The First Adam, The Last Adam (and all the rest of us)

Jesus Christ - Atonement

The Atonement:

Now here is a subject that can be rather expansive. I'm going to attempt to cover this with adequate explanation, but not exhaustively.

What was the atonement? Where do we start?

The fall created three issues for man:

1. breaking of fellowship with God.

2. the issue of God's wrath now had to be addressed

3. physical death

The atonement addressed these issues:

1. pouring out of the Holy Spirit as a result of Christ's success - restored fellowship.

2. the wrath of God was satisfied for those Christ came to atone for.

3. because Jesus rose from the dead; this is proof there will be a final resurrection.

Restored fellowship: Because of what Christ had accomplished, restoration of fellowship for believers on the new testament side of the cross is based on a different paradigm than those on the old testament side. I'll explain that more in the next chapter on believers.

The Wrath of God: To endure the wrath of God means to be eternally separated from Him. Now eternity as defined by God's existence, has no beginning and no end. So, in this sense the sinner condemned to damnation will never get out of that state because he/she is not eternal.

Now because Jesus's personhood was partially made of up a Divine nature, he/He could "outlive" God's wrath. Now he was able to do this because being the whole of God; the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts. God's wrath springs out of the aspect of His character that is His holiness. Holiness demands justice, which demands payment for transgression. This is why God "gets angry". The sum of what God is though, is not His wrath and this is how Jesus as being "wholly God" overcame wrath and satisfied the payment for transgression.

Now what actually happened to Jesus in this process? I'll cover that in a minute.

Physical Death: Death is said to be the last enemy to be overcome. (1 Corinthians 15:26) The proof that Jesus conquered death is obvious because he rose from the dead. (Yeah I know - duh!) Death is the culmination of the wages of sin and in the life of the unregenerate, is followed by the wrath of God.

Now in the order which these things were (or would have been) encountered by Adam (breaking fellowship, physical death, eternal punishment) they were addressed by the atonement in reverse action.

Wrath of God addressed:

Jesus first addressed the wrath of God. This is alluded to in Jesus's statement about being 3 days and 3 nights in the heart of the earth. This time frame occurred between sundown Tuesday night to roughly 3 PM Friday at the point Jesus died. This is literally 3 / 24 hour periods (3 days and 3 nights). Jesus endured (most of) this experience as (mostly) a complete person in body, soul, spirit and Divinity. This is because those who will be cast into the lake of fire at judgement day, will also endure it as complete people.

Now how was Jesus as God incarnate forsaken by God? Hebrews 10:20 talks about "he has consecrated us through the veil; that is to say his flesh". Now what happened to the veil in the temple? It was rent from top to bottom, which exposed the holy of holies. In the holy of holies was (suppose to be) the ark of the covenant. This is where once a year, blood was to be sprinkled on the mercy seat to atone for sin. This task was performed by the high priest. Christ the eternal high priest sprinkled the mercy seat with his own blood when the veil of his flesh was rent.