The following is extracted from one of John Owen's many masterpieces -- The Death Of Death In The Death Of Christ, Book I, Chapter III -- in which Owen obliterates all of the absurd notions of universal atonement, as well as the philosophic, but utterly unbiblical, and equally absurd notion, of human free-will. As Martin Luther so aplty noted, "Since the fall of man, free-will is but an idle word, and if a man does all he can, he still sins mortally." |
"And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: OF SIN, BECAUSE THEY BELIEVE NOT ON ME..." John 16:8-9 |
To which I may add this
dilemma to our Universalists --
God imposed his wrath due unto, and Christ
underwent the pains of hell for,
1. either all the sins of all men,
2. or all the sins of some men,
3. or some sins of all men.
If the LAST, some sins of all men,
then have all men some sins to answer for, and so shall no man be saved; for if
God entered into judgment with us, though it were with all mankind for one sin,
no flesh should be justified in his sight: "If
the LORD should mark iniquities, who should stand?"
[Ps. cxxx.2] We might all go to cast
all that we have "to the moles and to the
bats, to go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks,
for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty."
[Isa. ii. 20, 21]
If the SECOND, that is it which we
affirm, that Christ in their stead and room suffered for all the sins of all the
elect in the world.
If the FIRST, why then, are not all
freed from the punishment of all their sins? You will say, "Because of their
unbelief; they will not believe."
But this unbelief, is it a sin, or not?
If not, why should they be
punished for it? If it be, then Christ underwent the punishment due to it, or
not. If so, then why must that hinder them more than their other sins for which
he died from partaking of the fruit of his death? If he did not, then did he not
die for all their sins.
Let them choose which part they will.