Redemption: From What Are Sinners Delivered?

In the last post in this series, redemption was defined as release or deliverance by the payment of a price. New Testament redemption, of course, is the deliverance that comes through the work of Christ, with Christ acting the redeemer and his death being the price paid. Redemption is a way of looking at what Christ accomplished on the cross that brings into focus one aspect of the condition of sinners—they are in bondage. The bondage of sinners can be viewed in at least three ways: they are in bondage to the power of sin; they are in bondage to Satan; and they are in bondage to the legal ramifications of their sin.

Bondage to the Power of Sin
Jesus tells us in John 8 that "everyone who practices sin is a slave of sin." There is something about sin that keeps sinners in it's grip. Sin has it's source our constitution (or our make up) and we are powerless to change this. It's the redemption that comes in Christ Jesus that releases us from our captivity to our natural born sinfulness.

For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we will certainly also be united in the likeness of his resurrection. We know that our old man was crucified with him so that the body of sin would no longer dominate us, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. (For someone who has died has been freed from sin.) (Romans 6:5-7 NET)

In the "old man"–our natural born state—we are dominated or enslaved by sin, but union with Christ in his death frees us from that domination. Christ's death is redemption from the power of sin.

Redemption, when seen as freedom from bondage to sin, has an "already, not yet" aspect to it. There is a sense in which believers have already been freed from the captivity of sin, and yet another sense in which this redemption from sin is not completed until our glorification, which Paul calls "the redemption of our bodies (Romans 8:23)." Full and final redemption from everything that came to us as a result of having been born in slavery to sin comes only at the final resurrection.

Bondage to Satan
This is very similar to the idea directly above—that sinners are enslaved by sin. Ephesians 2:2 tells us that a spirit ruled by Satan "is now energizing the sons of disobedience. . . . (NET)" In 2 Timothy 2, Paul says that people are held captive to do Satan's will.

God, on the basis of redemption in Christ, transfers people from Satan's dominion to Christ's own kingdom.

He delivered us from the power of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. (Colossians 1:13,14 NET)

Then, in Hebrews 2, Christ's death is said to

destroy the one who holds the power of death (that is, the devil), and set free those who were held in slavery all their lives by their fear of death.

The destruction of the devil by Christ releases those held in slavery, so it's through Satan's destruction that sinners are redeemed from their bondage to him.

It isn’t, then, because of a payment to Satan that we are redeemed from bondage, and that’s a point to keep in mind when thinking about redemption as release from bondage to Satan. There is already a precedent for this, for when God redeemed his people from their slavery in Egypt, he didn’t make a ransom payment to Pharoah. What Pharoah received was crushing judgment at the hand of God, and that judgment brought about the release of the Israelites. Christ’s redemption of sinners from the power of Satan is set against this backdrop, and we should think of it as something similar. Christ redeems sinners by his triumphant victory over Satan. If, after reading that we are redeemed from bondage to the devil, you have a picture in your mind of God and Satan side by side making a deal for the release of captive sinners, you should erase that picture immediately and replace it with one of Christ crushing Satan.

Bondage to the Legal Ramifications of Sin
Sinners are condemned to death because of their sin, and Christ's death redeems them from this death sentence. The background for the practice of redeeming someone condemned to death is found in the Old Testament law:

But if the ox had the habit of goring, and its owner was warned, and he did not take the necessary precautions, and then it killed a man or a woman, the ox must be stoned and the man must be put to death. If a ransom is set for him, then he must pay the redemption for his life according to whatever amount was set for him. (Exodus 21:30 NET)

In this case, the man who owned the habitually goring ox is under a sentence of death for his negligence, but a ransom could be paid instead and he could go free.

The thought of ransom from a legal condemnation is found most noticeably in Galatians 3:13, where it says that “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law”; and Colossians 2:14, where we read that “Christ canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us.” However, anywhere that redemption is set in the context of forgiveness of sin or justification, it is redemption from the legal results of sin that is the focus. In addition, when we look at redemption as deliverance from the legal condemnation of our sin, the ransoming work is directed toward God, since it’s his justice, after all, that has condemned us. So in a passage like 1 Timothy 2:6, which connects Christ’s work as ransom payment with his mediatorial work representing human beings to God, there, too, it is probably redemption of the life of someone sentenced to death that is presented.¹

Summary
When we look at the condition of sinners in the light of Christ’s work as redemption, our attention should be directed to their slavery to sin and Satan, and their legal sentence of death.

---

¹Herman Ridderbos, Paul: An Outline of His Theology, page 194.

Sources
Paul: An Outline of His Theology, Herman Ridderbos.
The Atonement: It's Meaning and Significance, Leon Morris.
The Atonement, John Murray.

Redemption: What Does It Mean?

What do you think of when you hear the word redemption? Mostly, I'd say, we think of it as a religious word, although sometimes someone might speak of redeeming a coupon or a bond, but even that is no longer such a common way to speak. My mother may have redeemed her coupons and bonds; I use my coupons and cash in my bonds. Used in the religious sense, my dictionary gives redemption as a synonym for salvation; yet while those words may be general synonyms, used biblically, they're not exact synonyms. Redemption is salvation, for sure, but it's salvation—or deliverance—in a particular way.

Christians who lived when the New Testament was written would have understood the more precise meaning of the redemption words, since for them, these were not necessarily religious words, but words that were part of their everyday language and experience. For the Greeks, the redemption words were used, first of all, for the buying back of prisoners of war by paying a ransom for them, but they were also used for other ways of freeing people. When a slave was set free, for instance, the redemption words could be used even when no money was exchanged.

The early Christian writers, with their Jewish backgrounds, would have been acquainted with the way the idea of redemption was used in the Old Testament, so it's probably a safe bet to say that the Old Testament usage of the words coloured the meaning they gave to the word more than the specific Greek cultural usage. When they read the Septuagint, they would find the Greek redemption words used to translate certain Hebrew words whenever the idea of releasing something by the payment of a price was present.

This idea of payment might not be obvious every time the redemption words are used in the Old Testament, because sometimes the words are used metaphorically. For instance, God is said to have redeemed the Israelites from their slavery in Egypt. Now I've read the story, and nowhere do I see that Pharoah received money or any other benefit from God in exchange for the Israelites' freedom. It wasn't really a business transaction, was it?

Yet, as Leon Morris points out, there are some intriguing phrases that often accompany the idea of God's redemption of the Israelites that shows that while this might not be a redemption exchange, it still carried the idea of payment. God is said to redeem his people "with an outstretched arm" (Exodus 6:6) and "with your arm" (Psalm 77:15). It is God's might or power that's in mind here, and God exerts his power on behalf of his people.

