A Sanctuary for Biblical Logic

  This article aims to demonstrate how different views of Christ’s atonement logically affects our view of God’s omnipotence. There are two types of atonement that are commonly held: 1) universal, indefinite, or unlimited atonement, and 2) particular, definite, or limited atonement. The author used to believe the former view for several years while he was still attending an Arminian Charismatic church.   Universal atonement states: Christ died for all men without exception (i.e. universally) and paid for all their sins. It is an atonement unlimited in its intent (i.e. God intends to save all without exception including those who are already in the intermediate state or hell) and extent (i.e. God well-meaningly offering His salvific grace to all without exception upon the condition of man’s independent-free-will-activated faith or response to His grace or calling). Christ propitiates for the sins of all men without exception, removing the full curse of the wrath of God from them, an

  John Calvin rejects the use of the common phrase “Sufficient for all, Efficient for the elect”, especially in interpreting 1 John 2:2. That phrase is commonly understood as Christ dying for everyone without exception including the reprobates in a certain sense, but in another sense the efficacy of, or the final benefit of the atonement is for the elect alone. If the phrase means that God has the power (sufficient for all) to save everyone without exception (universalism) hypothetically if He wants to, I have no objection but apparently this is not what many moderate Calvinists understand of the phrase. I concur with Jim Ellis who concludes: “To say that Christ's death on the cross provided an atonement sufficient for all is to specifically suggest that He has atoned for the sins of all men, which is essentially a universal atonement. This is a false conception and makes us, along with those who hold to a universal atonement, say the opposite of what we mean.” He, quoting J. I. Pa