Some Christians today are fond of saying, “I am a four point Calvinist.” They accept all of the TULIP acronym except limited atonement because they think it sounds too restrictive to say that Christ died only for the elect. “Christ died for everyone,” they say, “and, with the Spirit’s help, each person must accept Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord as an act of free will. When that occurs, that person will be born again.”

Basically, this is popularized Arminian theology, which the Synod of Dort argued against in the Second Head of the Canons, titled “The Death of Christ and the Redemption of Men Thereby.” Since the extent of the atonement was the most contentious issue debated at the Synod of Dort¹and is so pertinent to debates among Christians today, this question deserves a fresh look here.

In exposing the faultiness of this line of thinking, I will examine two issues in this article: first, the centrality of the atonement; second, four positions in church history regarding the universality of atonement. Next month we will consider the major theological problems of the Arminian view of the atonement. In subsequent issues, I will show how a Calvinist view of the atonement is both biblical and more encouraging than many think, and I will answer some remaining objections against the Calvinist view.

The Centrality of the Atonement⤒🔗

The Christian church always has recognized that the atonement, which Christ accomplished at the cross, is the central theme of the Christian message. To atone is to make “at one.” Through Christ’s atoning blood, a holy God and sinful men and women are reconciled. The atonement brings unity and fellowship between God the Holy One and man the sinner. This is the central doctrine of Christianity because Christianity is preeminently a religion of redemption.

Against the backdrop of the fall and our ensuing depravity, the gospel brings a message of reconciliation, offering a way of escape from sin and from its destructive power, and a way of entrance into a reconciled and fellowshipping relationship with God. This is the way of the cross. God’s way of reconciling Himself with sinners was through the redeeming sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Any definition of Christianity that does not have redemptive atonement at its core is fundamentally defective.

The atonement is rooted in the free and sovereign love of God. Think of John 3:16, where the work of Christ as the Priest who brings atonement is traced back to God’s love for the world. If we were to ask the questions that come to mind in order, they would go like this: Why am I saved? Because I believe and trust in Christ. Why am I saved through faith? Because faith unites me with Christ, and in union with Him I receive all the blessings of His atoning work. Why did Christ come to perform that atoning work? Because this was God’s commission to Him. Why did God give Christ that commission? Because of His love for sinners. Here we have reached the ultimate source of the blessings of the atonement; further into the mind and will of God we cannot go.

Up to this point, many Arminians agree with Calvinists. But then other questions arise: What is the place of the atone­ment in the overall plan of God for human redemption? For whom did Christ die — everyone? Is the atonement universal? What is its extent, or perhaps better, its intent, since the cen­tral issue is its purpose or design?²Or, as John Murray says,

On whose behalf did Christ offer himself a sacrifice? On whose behalf did he propitiate the wrath of God? Whom did he reconcile to God in the body of his flesh through death? Whom did he redeem from the curse of the law, from the guilt and power of sin, from the enthralling power and bondage of Satan? In whose stead and on whose behalf was he obedient unto death, even the death of the cross?³

It is here that Arminians and Calvinists sharply disagree. In terms of salvation, Calvinists believe that Christ died only for the elect (while not denying the eternal, infinite value of Christ’s work, or denying that some non-saving, indirect benefits from Christ’s death accrue to unbelievers), whereas Arminians believe that He died for everyone universally.

Four Views of the Atonement’s Extent←⤒🔗

There are at least four views of the extent of Christ’s atonement. All but the first of these views below grapple with the issue of limitation to Christ’s atonement. Limited atonement is not a Calvinist invention, nor is it an exclusively Calvinist dilemma. Anyone who takes seriously the Bible’s message about hell and its inhabitants as well as sin and its wages must grapple with the question of limitation in some form when studying the death of Jesus Christ.

The first view is unlimited universal redemption. This view presumes complete universalism because it believes that God’s intent was for Christ to die for all so that all will be saved. Universalism believes in the final restoration of all things to God and hence rejects the doctrine of an everlasting hell. This view was taught by several ancient church theologians, such as Clement of Alexandria (c. 160-215) and his student, Origen (c. 185-251). Origen even taught that the devils ultimately would be saved.

Though never popular among those who profess the teachings of Scripture, universalism has lived on throughout the centuries. In 1803, the Universalist Church of America said in its statement of faith: “We believe that there is one God, whose nature is Love ... and who will finally restore the whole family of mankind to holiness and happiness.”⁴By 1961, when the Universalist Church merged with many Unitarian churches to form the American Unitarian Universalist Association, it had close to four hundred congregations with a total membership of seventy thousand.

Universalism directly opposes Scripture, which speaks of hell more than two hundred times. Jesus, in particular, affirmed the doctrine of eternal hell (Matt. 12:32; 13:40-42, 49-50; 25:41, 46; Mark 9:44-48; Luke 12:4-5). No wonder few universalists regard Scripture as infallible or take it seriously. Most succumb to a kind of rationalism that transcends Scripture; they reason that divine love precludes everlasting punishment, regardless of what Scripture says.

