What are the key ingredients of any successful atonement for sin?
In Christ’s Doctrine of the Atonement George Smeaton identifies four vital components, and proves that the Gospels set these forth.
1. They must be faultless sufferings, corresponding to the character of Him to whom the satisfaction required to be made.
2. They must be painful and ignominious to the last degree.
3. They must have an unlimited worth or value derived from the dignity of the sufferer.
4. They must accurately correspond to the declarations of God.
Smeaton then demonstrates how the Gospels were written to prove how Christ’s atonement met all four requirements.
1. Christ’s faultless sufferings are proven by the declarations of innocence by Pilate, Pilate’s wife, Herod, and Judas.
2. The painful ignominy is established by the Gospels’ descriptions of all the indignities heaped upon Christ at his trial, and in the way the sentence was carried out.
3. The immeasurable dignity of the sufferer is confirmed by Christ’s priestly prayers and sacrifice, as well as the salvation of the thief on the cross. It is also seen in his royal flattening of his enemies in the garden, his protection of his disciples, and the centurion’s exclamation, “Truly this was the Son of God!”
4. Christ’s atoning death matches the Old Testament prophecies, as the Gospel writers repeatedly record.
Smeaton’s point here is to prove that it’s not just the Epistles that explain the atonement but that the Gospels do too, primarily by the historical facts that they narrate, more than by doctrinal discourse.
However, the Gospels don’t rely exclusively on historical narrative. The evangelists also record the sayings of Christ which express his own thoughts on his atoning death and indicate the design, aim, and motive of his actions.
Smeaton says that these sayings supply “not only an objective outline of His work in its nature and results, but also a glimpse of the very heart of His activity…they disclose His inner thoughts, and convey the absolute truth upon the subject of the atonement.”
If, as Smeaton says, “[Christ's] work was fully and adequately known only to His own mind,” should we not pay particular attention to Christ’s doctrine of the atonement? That’s what Smeaton invites us to do in Christ’s Doctrine of the Atonement (buy at RHB or free ebook at Monergism).