This past Sunday at our weekly theology breakfast, we were considering the doctrine of limited atonement (or, particular redemption; or, definite atonement). Having considered much of the scriptural data, we turned to this quote from John Owen which helpfully lays out the problem:
[If Jesus died for all men]…why then, are not all freed from the punishment of all their sins? You will say, “Because of their unbelief; they will not believe.” But his unbelief, is it sin, or not? If not, why should they be punished for it? If it be sin, then Christ underwent the punishment due to it; If this is so, then why must that hinder them more than their other sins for which he died from partaking of the fruit of his death? If he did not, then he did not die for all their sins.
In other words, if Jesus has paid for all the sin of all men – including the sin of unbelief – everyone must be saved because all their sin has been forgiven. This leads us to the clearly unbiblical heresy of universalism and cannot be right.
To get around this problem, some insist that Jesus died for all the sin of all men except their unbelief. The problem here is that unbelief is itself a sin. Why is this sin not covered by Jesus’ death but all other sin is? There is no biblical grounds for the claim. Either all sin is covered by Jesus’ death or none of it is; the bible offers no other options.
Moreover, if Jesus died for all the sins of all men, but his death doesn’t cover unbelief, Jesus hasn’t paid for all the sin of anybody. Everybody is born in unbelief. If unbelief is unpaid for, nobody’s sin has been paid in full. If unbelievers are damned because of their unbelief that was never covered by Jesus’ death, believers will also be damned because their earlier unbelief is similarly not covered by Jesus’ death. What this means in practice is that Jesus’ atonement has failed and all are condemned.
In essence, Owen argues that if Jesus died for all the sins of all men then nobody remains in sin, nobody stands under judgement and all must be saved. It is universalism. But if Jesus died for all the sins of all men except unbelief, then nobody is saved – not even the believer – because their sin of unbelief remains untouched by the atonement. In other words, if Jesus died for all, either everyone is saved or nobody is.
The only other option here is that Jesus didn’t die for all. He died for all the sins of the elect alone, including their unbelief. Reformed theology would then argue not that we are saved upon condition of our believing; we are saved because of God’s determined will to elect a people, Jesus’ finished and complete work on the cross and the regenerative work of the Holy Spirit upon our hearts. Our believing is not the cause of our salvation, nor is it a condition upon our salvation, rather it is the consequence of our salvation. Believing is what believers do after God has chosen them, Jesus has atoned for them and the Spirit has regenerated them. It is a reflex to God’s saving work, not the condition for it.
Some verses that would bear this out (this list is by no means exhaustive):
Isaiah 53:8. For whom was God’s servant stricken? My people
Matthew 1:21. Who will Jesus save from sin? His people
Luke 1:68. Who has Jesus redeemed? His people
John 17:1-2. Who does he have authority over and who will Jesus give eternal life to? Authority over all men but eternal life only to those you have given to him
Eph 5:25. Who did Jesus give up his life for? The church. Not all in general, but his people.
The only real counter to these verses would stem from references to ‘the world or ‘the whole world’. But when we understand ‘the world’ to refer to all peoples, as opposed to exclusivity through Israel and the Jews, these pose no issue. Further, if we work backwards and insist ‘the world’ must mean every individual or ‘all people’, we are thrown back onto the problem posed and addressed above by John Owen.
What Owen helpfully highlights – and I believe his position is backed by scripture – is that a denial of limited atonement is, in effect, an argument for potential universalism or else for utter destruction. Neither position can be justified by the biblical data.
I’ve not heard the suggestion that Jesus died for all sins except unbelief. Do you have citations? Or do you mean it is a logical inference if there is a free choice to believe?
It is specifically what Owen argues, so you’d have to ask him who he heard it off 😜
But, without being able to do that, it is pretty common to hear people say something like, ‘jesus died for all people and his death covers their sin, but it only applies to those who believe’. That is, their sin is covered entirely except the sin of unbelief. We can then follow Owen’s logic from ‘why must that hinder them more than their other sins’.
Yes from the original quote I’m not sure if it’s that people were saying it … Or this is the logical inference of their position. I suspect but could be wrong that some people in terms of our contemporaries would not treat unbelief as sin. I think that’s wrong. Unbelief is in fact the root, or indeed belief in something/someone else.
