The doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement is the humbling truth that Christ bore our deserved wrath of God on the cross.
Charles H. Spurgeon issued a warning in 1888 concerning the penal substitution: “If ever should come a wretched day when all our pulpits shall be full of modern thought, and the old doctrine of a substitutionary sacrifice shall be exploded, then will there remain no word of comfort for the guilty .... The gospel speaks through the propitiation for sin, and if it be denied, it speaketh no more.”[1]
The doctrine of the penal substitutionary death of Christ is not only rejected by liberal theologians but even in the evangelical camp there is the claim that penal substitution is ‘cosmic child abuse’ and contrary to the love of God.”[2]
Gregory Boyd expressed his openness to all views of atonement in the book The Nature of the Atonement: Four Views: “Each model legitimately expresses a facet of what the incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Christ accomplished.”[3] Boyd can accept all the atonement models except penal substitution: “The Christus Victor model [Gregory’s view] need not hold that our individual sins, guilt, and deserved punishment were somehow legally transferred onto Jesus, that Jesus literally experienced the Father’s wrath or that the Father needed to punish his Son in order to be able to forgive us.”[4]
N. T. Wright contends that penal substitute advocates must interpret John 3:16 to say that “God so hated the world that he killed his son.”[5]
The doctrine of penal substitution is supported by many other core doctrines of God’s Word as illustrated in one of the most important texts in Scripture. This very theologically packed and significant passage in God’s Word is Romans 3:21-26. Paul like an expert theologian summarizes to some degree the biblical theology of the Old Testament on penal substitution.
Leon Morris stated that verses 21-26 are “possibly the most important single paragraph ever written.”[6]
Alva McClain said that if he could only have six verses out of the entire Bible, it would be Romans 3:21-26.[7]
Martin Lloyd-Jones conferred, “It is no exaggeration to say of this section that it is one of the greatest and most important sections in the whole of Scripture.”[78]
In this theologically loaded text are nine doctrines that support the doctrine of penal substitution: the doctrine of the wrath of God, imputation, prophets, faith, sin, the deity of Christ, justification, redemption, and the doctrine of propitiation satisfying God’s wrath. The next nine posts will highlight each of these doctrines that buttress the Biblical truth that Christ bore God’s wrath in our place.
[1] Charles H. Spurgeon, “The Blood of Sprinkling (part 1)” Sermon no. 1888 in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit: Sermons Preached and Revised by C. H. Spurgeon during the Year 1886, vol. 32 (London: Passmore & Alabaster), 129.
[2] Steve Chalke and Alan Mann. The Lost Message of Jesus (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2019), 182-183.
[3] Gregory Boyd, “The Christus Victor” in The Nature of the Atonement: Four Views, 23, “The Christus Victor model is able to encompass the essential truth of other atonement models” (ibid., 42-43).
[4] Ibid., 43.
[5] N. T. Wright, The Day the Revolution Began: Reconsidering the Meaning of Jesus’ Crucifixion (New York: Harper One, 2016), 43.
[6] Leon Morris, The Epistle to the Romans (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988), 173.
[7] Alva McClain, Romans: The Gospel of God’s Grace (Winona Lake: BMH Books, 1979), 101.
[8] Martin Lloyd-Jones, Romans: An Exposition of Chapters 3:20-4:25 (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1970), 31.