The Scope of Passover and Penal Substitution Theory

trinity-cruifixionOne of the terms used in the early fathers when interpreting the Scriptures was the “scope” of Scripture. By this they meant backing away from the detail of the text to see the larger picture, the “scope” of a broad reading. This technique was particularly valued in the so-called Antiochene School of interpretation, which is usually associated with a more historical/literal reading of Scripture. The failure to see the “scope” of the text all too easily exalts stray details to an unwarranted position. You cannot understand a tree until you see its place in the forest. This understanding of the “scope” of Scripture is particularly devastating to the penal-substitionary atonement theory.

Penal substitionary atonement argues that Christ, by his own sacrificial choice, was punished (penalised) in the place of sinners (substitution), thus satisfying the demands of justice so God can justly forgive their sins. It is thus a specific understanding of substitutionary atonement, where the substitutionary nature of Jesus’ death is understood in the sense of a substitutionary punishment.

I have written previously about the lack of Scriptural warrant for this teaching, as well as its creation of a false image of a wrathful God who must be satisfied in order to be reconciled to man. I will point out here that this theory falls outside the scope of the New Testament, particularly the gospels where a definitive scope can be discerned: that of Christ as our Passover.

As noted in my previous article, a central theme of Christ’s suffering, death and resurrection is found associated with the feast of Passover. At Passover, the Jews celebrate and remember their deliverance from Egypt by the miraculous intervention of God.

“So you shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this same day I will have brought your armies out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day throughout your generations as an everlasting ordinance. In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread, until the twenty-first day of the month at evening. For seven days no leaven shall be found in your houses, since whoever eats what is leavened, that same person shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a stranger or a native of the land. You shall eat nothing leavened; in all your dwellings you shall eat unleavened bread.”

Then Moses called for all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Pick out and take lambs for yourselves according to your families, and kill the Passover lamb. And you shall take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. And none of you shall go out of the door of his house until morning. For the LORD will pass through to strike the Egyptians; and when He sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the LORD will pass over the door and not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike you. And you shall observe this thing as an ordinance for you and your sons forever.” (Exo 12:17-24)

It was during this festival in Jerusalem that Christ was crucified. For the Primitive Christian community, it was clear that Christ is Himself now our Passover. He is the Passover Lamb. His blood saves us from death and hell (the destroyer). And like the earlier Passover, this miraculous intervention of God is remembered with a meal. The Eucharist is the New Passover, the New Covenant. It is not kept annually, but weekly (if not more often). And it is kept weekly on Sunday, the day of Christ’s resurrection.

This change in worship is a radical departure from the mainstream life of 1st century Judaism. There is mention in the book of Acts that the early community continued to go to the Temple in Jerusalem to pray. But it also says:

 And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching and communion, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. (Acts 2:42)

The gospels reflect an understanding of Christ as the New Passover that supersedes the Old. This is so dominant that it results in a changed pattern of worship – the primacy of Sunday (now called “the Lord’s Day”) as well as the eating of a new, weekly Passover meal (the Eucharist) as the center of worship.

The Penal Substitionary model of the atonement simply has no place within this scope. The blood of the lamb applied to the doorposts of Israel is not an atoning blood. It is not an offering or sacrifice of substitution. It belongs uniquely to Israel as the people of God. Only the children of Israel may eat of the meal (the lamb) – it is a meal of belonging and communion – in which no forensic or legal imagery plays a part. Strangers in the land, in years to come, are allowed to eat of the meal, only if they submit to the law of circumcision (and thus “become” part of Israel).

The essential imagery of the Passover is of an oppressed people. Their deliverance does not hinge on how they found themselves to be in bondage. “Let my people go,” is God’s word to Egypt. In essence: “They don’t belong to you – they belong to Me.”

This same imagery is at work in the New Passover. The people of God are in bondage (to sin and death). Christ constantly intervenes in their lives, healing them, setting them free and forgiving their sins.

