Dabney:
But there are others of these passages, to which I think, the candid mind will admit, this sort of explanation is inapplicable. In John 3:16, make “the world” which Christ loved, to mean “the elect world,” and we reach the absurdity that some of the elect may not believe, and perish. In 2 Cor. 5:15, if we make the all for whom Christ died, mean only the all who live unto Him—i. e., the elect it would seem to be implied that of those elect for whom Christ died, only a part will live to Christ. In 1 John 2:2, it is at least doubtful whether the express phrase, “whole world,” can be restrained to the world of elect as including other than Jews. For it is indisputable, that the Apostle extends the propitiation of Christ beyond those whom he speaks of as “we,” in verse first. The interpretation described obviously proceeds on the assumption that these are only Jewish believers. Can this be substantiated? Is this catholic epistle addressed only to Jews? This is more than doubtful. It would seem then, that the Apostle’s scope is to console and encourage sinning believers with the thought that since Christ made expiation for every man, there is no danger that He will not be found a propitiation for them who, having already believed, now sincerely turn to him from recent sins.
Dabney, Lectures, 525.
Pohill:
3. Christ suffered this punishment in our stead, he died huper emon, for us, (Rom. v. 8), and which is more emphatical, anti pollon, instead of many, (Matt. xx. 28), the particle, huper doth sometimes in scripture signify only the utility or benefit of another, but anti properly imports a subrogation or substitution of one in the room of another; and so Christ, as our surety, died in our room or stead. Hence the apostle argues thus: If one died for all, ara hoi pantes apethanon, then all died, (2 Cor. v. 15), all died in the death of one, in as much as that one died as the surety of all. Hence our sins were condemned in his flesh, (Rom. viii. 3), and so condemned there, that upon gospel terms they are remitted to us. But unless he had stood in our room, divine justice could neither have adjudged him to punishment, nor yet have admitted us to an absolution from sin.
Edward Polhill, “The Divine Will Considered in its Eternal Decrees,” in The Works of Edward Polhill (Morgan, PA.: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1998), 154.