Law and Life

The Community of the Atonement

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Law

Genre: Speech

Lesson: 14 of 39

Track: 125

Dictation Name: RR156G14

Date: 1960s-1970s

[Rushdoony] Let us worship God. The Lord is risen indeed, hallelujah. I am He that liveth and was dead saith the Lord, and behold I am alive forevermore, hallelujah. Let us pray.

Glory be to Thee, O God the Father almighty, who didst raise Thine only begotten Son from the dead and hast made us partakers of His victory over sin and death. Glory be to Thee, O Jesus Christ, who for our salvation hast overcome death and hast opened up for us the gates of everlasting life. Glory be to Thee, O God the Holy Spirit, who dost lead us into all truth in Jesus Christ. We praise Thee, Father Son and Holy Ghost, and rejoice that Thou hast made us Thy people and set before us such glorious promises in Thy Word, and we gather today on the day of resurrection to acknowledge Thy grace and mercy and the abundance of Thy blessings unto us. Bless us in our service unto Thee, and prosper us according to Thy Word. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Our Scripture is from the First Letter of John, the third chapter, verses 1 through 8, with the last sentence in particular being our concern. Our subject the community of the atonement. 1st John 3, verses 1 through 8. The community of the atonement. “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as He is pure.

Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.

And ye know that He was manifested to take away our sins; and in Him is no sin. Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen Him, neither known Him. Little children, let no man deceive you: he that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as He is righteous. He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.”

One of the clearest facts concerning the early church is that when they preached the doctrine of the resurrection, that Jesus Christ had risen from the dead, and that we in Him are partakers of that victory, no one contradicted them with regard to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It was long after every member of the early church was dead before anyone dared cast doubts on the resurrection. The witnesses were too many. Not only the apostles, but many others, up to five hundred at one time had been witnesses of the resurrection, and therefore this was a profound embarrassment to the enemies of Christianity for over a century. It was a few generations before they dared deny the resurrection. A second very interesting fact concerning the early church, is the tremendous confidence of the believers. As we saw some time ago when we were dealing with the doctrine of salvation in the early church, the new converts immediately after baptism, were given a little milk to drink, and a little honey to eat, to signify that they were now citizens of the promised land; of the new creation, and that theirs was every reason for rejoicing. Unfortunately that note of joy has gone out of the church since then. And one of the deadliest ideas ever to infiltrate into Christian thinking is the idea of diminished returns. What is this idea? In various forms, most of us have encountered it. I know that very early I found this idea being taught. One of the very first sermons I preached after being ordained, immediately after I received a long letter from an elder of that church telling me that I was preaching something very unsound because I did not hold to the idea of diminished returns. What is this idea? Well, it is in essence an evolutionary idea that because men in the days of the Patriarchs in the Old Testament were more primitive than we are, an idea we have no right to entertain, God dealt with them in a more material way. And so, for more primitive peoples, more backward peoples in the Old Testament era, there was a kind of material bait. God gave them material blessings so that they might be induced to believe spiritual doctrine.

But now, in the Christian era, we don’t need the material blessings, we don’t need material advantages according to these people, and therefore the returns are purely spiritual. This is the idea of diminished returns. We supposedly being more advanced than the Old Testament people are entitled only to spiritual blessings. So we shouldn’t expect any material advantage from Christian faith. Now of course in all of this there is an implicit neo-Platonism which downgrades the material world and material blessings. Blessings are blessings, whether they are material or spiritual, they are both a joy and a delight. Such people almost assume that the world and things material were created by the left hand of God, so that they’re not on the same level. Now even Scripture is misused by these people to justify the idea of diminished returns, and therefore a diminished Bible. Over the years, I have heard one particular verse cited over and over again, and just lately someone who claims to be a thorough going Calvinist echoed the same verse and said this is the gospel and we should limit ourselves to this. 1 Corinthians 2, verse 2, which reads, “For I am determined not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” And so, this man said echoing a long tradition that has beset the church in recent generations, through preaching has to be limited to the cross, and true faith is an endless cross-bearing because Jesus said if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. Matthew 16:24. Now true, in a world of sin life is a battle, but is this all it is? And is it true that Saint Paul said that the only thing to preach was Jesus Christ and Him crucified and refuse to preach anything else? Well certainly we find a great deal in Saint Paul’s preaching and just a little later, in the same epistle to the Corinthians, he says the saints are to manage, that is to judge, the world. And is that reading of 1 Corinthians 2:2, as we commonly find it today, an accurate one?