. . .[B]ecause he loves his people he puts forth his power. He saves them at cost. It is this that gives the use of the redemption terminology its point. . . . The term may be used metaphorically but the metaphor retains its point. The idea of price-paying is not out of mind.¹

You might say that God expended his power to free the Israelites from slavery, just as long as you don't understand this to mean that God had less power after their redemption than before.

Against the backdrop of the Old Testament, early Christian writers and readers would have understood that redemption and all the associated words had to do with being released by the payment of a price. It wasn't simply deliverance in general, but deliverance that came about at cost to the one redeeming.

Now that we've done a little defining of the biblical term redemption in this post, the plan is to move on in the next to consider from what it is that redemption delivers, and how it is that people are redeemed.

¹The Atonement: It's Meaning and Significance, Leon Morris, page 114.

Hypercalvinists

You thought they were an extinct bird, didn't you? Nope, they may be rare, but they exist, and the Baptist Board seems to have more than their fair share of them. Right now, I'm in a discussion with someone who doesn't believe in duty-faith. In other words, this person doesn't believe that the non-elect have a duty to believe, which is one of the classic hypercalvinistic beliefs.

Because they are rarish birds, the temptation is to ignore them. The problem in this case is that this hypercalvinist claims to be a Calvinist. Spurgeon, says he, is a "weak Calvinist", while he's the real sort. So there his posts stand, confirming all the suspicions about Calvinism that many noncalvinists already have, and it'd be a mistake to leave him unchallenged.

You don't know what hypercalvinists are? They come in different breeds, but here are two common signs of a true hypercalvinist:

• The denial that people have a duty to believe before they are regenerated by the Holy Spirit and enabled to believe. This comes from the idea that God can't hold people responsible to do what they are unable to do. In this case, the argument is that the gospel calls people to believe that Christ died specifically for their sins, and since Christ only died for the elect, if people in general have a duty to believe the gospel, they are being held responsible to believe something that is a lie. Therefore, God cannot hold people responsible for not believing the gospel, since the gospel isn't true for them anyway.
  
• Based on the previous point, hypercalvinists deny that there is a universal call or offer in the gospel.
  

So that's where I was for a while this afternoon. There are some discussions I can take part in without much thought, because I know the various arguments inside, outside, upside down. This isn't one of those. I've never done this before and I've already made a couple of mistakes, but you are welcome to check things out anyway. I figure it'll be a learning experience.

In a related note, someone else in another Baptist Board conversation is arguing that God is the author of sin, and this time it isn't just a terminology thing. This man believes that God causes people to sin in exactly the same way that he causes people to do good: God is ". . . the Agent, or Actor of Sin, or the Doer of a wicked thing", to quote Jonathan Edwards. I'd comment in that one, too, but I can only handle one thread at a time.

Related post: The Authoring of Sin

Purposes of Christ's Death: Titus 2:14 and Ephesians 5: 25-27

This is another reposting of a piece from the Purposes of Christ's Death series that I began shortly after I started blogging. You can find the other reposts from this series by clicking on the purposes of Christ's death label at the end of this post.

This post looks at two portions of scripture at once, because the purpose statements in each of these texts are similar.

He gave himself for us to set us free from every kind of lawlessness and to purify for himself a people who are truly his, who are eager to do good. (Titus 2:14 NET)

Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her to sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of the water by the word, so that he may present the church to himself as glorious--not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. (Ephesians 5:25-27 NET)

The purpose statement in the first verse is "to set us free from every kind of lawlessness and to purify for himself a people who are truly his, who are eager to do good"; and in the second text it is "to sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of the water by the word, so that he may present the church to himself as glorious--not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless."

Since I'm concluding these two purpose statements are similar, you can see that I'm making the assumption that the church and a people who are truly his are roughly equivalent in meaning. Each statement, then, says that a purpose of Christ's death is have a group of people who are pure or spotless. In the first verse, these people are called "a people who are truly his." The idea is ownership. These are people who belong to Christ; they are his treasured possession. In the second text, the group of people are called "the church", and you can see the idea of treasured possession here, as well, because the church is likened to Christ's bride—something He loved in the same way that husbands are encouraged to love their wives, and something that He was willing to give himself to obtain.

In Titus 2:14 it is said that Christ's death was "to set us free." This literally means "to release when a ransom is paid". Christ's death, or his giving himself for us, is intended as a ransom payment whereby His people are released from sin, and also as the basis upon which they are purified. I would take this purification to be that of the sanctifying process, although some might argue that. These purified people who belong to him are then identified by their zealousness for good works. To obtain for himself a purified people, then, is the purpose of Christ's death given to us in this verse.

In the second statement, Christ is also described as having given Himself. He gives Himself on behalf of the church, in order to sanctify her; and then, when she is completely sanctified, He presents her to Himself in all of the glorious purity that has been worked in her based on His own death for her. According to these verses, possessing a purified church is a purpose of Christ's death.

One purpose for Christ's death, then, is for Him to possess a purified people.

Purposes of Christ's Death: 1 Peter 3:18

This is a repost of another of the old posts looking at the purpose statements for Christ's death given to us in scripture. This time, the purpose statement is found in 1 Peter 3:18:

Because Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, to bring you to God, by being put to death in the flesh. (NET)

There are lots of not-so-clear things in the verses after this one, but this particular verse is pretty straight forward. The purpose statement given here for Christ's being put to death—or Christ's suffering for sins—is "to bring you to God." This, of course, is pointing to the reconciliation that Christ's death brings.

Reconciliation goes two ways: God is reconciled to human beings, and human beings are reconciled to God. Christ, the just one, suffers in place of the unjust ones (that would be sinners like you and me), and on the basis of what is accomplished by his vicarious suffering, the sin that stands between God and sinners is taken out of the way. Because of Christ death, God can reach out to cause sinners to be reconciled to himself. Sinners can be brought to God because Christ died.

Another purpose for Christ's death is to bring people to God.

Purposes of Christ's Death: Romans 3:24-25

I've been thinking about reposting a series of posts I did way back in 2004 when I first started blogging. It's a series that looks at the scriptural purpose statements given for Christ's death—you know, any statements about Christ's atoning work that include the words "so that" or "for this reason" or "to this end" or something similar.

Since I'm sick today, I thought this might be a good day to start recycling. I'll edit each one up a bit as I repost it.

First up—Romans 3:24 and 25:

....whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (ESV)

You'll find the purpose statement in this text stated twice, but a little differently:

This was to show God's righteousness . . .

and

It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

One of the purposes of Christ's death, according to these verses, was to demonstrate God's righteousness. The word translated just in the second statement could be translated righteous, as well; so the last half of this statement is explaining in more detail the way it is that Christ's propitiatory death shows God to be righteous: It is a way for him remain righteous and, at the same time, count sinners as righteous.

The problem, as the verse lays it out, is that God's passing over previously committed sins could raise doubts about his righteousness. The former sins referred to are the sins that God left unjudged in the time before Christ's death, and it would be unrighteous (or unjust) for God, in his role as judge, to simply shove these wrongdoings under the rug. We usually think of injustice in terms of finding someone guilty for crimes not committed, but it is also unjust to ignore crimes someone has committed. Therefore, there needs to be a right or just way for these sins to be overlooked.

And that's what Christ's death accomplishes; that's one of its purposes. It is the historical event that makes God's forbearance in previous times right. That Christ died means that sin was never simply ignored, but there was a righteous way for it to be passed over, and this righteous way was the means of propitiation that would come through Christ's sacrificial death on the cross. It is because of Christ's propitiatory death that God can withhold his righteous wrath against sinners and count them righteous instead; yet still be completely just in everything he does. Christ's death absorbs the retributive wrath of God that is made necessary by human sin, and in this way his death demonstrates to all people that God is righteous even when he mercifully forgives sin and justifies sinners.

Demonstrating that God passed over sin in a way that is righteous or just is one of the purposes of Christ's death.

Now It Comes Out

In the comments of Monday's post on the Baptist Board discussion I was participating in, I mentioned that

[w]hat really bothers me about the system being put forward in that thread is that it makes God unjust. People don't go to hell because God has just grounds for sending them there. After all, according to this theory, justice has been satisfied on behalf of every person

After I wrote that, I felt a little bit guilty, because although I could see that logically, this is where the so-called system was leading, it hadn't actually been said yet. Well, now it has. From the proponent the view under discussion:

Justice can condemn, but one can be condemned apart from any concept of justice as well. God has satisfied justice through His own sacrifice on our behalf. However, that is not the only way someone can be condemned, as the Bible clearly shows.

Well, yes, one can be condemned apart from any concept of justice, if the judge is an unjust judge.

By the way, this isn't typical universal atonement (You know, the unlimited side of the unlimited vs. limited atonement discussion!), which has God's justice satisfied potentially on behalf of every person, but only actually satisfied on condition of faith. Here's a short summary of the usual version of universal atonement, taken from this comparison chart.

Christ's redeeming work made it possible for everyone to be saved but did not actually secure the salvation of anyone. Although Christ died for all men and for every man, only those who believe on Him are saved. His death enabled God to pardon sinners on the condition that they believe, but it did not actually put away anyone's sins. Christ's redemption becomes effective only if man chooses to accept it.

Notice that universal atonement does not "actually put away anyone's sins", except as a person comes to faith. In that way, universal atonement does not have God condemning people who have no crimes counted against them. Neither does limited atonement, which has Christ's redeeming work putting away only the sins of his people. Limited vs. unlimited atonement is not the real issue here.

Update, March 1: No blogging today because I'm still working hard at this BB discussion. Leslie (see comments) took the time to read through the whole thing. As she says, there's some convoluted thinking there.

One example: In response to my statement that God can't condemn someone without just cause, we have this:

I’m sorry, but God can do what He wants.

I know a lot of people question the value of these sorts of discussions. I think that if you have the stomach for this sort of thing, and a rather thick skin, you can learn a lot from participating. At the very least, you'll solidify what you already know. When someone comes up with some rather novel idea, as in the case in this discussion, all the better, because you can't rely entirely on the apologetic work that others have done. When you have to develop the arguments yourself, you know what you know.

However, it's not for everyone, and it can be time consuming, which is why I began blogging and mostly gave up discussion boards. Blogging takes so much less time!

I've Been Amusing Myself

by participating in a discussion on the Baptist Board. This one's called atonement/justice and forgiveness, and the atonement theory put forward seems to be exactly the same one I posted about in the olden days when I first started blogging. So, of course, I couldn't pass the discussion by. (I go by russell55 on that board. At the time I signed up there, my first choices for name were taken, so that's my maiden name plus my birth year.)

In addition to being centered around an atonement theory I've already studied up on, this discussion is a rich source of the same kind of statements discussed in the series I posted recently called Thinking About Faith Alone and Christ Alone. (You can access all those posts from that link.) Here are some I could have added to the collection discussed there:

Man's sin is paid for in advance but, the condition [for salvation] isn't only having our sins paid for. You see that condition has been paid but, if there is no repentance and confession. The rest of the entire condition [for salvation] has not been met.

Can you see how this statement is a denial of Solus Christus, which affirms that what Christ did is sufficient for our salvation?

How about this?

Yet there is ONE sin that is UNPARDONABLE - Rejection of the Son - UNBELIEF

Yep, another denial of Solus Christus by the denial of the sufficiency of Christ's work. Christ's work was not sufficient grounds upon which the sin of unbelief could be pardoned.

Want more? The brackets in this one are original.

The atonement was done for all time for all in Christ Jesus. . . .

But since we did not sacrifice ourselves, thereby personally asking forgiveness, forgiveness became a different thing -- a personal thing. If not, then John would have never needed to say that if we confess our sins [then] He is faithful to forgive them. That is indeed an if/then proposition and not an accomplished fact on the Cross.

Christ's atonement, if this statement is true, is not sufficient grounds for forgiveness. We must add our confession to his work, thereby providing some of the grounds by which we are pardoned.

I could go on, but I won't. I have a life. At least I think I do.

Propitiation: What It Means, and Simpler Translation Possibilities

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post that brought up the subject of propitiation, but at that time, I didn't write anything about the meaning of the word propitiation because it wasn't necessary to do so in order to make the point of that particular post. Propitiation is a good word, but it's not one that's used in everyday language, is it? I'd be willing to bet that if you did street interviews asking random people to define propitiation, you'd go a long time before you found someone who could define it properly.

So what does it mean? It's a word that's used in some versions of the Bible in the translation of a family of Greek words: hilasmos and other words related to it. It may be that you use a translation that doesn't used the word propitiation at all, since many versions make other translational choices. Still, it's a good thing to understand what it means, at the very least in order to understand this facet of what Christ's death accomplished for us. Propitiation and the Greek words it translates have to do with turning away or appeasing anger. It has everything to do with dealing with anger or wrath, and in the New Testament, it's God's wrath that is being turned away or propitiated.

Propitiation is a personal word. Let me quote Leon Morris:

. . . [I]f we speak of propitiation we are thinking of a personal process. We are saying that God is angry when people sin and that, if they are to be forgiven, something must be done about that anger. We are further saying that the death of Christ is the means of removing the divine wrath from sinners.*

Despite the fact that it's a five syllable uncommon word, it's not really a difficult concept, is it?