Matthew (9:2ff) describes Christ’s healing of a paralytic. In that action He begins by forgiving the man’s sins. When those standing around question His authority to forgive, He says to the man, “Arise, take up your bed and walk.” And He explains that He has done this in order to show that the “Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins.”

In the Penal model of the atonement, we would have to ask how Christ could forgive this man since no justice has been satisfied. Is the man healed as a loan from a payment that will be made at a later point?

In the Scriptures, we do not have a legal problem. Sin is not a legal debt or an infraction demanding the satisfaction of justice. Sin is death (Romans 6:21-23). Sin is a life lived out of communion with God, the Lord and giver of life. As such, it is a spiritual entropy, a life that is collapsing. It is slavery and bondage to a growing process of nothingness.

For the gospel writers and the early Church, nothing describes this slavery better than the imagery of Israel’s bondage in Egypt. Their deliverance does not flow from a balance of accounts nor the satisfaction of divine justice. It is the love of God for His people. This imagery continues throughout the early Church, preserved especially in the Christian East. St. Basil’s Eucharistic prayer offers this summary:

Releasing us from the delusions of idolatry, He brought us to knowledge of You, the true God and Father. He obtained us for Himself, to be a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. Having cleansed us in water, and sanctified us with the Holy Spirit, He gave Himself as a ransom to death, in which we were held captive, sold under sin. Descending through the Cross into Hades that He might fill all things with Himself, He destroyed the torments of death. And rising on the third day, He made a path for all flesh to the resurrection from the dead, since it was not possible for the Author of Life to be overcome by corruption.

This is the story of the New Exodus. Baptism is the new Red Sea. In it are destroyed all of the enemies of God’s people.

St. Basil uses the language that is often described as belonging to a “ransom theory” of the atonement. I think this overplays but a single part of the “scope” of his imagery. The “ransom” is simply a ransom “to death.” It is a counterpart to the imagery of our being “sold under sin.” The scope of St. Basil’s account is that we were held captive and God sent His only Son to come and get us. And since we were held captive by death, He entered death itself to get us out. Christ’s resurrection is indeed the New Exodus, making a “path for all flesh from the dead.” Death is the ultimate Egypt, the last bondage.

St. Basil additionally makes this statement:

He emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being conformed to the body of our lowliness, that He might conform us to the image of His glory.

It is a use of Philippians 2 which Basil extends into the language of Divine solidarity. God has become what we are, that we might become what He is. In this New Passover, God Himself becomes the Lamb. God Himself enters into our bondage and death. God Himself leads us triumphantly back from the dead (through the Red Sea, etc.).

And now the meal, the feast of the Passover, is God Himself: “This is my body…this is my blood.” The first Passover was but a shadow of the second (and last). In in this account of Christ’s work, there is simply no imagery of a legal payment, a propitiation of the wrath of God. God is not the enemy of man.

A weakness of penal substitutionary theory is its inherently pagan character. The God who must be satisfied (whether we chalk this up to His justice or not) is a diminished God, rather than the Ground of All Being revealed in Christ.

All atonement theory makes use of imagery, and imagery always falls somehow short of reality. But imagery that actually distorts reality is another question. The Passover imagery of our deliverance was a long-standing theme of Jewish thought. It was and is central to Jewish identity. However, the justice-hungry God of propitiatory sacrifice actually has no history whatsoever in Jewish thought (including the OT temple sacrifices). If anything, there is material in the Old Testament in which God “despises” Israel’s sacrifices.

If I were hungry, I would not tell you; For the world is Mine, and all its fullness. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats? (Psa 50:12-13)

Another prominent set of images within the Old Testament are deeply reflected within the New Testament treatment of Christ’s suffering and death: those of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 53. Its words are deeply familiar:

Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed. (Isa 53:4-5)

This passage (and its accompanying verses) have played a prominent part in theories of Penal Substitution. But that reading, assuming the passage into a sacrificial scheme is nowhere required or indicated by the passage itself. Instead, within the New Testament context, particularly that of the gospels, it should be conflated and read together with the Passover imagery. It is, above all, part of the “ironic” character of the Passover victory of God.