Calvin, in his day, argued against that interpretation as a false and Roman interpretation, essentially a Greek interpretation, and he said of 1 Corinthians 2:2, “The substance of the passage amounts to this, as to my wanting the ornaments of speech and wanting to the more elegant refinements of discourse, the reason of this was I did not aspire at them, nay rather I despised them, because there was one thing only that my heart was set upon; that I might preach Christ with simplicity. In adding the word crucified, he does not mean that he preached nothing respecting Christ except the cross, but that with all the abasement of the cross, he nevertheless preached Christ. It is as if he said the ignominy of the cross will not prevent me from looking up to Him from whom salvation comes, or make me ashamed to regard all my wisdom as comprehended in Him. In Him I say, whom proud men despise and reject on account of the reproach of the cross, hence the statement must be explained in this way. No kind of knowledge was in my view of so much importance as to lead me to desire anything but Christ, crucified though He was. This little clause is added by way of enlargement with the view of galling so much the more those arrogant masters by whom Christ was next to despise, as they were eager to gain a clause by being renowned for a higher kind of wisdom. Here we have a beautiful passage, from which we learn what it is that faithful ministers ought to teach, what it is that we must during our whole life be learning, and in comparison with which everything else must be counted as dung.”

Now, Calvin’s point is very well taken. The whole idea of the cross, a criminal’s death, was repugnant to the Greeks in Corinth. But Jesus Christ, Paul says, I preach in all His fullness, even the cross. The Greeks with their material world, do not like the material world and most of all the horror of someone being put to death as a criminal. So I preach the fullness of Christ, the totality of the gospel with all it implies; the crucifixion, the resurrection, His kingship, His lordship over all things. So that instead of restricting it, Saint Paul here refuses to allow the gospel to restricted. Thus Saint Paul was attacking the reduction of the Bible rather than its expansion. He was objecting to any and all ideas of diminishing the scope of the gospel. Moreover, with regard to Matthew 16:24, as Calvin again points out, “Our Lord saw that Peter regarded the cross as the wrong way, and so He rebuked Peter, He declared that life is a warfare and all who follow Him must take up their cross, must engage in that battle against the powers of darkness. Our Lord’s cross was redemptive, ours is not. It means that the reproach of Christ, the hatred, the animosity against Him on the part of fallen man, we too bear that reproach. Thus instead of limiting the gospel by means of an idea of diminishing returns, we must hold that the cross opens up all the promises of God, because Saint Paul declares, and our Lord as He spoke to Peter declared that it was the way of Satan to prevent Him from going to Jerusalem and taking up the cross and destroying the power of sin and death, of restoring the new creation and of restoring man to his place therein.