There are scholars, as you might expect, who disagree that the words translated by propitiation must carry with them the idea of divine wrath, at least as far as the wrath of God refers to anything more than impersonal natural consequences of sin. I've read some of the arguments and I didn't find them very convincing. It seems the whole case rests, first of all, on the assumption that the wrath of God is not something personal, but rather an impersonal process of cause (in this case, sin) and effect (disasters and other things deemed to be sin's natural consequences). Then, given that assumption, examples are collected, from the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament) and other sources, where hilaskomai and other related words wouldn't necessarily have to carry the idea of wrath. All in all, without the assumption that God doesn't have personal wrath, it seems a rather weak argument. After all, just because a word might not need to carry an idea in a certain context doesn't mean that it doesn't carry that idea. You don't define words by what they might not mean in certain places.

If you take scripture seriously, it's hard to take seriously the assumption that God doesn't have personal wrath. Even in the New Testament, we find significant mention of God's wrath, and it certainly seems to be something more than just the natural or impersonal consequence of sin. Rather, God's wrath is frequently used–or so it would seem to me–in relation to God's personal action in response to sin. God is said, for instance, to give people over to the results of their sin, and the wrath of God is said to be revealed from heaven against unrighteousness (See Romans 1).

If you allow from the get-go that God has personal wrath against sin and sinners, then we need something that turns his wrath away from us. We need all those hilasmos related words to be propitiation, and nothing less than that. We don't need to use the exact word propitiation, but we need something that means it.

And I'm of the opinion that since propitiation isn't an English word that's commonly used, it's a good idea to have a few translations that use more common words to express the same idea. It's easy enough to say that everyone should just learn and remember what the word means, but not everyone will; and, for various reasons, not everyone does well with big uncommon words.

If we were to replace propitiation with something else in order to make things simpler to understand, what would be a good substitute? The word expiation isn't the best replacement for two reasons. First of all, I doubt that expiation is much clearer in meaning for most people than propitiation. Secondly, expiation doesn't mean exactly the same thing as propitiation, since it doesn't specifically have to do with turning away personal wrath. In fact, this particular substitute comes out of the argument that God's wrath is simply the impersonal natural consequences of sin.

In some translations, means of propitiation or propitiation in Romans 3:25 is replaced by mercy seat or sacrifice of atonement. Neither of these necessarily carry with them in the common understanding the idea of averting God's personal wrath, although technically, they probably do. But what they mean technically doesn't help when our goal is to have things stated in commonly understood language. Translations that talk about Christ taking away sin or being a sacrifice for sin aren't good replacements for propitiation in this verse, either, since they don't necessarily carry the whole meaning of propitiation, and understanding the whole deal is especially important when the context of the word is an argument for every single person being an object of God's wrath. My own favorite replacement for the difficult term means of propitiation in this verse is found in the footnotes of the NIV: the one who would turn aside his [God's] wrath.

Some wording similar to this would probably work in every place–there are only four of them–where propitiation is used in the New Testament. In Hebrews 2:17, where Christ, as priest, is said to make propitiation, we might say that he "turns away God's wrath." In 1 John 2:2, "he is the propitiation" could be "he is the one who turns away God's wrath." Same thing in 1 John 4:11: "the propitiation" becomes "the one who would turn away God's wrath."

I suppose, if you were a translator, you'd be hoping for a phrase with less words than this, but I can't think of a simpler way to do it without losing some of the meaning of the original language. What do you think? What word or words would you suggest to communicate the whole meaning of the original, which includes the idea of God's personal wrath against sin, without using the word propitiation? Or perhaps you'd prefer to always keep the word propitiation. If so, why not explain why you think that's the best option?

*Leon Morris, The Atonement: It's Meaning and Significance, page 152.

Thinking About Faith Alone and Christ Alone, Part 5

I started this series in November, and didn't get it finished before the busy Christmas season. I'm wrapping the series up with this one last post. The point of these posts, if you recall, is to consider the relationship between sole fide and solus Christus. The first post examined what it means that Christ's work is the grounds for our salvation, while faith is the means by which we receive salvation. The second post looked at the unique suitability of faith as the instrument through which the benefits of Christ's work are received. Then the third and fourth posts considered statements I'd heard or read concerning faith's role in the process of salvation that incorrectly (and probably unknowingly or unthinkingly) moved faith out of the realm of means only and over into the realm of grounds for salvation. In this final post, I want to look at the remaining two problematic statements about faith's role in salvation that I've collected.

Up first? Try this one:

I obtained my salvation on the basis of my faith.

Yes, I really did read this one recently. If you see that sentence as a clear example of a statement that makes faith into work, I think you are right.

First of all, there's that word obtain, which is defined as "to succeed in gaining possession of as the result of planning or endeavor; acquire." The word obtain has work (or endeavor) written all over it. Remember that the reason faith alone is the only suitable match, means-wise, for in Christ alone is that saving faith is faith that rests or trusts in Christ's work alone. Saving faith has right within it an understanding that I can't obtain my salvation. Saving faith is receptive; it receives what someone else has obtained.

The one who obtained my salvation is not me by my faith, but Christ by his work.

When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here . . . he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption. (Hebrews 9: 11, 12 NASV)

Christ is the one who obtained salvation for the believer, and it was a once-for-all-time, all-wrapped-up, no-loose-strings, sat-down-when-he-was-done work. It is finished. If you think of yourself as obtaining your salvation, you are taking something away--and not something insignificant--from the completeness of what was done for you in Christ.

The other problem word in this statement is the word basis. Basis is a word that refers to grounds, or as my dictionary says, "a foundation upon which something rests." Thinking of faith as the basis for salvation moves our faith over into realm of grounds for our salvation, and that's a role it can't play if our salvation is on the grounds of Christ's work alone. Christ's work is sufficient, and there is and can be no other and no additional basis for salvation.

Let's move on to the final inaccurate statement about faith's role in salvation. This problem with this statement is similar, but more subtle, than the problem with the previous statement.

The reason I am saved is because I believed.

Just as basis is a word that refers to the grounds for something, so too with reason and because. The reason anyone is saved is because the benefits of Christ's death are applied to them.

Faith isn't important for it's own sake, or because of what faith is in itself. It isn't the reason or the basis or the because or the why or the crux, or even the condition--if by that you mean a requirement that we must meet--of our salvation. All those words belong to Christ's work alone. His active and passive obedience--that he lived righteously and died for us--is the reason, the basis, the because, the why, the crux, the requirement met. Faith is important, but it's important because it has an object, and that object is the crucial thing.

