"The Day the Revolution Began" - Wright or wrong? (12)

Chapter 11

Wright continues his mission in life of trying to annoy me! We now get a look at what Paul says (apart from Romans). At Loc 3293 Wright says “That defeat was accomplished through the dying “for sins” of Jesus, Israel’s Messiah: Jesus, representing Israel and the world, took upon himself the full force of the divine condemnation of sin itself, so that those “in him” would not suffer it themselves”. Now this is pretty close to penal substitutionary atonement, but then, of course, this is all surrounded by remarks that seem to be critical of penal substitution. So what does Wright believe? It is clear that he believes God has a big vision for humanity, and is absolutely right in saying this, and right in saying church teaching often presents too small or narrow a vision (namely “going to heaven”. And of course he is right in saying this vision is opened up, made possible, by the cross and resurrection. But how does he believe it is achieved? Atonement theology seems the most satisfying explanation to me. Jesus “reinterpreting” Scripture just doesn’t cut-it.

He spends some time on Galatians, saying that the letter is not about salvation. I would agree and disagree with him on this, though this is largely on terminology. I agree that it is not about how to get saved, but is about on living in our salvation.

Wright then spends some time on saying that Paul is concerned with the global plan of God, not merely the salvation of the individual. Too often, and not just here in Wright’s book, we set the individual against the corporate. At one time we will stress the effect of salvation on the individual, neglecting the corporate effect. Realising our mistake we will then go to the other extreme and stress the corporate at the expense of the individual. If we look at the Bible we will see that God never does this! What do we see? We see a grand plan for Israel and for all of mankind, as Wright has been pointing out, but we also see God working through individuals. The Bible spends a lot of time on the “heroes” of the faith, Abraham, Moses, David etc. It also spends time on far less significant (in human terms) individuals, like Ruth, Ishmael and others. The gospels are full of individual encounters. So we need to consider the individual and the global effect, and we must never set one off against the other.

Wright then goes on to look at Corinthians, Philippians and Colossians, and there are no really new points (nor new annoyances).