The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum Atonement insufficient?

John 1:29; 3:16,17; 4:42; 6:42; 12:47

Joh 1:29 The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. (KJV)

Joh 3:16-17 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. (KJV)

Joh 4:42 And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world. (KJV)

Robertson's Word Pictures
The Saviour of the world. (See Mat_1:21 for s"sei used of Jesus by the angel Gabriel. John applies the term swthr to Jesus again in 1Jo_4:14. Jesus had said to the woman that salvation is of the Jews (verse Joh_4:22). He clearly told the Samaritans during these two days that he was the Messiah as he had done to the woman (verse Joh_4:26) and explained that to mean Saviour of Samaritans as well as Jews. Sanday thinks that probably John puts this epithet of Saviour in the mouth of the Samaritans, but adds: "At the same time it is possible that such an epithet might be employed by them merely as synonymous with Messiah." But why "merely"? Was it not natural for these Samaritans who took Jesus as their "Saviour," Jew as he was, to enlarge the idea to the whole world? Bernard has this amazing statement on Joh_4:42: "That in the first century Messiah was given the title s"tˆr is not proven." The use of "saviour and god" for Ptolemy in the third century B.C. is well known. "The ample materials collected by Magie show that the full title of honour, Saviour of the world, with which St. John adorns the Master, was bestowed with sundry variations in the Greek expression on Julius Caesar, Augustus, Claudius, Vespasian, Titus, Trajan, Hadrian, and other Emperors in inscriptions in the Hellenistic East" (Deissmann, Light, etc., p. 364). Perhaps Bernard means that the Jews did not call Messiah Saviour. But what of it? The Romans so termed their emperors and the New Testament so calls Christ (Luk_2:11; Joh_4:42; Act_5:31; Act_3:23; Phi_3:20; Eph_5:23; Tit_1:4; Tit_2:13; Tit_3:6; 2Ti_1:10; 2Pe_1:1, 2Pe_1:11; 2Pe_2:20; 2Pe_3:2, 2Pe_3:18). All these are writings of the first century A.D. The Samaritan villagers rise to the conception that he was the Saviour of the world.

Emphasis mine

Joh 6:42 And they said, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I came down from heaven? (KJV)

Joh 12:47 And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. (KJV)

To which I may add this dilemma to our Universalists:

God imposed his wrath due unto, and Christ underwent the pains of hell for,

1. either all the sins of all men,
2. or all the sins of some men,
3. or some sins of all men.

If the last, some sins of all men, then have all men some sins to answer for, and so shall no man be saved; for if God entered into judgment with us, though it were with all mankind for one sin, no flesh should be justified in his sight: “If the LORD should mark iniquities, who should stand?” Ps. cxxx. 2. We might all go to cast all that we have “to the moles and to the bats, to go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty,” Isa. ii. 20, 21.

If the Second, that is it which we affirm, that Christ in their stead and room Suffered for all the sins of all the elect in the world.

If the first, why then, are not all freed from the punishment of all their sins?

You will say, “Because of their unbelief; they will not believe.”

But this unbelief, is it a sin, or not?

If not, why should they be punished for it? If it be, then Christ underwent the punishment due to it, or not.

If so, then why must that hinder them more than their other sins for which he died from partaking of the fruit of his death?

If he did not, then did he not die for all their sins. Let them choose which part they will.

Let it not be thought that the Arminian by his doctrine escapes limited atonement. The truth is that he professes a despicable doctrine of limited atonement. He professes an atonement that is tragically limited in its efficacy and power, an atonement that does not secure the salvation of any.
He indeed eliminates from the atonement that which makes it supremely precious to the Christian heart. In B. B. Warfield’s words, ‘the substance of the atonement is evaporated, that it may be given a universal reference’.
What we mean is, that unless we resort to the position of universal restoration for all mankind--a position against which the witness of Scripture is decisive--an interpretation of the atonement in universal terms must nullify its properly substitutive and redemptive character.
We must take our choice between a limited extent and a limited efficacy, or rather between a limited atonement and an atonement without efficacy. It either infallibly saves the elect or it actually saves none." (Murray, The Reformed Faith and Modern Substitutes, in The Presbyterian Guardian, 1935).