What words would rightly describe faith's role in our salvation? Theologians call it the instrumental means of salvation or the vehicle through which salvation is received. Salvation is by faith, or through faith, but even then, it's not merely by faith or through faith. It's by faith or through faith in Christ. Faith is the way salvation is received because faith is an expression of a relationship to the Christ whose work provides the meritorious grounds for salvation to those who are united with him.

Does this seem like a whole lot of nitpicky hairsplitting over picayune details? It might be nitpicky hairsplitting, but the details aren't unimportant. I might even grant that much of the time, these sorts of statements are simply sloppy language; but sloppy language, repeated often enough becomes sloppy thinking, and sloppy thinking, over time, becomes the way we think things really are. If we repeat those sorts of phrases often enough, we really will start to see our faith as the basis for our salvation. We will begin to think of our faith's role in our own salvation as joining with Christ's work in meriting it for us, even though we would never be so bold as to use the word merit to describe it. I can't speak for you, but I've have a hard time coming up with a list of one item more important than preserving, in our language and our thought, the perfection of Christ's sacrifice and the sufficiency of his work in providing the merit by which we are saved.

Thinking About Faith Alone and Christ Alone, Part 4

This is the fourth post in a series of posts considering the relationship between sole fide and solus Christus. The first post in this series considered what it means that Christ's work is the grounds for our salvation, and that faith is the means by which we receive salvation. The second post looked at the unique suitability of faith as the instrument through which the benefits of Christ's work is received. Next up, in the third post, we looked at one incorrect way of thinking about faith's role in the process of salvation that moved faith out of the realm of means only and right over into the realm of grounds for salvation. In this post, I'm going to look at another statement I saw recently that also makes faith out to be grounds, instead of just the means, of salvation.

What's that statement? Here you go: The only unforgivable sin is unbelief.

You've probably heard someone say that; perhaps you've even said it yourself. This is another of those statements that is often said without much thought. I understand the point that is usually being made: unbelief that persists until the end of life will certainly result in condemnation, and absolutely anyone who truly believes will be forgiven all their sins. That's a good point to make, but this statement is not the way to make it, because it leads to a conclusion that those who make the statement probably aren't considering.

What makes a sin forgivable? What provides the grounds for any sin to be forgiven? Yep, that's the solus Christus thing again: the grounds for forgiveness of sin exist in Christ's work. Any sin covered by Christ's death is a forgivable sin. If unbelief is unforgivable, then Christ's death didn't cover the sin of unbelief. If unbelief is the only unforgivable sin, then unbelief is the only type of sin not covered by Christ's death.

If that is so, then how is the past sin of unbelief covered for any believer? Why is that sin not counted against a believer? Do we somehow make up for our past unbelief by our present belief? If you take the statement "the only unforgivable sin is unbelief" at face value, I'm afraid this is where it leads: the past sin of unbelief is forgiven on the grounds of present belief.

That makes faith not simply the instrument of salvation, but grounds for it as well. It isn't the sole grounds for salvation, since Christ's work is the grounds for the forgiveness of all other sins but unbelief; but it is grounds for salvation along with Christ's work. Taken to its logical conclusion, the idea that unbelief is the only unforgivable sin makes our faith the partial grounds for salvation. And of course, grounds are nothing more or less than the merit or demerit upon which something is obtained, so this idea makes faith a work by which, together with Christ's work, salvation is merited.

I have a couple more statements about faith's role in the process of salvation that I want to inspect when I can get to them, but things are getting busy. I'll post on them sometime, but don't wait with baited breath.

Thinking About Faith Alone and Christ Alone, Part 2

The previous post in this series considered the relationship between faith and Christ's work: what it means that Christ's work is the grounds for our salvation, and that faith is the means by which we receive salvation. In this post, I want to explore faith's unique suitability as the instrument through which salvation, grounded as it is in Christ's work alone, is received. We're looking at why, if salvation is in Christ alone, there is no other instrument but faith that would fit with it as a receptor for it. In other words, it's all about the reason that in Christ alone necessitates by faith alone.

In Christ alone is the refomation slogan that points to Christ's work as the sole grounds for the salvation of sinners. When we talk about grounds or cause, we are introducing the idea of something being earned or deserved, either by merit or demerit. If a worker does a job for someone for an agreed upon price, they have grounds for demanding a paycheck once the work is done. The job well done merits the wage paid. When we talk of grounds for a lawsuit, we're speaking of something done wrong by the person being sued that justifies the demand for some sort of recompense. In this case, it's a matter of demerit or harm done, rather than merit or good accomplished, that comprises the grounds. Grounds are what justifies what we get; grounds are what earns for us what we are owed. So when we say that the only grounds for our salvation is Christ's work, that means that our salvation is merited by Christ's obedience, death and resurrection, and not by anything meritorious that exists within us, nor by anything meritorious that we produce. Christ alone means that our salvation is not earned by us, but wholly by Christ. The entire basis of--or reason for--our salvation is Christ and his work; there is nothing (and no one) else.

And if that's the case--that salvation is unmerited by us, but wholly merited by Christ--Scripture tells us that the only means by which it is possible to receive those saving benefits is by faith. Romans 4:16 says that justification "is by faith so that it may be by grace." In other words, justification is by faith, because justification is God's gift, and as you can probably figure out, if it's a gift, then it is not earned by us or owed to us. Justification being by faith, then, preserves Christ's work as the sole grounds for justification, and keeps any question of our own merit off the table. You might say that faith alone is the perfect fit--and the only fit--meanswise, for Christ alone.

Can you see why that would be? Isn't true faith--saving faith--an acknowledgment of our dependence on Christ alone for salvation? Isn't the cry of faith, "I have nothing; I can do nothing; you alone are my only hope!"? Faith places it's hope, it's grounds for salvation, squarely on the only grounds there are: the obedience, death and resurrection of Christ. It is, at it's core, the negation of personal merit or work, and trust in the merit and work of Christ. The eyes of faith see Christ's work as the center of salvation, the hinge on which it all turns.

I want to quote Herman Ridderbos from Paul: An Outline of His Theology, but first, let me give you fair warning. This book was originally written in Dutch, and translated into English for us, so it doesn't read the same as a book written first in everyday English. It can be a difficult slog--like a long trudge through a deep bog--and this quote is typical of the book as a whole. But your slogging will all be worth it, I promise. So buck up, soldier. Put on your thinking cap and it's forward, ho!

Ridderbos says that the purpose of the phrases regarding the relationship of faith to justification, salvation, or righteousness in Paul's letters, like by faith, through faith, from faith to faith,

is none other than to designate the object of faith as the ground of justification. Faith does not justify because of that which it is in itself, but because of that to which it is directed, in which it rests. For this reason, the exclusive emphasis with which faith is here placed over against works has a negative significance insofar as it speaks of man and his share in justification. Man is justified not on the grounds of what he is himself or has or achieves, but precisely on the grounds of that which he does not possess and which he in himself does not have at his disposal, but which he must receive, obtain, by faith. Faith here stands over against works as that which which is absolutely receptive and dependent, over against that which is productive, which is able to assert itself (page 172).