The second view has been called limited universal redemp­tion. This view teaches that the atonement is universal in design but limited in its accomplishment. The Trinity has purposed the salvation of all through Christ’s atoning death, but not all are saved in the end. The cross is not directly a satisfaction for sin; it only becomes so when a sinner believes in Christ for salvation. Though all are given sufficient grace to be able to believe the gospel, many refuse to believe it and so do not receive the benefits of the atonement.

This view, common to many evangelicals today, might be called inconsistent or Arminian universalism.⁵Jacob Arminius (1560-1609) regarded election and the atonement as being conditional on God’s foreseeing who would believe. Raymond Blacketer provides an excellent summary of his views:

For Arminius the work of Christ on the cross does not effect salvation (understood as propitiation, satisfaction or redemption) for any person or group; instead, it only makes salvation possible. The cross brings about a new legal situation in which God consequently has the right to enter into a new relationship to humanity, under new conditions that God is free to prescribe. The condition that he prescribes is faith; and it is up to the individual sinner to use the universal grace provided by God to take that step of faith. The determinative factor in salvation is the free choice of humanity, albeit assisted by cooperat­ing grace.⁶

Arminius’s followers, known as the Remonstrants, pre­sented the following assertion to the Dutch government in their document “The Five Articles of the Remonstrants”: “Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, died for all men and for every man, so that he has obtained for them all, by his death on the cross, redemption and the forgiveness of sins; yet ... no one actually enjoys the forgiveness of sins, except the believer (John 3:16; 1 John 2:2).”⁷That is to say, salvation depends on human acceptance of it. Arminians often picture salvation as a gift offered to all men upon the merits of Christ’s dying for them, but each individual must reach out his own hand of faith to accept it.

The third view is hypothetical universalism. This position, first proposed by Moïse Amyraut (1596-1664) and known as Amyraldianism,⁸teaches that Christ died hypothetically for all without exception, but divine grace and election have ensured that only the elect will believe. Since God knew that all humankind was so corrupt that no one would believe, He elected some to faith, in whom the Holy Spirit then grants faith and applies salvation. So the intent of the atonement differs from the application of salvation.

George Smeaton says Amyraldianism presents an incoher­ent system, for it supposes “a double and a conflicting decree; that is, a general decree, in which God was said to will the salvation of all, and a special decree, in which He was said to will the salvation of the elect. To Christ also it ascribed a twofold and discordant aim, viz. to satisfy for all men, and to satisfy merely for the elect.”⁹

Both Amyraldianism and Arminianism maintain that Christ suffered for mankind, not that He paid the penalty for sins. And they both teach, as Robert Letham says, “that this suffering does not intrinsically achieve what it was intended to do since it is dependent on a response on the part of human beings which, in very many cases, fails to materialize.”¹⁰The difference between Amyraldianism and Arminianism is that in the former, the limitation is the choice of God, while in the latter, the limitation is the choice of the one who believes.

Iain Murray says, “Traditional Reformed theology rejected this Amyraldian combination of the universal with the par­ticular, holding that God had only one intent and purpose in the death of his Son, the actual salvation of those for whom he suffered.”¹¹

The fourth view is the Calvinist view of limited or definite atonement, which, as codified by the Canons of Dort, “is the belief that the satisfaction rendered by Christ on the cross was of infinite value and worth by virtue of Christ’s incarnation but that its intended object was not sinners in general, or every individual, but rather those whom God had elected from eternity.”¹²The Father sent His Son to the cross to pay for the sins of the elect, so that Christ died savingly and person­ally for all of God’s chosen people. His death was a voluntary (Ps. 40:7-8), ransoming (Matt. 20:28), obedient (Rom. 5:19), vicarious (Rom. 6:23), expiatory (Heb. 10:10, 14), propitiatory (Rom. 3:25), reconciling (Rom. 5:10), redemptive (1 Pet. 1:18-19), and victorious (Rom. 8:31-39) act that secured salvation for all those the Father had given Him. All of these words differ somewhat in meaning, but they all indicate that Christ’s death is the elect’s salvation.

The doctrine of limited atonement is not simply a point of logic in the Calvinistic system of thought; it is an integral point of an exegetical understanding of the work of Christ. In terms of both intent and accomplishment, the extent of Christ’s cross work is limited to those who will be saved. The death of Christ is not a provisional measure, but actually secures salvation; it does not just make sinners redeemable but actually redeems.