Now, the cross means the atonement. The message of the day of resurrection is the message of the atonement and the victory of that atonement through our Lord’s destruction of the power of sin and death by His cross and by His resurrection. It is important for us, therefore, to know what atonement means, and what atonement means in the Old Testament so that we can understand what our Lord did in the New. First of all, there was a need for the atonement because man had sinned. As C.L. Mitton has declared with regard to the meaning of atonement in the Bible, and I quote, “The Bible as a whole assumes the need for some atoning action if man is to be right with God. It is accepted as a fact beyond dispute that man is estranged from God and is himself wholly to blame for this estrangement. His disobedience to the will of God, his sin, has alienated him from God, and this alienation must first be remedied if right relationships are to be restored. The barrier cause raised by man’s past must be removed.” Then second Mitton tells us in defining the biblical meaning of the word atonement, “To atone for a wrong is to take some action which cancels out the ill effects it has had.” Now that’s very important. Atonement restores us to a right relationship with God, and it cancels out the bad effects that the action (sin) had. And therefore our Lord, with His atonement, cancelled out the bad effect, sin and death. In His own person He destroyed the power of sin and death. Moreover, He declares emphatically that the power of the grave is broken and finally with the new creation, the last enemy (death) shall be destroyed. This is the word of God through Saint Paul and 1 Corinthians the 15th chapter.

So, the new creation began with our Lord’s resurrection, with the destruction of the last enemy, the last effects of a fall are wiped out and cancelled. Now man’s rebellion requires death, man’s death cannot provide atonement. God makes atonement for man by providing an efficacious substitute; Jesus Christ, the new Adam, who cancelled out the effects of sin and death and began the restoration of God’s purposed kingdom. The kingdom for which He created man in the beginning. Now looking at the usage of Old Testament passages of the word of atonement, we find first of all that there is an atonement of material objects such as the alter. In Exodus 29, verses 36 and 37, we are told there was a seven day ceremony so that the alter could be atoned for; so it could be set apart for the purposes of God. In Zechariah 14, verses 20 and 21 we see a world in which all material objects are made totally holy so that there is an atonement of things material. And we are told in Revelation that the curse is finally removed and there is no curse on the earth so that the atonement has an effect even on the very ground which was cursed for man’s sake. Then second we find in the account of the military census and the poll tax in Exodus 30:11-16, that the tax is spoken of as atonement money. That it was to provide protection for the community. That it was to provide protection for man from plague, and the word plague means defeat, death, killing in battle, and we are told then that in the battle against Midian, because the men went out in the Lord, there was not a single death, so that the atonement means that we are also under the protection of God in a material way. Then third, the atonement also meant the annual Day of Atonement in the Old Testament. In Exodus 30:10, in Leviticus 23:27 and 28, and many, many other passages, atonement for the nation as a whole, placed under the covering, the protection of Almighty God. We find references to this in 1 Chronicles 6:49, 2 Chronicles 29:24, Nehemiah 10:43, and elsewhere. That while not every member of the nation is protected and under the atoning blood and protection, nonetheless the nation for its basic faithfulness is under a material protection because it recognizes the atonement and the Lord of the atonement. The fourth we find very definitely that there is an atonement for persons, that we as a person can go to the Lord and find atonement for our sins; a cancellation of the effects of sin in our lives and of the consequences of death.

So that we find that the atonement effects the person, the nation, things spiritual, things material. It has thus a very, very far-reaching consequence in every area of life. The consequences of atonement can be summed up in one word; salvation. Now, must we say as so many today imply and declare that the consequences of the atonement which was typical in the Old Testament and celebrated only with the blood of bulls and goats as a substitute for Christ who was to come, that the consequences of the Old Testament atonement are greater than the consequences of the New Testament atonement? That the blood of bulls and goats, which only symbolized what Christ was to do, accomplished more than what Jesus Christ did upon the cross? It’s blasphemy to think so. Instead of saying there were diminished returns from the Old to the New Testament, we must say on the contrary, that we must hold to expanded returns, the fullness of returns, and that anything less than that is not the gospel. That to preach Christ and Him crucified means to proclaim the fullness of atonement, the fullness of victory of salvation through the cross of Christ. And when we look at the New Testament, indeed this is what we find. Because emphatically, the New Testament over and over again makes clear that it is not diminished returns but expanded returns. Our text, for example, makes emphatic, for this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil, what the devil did was to bring sin and death into the world, to cause man to lose the garden of Eden, to put a barrier between God and man, to make man’s life one that is no longer free but in slavery and bondage, and so what did Jesus Christ through His atonement come to accomplish? Do destroy the works of the devil, to cancel out the fall, to cancel out the power of sin and death, to cancel out the fact of a fallen natural world around us, to restore that which God created in the beginning, and He as the first fruits of the new creation to gather unto Himself a new humanity, so that this new humanity might go forth and conquer in the name of Christ, of the king of kings, Lord of lords, and at the end to usher in a new creation in all its fullness, manifesting the total cancellation, the total destruction of the works of the devil.