Did you follow that? Faith does not justify because it is a kind of merit, but because it rests in merit outside of itself. In this way, as the means of justification, faith stand in direct contrast to works or merit*, because justification by faith implies that human beings have no "share in justification", whereas justification by works implies that human beings participate in their own justification by providing at least some of the grounds for it. If justification were by works, then a person would be justified (at least in part) on the grounds of what he possesses or produces; yet since it's by faith, it's the opposite: a person is justified on the grounds of something he doesn't possess or produce, but rather receives. While works produce, faith receives, and it's the receptive nature of faith that makes it the only means by which we can be justified entirely on the grounds of Christ's merit, or solus Christus.

That "by faith" points directly to the work of Christ alone does away with any claim human beings might have that the righteousness that comes to them by faith is of themselves. The "principle of faith" excludes all human boasting, something a principle of works or merit would not do.

Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded! By what principle? Of works? No, but by the principle of faith! (Romans 3:27 NET)

Because salvation is by the principle of faith, all the glory for it goes to God (Soli Deo Gloria) who gave us grounds for salvation by sending his Son to merit it for us.

So, while the point of this series was to consider the relationship between sole fide and solus Christus, we've touched on their intertwining relationships with two of the other solas as well. If salvation is grounded only in Christ's work (solus Christus), it cannot be earned by us (sola gratia); and therefore must be received by means of faith in the work of Christ (sole fide), so that the all human boasting--or any claim that we produce something obtains justification for us--is excluded (Soli Deo Gloria). It all fits together in a tidy little logical package, based in and gleaned from the other sola: sola scriptura.

In the next post, I plan to consider some incorrect ways of thinking about faith's role in the process of salvation--ideas about faith that move it out of the realm of means only, and move it over into the realm of grounds for salvation by making faith a virtue by which we merit salvation, or a requirement that we meet in order to obtain salvation--and then move on to some other wrong ways of thinking about the process of salvation that base it in still other grounds besides faith, instead of entirely in Christ's work.

*This is not to suggest that faith stand in direct contrast to works in every way, but as a means of justification, they stand opposite to each other.

Thinking About Faith Alone and Christ Alone, Part 1

A couple of weeks ago I posted something on the Reformation slogan Solus Christus, or "in (or by) Christ alone"--a phrase that is used to refer to the truth that our salvation is accomplished by the work of Christ, and by nothing else instead of or in addition to his work. In other words, the whole grounds for our salvation--or the very reason we can be saved--is the work of Christ; or, to put it yet another way, it is Christ's obedience, death and resurrection on our behalf that justifies our justification. Since then, I've been doing some thinking about the relationship between Solus Christus and another of the five solas: Sole Fide. As you might expect, if I've been thinking it, I will eventually blog it, and this is post one on this subject.

Sole fide means "faith alone." It refers to the truth that our justification, grounded in Christ's work, comes to us through faith alone, and through no other means. There are various ways this is explained. It is said that we lay hold of Christ's work on our behalf through faith alone, that faith is the conduit through which Christ's work comes to us, or that faith is the instrument or vessel which receives God's gift of salvation. I think those are all good descriptions of the role faith plays in our justification.

If we are justified through the means of faith alone, it is certainly right to say that faith is necessary for justification, since it's through faith that we receive it; but at the same time, faith is not the grounds for our justification--the basis upon which we can be justified--since the grounds or basis for our salvation is Christ's work alone, not Christ's work plus our faith. Scripture always speaks of faith, in relation to justification, in language that refer to means only, and never uses the language of grounds in relation to it. That's why thoughtful theologians say salvation is by or through faith, but they don't say it is because of faith: they are being careful to maintain the distinction that faith is the means of salvation, but not the grounds of it.

Are you not sure of the distinction? Here's an example that might help. Imagine a parent punishing a child with good cause. When we use the term "with good cause", we are using the language of grounds. We are saying that there is suitable grounds or sufficient reason for the punishment. The child is punished because he or she did something that needed punishment, and that misdeed is the grounds--or the good cause--for the punishment. Let's say, to expand the illustration, that the punishment was the removal of a certain privilege. Going without the privilege is the way the punishment is received by the child. It's not the grounds of the punishment, which is the misdeed, as discussed above, but the means by which the punishment comes. Going without the privilege is, of course, necessary in order for the child to be punished, but we can't say it's the reason or cause or grounds for the punishment.*

So the answer to the child's question, "Why was I punished?" is not "Because you went without the X-box for a day," but "Because you clobbered your brother over the head with your controller." The answer to the question "How was I punished?" is "By going without the X-box." Because, why, cause, reason, and basis are word in English that speak to grounds; how, by, and through speak of means.

(I know we don't always use language in exactly this way or this precisely. For example, we also use cause to refer to something that brings about an event, which speaks more to agency**, and, of course, that's a right way to use the term. However, in the realm of moral, legal, or theological discussion, the word cause is used frequently as a synonym for reason or grounds, and that's the way I'm using it here. The reason it's so important to think through the terms we use is that when we're speaking about important things--like our salvation, for instance--where much can be gained from understanding the relationships between the necessary elements, precise language helps us understand the concepts without confusion.)

The relationship between in Christ alone and through faith alone in our salvation is similar to the relationship between the child's misdeed and the loss of the X-box in our example. It is similar in that the grounds, reason or cause of salvation is Christ alone, and the means through which our salvation comes is faith alone, so that the answer to the question, "Why am I saved?" is "Because of Christ's work on my behalf," rather than "Because I believed." Faith comes in as an answer to the question "How am I saved?"; I am saved "through faith alone."

The distinction between faith as the means of salvation and Christ's work as the grounds of salvation is the background for the rest of what I want to write on this subject. Next up, I'll post on the reason that faith alone as the means of salvation fits so perfectly with Christ alone as the grounds of salvation. After that, I plan to post on some sloppy theological thinking that adds faith to Christ's work as the grounds of salvation.

*This illustration doesn't work perfectly, but it's the best I can think of, so I'm sticking with it for now.
**Faith is not the agent of salvation, either, by the way. But that's a whole nuther discussion.

By Christ Alone

In case you haven't heard, today, October 31, is Reformation Day. It's the anniversary of the day in 1517 when Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the church in Wittenberg, and a day for Protestants to remember the Reformation. I'm going to mark the day by posting a reflection on one of the slogans of the Reformation: Solus Christus, or by Christ alone. This little phrase refers to the truth that our salvation is accomplished by Christ's work and nothing else. It only seems right--doesn't it?--that I should ground this reflection in scripture, since another of the slogans of the Reformation is Sola Scriptura, which points to the supreme authority of scripture in the life of the church and the life of the believer.

