Knee-Jerk
I have a tendency to be defensive. It’s one of the things I most dislike about myself. The problem with being defensive is the lack of grace that comes with it. I have worked very hard at being less defensive. By God’s grace, I have come a very long way, though I still have a long way to go.
This has been put to the test recently, as I stumbled into a debate among theologians and seminary students on their respective blogs (I was not involved in the debate, I just kept reading what they had to write…my first mistake). The debate all has to do with something called Atonement Theory, which is the attempt to answer just how Jesus’ death on the cross takes away sin.
There are many theories. Some say that there are as many as 10 in all, though I would imagine that it is entirely possible that there are more. Ironically (thanks to the cut-and-paste method of studying scripture), they are all rooted in scripture and they all contradict each other leaving everyone to believe that their view is correct, thus making everybody else’s view wrong.
It is a mess. I did not realize just how passionate people are about their theories until I began reading all of this. Nonetheless, I continued to read. And the more I read, the angrier I would get. Here is why: when it is all said and done, their debate is completely fruitless. In the midst of all the comments left on the blogs that I read, not one person ever said, “I decided to become a follower of Jesus because of what you wrote.” Instead, the majority of the comments read more like comments that would be made on a playground between second graders that don’t like each other. If I was not already a follower of Jesus, their writings would not make me want to be one.
The truth is that their debates are doing more harm than good. They are causing division. Lines of fellowship are being drawn by people who have no authority, biblical or otherwise, to draw them. And all of this is being done over a theory.
Writing is not inherently wrong. Motive and intent make some writings wrong. My hope in writing this is that those who are in the midst of these debates would realize what is really going on. While those of you who are involved in this debate argue about how atonement works, there is a world outside that desperately needs to know that atonement works. Interestingly enough, neither Paul’s letters nor the other writings found in the New Testament explain exactly how atonement actually works. This could be due to a number of reasons, but I figure if the Spirit did not see it fit to explain the ins and outs of atonement in the writings we have, chasing after it would probably not be time well spent. Especially if the only fruit it yields is division.
