This fruitful discussion came up last night at our little community group and I figured I ought to complete the thoughts that were coming into my head, since I was averse to keeping people up all night with a systematic thought behind the doctrine of substitutionary atonement and how that was played out under the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, and the differences and similarities therein.
The thesis is this: God does not punish believers for their sins, nor has he ever punished believers for their sins, nor will he ever punish believers for their sins. God cannot do this because that sin was nailed to the cross when God took out ALL punishment for ALL the elect's sin on his own Son.
So in other words, God does not apply the retributive result of justice to the Christian, because He already punished Jesus for it. God does not punish Christians. He does not draw retribution to satisfy his wrath against the Christian by inflicting his wrath upon the Christian, because Jesus took that wrath for himself. The great exchange was when Jesus took our sinfulness and applied it to himself, and he handed us his righteousness.
Where the disconnect comes is in the word "punish", and its contrast with the word "discipline". Some definitions of "discipline" use the word "punish", but if we are looking at the real roots of the word, we find that discipline and punishment need not be the same thing, and I believe there to be a real distinction when we are referring to God's punishment (His visiting of his wrath upon the unrighteous) and God's discipline (His visiting of his corrective grace upon the elect).
Of course, the biggest spat of the night was the following distinction I made (which was not agreed with) about the substance and nature of the Old and New Covenants. I asserted (and still do) that David's sin with Bathsheba, the resulting death of his son, and the resulting blasphemy against God's law by the people of Israel as they witnessed their wayward king; all of these were covered by the blood of Jesus Christ. The New Covenant was not inaugurated but its effects were most certainly retroactive. The same faith that saved David is the same faith that the believer has. The difference is, David's faith was in the promise of the seed of the woman and the Christian's faith is in the actual seed of the woman. The New Covenant is better than the Old for many reasons, and this is one of the big ones. We no longer see the shadow of Christ in the sacrificial systems of the Old Covenant. We see Christ through the Spirit because He has atoned for all sin for all time for all of His elect. And when Hebrew asserts that the patriarchs of the faith were commended due to their faith, we have to ask what sort of faith they had and what the object of the faith was.
The Old Covenant believers had real saving faith in the promise of the New Covenant. That faith was not provided for by the sacrificial system. Rather, the sacrificial system was used to clean the Old covenant believer of their sins. Its use was manifold in keeping God's people preserved in the covenant of works. The law acted as a guardian (Galatians 3:23-29), a schoolmaster, but faith in the law was not the means by which God's people were preserved. Rather, faith in the promise of the New Covenant is how God preserved his people.
Now we know that the New Covenant is better than the old, and I think a lot of this has to do with seeing the shadow of Christ (forthcoming, revealed but not inaugurated in the Old Covenant), and partaking in the substance of Christ (now revealed, inaugurated, delivered as promised in the New Covenant).
My point: The Old Covenant believers had the same faith while under the Old Covenant that New Covenant believes have under the New Covenant. Were there differences? Absolutely. But God took it upon himself to take up the wrath against all believers for all time. Look at the inheritance that the Gentiles have in the epistle to the Hebrews, the perfection of God's sacrifice for ALL believers in Hebrews 10, the commendation of faith (the same commendation the Christian receives) in Hebrews 11. All of which was made possible by the revelation of the New Covenant in Genesis 3:16, and God's reconfirmation of that promise through the Old Covenant with Abraham, and the rest of the patriarchs. Thus the shadowy object of their faith was inaugurated as the full substance of the Christian's faith.
For this reason, I have strong reason to believe that God has never punished believers for their sins and blasphemies, in the Old Covenant, and in the New Covenant. The same unforgivable sin, blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, is that which God ultimately punishes all unrepentant believers for. But for the elect church, for all time, believers in the NT and the OT, God's punishment was meted out on himself, mirroring the promise he made with Abraham, taking the responsibility of the covenant upon himself in Genesis 15:17. He swore on himself because there was no greater one in Hebrews 6:13.
God promises to discipline His beloved, and promises to not punish them. And justice is preserved because Jesus took that sin upon himself, past. present, and future, and paid the penalty, and He was punished for our sins and blasphemies. He took our rags and gave us riches. It is consequently unjust for God to punish a believer when that punishment was already given to Christ, who died and rose again. It is consequently only just for God to discipline his beloved (Hebrews 12). It is consequently just for God to punish the unrepentant rebellious sinner. As God's wrath was satisfied by Jesus' death, and we are clothed in Jesus' righteousness, it is impossible for God to strike the Christian in wrath, for He would be striking himself, and that was already finished at Calgary.
SDG
Nick
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