Therefore since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest incapable of sympathizing with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way just as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us confidently approach the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace whenever we need help. (Hebrews 4:14-16 NET)

This bit of scripture tells us that believers have direct access to God, for not only is there is no longer a barrier that keeps us from approaching him, there is a conduit for us to approach him through. This place of bold standing before God and free approach to him comes to us through the work of Christ: through his historical reconciling work on the cross; and, presently, through his continued mediatorial work in heaven.

Our bold standing and confident approach has everything to do with the unique nature of our high priest. He is the only one who has all the characteristics required to give us direct access to God. No one else can fill the bill, for he is the only one perfectly suited for the job. It's his perfect suitablity--his complete ability--that warrants our boldness before God.

First of all, our high priest has passed through the heavens. You won't find him in a subordinate area of heaven; rather, he is right up there in the highest heaven next to God. As God's own Son, he has a greatness equal to God's, so there is no barrier of inferiority. He is in God's immediate presence, sitting at God's right hand. You might say that he has God's ear in an immediate and direct way that no one else has ever had.

And that's not all. Not only does our high priest have completely unhindered access to God, but he is also completely one with us in our weakness. He is not representing us before God as one who can only imagine what things are like for us, who can only contemplate from afar what it is to be who we are. No, he has been one of us! He came where we are and experienced what we experience.

Even his temptations were like ours. No matter what temptation troubles me or what trial taunts me, he can understand, for he has experienced similar temptation in a deeper way than I have, since he always stood firm in the face of it. He knows the full force of all the kinds of temptations common to humankind, not just the piddling part that a sinner who gives way to a temptation knows.

It is these two things that make him the one perfect high priest: he represents us as one of us, and he has direct access to God. It is because of who he is and what he's done that the way to the throne is open for us. Moreover, it is on the grounds of what he's done that the throne is indeed a throne of grace--that what is dispensed there for us is mercy and grace.

So let us come boldly. If we come hesitantly or timidly, perhaps it is because we don't fully grasp who Jesus the Son of God is and what he has accomplished. If we are apprehensive to draw near, we are ignoring, in a way, some of who Christ is and what he accomplished. It's not bravado that brings us near, for the reasons we can come confidently are strong ones--the best ones--all centered in Christ and his work. It glorifies Christ when we use freely the access that he, in his uniqueness, has opened for us.

It's because of the unique nature of our high priest that we ought to hold fast to our confession. The writer of Hebrews is writing, at least in part, to faithful Jews who had moved forward to embrace Christ as the fulfillment of God's promises to them. They were tempted to go back to the old system with its lesser priests and sacrifices, but the writer warns them that to do so would be letting go of their confession of the perfect Priest and Sacrifice. Christ accomplished it all--once for all time--something no one else could do. He needs no help from anyone or anything, and to the extent that we do not confidently rest in him and his work alone, we are not holding fast to our confession.

Holding on to our confession, then, means grasping tightly to the work of the one-of-a-kind perfect human and complete God, and not looking back to other helps or go-betweens. Or maybe you prefer to call it resting in Jesus, which is, in a wonderfully counterintuitive, paradoxical sort of way, exactly the same thing as grasping tightly to him. Christ is all we need. We can rest in him alone; we can cling to him alone.

Just as it was for the first hearers and readers of the book of Hebrews, so, too, for us: the key to our continued standing in the faith lies in our true understanding of the extent of Christ's perfection for his office and the completeness of the adequacy in his work. We come boldly to the throne through the one and only mediator, the one and only high priest, the one and only way to God's ear whenever we need help. So we bow at the Name of the One who became, for a little while, lower than the angels in order that he might bring us directly into God's presence.

More Reformation Day reflections can be found in the Reformation Day Symposium at Challies.com.

The (NET) Bible is available as a free download at http://www.bible.org.

The Boxing of God

In a former life, I spent a lot of time on theology discussion boards. You don't have to be on discussion boards long before you realize that there are a few standard oft-repeated, but mostly meaningless, rebuttal phrases. The purpose of these particular sorts of rebuttals is to be such shocking accusations that no additional response is needed. I thought it would be interesting to consider a couple of them.

First up is the God in a box rebuttal. The discussion in which this phrase is used usually goes something like this: Someone makes a propositional statement about God that doesn't sit well with someone else, but instead of giving a reason that the statement about God is wrong, the person who disagrees trots out this all-purpose propositional-statement-about-God rebuttal, "You can't put God in a box like that!"

Of course, part of that statement is always right. We can't put God in a box. God is infinite, and our statements and ideas about him will never contain the whole of who he is. He is other, and in a category completely separate from us, and not exactly like anything we know or are able to experience. He is creator--the one who created us and created the box we exist in--and as boxees, we will never succeed at packaging the packager.

Nope, the problem with that rebuttal statement is not so much with the "You can't put God in a box" part, but with the "like that!" part. Sometimes those words are an objection to any definite statement about God, coming from the idea that God is so beyond us, so mysterious, that we can know nothing much truly true about him. Definite statements about God make some people really, really, nervous. They have the idea that since much of who God is is beyond the realm of our comprehension, any statement about him necessarily is false, in the sense that it reduces him to less than he is by attempting to contain an infinite God in a statement (or set of statements) about him.

More often than not, though, the objection isn't that we can know nothing about God, but that the particular statement doesn't jibe with the objector's idea of God. God, as they understand him, isn't "like that!"

Often this objection arises when someone says that God can't do something or must do something. Statements like this are seen as limiting God, and don't we all know that God is completely free? There are no rules or standards that God must conform his actions to, and no limitations on his abilities, so how can it ever be right to say that God can't or God must?

It is, of course, true that God is completely free. He's the only truly free being there is. Unlike any other being, he is entirely free to express himself, and if you think about it, that's what true freedom is, isn't it? It's when we can't "be ourselves" that we feel our freedom is restricted. But God has freedom to be himself in a way that no other being does. Absolutely nothing stands in the way of his self-expression, but it's himself he's expressing, and he isn't anyone-or-anything-at-all, he's someone. He has characteristics, so when he expresses himself, he expresses himself according to his characteristics, and that's not limiting, that's freedom.

And while it is correct to say that the whole of God is incomprehensible to us, there are things about him that we can understand, and there are some understandable things about himself that he's chosen to communicate to us, so it's not correct to think that we can know nothing truly true about him. While we can't box him up, he's given us hooks we can hang our hats on.