That Divine Irony is especially seen in Christ’s repeated identification of His coming crucifixion with His glorification.

But Jesus answered them, saying, “The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified. “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain. “He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. (Joh 12:23-25)

And at the very moment of His betrayal:

Having received the piece of bread, he [Judas] then went out immediately. And it was night. So, when he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man is glorified, and God is glorified in Him.” (Joh 13:30-31)

This Divine Irony is present in the Old Testament Passover story as well and there, too, it is described as “glorification.” The perceived weakness and helplessness of God (and His people) become the very means by which God draws His enemies into their defeat. In the Exodus account, God clearly directs Israel into an impossible position in order for the wonder (glory) of His victory over Pharoah to be seen yet more clearly. It is glorious precisely because it is revealed at the moment of most complete weakness.

The same is true in Christ’s glorification (crucifixion). He is silent before Pilate and Herod, making no defense for Himself. His quiet submission to the insults and charges leveled against Him are also tokens of His voluntary suffering.

As a sheep led to the slaughter, or a blameless lamb before His shearers is mute, so He opened not His mouth. (Isaiah 53:7).

That “we esteemed Him stricken and smitten by God” (Is. 53:4) is not a description of the Father pouring His wrath upon Him, but a reflection of the confusion voiced by the bystanders of Christ’s suffering:

He trusted in God; let Him deliver Him now, if He will have Him. (Matt. 27:43).

The envy and ignorance of those witnessing Christ’s humiliation is utterly ironic – for what Christ does – He does for them!

But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; (Isa 53:5)

The language of Isaiah meshes seamlessly with that of the Passover, adding depth and insight into the saving work of God. It is not a framework for penal imagery.

Penal imagery represents one of the most serious deformations of Christian thought, a sad detour for theology. That it has now passed into fixed dogma within some circles should be of great concern to all Christians. Those who hold to this dogma would do well to return to the fathers and consider the scope of Scripture. The labyrinth of proof-texts that are often assembled to argue for the penal model are but isolates. They belong in no over-arching theme of Scripture or central story of the faith. They are foreign to the sacramental life of the Church as it lives its life in union with Christ.

Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.

About Fr. Stephen Freeman

Fr. Stephen is a retired Archpriest of the Orthodox Church in America. He is also author of Everywhere Present: Christianity in a One-Storey Universe, and Face to Face: Knowing God Beyond Our Shame, as well as the Glory to God podcast series on Ancient Faith Radio.



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Comments

141 responses to “The Scope of Passover and Penal Substitution Theory”

  1. leonard nugent Avatar
    leonard nugent

    Michael, my parish priest didn’t even do the memorial of St Catherine of Sienna this morning. I prefer to work out my own salvation with fear and trembling

  2. mary benton Avatar
    mary benton

    I believe that all are saved. But as to whether all accept salvation, that is another question…

    There is no one that God does not love enough to welcome into His presence, into His joy.

    But love cannot compel and still be love. If God forced us to love Him (or each other), would we still call it “love”? I don’t think so.

    Christ has already accomplished our salvation and our sins cannot undo that. However, our sinfulness can blind us to this reality so that we experience darkness while living in the Light.

  3. Dino Avatar
    Dino

    Well said Mary.
    Michael, I recall the very explanation of how the Ego can strive as an eternal match for even God and His love by elder Aimilianos.

  4. fatherstephen Avatar
    fatherstephen

    Dino,
    Yes to Elder Aimilianos. The whole “mystery” of the ultimate turn of salvation is not a mystery of “how things will be.” It is a mystery regarding the human person. That mystery is the question of how we come to be what we are, how we change, etc. That our personhood has an “ultimacy” about it is preserved in the unspoken, unanswered ultimate state of things. We cannot say how things will be because we cannot fathom the ultimacy of the human person. God has made known His will: “that all may be saved.” But any proclamation that this “wins” does not give the room and respect to the human person which God Himself apparently does. It’s troubling –

  5. mary benton Avatar
    mary benton

    Another thought occurred to me…

    It seems that the penal substitution model supposes that Christ’s death and Resurrection somehow needed to take place for God’s sake, i.e. to appease His wrath, etc. This we do not believe.

    Could it be said that God’s forgiveness of us (and the destruction of our death) was already complete before the historical coming of Christ but that WE needed to witness His love, death and Resurrection to know and believe in the truth already held in store for us?

    I realize that perhaps I am treading where I should not go by conjecturing about God’s reality outside of what is revealed at the human level. Forgive me, if that is what I am doing.

    My reason for raising this question is that is seems that nonbelievers will sometimes look upon our belief in Pascha and say, “What has really changed here? How have sin and death been defeated?” From all outward appearances, sin still rules our world and people die just as much as they did before.

    I am not suggesting that Pascha was simply a “reminder” and nothing more. Rather its emergence into our history reflected a reality that already WAS in God’s eternal Being – but its occurrence in time ruptured a barrier that our sin had created between the reality of God and the experience of man.

    When our vision is still clouded by sin (temporarily or in rejection of Christ), the experience of man says the barrier still holds. It seems that nothing has happened and death still reigns.

    In faith, with our eyes open to Pascha, we see that nothing could be further from the truth. We know the greater Truth and proclaim it, longing for all to open their eyes and see.

    Forgive my foolish ramblings. Please correct my errors.

  6. Fr. Joseph Lucas Avatar
    Fr. Joseph Lucas

    Dear Fr Stephen:

    Christ is Risen!

    Nicely written. I always enjoy your articles. I just wanted to comment on a few things. My specialization is patristic exegesis, and my dissertation is on sacrificial motifs in the Greek Fathers.

    First, just wanted to mention that the use of the term “skopos” in biblical exegesis was really developed by Origen, and then chapioned by St Athanasius against the Arians. So it is more an Alexandrian approach. St Cyril of Alexandria used it thoroughly in his debates with the Antiochenes Nestorius and the Three Chapters. Not to say the term wasn’t also used by Antiochene exegetes, but simply that Alexandrians really defined it as such. Of course, the concept itself is found even earlier, for example in St Irenaeus, who uses the term “hypothesis” with the same general intent.

    I also wanted to add that, in several of the Fathers who exegete the Old Testament, all of the sacrifices of the Tabernacle/Temple are fulfilled in Christ. Origen is perhaps the first to state this, but it is repeated by others, including St Cyril of Alexandria. Thus, all the sin-sacrifices point to an aspect of the work of Christ. And you are certainly correct that nowhere does the OT connect these sacrifices with the wrath of God, or with the pagan concept of assuaging His wrath. Rather, sin-sacrifices have as their purpose reconciliation or restoration of communion with God, whom man has turned from (not the other way around). What is perceived as God’s wrath, according to the Macarian homilies, is the perception of our estrangement from Him due to our sins. God’s holiness means sin cannot stand in His presence. When we sin, the perception of His holiness results in a feeling of being repelled from Him; but in fact, He does not push us away, but desires that we “turn from [our sinful] ways and live.” (Ez 18:23)

    As there are numerous soteriological images in the Bible, each points to a different yet overlapping aspect of what the God-Man Jesus Christ has accomplished for us. One of these images is “mercy-seat.” Christ is not only “our Pascha,” but is also our “hilasterion,”(Rom 3:25; 1 Jn 2:2, 4:10) (sometimes translated “propitiation” or “atonement,” but in fact it is the Septuagint term for the mercy-seat on the Ark of the Covenant on which the sacrificed blood was sprinkled on Yom Kippur). In a general sense, “hilasterion” can simply mean “sacrifice.” If we take this word in its technical sense, it means that Christ’s sacrifice effects communion with God, since the mercy-seat is where the glory of God appeared and spoke to Moses and Aaron. In addition, the verb form (“hilaskomai”) in the LXX almost always has humans as the object (middle voice), and refers to our “expiation” or cleansing from sin.

