Theological Term of the Week
Tuesday, June 14, 2011 at 9:44PM
rebecca in theological terms

governmental theory of the atonement
The view of the atonement that maintains that the death of Christ does not strictly satisfy God’s justice, since God can relax the claims of the law as he pleases; he can also accept something less than perfect obedience (like faith, for instance, or imperfect obedience) as the basis for forgiveness of sin. The primary purpose of Christ’s death, then, is to show how abhorrent sin is in order to deter people from sinning so that moral order can be maintained in the world.

Learn more:

  1. Theopedia: Governmental Theory of the Atonement
  2. Sam Storms: Grotius and the Governmental Theory of the Atonement
  3. William Sasser: Erroneous Theories of the Atonement (pdf)
  4. J. Gresham Machen: The Bible and the Cross
  5. Kim Riddlebarger: No Ordinary Death: Jesus Christ, the Propitiation for Our Sins

Related terms:

Filed under Defective Theology.

Do you have a term you’d like to see featured here as a Theological Term of the Week? If you email it to me, I’ll seriously consider using it, giving you credit for the suggestion and linking back to your blog when I do.

Clicking on the Theological Term graphic at the top of this post will take you to a list of all the previous theological terms in alphabetical order.

Article originally appeared on Rebecca Writes (http://rebecca-writes.com/).
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