Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Progressive Christian
Forgive Us Our Debts, Not Repay Our Debts

Forgive Us Our Debts, Not Repay Our Debts

Last updated on: September 8, 2021 at 4:47 am by James F. McGrath

Forgive Us Our Debts, Not Repay Our Debts 2021-09-08T04:47:24-04:00 James F. McGrath

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Several points come together in this blog post, emerging from the journey of my Sunday school class through the Lord’s Prayer. The petition for forgiveness in this prayer that every Christian denomination utters stands at odds with how some individuals and groups understand the atonement and the significance of Jesus’ death. In short, if you think that forgiveness of sin is only available through the death of Jesus, then you must understand that line (“forgive us our sins/debts”) either as Jesus teaching his followers to pray something that was meaningless and ineffective at the time he taught it to them, or as “really” meaning something like “forgive us our sins by sending Jesus to the cross to die for us and make that possible.”

The problems with the view that Jesus’ death alone makes forgiveness possible run even deeper than that. It isn’t just the fact that the entire Jewish Bible (Christian Old Testament) is full of similar prayers as well as affirmations that God has mercifully forgiven, all of which become meaningless or even false within the framework of this theology.

Some theologies of atonement claim that God is unable to forgive apart from the cross.

Think about that for a moment. Those same Christians affirm divine omnipotence. They may have a bumper sticker that affirms that nothing is impossible with God. They may insist that God can make a square circle.

But forgive simply by showing mercy, forgive by just forgiving? Sorry, no, they will tell you, God’s hands are tied.

That isn’t what the Lord’s Prayer says. It doesn’t call upon us to pray “Send Jesus to pay our debt, as we forgive our debtors.”

There is so much more wrong with this view of the atonement, often categorized under the label of the Penal Substitution Theory of atonement. It shifts the idea of sin away from images of broken relationship and reconciliation to a matter of accounting. It then posits God “cooking the books” to resolve the debt we cannot pay.

We must add to the list of problems with this view the fact that the language of Jesus paying our debt is not biblical.

But the biggest issue is that ultimately this view makes God the problem when it comes to forgiveness of sin. We’d like to be better, but we have a sinful nature and so can’t be. We long for forgiveness and reconciliation, supposedly, but apart from the cross God’s hands are tied. Do you see how this view subtly shifts blame away from us? If God can forgive and is eager for human beings to be reconciled to God, then the problem is squarely on our end. We claim to want reconciliation but we actually prefer to carry on living as we choose and trusting that this just adds to our sin debt account which Jesus has paid in full. Penal Substitution substitutes impersonal transactional images for reconciliation, which requires genuine repentance and transformation.

There is a famous sermon with the title “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” The Penal Substitution Theory of Atonement is what happens when you put God in the hands of angry sinners.

But another way of viewing things is possible, and we find it expressed in (among other places) the Lord’s Prayer…

Of related interest, I was invited to be the first guest on a new Freethinkers Podcast and spoke about the topic of this blog post (and indeed, mentioned my need to finish it!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icCUCZ3A7zI

I will also need to take up and explore the idea that Jesus and before him John the Baptist were “pirates of forgiveness” which Richard Beck expressed on his blog recently. I like the idea that John the Baptist’s rite offered an alternative to sacrifice, which was prohibitively costly for the poor.

Richard Beck also talks about theories of atonement and related metaphysics in a blog series titled The Disenchantment of Salvation. Here are part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4.