    The Epistle to the Hebrews most closely connects the work of Christ to Yom Kippur, comparing what Christ has done to the cultic act of the High-priest on that annual solemn feast. But in Hebrews, Christ is depicted not simply as the offering, but as the offerer–the High-Priest–who represents or collectively embodies the People of God as they offer worship to Him. Thus the NT depicts Christ’s offering as a mediation between God and Man, a mediation which occurs by the very fact of the Incarnation (Heb 2:10-18). This is another aspect missing from many atonement theories.

  7. Michael Bauman Avatar
    Michael Bauman

    mary benton, let us not forget the Incarnation part of the mystery. He took on our flesh and our nature and still has it. The “and still has it” part is easy to forget it seems to me.

    Plus, Jesus did not proclaim, “It is finished” until he died. He completed the human part of the mystery, in a sense. It is that, as St. Athanasius points out that kept us from sliding into further toward non-existence.

    His Resurrection and Ascension opened the gates of Paradise or re-opened them to us.

  8. mary benton Avatar
    mary benton

    Michael,

    Good point.

    Perhaps my point (if it needs to be made at all) would be that God did not need to be changed. The psalmist wrote (#136) “His mercy endures forever” before the coming of Christ – and of course, it did and it does.

    God is not subject to human history BUT – as you pointed out – He subjected Himself to it in the Incarnation. He gave Himself over to bear the limitations of our human historical experience – not because God would be incomplete (or His wrath unavenged) without doing so but because we would. And He love us enough to do that for us.

  9. Boyd Avatar
    Boyd

    What are we asking for when we ask God for forgiveness? What is forgiveness?

  10. fatherstephen Avatar
    fatherstephen

    Boyd,
    Good questions. I’m working on an article right now on Confession and forgiveness. It should be helpful.

  11. Andrew Gillies Avatar

    Hi fatherstephen and all,

    I really enjoyed this article and the notion of the “scope” of Scripture but as a Protestant for whom the notion of penal substitutionary atonement has been uncomfortable for some time I was interested to read the comment “I have written previously about the lack of Scriptural warrant for this teaching” I’ve scanned the comments above and did a quick search of this blog but could not find the particular article or entry. Could you post a link to it?

  12. TimOfTheNorth Avatar
    TimOfTheNorth

    Father Stephen,

    I am a father to two young (early elementary school age) children. As an “evangelical” seeking to integrate the mind of Orthodoxy into the working out of my salvation, I have found your posts and book very helpful in leading me there.

    My question now is how to bring this truth down to the level of my children. We live in a society (schools, government, etc.) whose institutions are ordered around “morality” and rule-keeping (or breaking) and its subsequent penalties. “You do the crime, you do the time.” How can I instead explain the notion of sin as disintegration and “moving toward non-existence” to children whose minds are yet mostly capable only of concrete thought? I found myself discomfited recently reading to my children a book (several decades old) explaining the Christian faith when it declared that “God must punish our sin.” Hmm, really? As parents we try to explain and live out (hopefully! Christ have mercy!) the understanding that discipline is meant to correct and to teach our children. It is not to punish them. But I wonder sometimes how much sense this makes to a six-year old brain. When one child offends the other and I send him to timeout (or whatever other consequence seems most appropriate for the circumstance), how can I effectively lead him to see it not as a penalty (which I think is the default comprehension) but as ultimately intending his salvation? I fear that “Son, I’m hoping to guide you away from non-existence” will not resonate very well at this age. 🙂

  13. […] Penal imagery represents one of the most serious deformations of Christian thought, a sad detour for theology. That it has now passed into fixed dogma within some circles should be of great concern to all Christians. Those who hold to this dogma would do well to return to the fathers and consider the scope of Scripture. The labyrinth of proof-texts that are often assembled to argue for the penal model are but isolates. They belong in no over-arching theme of Scripture or central story of the faith. They are foreign to the sacramental life of the Church as it lives its life in union with Christ. […]

  14. Dean Avatar
    Dean

    TimofheNorth
    Alaska? I spent time there many moons ago. I’m a grandfather now but raising two girls I recall some similar struggles. You’re right ,they are too young for abstract thought. But if you discipline them you can always go up to them after the timeout, etc., and hug and kiss them reaffirming your love for them and giving a reason for their timeout. Seeing their earthly father respond in this way will aid them in concrete ways they can understand… to see how their heavenly Father deals with us. Fortunately, also there are many more Orthodox books now written for children available for parents, such as Conciliar press, I believe now Ancient Faith Press. Check out other Orthodox book sites too.

