Cited by bro Roberts as evidence of his consistent position on Christ in relation to his sacrifice in The Christadelphian September 1894

The Christadelphian March 1874, Robert Roberts

“Gone Back to Babylon”

“Gone back to Babylon:” yes! it is a sad but true story, as will presently appear.

Mistress Roma (the Babylon of Apocalyptic vision) has done more than all other influences and agencies put together, to alienate the human mind from “revelation” and turn men to Atheism. This effect may not be so visible among the unthinking “masses,” though even among them it is not imperceptible. It is more particularly among the intellectual and the reflective that faith has been killed and hope withered by the operation of Papistical doctrines. These doctrines (modified in Protestantism), are advanced in the name of Bible religion; and being, in the main, put forward in Bible words and phrases, they are taken for Bible sentiment by the common run of people who are but superficially acquainted with the Bible themselves. Hence, any conclusions they arrive at in the process of reflection, with regard to the doctrines, are set down also against the Bible with the result of excluding the Bible itself from belief or attention.

The revival of the truth in our day has shown us that these doctrines are only apparently scriptural, and that the things signified by the forms of speech used from the Bible in support of them, are of a totally different character, presenting none of those stultifications of reason and justice which embarrass the reception of the Papal dogmas with all reasoning minds, whether expounded by Roman Catholic priest or dissenting preacher.

Among these doctrines, none have more effectually caused intelligence of the higher order to stumble at the Word than those expressed by the phrases “original sin” and “substitutionary atonement.” By the first, it is taught that God holds the human race guilty of Adam’s transgression, and that even children, “a span long,” will be punished because of it. Apart altogether from the question of eternal torments, men have agonised themselves in vain to reconcile this holding of an innocent person guilty, with the revealed character of the Creator, who says, “The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son.”—(Ezek. 18:20.) An innocent person is not guilty; and to hold innocent multitudes guilty of an offence which they never committed, is a proceeding so contrary to even human conceptions of truth and justice, that men of thought have stumbled when asked to believe that God is guilty of that which in a man no language would be considered too strong to denounce. They have asked: “Am I to believe that mortal man is more just than God? that God is less righteous than man? am I to believe that He holds me guilty of eating an apple I never had in my mouth, and disobeying a commandment that was never given to me and that I never had the opportunity of obeying?” And there they have stumbled and lain. They have stumbled over a stumbling stone of artificial creation. The priests put the stone in the road that caused them to fall. In their ignorance, the priests interpreted the ways of God as if he were a man, and invented a lie that has killed many.

In our day, the stone has been put out of the way. John Thomas has shown us that the stumbling stone is no part of the king’s highway, that God does not hold us guilty of Adam’s transgression, but that he held Adam guilty of his own transgression, and sentenced him to death for it; and that as to our sharing that death, death becoming a physical law of Adam’s being, we could not as his children, partake of his nature without inheriting the law of it; that thus has death passed on all men “who have not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression;” that so far as they are concerned, their inheritance of death is an innocent calamity, a something they are not responsible for, a something they would easily be delivered from if they were not themselves transgressors; that so far as our individual destiny is concerned, we will never be subjected to the vulgar clerical injustice of being held “guilty (!) of original sin,” but will be judged on our own individual relation to the law of life, that has since that time come into force.

This has removed a great difficulty, and thinking men, with a breath of relief, have, with much comfort, said, “Oh, I see, that is certainly reasonable: I see nothing inconsistent in that.” They have gone on to place the other elements of truth, one by one, like bricks in a building, till the beautiful edifice they have seen is complete, and have taken up their abode there.

The other doctrine mentioned—“substitutionary atonement”—has also, like the doctrine of “original sin,” slain many strong men, who are now in those chambers of death to which the steps of Mistress Roma decline. It has propounded for human belief that God has punished the innocent instead of the guilty, and will let the guilty go free if they recognise the fact. The class in question have said “What! You tell me the Creator is just and immutable in all His ways, and will by no means clear the guilty; and yet that in the largest and most important of His dealings with men, He perpetrates the most flagrant injustice it is possible to conceive, in winking at the escape of the guilty on consideration of an innocent victim falling a prey to His demands (!)” Astounded intelligence has said, “I can understand a human monster satisfying cravings for vengeance in such a way; but don’t tell me that a Being so holy and perfect and just and equal and unchangeable as the Creator must be, could so tarnish His highest work.”