Now the word that is used by John here when he says for this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil, that word destroy means also demolish, dissolve, break up, eliminate. It is a most emphatic word, and this is our calling in Christ. As the community of the atonement, to be a part of that work which He began with His atoning death and resurrection; the dissolution of the destruction of the works of the devil. Then second, according to 1 Peter 3:18, a consequence of the atonement is our reconciliation with God. For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit. Jesus Christ brings us who are unrighteous to God by His righteousness, and we are brought to God when we who are unrighteous are by faith in Christ’s vicarious expiation justified and declared righteous. Moreover, communion with God is established in a new and living way which He has consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say His flesh. Thus in Hebrews 10:20 we are told emphatically that even as man walked with God in the Garden of Eden, so now too communion has been established between God and us. That while this communion, while we are not perfectly sanctified, is not total, it is nonetheless real, so that now God is with us, that the meaning of Christ’s name “Emmanuel”, is God with us. So that we have again the privileges of the garden of Eden; communion with God, and we are summoned day by day to open up our hearts unto Him in prayer, to make our every want and wish known to Him because the resurrection, the atonement, opened up for us that communion. Again, many passages of the New Testament such as 1st Timothy 1:19, 3:9, 2nd Timothy 1:3, Hebrews 9:14, and other passages, declare that the conscience of the believer is cleansed and purified by the atonement, so that now we can face God with a cleansed conscience, knowing that we stand not in terms of our righteousness, but the righteousness of our Lord; of Jesus Christ.

Resurrection, thus the atonement, annulled the work of Satan; cancelled out the effects of sin and death. A new humanity was created and we as the citizens of the new humanity have a work of demolition; to destroy the works of the devil wherever we find them, and to rebuild in terms of our King Jesus Christ, who is laying hold, laying claim to every area of life, every kingdom, every country, every continent, as its rightful Lord. The community of the atonement and the resurrection thus is made up of the people of Christ, the new creation, the people to whom all the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him amen, unto the glory of God by us, according to Saint Paul in 2nd Corinthians 1:20. The idea of diminished returns thus, is not biblical, and it must be negated, it must be fought against. It was only when the church held, and in every era that the church held instead of to the idea of diminished returns, the idea of fulfilled, expanded returns, that Christians have conquered and dominated. But whenever the church has been infected by the alien, the neo-Platonic idea of diminished returns, it has in effect crucified Christ afresh, denied the resurrection, and lost its power. It has had only a form of the faith while denying the power thereof. If the church again turns to the meaning of the atonement and the fullness of returns that the atonement declares is ours in Christ, then again the people of God shall be the people of victory, and then again this land and every land where the people of God establish the rights of King Jesus, shall see the people of the atonement in power and in victory. Let us pray.

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we give thanks unto Thee that Jesus Christ has come to destroy the works of the devil and through His cross and resurrection has annulled the power of sin and death. We thank thee that we, as the community of the atonement, have been commissioned to go forth in His name and to make disciples of all nations, and to summon them in Thy name to be baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, and to the victory of the resurrected Christ. Bless us O Lord in terms of this faith and prosper us unto victory, that the kingdoms of this world might indeed become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ. Bless us to this purpose, we beseech Thee, in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Are there any questions now about our lesson? Yes?