  15. Karen Avatar
    Karen

    Fr. Joseph, thank you for your illuminating comment.

  16. Michael Bauman Avatar
    Michael Bauman

    Alas when I read comments of learned and faithful men such as Fr. Joseph I often wonder if there can ever be an adequate expression of the Orthodox faith in English.

    English is a beautiful and expressive language when used rightly and certainly capable of being expressive of the faith, but what we speak and use today is so debased and getting worse and their remains so much that is not even in English yet. And our religious vocabulary is so un-Orthodox.

    Lord, please send the workers to your field here and have mercy on us.

  17. fatherstephen Avatar
    fatherstephen

    Fr. Joseph,
    Thank you for your careful comment. On the skopos of Scripture and the “Antiochene School,” I was following Eugen Pentiuc’s analysis (The Old Testament in Eastern Orthodox Tradition, St. Vladimir Seminary Press, p. 173).

    While Origen certainly speaks of the skopos, he tends to mean more the Divine “intent” rather than a broad narrative context. St. Athanasius (Alexandria) uses it in this latter sense in refuting Arius. The whole Antiochene/Alexandria thing is overdone, no doubt. But for many of the Alexandrians, the focus was on words rather than narrative. While the Antiochene exegetes were more strongly associated with this latter approach. And it’s certainly true that the same is called the Apostolic Hypothesis in Irenaeus. I think its also something of the same idea behind St. Paul’s admonition to Timothy regarding the “hypotyposis” of sound words. It is, in fact, the Tradition.

  18. Steve Robinson Avatar

    Regarding Isaiah 53, St. Matthew observes in Matt. 8:17, upon the healing of St. Peter’s mother in law of a fever and Christ’s healing of demon-possessed, and illnesses “with a word” was, “in order that what was spoken of through the Prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled, ‘He Himself took our infirmities and removed our diseases’.” There was no substitutionary paradigm, it was out of the love of Christ and His healing was in the same manner as His forgiveness: with a word.

  19. fatherstephen Avatar
    fatherstephen

    Steve,
    It’s one more nail in the coffin! The Penal substitionary model is simply not scriptural – even contrary to Scripture. It misreads what is there, and ignores other things, importing a foreign scheme into Scripture. It’s just wrong, wrong, wrong.

  20. Steve Robinson Avatar

    I don’t know how many times I read that passage over 30 years and didn’t see that. Orthodoxy: all the scriptures you didn’t underline…. 🙂

  21. Chris Avatar
    Chris

    Wow! Matt 8:17 is an epiphany for me as well. Great insight! Based on this logic, could we not say that when Jesus forgave the sins of the adulterous woman & paralytic that Isaiah 53:5 was fulfilled as well?

    Could the Isaiah passage have a “fulfillment” every time Holy Unction and Confession are administered? We participate in its fulfillment sacramentally.

  22. Drewster2000 Avatar
    Drewster2000

    This was a real gem for me:

    “Additionally, the Fathers see us moving constantly between poles of “pain” and “pleasure.” Our desires became disordered, and instead of being pointed at God, they are directed towards lesser things. But since they were created for God – our desires have an infinite capacity and can never be satisfied with something finite. So we pursue finite pleasures and are not satisfied so we have pain. And we flee our pain and rush again towards some finite pleasure. This cycle is what the fathers call the “passions.” We are enslaved to them.”

    thanks Fr. Stephen

  23. Drewster2000 Avatar
    Drewster2000

    TimOfTheNorth,

    My advice for you is simple…and hard at the same time. One of the very best things we can do as parents is be a good example. Specifically relating to your question of how to transmit to them this idea of sin-as-death rather than sin-as-morality, I will say this:

    I am the father of 3 young children (8,10,14) and also living in the North of North America. There came a point a few years ago when something triggered a change in me. I began to understand that raising them was MUCH less about a power struggle and much more about loving them.