Elsewhere on my own blog, John Macdonald asked a question about 2 Corinthians 5 and penal substitution, to which I responded as follows:

I will have another blog post on atonement and related matters soon. In the meantime, very briefly, I think that the broader context of 2 Corinthians 5 and other specific statements are clearer and articulate a view that is not penal substitution, while the words you quote are ambiguous and likely mean something else. On the one hand, “made sin” does not necessarily mean “made to bear sin” and the whole statement could be understood in terms of participation and exchange – he became what we are that we might be made like him, he got entangled in this world of sin to disentangle us from this world of sin, and so on. Meanwhile elsewhere in the immediate context we find the following: “God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them.” That makes restoration of relationship the focus, and depicts God as simply forgiving rather than requiring substitution or other satisfaction. Most decisive, in my opinion, is the other statement in this immediate context, “one died for all, and therefore all died…” It is not that one died because all should have and thus substituted in their place. Rather, the one dying means that all who are in Christ die as well to the present evil age, and begin to share in the new life of the age to come. The image is of a “second exodus” not from bondage in a particular place in the world, but from the bondage to sin and death that characterizes the present age as a whole.

Steve Caruso drew my attention to Aramaic resonances in the Gospels that I hadn’t noticed before, which connect some of the texts I talk about here and/or explored in the Sunday school class that prompted this post.

Also of related interest:

An Epidemic of Moral Injury

The Context of Matthew 18:21-35

The Meaning of Matthew 18:21-22

The Meaning of Matthew 18:23-27

Mike Bird mentioned Philemon and justification by grace. I’m not sure the point works. What do you think?

https://solacrux.wordpress.com/2021/04/26/pluriformity-of-atonement-views-part-i/

Bob Cornwall blogged about salvation

God Saves Us From God?

Who Will Be Saved? – The Question That Divides Evangelicals from Mainline Protestants

Previous Post

September 6, 2021

Jesus Snorted Like a Horse

Next Post

September 27, 2021 What Jesus Learned from Women: More Reviews

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category 1 Corinthians 1 John 1 Peter 1 Samuel 1 Thessalonians 1 Timothy 2 Corinthians 2 Kings 2 Peter 2 Samuel 2 Thessalonians 2 Timothy academia Acts of the Apostles afterlife Akhaten Alcatraz American Academy of Religion Amos Anglican Arabic Aramaic archaeology art artificial intelligence astronomy atheism atonement Babylon 5 Baptists Battlestar Galactica Bible Biblical Studies Carnival biblioblogging Black Mirror Blade Runner Book of Job book review Buddhism Call for Papers China Christianity Christmas Christology Chronicles Coptic creation Daniel Deuteronomy Doctor Who Dune Easter Ecclesiastes economics education Eldad Keynan Enoch Seminar Ephesians eschatology Esther Evangelicals evolution Exodus Expanse Ezekiel Ezra fantasy Fringe fundamentalism Galatians games Ge'ez genealogy Genesis Gnosticism Gospel of Jesus' Wife Gospel of John Gospel of Judas Gospel of Luke Gospel of Mark Gospel of Matthew Gospel of Peter Gospel of Thomas Greek Harry Potter Hebrew Hebrews Hinduism historical Jesus history Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Holidays horror Hosea humor incarnation India inerrancy information literacy inspirational Intelligent Design Ireland Isaiah Islam Israel Italy James Jeremiah John the Baptist Jonah Joshua Judaism Jude Judges Judith Lamentations languages Latin Leviticus libraries literature Lord of the Rings LOST Mandaeans Mandaic memes Methodism Micah monotheism morality Mormons movies music mythicism NASSCAL Nehemiah new perspective New Testament news Numbers Orthodox paganism panentheism pantheism Patheos Paul and his letters Pentecostals Philippians Philippians 2:6-11 philosophy physics Planet of the Apes podcast politics Progressive Christianity Protestantism Proverbs Psalms pseudoscience racism religion Revelation Roman Catholicism Romania Romans Ruth scams science science fiction Secret Gospel of Mark Society of Biblical Literature Song of Songs Star Trek Star Wars Stargate Swahili Syriac Taoism technology Terminator The Handmaid's Tale The Hobbit The Matrix theodicy theology theory Timeless Titus tomb Torchwood travel TRON Uncategorized United Kingdom Westworld X-Files young-earth creationism Zechariah

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 February 2007 January 2001

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz