To Taste Death for Everyone

The understanding of the Son of God dying for the sin of all people is the most central, unique, and pivotal of Christian doctrines. It is also the most difficult and offensive. How could one person dying have any benefit beyond that of martyr or example? What kind of God would be so vengeful and bloodthirsty that he would demand his own son be offered for a cruel sacrifice? While Christians get so accustomed to this basic tenet of their beliefs that the awfulness of it loses its impact on them, it remains incomprehensible and repulsive to those considering Christianity from the outside.

The introduction to “The Letter To The Hebrews” directs our attention to this issue as the basis for the rest of the argument contained in the book (all quotations taken from The English Standard Version of The Holy Bible 2002). God is, and God has spoken, in many times and in many ways, as the author begins his discussion, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son. And then he goes on to define who this Son is, and how he has spoken. In the first paragraph he (is) heir of all things … created the world… the radiance of the glory of God… the exact imprint of his nature… upholds the universe by the word of his power…(made) purification for sins… sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.

I see two causes for offense in the doctrine of atonement. One is the cruelty of a father having his son murdered to appease his own wrath. The second is that I do not naturally feel that I am bad enough that anyone else should have to die for my shortcomings, let alone the Son of God. While the first offense is most often put forward as the insurmountable one, I suspect the second is the true root of our difficulty. In response to these anticipated concerns, the author establishes the relationship between this Father and Son. At first we see it is as intense and close as any human father and son, You are my Son… I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son… anointed you with the oil of gladness… sit at my right hand. It is not lack of love for the Son that releases him to his torturers.

But the relationship is more profound than any human one. God says of the Son, Your throne, O God, is forever and ever… You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands; they will perish, but you will remain… they will be changed. But you are the same, and your years will have no end. The important picture here is not a vengeful father sending his son to the gallows. It is the Creator of the universe, my Creator, dying for me. The notion of a benevolent first century Jewish rabbi allowing himself to be put to death to demonstrate love and forgiveness is remote, warmly touching, and not an offense. The caricature of an enraged self-absorbed “god” finding pleasure in torturing his son is rightly obnoxious. But the living, personal, passionately feeling, all-powerful immortal creator of the universe and every living thing, becoming a mortal creature to restore relationship with a rebellious creation – that is beyond human thinking. Failing to recognize Jesus of Nazareth as Immanuel, God in the flesh, leads us to question the validity of God as well as the Christian paradigm. Allowing ourselves to see the unthinkable, that this ordinary appearing human, destined to die like all humans, was the Creator of all, brings us to see the act as more awesome than awful.

And it also confronts us with the second “offense”: “Surely I am not that evil!” And the author takes us there as well, Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. For since the message declared by angels proved to be reliable and every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? Most of our difficulties with the teachings of the Bible stem from underestimating both how great God is, and how serious our own problem is. The unique beauty of the Christian “Gospel” is Jesus, the bridge between those otherwise irreconcilable poles.

The author goes on, We see…Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering… Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery…Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

The outlandishness of this claim sets apart the message of the New Testament as either the only way for all mankind, or else as delusional madness. Next time we are tempted to find fault with God for being unfair or unloving, we can be reminded that our sin problem is indeed “that bad”, and that it was the only, living, creator, God who gave himself to overcome it and reconcile us to him. -philw