Here again the truth, by the hand of that sturdy digger after the hidden treasures of divine wisdom, who now rests in his grave, has come to the aid of all who are made to stumble thus in the presence of the misrepresented wisdom of God in the sacrifice of Christ. He has shewn us that this is also a block of unhewn stuff placed on the king’s highway by the bewitching emissaries of the nation-inebriating Harlot who sits on the Seven Hills. He has shewn us that the death of Christ is no substitutionary atonement at all; but heaven’s etiquette in the process of receiving back the members of a fallen race into favour and life. He has enabled us to see that insubordination against the Eternal Self-existent Upholder of all things (expressed by the word “sin,” in its primary sense) is, on the part of creatures who exist by His permission, so great an offence that it cannot be overlooked in any scheme of kindness; that God’s authority must be vindicated in a way that will be visible through eternity; that God’s appointments towards men must be upheld; that nothing He has done in justice must be set aside in kindness; that His law must be carried out, not on a substitute, which would not be carrying it out, but setting it aside; that it must be carried out on the very race proposed to be admitted to favour; that since, however, its execution on them, (as matters stood before his provision in Christ) would destroy them, because they are not only mortal by Adam, but guilty of “many offences,” He introduced an element in the situation which admitted of its being done in a way permitting of recovery. He himself, by the Spirit, made one among them and of them, a man, a mortal man, in the identical nature of man, but an obedient man, who suffered the operation of the law working in all men, and survived it in a resurrection because of his obedience; that the divine law being thus vindicated in him, to Him was given the power to give and raise to life all who bow before him as the vindication of God’s broken law, recognising themselves as crucified with him and baptised into his death, in being buried with him by baptism.

Again, thinking men, who have thirsted for something higher than human things, but have been staggered and held back by the monstrous fables of Mistress Roma, have thanked God for this relief, and been able to see that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not on the principle of substitutionary atonement (so called) but on the principle of an upholding of the majesty of His authority as the foundation of offered favour. For this, they have thanked God, and reaching forth the hand of grateful faith, (grateful for liberty to be able to believe in the way of God without surrendering their reason), have laid hold of the hope set before them in the gospel.

But now, what do we ’see? Lamentable spectacle! Some who had tasted this glorious liberty (if ever they really understood and enjoyed it), have turned their backs on the banner of truth, and are on the full march back to Babylon. For what is their doctrine but a revival of the Roman fables of “original sin” and “substitutionary atonement?” They say Christ was exempt from our inherited mortality. When in answer to this they are confronted by the fact that Christ was identical in nature with ourselves, they see they will be obliged to admit that he was under our hereditary law of death, if that hereditary law be an actual in working physical law of our nature. They see that this conclusion cannot be evaded: and so they try to escape the difficulty by teaching that death is not an inworking physical law, but a thing of “relation,” by which they mean that in God’s mind, we are condemned, but not in our nature: and that consequently Christ’s partaking of our nature did not involve his participation in our condemnation. This is ingenious, but what does it mean as regards the moral bearings of the question? It means that we are condemned, not because of physical extraction from Adam, but because God holds us guilty of Adam’s transgression. What is this but the priestly doctrine of “original sin?” Indeed the principal advocate of this revived heresy gravely speaks of our being “guilty of original sin!” Therefore, this Renunciationism means “Back to Babylon;” back to the priestly fable of “original sin;” back to the clouds and darkness which obscure the face of divine justice and charge iniquity against the Most High; back to the horrid entanglements that rack the soul with dreadful and despairing efforts to reconcile the dealings of the Deity with His revealed character in all His word.

So with the death of Christ: in this theory (which with much fair speech, causes the simple to yield), the law of mortality had no hold on Christ; and, therefore, in dying, he died as a substitute—“instead of” those who ought to have died. And thus we are landed back in the doctrine of “substitutionary atonement,” one of the lies and blasphemies uttered by the apostacy against the wisdom of God. Back to Babylon! Back to the yoke of bondage! back to the unutterable degradation and vulgarity which represents the Immutable Deity as a compromiser of His own law and a trafficker in commercial exchange!

And it is easy to go back; for on the surface, this lie of Babylon commends itself. It is in harmony with human ways. It comes down to the level of carnal rules of action. It makes God act like a man; and, therefore, the mere-man mind takes quickly to it. It is the fashionable religious lie of the day, expounded in every church and conventicle. No wonder that those just emerged from these dens of darkness should be easily re-entrapped. It is a great test, in these times, that a prominent professor of the truth should renounce the truth and bend his energies, with all the strength that comes from malignant objects, to revive and re-bewilder the minds of the brethren with this exploded fable.