    For example, if they get up before the designated wake-up time, my former stance was that they are robbing me of my quiet time – and they’re breaking the rules! I’m so angry! If you get up early, you’ll find an angry father! Bad child! Getting up early HURTS children!

    If on the other hand I take the proper view that being their father means laying my life down for my children, then my lack of prep time is not a good reason for enforcing this rule. OK, then what is? Why not let them get up with the sun? (Those who live in the North know that this is in no way feasible in the summertime at 3am.)

    The issue then becomes about them: their need for sleep, and even the stability of a regular waking time. The focus changes to them and what they need. Their “sin” hurts them, and it is then no longer about breaking a rule and disrespecting their father, but about sinning against their mind and body which needs more rest than they are allowing.

    This change in perspective also changes me – from a vengeful, angry God to a loving father who is looking out for their best interest. With this change in attitude, I’m much more likely to gently remind them to go back to bed rather than to come after them like a prison guard.

    And in this way I am teaching them by example about sin being something that hurts them, that kills them – some sins do so in bigger and faster ways than others, but it’s all sin leading to death, and not a breaking of the rules.

    Hope this helps.

  24. TimOfTheNorth Avatar
    TimOfTheNorth

    Thanks, Dean and Drewster2000, for your reminders of the priority of love in parenting. I certainly have had many opportunities to re-learn this lesson.

    (For the record, “OfTheNorth” refers to MN–“The star of the North”–and not to AK. I apologize for the confusion!)

  25. Yannis Avatar
    Yannis

    I have the same problem concerning the raising of children, particularly as my wife is a Western Christian, very moralistic, and blame/guilt orientated.

    What I have ended up telling my oldest son (who is 7) I shall share, though I am unsure whether it has any merit.

    My son is currently learning to improve his writing. He has fresh in his mind the idea of practice, and how it makes you better at things, and makes those things easier. I told him, therefore, that every time he does something naughty, he is practicing being naughty; he is getting better at it, and it will be easier for him in the future. I told him that the thing to do is to practice being good, and to avoid being naughty even when that is easier. I also told him that when I tell him off or punish him, it is not because I like doing so, but so that being naughty would be more scary, costly, less easy, etc. for him, and so I am helping him practice more the good than the bad behaviour.

  26. Karen Avatar
    Karen

    Yannis, I like your approach very much.

  27. TimOfTheNorth Avatar
    TimOfTheNorth

    Yannis, thanks for sharing. I think there is wisdom in how you handle this.

    As perhaps it should, this existential struggle of parenting well has provided me with much food for theological thought. This past Sunday morning I again heard the idea of “appeasing God’s wrath” expressed a couple of times. What came to my mind was that if I am to be becoming more holy–more like the Father–this means that I, too, must become more wrathful as I mature in my faith. For the wrath of God against sinners is an expression of His holiness. Even allowing for the qualifications that many in my circles would raise differentiating God’s wrath from purely human wrath, this seems to be a very upside-down picture of the Christian life. When my children sin, ought I also to need my wrath to be appeased before I forgive? This seems preposterous! I think of those men and women in our community we respect for their holiness and faith. They are not wrathful but rather merciful and gentle. In them we see Christ and thus we see the Father. Certainly they may be quite severe toward those habits of sin that they see destroying those whom they love, but towards the sinner they are patient and kind. These are whom I wish to imitate. May God forgive me for needing to be appeased–and for imagining that He needed to be appeased!

  28. Daniel Avatar
    Daniel

    Love this post Father. Thank you. I do have a question that closely pertains to this. I consider myself an ex-Evangelical and I’m an inquirer of The Church. In my Evangelical upbringing, I was of course taught PSA. So when I sinned, say I lied or actively engaged lustful thoughts, some time later, I would pray and in my prayers my chief concern was to be DECLARED innocent of those specific sins. Thus my prayers amounted to an urgent appeal for God to forgive me of those specific sins. I know you’ve written extensively about sin being not just specific things we do, but rather, more akin to a disease that infects us. In light of that, along with rejecting PSA (which I firmly agree with you in doing so), I’m wondering how that would change the prayers of someone like me who’s used to praying for the forgiveness of specific sins? In other words, for an Orthodox Christian who rejects PSA and understands that sin is a disease, what do that person’s prayers look like, especially in the context of the times (quite often I’m guessing) when they know they’ve sinned?