I think it would be worth reading the comment from Tom Repton to see how some (who don’t agree) might view it
This is one part of theology I think some people confuse wayyyy too much, usually it feels from American Reformed/Conservative Christians (or maybe I’m being harsh with that?).
Until recent years, I’d never heard that Jesus ONLY DIED FOR THE ELECT – I think it came up in Systematic Theology, or another book by a preacher/theologian. Now to be clear, I believe God elects some and not others (as scripture shows), I believe in limited atonement rather than universalism (as scripture shows), but I just don’t think we can say ‘Jesus died only for the elect’ from Scripture. God chose the elect, and Jesus’s true followers will only be those who are elect, but to say He only died for them just doesn’t seem to me to be what Scripture says.
The argument is, as above, if Jesus died for all, then surely all should be saved…but the problem with that argument is that it doesn’t take into consideration people rejecting Jesus/unbelief, and makes it seem that Jesus’ dying for sin would only be real if someone then believes in Him. But surely the worst sin is the sin of unbelief and outright rejecting Jesus’ atoning death for our sin?! Surely rejecting the gospel is sin and what unbelievers are doing?! If one argues that He didn’t die for those who are not elect anyway, then those people haven’t rejected Jesus’ death for sin, because He didn’t die for their sin anyway – so in a way they are not sinning in that area? It just seems to create ‘categories’ (or whatever you want to call them) of people that scripture doesn’t even have – ‘those Jesus died for’ and ‘those Jesus didn’t die for’ – surely what the Bible teaches is ‘those who accept/believe in/receive Jesus (and therefore His death for sins/propitation/atoning sacrifice)’ and ‘those who reject Jesus (and therefore reject His death for sins)’?
Again, if Jesus ‘didn’t die for their sins’ then they haven’t done anything wrong in not believing in the gospel, they haven’t rejected the cross, haven’t rejected Christ’s atoning sacrificial death, as it wasn’t for them anyway…
Surely scripture says that Jesus died for all, but through sin/some not being the elect of God, those people reject Jesus’ death for their sins, they reject his resurrection, they are rejecting his gospel. Unbelief IS a thing, and election IS a thing – both are clear in scripture surely?!
You say ‘surely scripture says that jesus died for all’, but if you follow the verses that I listed, they expressly don’t say that! The Bible directly talks about those jesus died for and those he didn’t.
You are absolutely right that the worst sin is rejecting jesus, which is really the power of Owen’s argument. He insists that unbelief is as bad – if not worse – than the rest. It makes no sense that Jesus’ death would cover all sin except this one and forces us to either universalism or the utter destruction of all people.
I’m not sure I follow your argument that if Jesus didn’t die for unbelievers, their unbelief isn’t sin. I’m not sure what scriptural, logical or necessary reason there is to accept this. The bible speaks very definitely of God hardening Pharaoh’s heart for example (cf. Rom 9) but it simultaneously still asserts that this was sin. The bible repeatedly calls unbelief sin; it nowhere suggests that if Jesus wasn’t atoning for such sin it no longer counts as sin. By that logic (it seems to me) anybody whose sin is not covered by Christ’s atoning work on the cross (which on both Arminian and Calvinistic soteriological views is all unbelievers) must be considered sinless altogether. This would take us back to universalism again. If you insist this only applies to unbelief, and nothing else, there is no logical reason to affirm that the bible calls unbelief sin but, because Jesus only died for the elect, the unbelief of unbelievers is not sin.
There are two things here: (1) who did jesus die for? (2) who believes in Jesus? The answer in both cases is ‘the elect’ or, another way of putting it, Jesus only died for those who ultimately believe. These are the same thing.
It is possible to deny jesus, reject his salvation and therefore be one of those for whom his death was never intended. Belief or non-belief is merely the proof of election (or rather, the first fruits – persevering to the end is really the ultimate proof). Belief is merely a reflex to the work of God, not a condition for God to work
You can’t turn it into a maths equation and that’s probably why many prefer particular or definite atonement. The point is whether or not his death is affective, does it actually definitely save it just create the potential to save.
This is a wonderful, logical argument for limited atonement. Thank you.