[Audience member] Did Adam live under the, with the gift of faith before the fall? If he did, how did he lose it? How did he fall? {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes. Adam was required to walk by faith in the garden of Eden, and to believe in God and to obey His Word. Now the temptation was precisely to doubt the Word of God, to walk not by faith but in terms of his autonomous and independent reason. The first word of the tempter was yea hath God said? There’s something wrong with you, he was implying, because you believe every Word of God. You should test every Word of God in terms of your own independent reason. So, instead of faith, which God required, and in terms of which man was walking up to that point, what the tempter offered was autonomous reason. The consequence of course was that man fell. Now, man as he is restored in Christ is to stand not in himself, but in Christ’s atoning work, and then to have faith in terms of that. Now of course, he cannot fall also, because it is not his righteousness that maintains him, as it was Adam’s up to that point, but the righteousness of Christ. Yes?

[Audience member] In Christ’s atonement, did He take upon Himself the consequences of the sins of the elect or was it a general punishment? The way I understand it is that He took on all the consequence of the sin that I will ever commit.

[Rushdoony] Well the consequence of all sin is death. So He took upon Himself death and the death penalty is annulled as far as we are concerned, because He has assumed that death for His own, for His elect.

[Audience member] But the things that I would experience in hell had not Christ died for me, did He experience those things?

[Rushdoony] He suffered the total separation from God, yes. And the cry on the cross was “my God, my God why hast Thou forsaken me? Because He took upon Himself our position and as the reprobate are totally separated from God, He was at that moment totally separated from God, totally the sin bearer. And yet at the same time He was the high priest, offering up Himself.

[Audience member] A reprobate person goes to hell, won’t a large part of their suffering be going through the things that he did in this life and taking the consequences of those sins?

[Rushdoony] The sinner is given a vivid picture in his estate in hell, in Scripture, weeping, wailing, gnashing of teeth, burning, all of which are images to convey the fact of total isolation within himself and his memory. Now, the essence of sin is that man isolates himself from God. He wants to be his own god, his own universe. I’ve often cited Sartre, the existentialist, who says that for him the neighbor is the devil. There can only be one God, the existentialists are logical. And if I’m that one God, for me my neighbor is the devil. So there’s no community in hell and Sartre in a vivid play entitled No Exit makes that point. In hell there is no community whatsoever, because No Exit, from beginning to end, is about people in hell. There’s no exit from their isolation. Even when they talk to one another it’s really a monologue. They are talking to themselves. Nothing that anybody else says penetrates their mind. We all know some people like that, and we all tend to be that way sometimes.

Now, the totality of this is hell, and therefore they have nothing to live with except their own memory and there is nothing else they want to live with because they refuse to recognize the reality of God and when you refuse to recognize the reality of God, ultimately neither the world nor other people are real. Now some of you I think attended a year ago this, was it last fall? Yes, the series on Epistemology, the Christian, the Biblical theory of knowledge that I conducted in Eagle Rock, I think eight or ten evening sessions. And we saw how the epistemology of fallen man, that is his theory of knowledge, leads him step by step to deny there is a material world out there. Then it leads him to deny the reality of other people. The reality of anything except his own mind so that ultimately, the epistemology of modern man says nothing really exists except my own mind, and if I see other people they’re aspects of my mind. If I see trees and things out there, they are aspects of my mind. They’re not something real out there because there is nothing real except my mind. Now, this is insanity really, but it’s also modern philosophy, and it’s hell. Any other questions? Yes?

[Audience member] {?}, historically, before Christ saved us, {?} were able to lose their faith.

[Rushdoony] No, only in Eden. All those who were redeemed after the fall were redeemed by the atonement of Christ, set forth in the blood of bulls and goats.

[Audience member] {?} Adam and Eve in the garden.

[Rushdoony] Yes. Any other questions? Well if not let us bow our heads for the benediction. And now go in peace, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, bless you and keep you , guide and protect you, this day and always, Amen.

[End of tape]