One of the most important hooks that God has given us is the hook of his immutability, because that characteristic ensures the constancy of the other characteristics. God's character is unchanging. He is who he is, and who he was, and who he will be, and he isn't going to morph into something or someone else tomorrow, or ever. If he tells us he is truthful, then he is always truthful. His immutability makes his truthfulness an everlasting hook to hang our hats on, too. It's because of this that we are not limiting God when we say he can't lie. We are not saying that there is a set of rules (including "don't lie!") outside of himself that he must always live up to, even though he feels like lying. Nope, we are affirming his perfect ability to be who he is, forever, freely; and to speak and act in accordance with who he is and what he wants, forever, freely.

Sometimes the God in the box objection comes in slightly different form, but it all boils down to the same idea. For example, in the first comment on this post at Jollyblogger, an objection is made to the idea of penal substitutionary atonement. The idea of a penal substitutionary atonement, says the commentor,

suggests that once the Father has made a law, that He is unable to subsequently be merciful until that law if fulfilled. That makes God's law more powerful than God.

If I understand the commenter correctly, her objection is to the idea that sin must always be given its just deserts, as if the just deserts for sin comes from a rule God set up outside of himself, and if he always has to go by his own rule, God is limited. This is really just another form of the God in a box objection--that any must or can't statements pertaining to God are limits to God's freedom. In this particular case, it isn't that God made a rule that he must always make sure sin receives what it deserves, but rather, that God exists as a God who is characteristically just. Expressing himself fully and freely means that he always gives justice to sin, and if he didn't he wouldn't be who he is. Therefore, he cannot simply pass over sin out of mercy for sinners, but his mercy must be given in a way that is also just.

Of course, there are things for which the objection of boxing God might rightly be made. Whatever limits we speak of in regards to what God can do, if they are not limits that arise directly from the specific characteristics he's revealed and explained to us through his word, then, in a sense, we are trying to put God in a box. If I were to tell you that God was confined to one place at one time, that'd be making God out to be less than he has revealed himself to be, and boxing him in that way. I still don't think that "You can't put God in a box like that!" is nearly as good a response as giving evidence that God has revealed himself to be a both a transcendent and immanent God.

Next up, the oft repeated rebuttal, "You're making God the author of sin!"

Definite Atonement and the Open Invitation of the Gospel

One objection some people have to the doctrine of definite atonement (a.k.a. limited atonement or particular redemption) is that they don't see how there can be a genuine free offer of the gospel if there is particularity in the atonement. The idea that the two things are incompatible comes, in part, from considering the atonement to be simply a commercial kind of transaction, the same sort of transaction I make when I go to the grocery store to buy groceries. If I buy 3 boxes of Cheerios, then I pay 3 times the price of one box. If I pay for my order, and then decide at the last minute that I need another box of Cheerios (my kids like them, okay?), I can't just slide that extra box by the cashier without paying more for it.

Those who raise this objection seem to consider the purchase made in the atonement to be much like my Cheerios purchase. The atonement is thought of as a certain quantity of atonement that has paid for a certain number of people, and if anyone were to be added to the number of those redeemed, then more atonement would have to be paid. Therefore, a genuine offer of forgiveness on condition of repentence cannot be made to those who are not among "the certain certified sinners"* for whom Christ died.

Charles Hodge answers this objection in his classic discussion of the extent of the atonement, For Whom Did Christ Die?, by reminding us that this is not payment that is "so much for so much", but payment by sacrifice:

The Scriptures teach that Christ saves us as a priest, by offering Himself as a sacrifice for our sins. But a sacrifice was not a payment of a debt, the payment of so much for so much. A single victim was sometimes a sacrifice for one individual; sometimes for the whole people. On the great day of atonement the scape-goat bore the sins of the people, whether they were more or less numerous. It had no reference at all to the number of persons for whom atonement was to be made. So Christ bore the sins of his people; whether they were to be a few hundreds, or countless millions, or the whole human family, makes no difference as to the nature of his work, or as to the value of his satisfaction. What was absolutely necessary for one, was abundantly sufficient for all.

In other words, it's not really the number of people that counts, but the relationship of those people to Christ. Christ represented the people or his brethren in the propitatory sacrifice he made before God (see Hebrew 2:17). The sacrifice made would serve as propitiation for all of the people, no matter how many or few they were, but would not be propitiation for anyone outside of that represented group.

If you need to think of it as a commercial transaction, then think of it as something like a buying a lifetime family pass to the zoo. The pass will admit anyone in the family. If a family has 2 children, the pass will work for the parents and the children of that family. A family of 15 can also enter the zoo on the same sort of family pass. They don't pay more because they are larger. If a family who starts out with 2 children were to adopt 7 more, they wouldn't have to purchase more passes. This pass, however, won't work for the next door neighbour's child, because neighbour children are not covered by that one family pass. The pass works for all those of a certain relationship, not for a certain maximum number.

The invitation of the gospel is an invitation to be adopted into the family--to become part of the group that holds the pass. This group is open to absolutely anyone who responds in faith to the invitation of the gospel. And anyone who believes--who is adopted into that family group--has already been atoned for when Christ stood before God and represented his brethren.

The pass doesn't apply to those who never believe, who are not part of Christ's brethren, and who remain always outside of this represented group. This absence of a pass for those who are never united to Christ is not because the one pass that exists would not work for them if they were to become one of the brothers or sisters of Christ, but because they remain outside the particular group (Christ's brethren) for whom the pass was purchased.

This is what is meant by the phrase "sufficient for all, efficient for the elect". The one sacrifice is sufficient for any number of people--Spurgeon says even "ten worlds"--and would work for ten worlds worth of people if that many were to be united with Christ. It is, however, efficient only for those who are actually united with Christ. The call of the gospel is simply a call to be united with Christ through faith, and anyone who answers that call has been atoned for by the one representative sacrifice of Christ.

By the way, the belief that a definite atonement and a free offer of the gospel are incompatible is not exclusive to those who don't adhere to the doctrine of definite atonement. There are also a few who affirm definite atonement; and then, based on how they percieve definite atonement, conclude that there is no free offer of the gospel. In both cases, it seems that the root of the objection is the idea that the atonement is the payment of "so much for so much".

*The phrase "certain certified sinners" is one that I've heard bandied about by those who oppose the doctrine of definite atonement. I'm not sure anyone arguing for definite atonement has ever actually used that phrase. Perhaps they have; I just haven't read or heard it.

[I already linked to Jollyblogger's article on limited atonement. Adrian Warnock has one as well.]

[Update: Tim illustrates particular redemption from another angle.]

[Update 2: Also dealing with this specific objection, but in a different way, is Crusty Curmudgeon.]