Is the atonement of Christ unlimited?

The gospel of God's grace in Christ Jesus is offered in perfectly good faith to all mankind. Christ is "the propitiation for our (believers') sins, and not for ours only, but also for (the sins of) the whole world" (1 Jn. 2:2). As the propitiation, Christ is the one who has by His great sacrifice fully satisfied God in regard to the question of man's sins, and the value of that sacrifice is fully avaliable for all who will receive it: it is not limited in any way. Those who refuse it will have only themselves to blame for the judgment they fully deserve. lf they could not believe, it was because they would not. As we have before seen, man is fully responsible to God, and one must receive salvation in God's way or be lost.

It is for His people, for the seed of Abraham, for believers, the atonement is made, — a satisfaction available for all the world upon condition of faith; actually such for all believers. It is an atonement unlimited in value and availability for all men; limited only by the unbelief that slights or rejects it. This must be to Arminians at least a very intelligible thought. It answers, as I have said, all demands, and removes all difficulties.

But the assumption that His blood has no scope beyond the elect is a serious error. Not that to me God's electing love is a doubtful question, but as sure as any other truth of revelation, and a spring of solid comfort to the household of faith, humbling to man's pride and glorifying to the God of all grace. One may be quite willing to allow, therefore, that election is behind the second goat, if such an expression may be allowed. For there limitation comes; but the first goat typically is unlimited in its range. For this reason is grounded upon it the going forth of the gospel to every creature under heaven. What can be less limited, if other truth be safeguarded? Nothing can be conceived more disastrous to the unmeasured width of the gospel than to address the elect merely. The Lord commanded that it be preached to every creature. Therefore you do well to act on His word, and need not fear for God's glory. Be assured that God has found a ransom and is fully vindicated. Do not imagine for a moment that you are in danger of going beyond what the blood of Christ deserves, and what God estimates of His ineffable sacrifice. Were there a thousand worlds to save, were there sinners beyond all that exist to hear God's glad tidings, there is that in the blood of Jesus which would meet every sinner of every world. Such is the unlimited value God finds in the death of His Son.

It is added that "He is the propitiation for our sins;" and then, after John's manner entirely, "Not for ours only, but also for the whole world." There is not, as in our version, the "sins of the whole world." Nevertheless, we need not hesitate to speak of this, as it is surely implied. When the apostle says: "Not for ours only," he necessarily infers that it is for the sins of others also. This does not mean that they are put away. He is a propitiation, as is said in Romans, "through faith, by His blood." It is for believers, therefore, that all this becomes effectual, and only for these. Yet so thoroughly sufficient is the perfect Sacrifice that has been offered, and so plainly is it available for every soul that honestly desires it that we can say: "For the sins of the whole world," without the least trouble or question. Beautiful it is to realize that it is just in John's Gospel, where the deepest things of divine grace are told out, that there is the fullest going out in heart to all. The call and the provision are for all. The sin of rejection is upon him who rejects, and he shall never be able to say that there was not a remedy, or that he was not able to avail himself of the remedy.

And the language of Scripture is everywhere in accord with this. It does speak of propitiation for the sins of the whole world: it does not speak of their sins being "laid on" or "borne" by Christ. These two things have been confounded on the one hand, and made into a doctrine of limited atonement, or of substitution for all. On the other, where the distinction has been noticed, it has been taken to imply that on the cross there was a work for all and a special work for the elect beside — a double atonement, as it were; that it was a propitiation for all, a substitution for the elect. In other words, the Arminian atonement and the Calvinistic atonement are both considered true, and to be found together in the work of Christ. But this leads to much confusion and misreading of Scripture, much manifest opposition to it.

It has led some to speak of salvation as a thing wrought out eighteen hundred years ago, — not simply the blessed work which saves, but actual salvation. Faith serves as a telescope to see what existed before we saw it, and what it had nothing to do therefore with producing. The sins of believers were thus dealt with and removed before they were committed, and people find peace by faith, but are not justified by it. All this is in complete opposition to the Word; yet it is a just consequence of the doctrine of a substitution for the elect, and their sins borne when the Lord Jesus died.

Yet He did bear their sins upon the tree, and Jehovah laid on Him the iniquity of us all. "Ours"? Whose, then? and how does this differ from the doctrine just repudiated? The answer is very simple. These words are the language of faith, of believers; and of believers as such only is it true. He bare the sins of believers on the tree, and this is equivalent to what we have been saying — that the efficacy of atonement is conditional. It is conditioned upon faith, and His bearing the sins of believers is a complete negative of universalism in all its phases. Only their sins are borne, although the atonement is for the sins of the whole world; and the duty and responsibility of faith are therefore to be pressed on every creature. The sins of believers were really borne eighteen hundred years ago; but only when men become believers are their sins borne, therefore. The very man who today believes, and whose sins were borne eighteen hundred years ago, not only could not say yesterday that his sins were borne, but they were really not borne yesterday, although the work was done eighteen hundred years ago. But it was done for believers, and only today is he a believer. The work of atonement only now has its proper efficacy for him: he is justified by faith.

Again, in this view, the evangelist can proclaim the gospel without any reserve. He can boldly tell men — all men — Christ died concerning your sins. He can unhesitatingly say, God has been so glorified about your sins by Christ's death, that on the ground of it He is now offering you salvation and is beseeching you to come and take it. You cannot refuse on the plea that the provision for salvation is only sufficient for a limited number. Every man can be told that the provision is for him, and that if he refuses it he can never say he perished because salvation was not provided for him. It is a misrepresentation of the gospel of God to say God has provided salvation only for those who actually believe. God has put no limit to the number who can be saved. He has made provision for all. While all thus can be saved, none are saved except they repent and believe the gospel.

In connection with this care is needed, for it is very easy here to speak unscripturally. Nowhere are we authorized by Scripture to speak of Christ dying for the sins of everybody in the sense that He was everybody's substitute. On the other hand, we are nowhere authorised to limit the bearing of His sacrifice viewed as propitiation. In this connection its scope is nothing less than the whole world.

Being the Godward aspect of His death the widest possible circle is in view — "the whole world." When the substitutionary side is stated believers only are in view: it is "our offences," or, "the sins of many." But though only believers stand in the realized benefits of the death of Christ, God needs to be propitiated in regard to every sin that ever has been committed by men, in regard to the whole great outrage which sin has wrought. He has been thus propitiated in the death of Christ, and because of this He can freely offer forgiveness to men without compromising in the smallest degree one feature of His nature and character.

The Lord Jesus, then, was the Substitute for believers, and thus made propitiation for the sins of the world, its efficacy being conditioned upon faith. He stood as the Representative of a class, not a fixed number of individuals, — of a people to whom men are invited and besought to join themselves, the value of the atonement being more than sufficient and available for all who come. The responsibility of coming really rests, where Scripture always places it, upon men themselves.

These are not imaginary difficulties or results; they are actual and operative. And they are the effect — as so much error is — of misplaced truth. Election is a truth of Scripture; but election is not, in Scripture, brought in to limit the provision made in atonement, — a provision really made and sufficient for all the world. On the other hand, Christ is not a substitute for the world, for substitution implies the actual bearing and bearing away of the sins of those who are represented in the Substitute, and the sins of the world are not so borne away. He is the Substitute of His people, but a people not numerically limited to just so many, but embracing all who respond to the invitations of His grace, though it were indeed the world for multitude.