now it pains me to disagree with Tom Nettles because I have the utmost respect for him and his writings have been extremely helpful to me and to countless others who want to understand Calvinism’s role in historic Baptist Theology.”
(“The Nature of the Atonement: Why and for Whom Did Christ Die?”, 2003 )
www.biblebb.com/files/MAC/SC03-1027.htm To me, the word “sufficient” indicates potential extent, and the word “efficient” indicates actual extent and actual intent. It seems to me that if His death was sufficient to save the non-elect, then in some sense there was enough blood to provide for the potential salvation of the non-elect. If there was not enough blood to provide for the potential salvation of the non-elect, then how can we say that His death was sufficient to save them? His death was sufficient to save an infinite number of worlds had He intended to do so. I think there’s a sense, however, in which the extent of his atonement was measurable and limited. Dr. Nettles explained:
“Concerning the atonement, although sin is imputed to Christ, Scripture does not allow us to consider his death as an atonement for only the guilt of Adam to his posterity. As the apostle Peter clearly states: ‘He himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree. . .’ (1 Peter 2:24, NIV). God’s wrath comes not only for what Adam’s sin has done to the race, but for the aggravation the race has added to the original corruption. Moreover, it is a non sequitur to move from the deity of the sacrifice to sufficiency for every individual man. Such a conclusion assumes that deity can do nothing by measure. Every event of the ministry of Jesus refuses to harmonize with that basic idea. His act of feeding the five thousand produced just enough food to satisfy those, plus another day’s provisions for the disciples.”
(Nettles, By His Grace and for His Glory, page 308 )
Note the three illustrations below:
Blood Illustration #1 (Arminian): Let’s suppose that God has created 100 units of blood for use on the cross, and only 100 people have existed in the history of the world. Fifty of them are elect, and fifty of them are non-elect. Each of these 100 people could be bought for a unit of blood, and each bought person would then have eternal life. There is enough blood to buy each of them. The blood supply is sufficient for all of them. At the redemption center a unit of blood is available for distribution to each person, and 50 elect people receive 50 units and do not reject them. Fifty non-elect people, however, either are not aware that a unit is available or refuse (veto) the unit placed in front of them. Thus, there are fifty wasted units of blood. (In this case we can say that 100 units of blood were sufficient to save 100 people, but we cannot say that 100 units were efficient to save 100 people. Fifty units were efficient to save the 50 people that God intended to save. Thus, the other 50 units were wasted.)
Blood Illustration #2 (Five-point Calvinistic): Let’s suppose that God has created 50 units of blood for use on the cross, and only 100 people have existed in the history of the world. Fifty of them are elect, and fifty of them are non-elect. Only 50 out of these 100 people could be bought for a unit of blood, and each bought person would then have eternal life. There is not enough blood to buy all 100 people. The blood supply is insufficient for 50 of them. At the redemption center no blood is offered to non-elect people because they might accept it, and there is only enough blood for the elect people. Fifty units are offered to the 50 elect people whom God intended to save. These 50 elect people receive the 50 units and do not ultimately, finally reject them. There are no wasted units of blood. (In this case we cannot say that 50 units of blood were sufficient to save 100 people, but we can say that 50 units of blood were efficient to save the 50 people that God intended to save.)
Blood Illustration #3 (Modified Calvinistic): Let’s suppose that God has always known both what the 100 people “could” do and also what they “would” do under certain circumstances. He knows that in certain circumstances, if 100 units of blood were provided to potentially buy them, all 100 people “could” receive eternal life, but He knows that only 50 people “would” actually choose to receive it under those circumstances. Those 50 people who “would” choose to receive it are also the 50 elect people that God has always intended to save. At the redemption center in the actual world a unit of blood is offered to a few non-elect people, but they refuse to take it. (Their rejection hastens their hardening, which somehow fits into God’s plan.) The 50 non-elect people “would” choose to reject eternal life under any circumstances. Thus, in the actual world, God only created 50 units of blood for use on the cross. These 50 units are efficient to save only the 50 elect persons that God has always intended to save. There are no wasted units of blood. (In this case we can say that 50 units were potentially sufficient to save 100 people because God had already potentially provided the extra 50 units in His omniscient foreknowledge. The 50 units could be offered to all 100 people, but there would be no danger of a shortage of blood for the 50 elect people. We can say that 50 units of blood were efficient to save the 50 people that God intended to save.)
The third illustration is of course the one I prefer. The other two seem to lack either efficiency or sufficiency.
