Hi Dr. Craig. What implications does penal substitution have for the debate
between limited atonement and unlimited atonement? Because it seems that if the
sins of all of humanity were imputed to Christ but Christ's righteousness was
only imputed to a few people then that would mean that he was punished too
severely would it not? That he was what? Punished too severely. Oh I don't think
that would follow. Usually, as I indicated in response to the earlier question, the
gravity of the offense against God is taken to be infinite in its proportion,
and so the punishment that Christ endured would be similar to whether it
included everybody or just a portion of humanity because of the infinite offense
rendered to God by sin. The relevance of the doctrine of limited atonement, which
for those who are not familiar with this notion, says that Christ only died for
the elect; he didn't die for the sins of the whole world, he only died for the
sins of the elect. Where that would come in is that some advocates of penal
substitution, namely Calvinists, reformed theologians, as well as critics of penal
substitution, have said that if Christ really did pay the penalty for all
person's sins, then this should result in universalism. Everyone should be saved.
The critic of penal substitution, therefore, rejects penal substitution; the
reformed theologian instead limits the scope of penal substitution to the elect.
I don't think either of those moves is necessary. It seems to me that Christ's
sacrificial death can be sufficient for the sins of all persons, that is it
provides sufficient satisfaction for God's justice,
but it isn't actualized in a person's life until it is appropriated by faith
and repentance. So that Christ on the cross potentially wins the salvation of
all persons, but this needs to be actualized by repentance and faith over
history in individual lives. And I think the reformed thinker himself
acknowledges a distinction like this in that the reformed thinker distinguishes
between redemption as accomplished and as applied. He will say redemption is
accomplished at the cross, but it is applied to individual lives as they turn
to God in repentance and faith. Now, that distinction is necessary because if
redemption were actually accomplished at the cross, or applied, as they would say,
at the cross, then the elect would be born regenerate; they they would never be
separated from God, and yet Paul says in Ephesians we ourselves were once
children of wrath like the rest of mankind. So even in the lives of the
elect there is a period of time where they are unregenerate sinners under the
condemnation and wrath of God, even though their redemption was supposedly
accomplished at the cross it hasn't been applied. The only way I can make
sense of that distinction is by saying that Christ's redeeming death was
sufficient for everyone's sins that day on Golgotha, but that it needs to be
actualized or appropriated in individual lives through repentance and faith, in
the absence of which it remains ineffectual.