Those who believed that redemption was designed for the elect include Augustine (354-430), Prosper of Aquitaine (ca. 390-460), and Gottschalk (ca. 805-869), though they also had differences. Gottschalk, for example, rejected the teaching of Prosper that though Christ’s atonement is efficient only for the elect, it is sufficient for all. Peter Lombard (ca. 1100-1160) codified the efficiency-sufficiency view for the Middle Ages,¹³which most Reformation theologians upheld. Calvin never criticized this view, either, though he acknowledged that it did not answer all the questions relative to the atonement’s extent.¹⁴Among other Reformers, Johannes Oecolampadius (1482-1531), Martin Bucer (1491-1551), Peter Martyr Vermigli (1499-1562), and Caspar Olevianus (1536-1587) all taught that Christ atoned only for the sins of the elect.

Scholars have long debated Calvin’s view, usually find­ing support in Calvin for their own position. James Anderson, Robert T. Kendall, James B. Torrance, Curt Daniel, and M. Charles Bell think Calvin taught either universal redemption or what one might call a provisionally universal atonement that recognizes that God loves all mankind while yet purposing that only some should be saved.¹⁵Alan Clifford thinks that Calvin agrees with Amyraut rather than with John Owen and traditional Reformed theology on the extent of the atonement.¹⁶A. A. Hodge, Paul Helm, Robert Godfrey, Roger Nicole, and Richard Muller assert that Calvin taught an implicit, effective atonement.¹⁷Tony Lane and Robert Letham say that Calvin was ambiguous or even contradictory on the atonement, but that he maintained its intrinsic efficacy.¹⁸Hans Boersma and G. Michael Thomas conclude that Calvin did not support either particular or universal redemption, but kept a certain tension in his doctrine of atonement.¹⁹

Robert Peterson argues that the issue of the extent of the atonement belonged more to the subsequent period of Reformed orthodoxy and was therefore largely anachronistic for Calvin²⁰Pieter Rouwendal shows, however, that the question of the atonement’s extent was dealt with in Calvin’s day, but the way that it was handled by later Reformers was foreign and anachronistic to Calvin. Theodore Beza (1519-1605) and other later Reformers maintained particular atonement while being critical of the notion of Christ’s atonement being sufficient for all. They were unhappy with the word for because it implied intent, whereas Christ had no intent to die for all, they said. Thus, Beza’s doctrine of particular atonement was somewhat removed from the classical position that maintained the efficiency-sufficiency distinction.²¹I think Rouwendal is correct, though there are indications that Calvin was leaning in the direction of what would come to be called particu­lar redemption. Commenting on the possibility that Christ’s propitiation appeased God’s wrath even for the reprobate, Calvin said, “Such a monstrous idea is not worth refuting.”²²The unanswerable question, of course, is, whether Calvin, if he had lived thirty or forty years later, would have moved from the classical position to embrace Beza’s criticism of the efficiency-sufficiency distinction.

In response to the Remonstrants, the Synod of Dort, after considerable debate, maintained the classical position on atonement, albeit with a mild capitulation to Beza and his staunchest supporter at Synod, Franciscus Gomarus (1563-1641). Head II, Article 8 says,

For this was the sovereign counsel and most gracious will and purpose of God the Father, that the quickening and saving efficacy of the most precious death of His Son should extend to all the elect, for bestowing upon them alone the gift of justifying faith, thereby to bring them infallibly to salvation.

Though limiting the saving benefits of Christ’s satisfaction to the elect, the delegates at Dort also stressed that the doctrine of limited atonement does not suggest any inadequacy in the death of Christ. Because it was Christ who suffered, His death is of infinite value. The Canons of Dort declare unequivocally that “the death of the Son of God ... is of infinite worth and value, abundantly sufficient to expiate the sins of the whole world” (Head II, Art. 3).

Thus, the canons affirm that although Christ’s atoning death is efficient only for the elect, it is sufficient for all. The Dortian divines recognized, however, that the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement for all must be carefully defined so that it does not degenerate into a thinly disguised form of Arminianism. They said that Christ’s death was sufficient in itself for all while denying that Christ died with saving intent for all. In other words, they moderated the classic formula of atonement by taking Beza and Gomarus’s criticisms into account.²³

Later Calvinists provided even more clarity here. For example, nearly all Calvinists would agree with Owen, who says that Christ’s atonement would have been “sufficient in itself for the redeeming of all and every man, if it had pleased the Lord to employ it to that purpose.”²⁴But since God has not so purposed it, as Owen goes on to show, the atonement is truly sufficient only for those for whom it is efficient.²⁵Even Beza would have accepted Owen’s comments here, I believe.

The Synod of Dort rejected the charge that definite atonement had negative implications for the indiscriminate preaching of the gospel and the calling all people everywhere to look to Christ and live (Head III-IV, Art. 8). Most Calvinists ever since have taught that definite atonement should instill confidence in our preaching and witnessing because we are calling on people to entrust themselves to a Savior who infallibly saves, who has left nothing to chance, who will not lose any of those whom the Father has given Him, and who has fully paid for the salvation of everyone who will trust in Him.²⁶