If Christ has borne whatever our sins deserved, and by doing so has satisfied God’s justice to the full, then God cannot, in justice, punish us for sin, for that would require the full payment from Christ and yet demand part of it from us… God does not chastise us as a means of satisfaction for sin, but for rebuke and caution, to bring us to mourn for sin committed, and to beware of the like. It must always be remembered that, although Christ has borne the punishment of sin, and although God has forgiven the saints for their sins, yet God may correct His people in a fatherly way for their sin. Christ endured the great shower of wrath, the black and dismal hours of displeasure for sin. That which falls upon us is as a sun-shine shower, warmth with wetness, wetness with the warmth of His love, to make us fruitful and humble… That which the believer suffers for sin is not penal, arising from vindictive justice, but medicinal, arising from a fatherly love. It is His medicine, not His punishment; His chastisement, not His sentence; His correction, not His condemnation.

Topics: Grace & Redemption, Guilt & Forgiveness, Suffering & the Question of God

Samuel Bolton

Samuel Bolton war ein englischer puritanischer Theologe und Geistlicher des 17. Jahrhunderts, der in London predigte sowie als Master des Christ’s College in Cambridge und Mitglied der Westminster-Synode wirkte. Bekanntheit erlangte er vor allem durch sein Werk „The True Bounds of Christian Freedom“, in dem er das Verhältnis von biblischem Gesetz und christlicher Freiheit zwischen Gesetzlichkeit und Antinomismus bestimmte. Für Bibelleser bietet sein Ansatz eine theologische Orientierung dazu, wie das Gesetz Gottes und die Botschaft der Gnade im gelebten Glauben zusammenwirken.

All quotes by Samuel Bolton (7)

Samuel Bolton

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