  29. fatherstephen Avatar
    fatherstephen

    Daniel,
    I think the hardest part of this is coming to believe and trust that God actually loves us and that forgiveness is given to us. When in such circumstances I certainly pray and deal with specifics – but in my prayer and thoughts I’m honest and recognize that its a symptom – so I go deeper than the circumstance and ask for healing and transformation of my true self in Christ.

  30. Daniel Avatar
    Daniel

    Thank you Fr. I so appreciate your thoughts and advice! They are always most helpful and encouraging!

  31. Yannis Avatar
    Yannis

    Tim,
    I actually reverted to Orthodoxy (having been Evangelical for most of my adult life) when I became a father, and it was no coincidence!

  32. Yannis Avatar
    Yannis

    Daniel,
    The prayers are indeed different. I remember an occasion a few years ago, when attending my wife’s Evangelical church that one of the pastors, an ex-missionary to Russia, expressed his distress and sadness for the Russians who “just keep praying ‘Lord have mercy’” – to him it didn’t make sense.

  33. Michael Bauman Avatar
    Michael Bauman

    Father says:

    I think the hardest part of this is coming to believe and trust that God actually loves us and that forgiveness is given to us. When in such circumstances I certainly pray and deal with specifics – but in my prayer and thoughts I’m honest and recognize that its a symptom – so I go deeper than the circumstance and ask for healing and transformation of my true self in Christ.

    I just celebrated the 27th anniversary of being received into the Church on the Sunday of the Myrrh-bearing women.

    I’m just beginning to get and inkling of the love of Christ for me despite my sin, in the midst of my sin. As Father said in another thread a few weeks ago: He is always there in the depths of our brokenness waiting for us.

    The life of repentance to which the Church calls us some times seems like hacking through a dense forest to get to the lost city.

  34. mary benton Avatar
    mary benton

    Michael,

    I was recently explaining to someone the unconditional love of God and they said, “It can’t be that easy!” and I responded, “Actually, it can.”

    But I know just what you mean. What we are offered is so very simple. Yet we make it so very difficult.

    I just read Elder Porphyrios’ words, “Look on all things as opportunities to be sanctified.” (Wounded by Love).

    Such a profound truth. God can use even my weakness and sin to make me holy. All praise to Him.

  35. Karen Avatar
    Karen

    Many years, Michael!

  36. Karen Avatar
    Karen

    Yannis, I’d love to hear your “revert” story. You should consider writing up your spiritual journey for Fr. John Peck’s “Journey to Orthodoxy” site.

  37. Yannis Avatar
    Yannis

    Karen, thanks. I doubt my story is important enough to post on a website – do they even take stories from randoms?

  38. Karen Avatar
    Karen

    Personally, I never get tired of hearing how God has worked in someone’s life to bring them to faith. I don’t think you have to be anybody special to get your story there. Fr. John has, I believe, just picked up stories sometimes from people’s own blogs (otherwise ordinary people, who just happened to have shared their story on the web). Just a thought . . .

  39. […] the soteriological presupposition of modern pop-Christianity, which he argues is based on penal substitution and a result of the theological project of the Protestant Reformation. The resulting gradual […]

  40. Maged M Avatar

    Research regarding atonement in the early church: http://myagpeya.com/blog/soteriology/

  41. Fr. Stephen Freeman Avatar

    Maged,
    This article is an example of the kind of research that gives faulty results. It looks for penal “terms” (punishment and such), and suggests that such words are evidence of a theory that is not present. No one denies that such language is present in the early Eastern Fathers. What is absent is the theory. What is also absent is a proper understanding of the questions on the part of the author.

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