Those who fall before the trial must not be surprised that those who know and appreciate the liberty wherewith the truth has made them free, cling tenaciously to their position, and refuse to join them in their march back to Babylon. If they will go, they must go by themselves. The friends of the truth will wash their hands of all complicity with their treason, and wait in patience the coming day.

Answer’s to Correspondents

Personal Sins in the Day of Recompense

“Are not believers still (though Christ has suffered violent death for them) really under the curse of divine law for personal sins even as they are yet in reality under the Adamic curse? If not, Why is the curse for personal sins not personally undergone as well as the Adamic curse?”—(J.G.)

Answer.—Suffering the Adamic curse is a question of physical constitution, which (though we put on Christ) remains unchanged till the expiry of the whole time allowed for probation, when we shall be “glorified together (Rom. 8:17); they (of former days) without us not being made perfect.”—(Heb. 11:40.) The effect of personal sin unforgiven would be to exclude us from eternal life by the violent displeasure of God in the day of revenges, which shall devour the adversary. God for Christ’s sake forgives these, if we make confession and forsake them.—(1 Jno.1:9; Prov. 28:13.) Therefore, in the final sense, believers are not under the curse for personal sins, but stand accepted in the Beloved, if they fear and are obedient. They will joyfully see that the Father’s displeasure is no more toward them when the Lord invites them to a portion in his kingdom and joy. They will realise the truth, that “He hath not dealt with us after our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities; for as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is His mercy towards them that fear Him; as far as the east is from the west, so far hath He removed our transgressions from us.”—(Ps. 103:10–12,)

Did Jesus Die as a Substitute

M.L.S.—Jesus did not die as our substitute, but as our representative. Had he died as our substitute, his resurrection would not only have been unnecessary, but would have been excluded, because the death which we had to die was a death without resurrection. Jesus died as one of us, for he was of the same physical nature with ourselves, as Paul abundantly testifies. He was the seed of Abraham (Gal. 3:16), not “of the seed” of Abraham, as the latest quibble has it. He partook of the same flesh and blood as the children—(Heb. 2:14–17.) Consequently what is affirmed of the physical nature of his brethren was affirmable of him in the days of his flesh: body dead because of sin (Rom. 8:10), sentence of death in ourselves (2 Cor. 1:9), waiting for the redemption of the body (Rom. 8:23), a vile body (Phil. 3:21) a weak, corruptible, dishonourable, natural body.—(1 Cor. 15:42–44.) That feature of his case which distinguished him from us was, that he was God at work in our nature. The object of this was that the work might be God’s—that the glory might be to Him. The result of the work was a man without sin morally, though suffering the consequences of sin physically, in whose death and resurrection the law of sin and death was annulled. To him, God asks all men to look to be saved. Their sins are forgiven for his sake, if they repent; they have eternal life if they recognise the vindication of God’s law in him. To use the words of Paul (Rom. 3:25, 26), “God hath sent him forth to be a propitiation for our sins, through faith in his blood.” Why was the blood shed? “To declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God, ” “that he might be just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus.” The forbearance of God is the great feature of the case. If the death of Christ had been as a substitute, there would have been no “forbearance” in letting the others go free. When a debt is paid, there is no forbearance in exempting the original debtor. But God forgives our sins through His forbearance, not because he obtained satisfaction in the death of Christ in the sense of a substitute, but because in him, his righteousness was declared; in his death his way towards men was upheld, his despised authority vindicated; and the way open for him to be gracious without compromise to all identifying themselves with this righteousness in baptism into the name of the crucified and risen representative. But you say: “the two Adams were two federal heads; all sinned in one and all died in the other.” You say this to exempt Christ from the operation of his own death. Do you not see that your argument proves the reverse? Was not the first Adam personally included in the results that came on us; and if there is to be a parallel, the second Adam must be personally included in what he underwent and accomplished. But in point of fact, there is a mistake made about Paul’s use of the word “Adam” in relation to Christ. He is constantly understood to apply it to him in the days of his flesh, whereas the context will show it is applied to him in his glorified state. He is the second Adam now in the matter of giving life, after having vanquished the death that came by the first. As we get death from Adam, we get life from Christ, but not from the weak and suffering and dying Christ of 1,800 years ago, but from the Christ exalted to heaven in his state of victory over death—in that state, in which having died unto sin once, death hath no more dominion over him (Rom. 6:10), in the state in which he is now: in which, being our life, when he appears, we appear with him in glory.—(Col. 3:4.) But though connected with him as to individual destiny, the saints are not yet free from hereditary condemnation. They are free from the individual condemnation that will be pronounced on those who come in contact with the light but prefer the darkness.—(John 3:19.) That is, it is not in store for them. They are delivered from it in the remission of their sins, but it is yet true that the body is dead because of sin (Rom. 8:10); that the body requires redemption (ib. 23) being vile, dishonourable, and corruptible, and deathful, because being the image of sinful Adam.—(Phil. 3:20; 1 Cor. 15:42–50.) They do not obtain the physical results of their transfer from Adam to Christ till the appointed “marriage” with the Lamb, in the transformation of their vile body into conformity with the body of his glory.

