inclusive atonement...
Monday, May 14, 2007
"The longer I live, the more I believe that the beauty of the atonement is not that it only works if you believe it in the right way, it's that it works even if you don't understand it at all. I'm not going soft on doctrine - I love doctrine with a passion, and I spend a good slice of my life teaching it - but even I have to admit that we aren't saved by doctrine, and that God can be visibly and awesomely at work in the lives of people whose doctrine is well wide of the mark. The grace and generosity of God is, I'll grant you, completely outrageous. He seems to insist on including people in the Kingdom of God who are not like me at all. Where does it come from, this need to have doctrinal proof of someone else's salvation? I have to wonder whether that isn't precisely the kind of thing that Jesus died to save us from."
Once again, fellow-chaplain Maggi Dawn manages to find words filled with grace to express deep insights in 'this' post on the atonement. It's well worth reading in its entirety, as it is a timely contribution to a divisive debate that seems to be getting out of hand. Thanks Maggi for expressing so well what desperately needs to be heard by all.
Once again, fellow-chaplain Maggi Dawn manages to find words filled with grace to express deep insights in 'this' post on the atonement. It's well worth reading in its entirety, as it is a timely contribution to a divisive debate that seems to be getting out of hand. Thanks Maggi for expressing so well what desperately needs to be heard by all.
Labels: theology
I'm Malcolm Chamberlain
from Liverpool, United Kingdom
. I'm married with two young children and, in addition to Liverpool, have lived in Leicester (for the first 18 years of my life), York, Peshawar (Pakistan), Oxford and Walsall. I've been actively involved in the emerging church since 2001, as a founding member of Dream in Liverpool City, and coordinator of the Dream network. I'm currently engaged in research into emerging missional communities, and work as a parish priest and pioneer minister.
