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Calvin and Calvinism » 2008 » July

Archive for July, 2008

I am not in agreement with everything Spear says regarding the atonement, however, some of his comments here are insightful and instructive.

The Atonement and the Penalty of the Law1

Samuel T. Spear,

Thirdly, it is further admitted that the figure of paying a debt is a very inadequate and defective exhibition of the work of Christ. “At the same time, we shall be careful not to push this similitude (of debtor and creditor) to an unlawful extreme, nor to represent the satisfaction of Christ as tallying in all respects with that which is made in human transactions.” “But pecuniary transactions, we not only admit but insist, can furnish no perfect parallel to the mysterious transaction of saving sinners.” “This does not make redemption a commercial transaction, nor imply that there are not essential points of diversity between acquiring by money, and acquiring by blood. Hence our second remark is, that if Dr Beman will take up any elementary work on theology, he will find the distinction between pecuniary and penal satisfaction clearly pointed out, and the satisfaction of Christ shown to be of the latter, and not of the former kind.” Thus it appears that the figure of paying, a debt by a surety, is defective; and that a “penal satisfaction only is meant by it. The analogy between sin and a debt is very remote, and equally so that between a “penal satisfaction” and the payment of a debt. It is by unduly pressing this analogy, that errors have arisen in respect to the atonement. “The supposition of an exact and perfect resemblance between the atonement and the payment of a pecuniary debt, might lead us to deny the full extent of the provision made by the death of Christ for the salvation of mankind; or it might lead us to believe that all men will finally be saved; or what is a still more shocking error, to believe that sinners are under no obligation to obey the divine law, and cannot be justly required to endure its penalty.” Strictly speaking, the atonement pays no debt; neither is Christ a surety for a literal debtor…

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2
Jul

Obadiah Sedgwick on the Foedus Hypotheticum

   Posted by: CalvinandCalvinism    in God who Covenants

In the following excerpt from Sedgewick (one of the WCF divines), we see a reference to a hypothetical covenant. In this section, Sedgewick does not condemn the doctrine, nor specifically endorse it. In the Tables, though, he says:

There is an absolute Covenant,
And an Hypothetical Covenant,

From my searching of this work so far, it is not apparent that Sedgewick later develops this idea in this work.

Sedgewick:

Of the Covenant in special.

I shall now descend to something more special, to show unto you, what that Covenant which God makes between himself and his people.

There are those who distinguish of a twofold Covenant.

1. There is Foedus absolutum, which is such a promise of God, as takes in no stipulation or condition at all, that runs altogether upon absolute terms; such a Covenant was that which God made with Noah, that he would never down the world any more. Gen 9.11. and such a kind of Covenant is that, when God promises to give faith and perseverance unto his elect, Heb. 8.10, &c. Both these Covenants are absolute, and without any condition; there is nothing in them but what is folded up in the promises themselves.

2. Foedus Hypotheticum, which is a gracious promise on God’s part, with an obligation to duty; for although it be natural to God, to recompense any good, as it is to punish any evil; And although man does owe unto God whatsoever God covenants with him for; yet it so pleases his Divine Will thus to deal with us, that in binding of us to duty unto himself, he binds himself in reward unto us, and promises such and such a recompence, upon the condition of such and such a performance.

Obadiah Sedgwick, The Bowels of Tender Mercy Sealed in the Everlasting Covenant (Printed by Edmund Mottershed, for Adoniram Byfield, and are to be sold by Joseph Cranford, at the Sign of the Castle and Lyon in St. Pauls Church-yard, 1661), 6. [I should note, that by posting this comment from Sedgewick, I am not suggesting that Sedgewick was an Amyraldian or even sympathetic to hypothetical universalism.]

James Saurin on God’s Will for the Salvation of Sinners1

1) St. Peter, as we said before, St. Peter meant to refute the odious objections of some profane persons of his own time, who pretended to make the doctrine of a universal judgment doubtful, and who said, in order to obscure its truth, or enervate its evidence, “Where is the promise of his coming, for since the fathers fell asleep all things remain as they were?” 2 Pet. iii. 4. I am aware that this comment is disputed, and some have thought that the destruction of Jerusalem was the subject of this whole chapter, and not the end of the world; but, however averse we are to the decisive tone, we will venture to demonstrate that the apostle had far greater objects in view than the fatal catastrophes of the Jewish nation. This I think clearly appears,

1. By the nature of the objection which libertines made. “Where is the promise of his coming, for since the fathers fell asleep all things remain as they were?” These libertines did not mean that from the beginning of the world the commonwealth of Israel had suffer ed no considerable alteration; they did not mean from that false principle, to draw this false consequence, that Jerusalem would al ways remain as it then was. How could they be such novices in the history of their nation, as not to know the sad vicissitudes, the banishments and the plunderings, which the Jews had undergone? They meant, that though some particular changes had happened in some parts of the world, the generality of creatures had always remained in the same state; thence they pretended to conclude that they would always remain so.

This appears further by the manner in which the apostle answers them in the verses preceding the text. He alleges against them the example of the deluge, “This,” says he, “they are willingly ignorant of, that the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished,” ver. 5, 6. To this he adds, “the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the things that are therein, shall be burnt up,” ver. 10. On which we reason thus: The world that was formerly destroyed with water, is the same which shall be destroyed by fire; but the world that was destroyed with water, was not the Jewish nation only: St. Peter then predicts a destruction more general than that of the Jews.

3. This appears further by this consideration. The people to whom St. Peter wrote, did not live in Judea, but were dispersed through Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. These people could have but little to do with the destruction of Jerusalem. Whether Jesus Christ terminated the duration of that city suddenly or slowly, was a question that regarded them indirectly only; but the day of which St. Peter speaks, interests all Christians, and St. Peter exhorts all Christians to prepare for it, as being personally concerned in it.

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