Ángel
Manuel Rodríguez
A friend of mine tells me that all the benefits of
Christ's death were given to the human race when He died. This doesn't
seem biblical. Is it?
Such an idea, called by
its proponents "legal universal justification," is not biblical.
Some Adventists find it attractive and embrace it without critical analysis,
but this is a dangerous approach. Truth should not be determined by what
seems to make sense, or by what makes us feel good, but by what we find in
the Bible. The following points may help you in evaluating that teaching.
I. The Totality of Scripture: We must submit any claim of truth to the teachings
of Scripture. The fact that a few texts seem to support such teachings is
not enough to demonstrate the correctness of their claims. These claims have
to be examined within the context of the totality of Scripture in order to
clarify how the texts ought to be interpreted. Some people come up with what
appears to be an original idea and proceed to look for biblical texts to support it. They bring to the text those ideas and read them into it. Their
interpretation may appear to be logical and persuasive, but they are, in
fact, imposing their ideas into the text. In evaluating those ideas we need
to examine the biblical teaching in full, not just a few texts.
2. Impact on Other Clear Biblical Teachings: These views may appear to be innocuous, but we should
examine their impact on other teachings of the Bible. If the implications
of a new teaching undermine other biblical teachings, there is something
wrong with its claims, despite the fact that biblical texts are used to support
it. That means the texts being used should be interpreted in a different
way.
3. A Case in Point: The Mediation of Christ: One example may be enough to illustrate this
last point. Since universal legal justification teaches that before the Lord
all the sins of the human race have already been forgiven and the human race
has been saved, as a practical matter it leaves no room for the biblical
teaching of Christ's high priestly mediation before the Father. According
to Paul, the death and resurrection of Christ make possible the mediation
of Christ before the Father (Rom. 8:34). Mediation means that human sin and
guilt are still relevant before the Lord in heaven and that it is only through
Christ's work for us
in the presence of the Father that we receive the benefits
of His sacrificial death. The fullness of those benefits is granted only
to those who believe. Guilt and sin continue to be part of the human experience
in the sight of God!
The role of
our Mediator before the Father is an indispensable element in the plan of
salvation (Heb. 7:25; 9:14). So we must ask, if it is true that in the sight of God the sin of the human
race has been forgiven and humanity has already received the totality of
the benefits of His death, why would John write, "My dear children,
I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we
have one who speaks to the Father in our defense—Jesus Christ, the
Righteous One" (1 John 2:1, NIV; cf. Acts 2:38)? John went on to suggest
that the forgiveness of sin through the effectiveness of the mediation of
Christ before the Father is assured because "he is the atoning sacrifice
for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole
world" (1 John 2:2, NIV).
Christ is the
mediator for anyone who wants to approach the Father to receive through Him
forgiveness, justification, redemption, reconciliation, etc. The views you
mentioned tend to interpret the mediation of Christ in terms of the cleansing
of the human heart from sin. But the doctrine also deals with the work of
Christ in heaven and the application of the benefits of His sacrifice to
repentant sinners. Proponents of legal universal justification do not seem
to be fully aware of its serious doctrinal and theological problems. In some
cases they tend to redefine the doctrine of Christ's ministry in the heavenly
sanctuary.
8/06
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