Christ and His Death

E.N.—Your advice to “read and think over the gospel by John” is good. We have done so many times, but not with the result of believing that the body of Jesus was in any respect different from that of David and our own. If you admit his body was the same as ours (as those who have misled you profess to admit), you are bound to admit the following things respecting it: that it was dead because of sin, because ours is (Rom. 8:10); that it was vile, because ours is (Phil. 3:21); that it was mortal, because ours is (1 Cor. 15:53); that it was unclean, because all born of women are (Job 14:4; Ps. 51:5); that it had the sentence of death in itself, because Paul’s had (2 Cor. 1:9), the reason of all which was, that it was produced exactly as ours is, in being made and born of a sinful woman. These conclusions do not in any way conflict with the discourses of Christ in John. He truly said his flesh was the bread come down from heaven to give life to the world; but you must not fall into the mistake of many of his disciples, who supposed he meant there was some virtue in his flesh in a physical sense, and that his flesh had to be really eaten. Christ corrected their mistake, saying, “It is the Spirit that maketh alive; the flesh profiteth nothing. The words that I speak unto you, they are Spirit and they are life.”—(Jno. 6:63.) The Spirit was the Saviour: God in Christ reconciling the world to himself.” The words that Christ spoke concerning this mystery of love and wisdom were the food to be eaten. As the mystery related to the manifestation of God in the flesh, the words related to the flesh, and, therefore, were in parable spoken of as the flesh; but the flesh in itself was profitless, except as an ingredient in the Spirit’s work of salvation. To be an efficacious ingredient in this work, it required to be and was “the same” flesh. God’s plan required the sinful flesh to be offered in the person of a sinless wearer of it, whom He only could produce by the manifestation of Himself therein. In this way He sent forth His Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and on account of sin, condemned sin in the flesh. If you call his flesh “holy flesh,” you are with the antichrists of John’s day, against whom he specially warned the brethren. But you lay special stress on Christ saying, “I am the resurrection and the life” You say none under sentence of death could use such language. All depends upon the sense you attach to “sentence of death.” If you mean personal condemnation on account of personal sin, no doubt your remark is true, but as no one believes such a thing concerning Christ, this cannot be your meaning The mortality we inherit from Adam is what is contended for as Christ’s inheritance from his mother equally with our own. If this is what you mean by being “under sentence of death,” then your remark is by no means obviously true, but in presence of the facts, becomes obviously untrue. If the saying, “I am the resurrection and the life,” meant that the person uttering it required to be one that should not die, your remark might be worthy of consideration; but seeing it was uttered by one who did die afterwards, the case stands the other way. This dying on his part was no accident; it was a matter of purpose on the part of the Father who sent Jesus. Does it matter how you express the enunciation of this purpose—whether by the words “sentence,” “appointment,” “will,” “requirement,” or “decree?” As a fact which you must admit, death was before him; yet he could say, “I am the resurrection and the life.” Hence your assertion, that no one so situated could use such language, becomes self-evidently untrue. The fact is, that no one except one in that situation could use such language; for only one bearing our condemnation could be made righteousness and resurrection-life to us. That he was in himself spotlessly righteous—God’s holy one in a moral sense—did not alter the fact that he was in our mortal nature. The purpose of God to nullify our mortality in him (that we might afterwards in union with him obtain redemption) required the two things: that he should have our sentence on him, but that he should be perfectly holy in a moral sense. The one was the remedy for the other. The sentence was required for his death; his righteousness for his resurrection. Such a combination could only be produced in the way recorded in Luke 1:35. Your other assertion that no one under sentence of death can redeem those who are under sentence of death, is equally without scriptural foundation. It is true in human law but not in divine. God’s ways are not as man’s ways. In this, God was the redeemer, and the facts show that in doing the work He required a righteous one to come under the sentence in the very way we come under it. God brought His beloved under our death for the declaration of His righteousness, that His forbearance might be extended to us in the remission of our sins, without danger of boasting on our part.—(See Rom. 3:25, 26.) God forgives us for Christ’s sake (Eph. 4:32). Therefore, by a figure of speech, we are said to be washed in his blood, and our sins said to have been laid on him.