ELF Meeting Recap and Thoughts

Last evening I attended a meeting of the ELF which is a Tri-States group that meets and listens to fairly famed teachers, authors, and pastors. ELF I found out stands for Evangelical Leadreship Fraternal. It was extremely enjoyable to meet and fellowship with local men. A group from Galena headed by Gary Kirst puts this meeting together and there has been some power packed guys there, among them,

- D.A. Carson (last time)
- Steve Wellum (last night)
- Leland Ryken (next time)

The food was excellent, I sat next to Ken Fleming and we talked for a while. More than the food and more than the fellowship was the glorious message of the gospel relayed to us by Dr. Steve Wellum speaking on the topic "Substitutionary Atonment: A Biblical Teaching Under Fire". Mark Stevenson invited me to come after he saw my response - to what I feel is one of the biggest ordeals in Evangelicalism right now - on this blog.

In short Dr. Wellum produced a well thought summary of the problem and the deeper problems within the problem. First : The Problem,

People are ditching Penal Substitutionary Atonement (PSA from here forward) all over the place for a variety of reasons. The most prominenet of which are a) A compromise with society, we are a society of "Whatever is good for you is good for you" otherwise known as pluralism. b) Theological Illiteracy, we do what feels good and doctrine just gets lost. Doctrine is not just a "bag of marbles" which is how many people view it today. The church and many people are tending to "tinker with God" and change some things around very cleverly in the doctrines of wrath and sin. Ultimately however the cross is a "test case" for our theology.

Dr. Wellum went on to explain the many problems people have with PSA among them being: a) it makes God an unrighteous violent judge which He expressly says we must not be, b) it is just a "western" theory of things (which is exactly what I was responding to on my blog), c) it makes our salvation a mechanical transaction, d) it makes God unethical. These views are held either in part or in whole depending on who you read and talk to. Men like Joel Greene and Steve Chalke say that a bloody atonement theory is just "cosmic child abuse" and God is just a wrathful devil if we follow this view. Dr. Wellum made an excellent comment when he said, "penal substitution is not just a theory of the atonement...it is that which makes sense of scripture...nothing in the Bible makes sense without it."

From here I had a hard time keeping up in the note taking fashion as I was exhausted and my hand hurt so I only took down quotes and brief ideas but oh they are glorious quotes and ideas. I will be getting the message in full shortly on audia and I will either try to make it available or will directly transpose it for your intellectual delight.

The most important and fresh ways of saying the real problems with having problems with God being wrathful that he said was the idea that God is a judge. Its there in scripture (Duet 32:4, Gen 18:24) and we must not forget it. But God is not like a judge in a way. Or at least like an earthly judge. Because an earthly judge judges based on a law far separated from himself. But when judges based on a law, He is the law. God is His law and when He comes down off of that seat to take the penalty for what the law requires, HE makes the law, HE is the law, and only HE can satisfy the law. And this He does when He kills His only Son and essentially kills Himself for our sakes. This IS the gospel! Ok there will be more later.

For Our Bloodied Savior's Glory
Ryan