|
Volume
Five - The Atonement
Between God and Man
(Click on chapter number to go to
text.)
| Foreword |
|
| Chapter
1 |
The
Fact and Philosophy of the Atonement |
| Chapter
2 |
The
Author of the Atonement |
| Chapter
3 |
The
Mediator of the Atonement –The Only Begotten One |
| Chapter
4 |
The
Mediator of the Atonement –The Undefiled One |
| Chapter
5 |
The
Mediator of the Atonement –“Made Like Unto His Brethren” and
“Touched with a Feeiling of Our Infirmities” |
| Chapter
6 |
The
Mediator of the Atonement –David’s Son and David’s Lord |
| Chapter
7 |
The
Mediator of the Atonement –“The Son of Man” |
| Chapter
8 |
The
Channel of the Atonement –The Holy Spirit of God |
| Chapter
9 |
The
Baptism, Witness and Seal of the Spirit of At-One-Ment |
| Chapter
10 |
The
Spirit of a Sound Mind |
| Chapter
11 |
The
Holy Spirit of At-One-Ment –Supposed Objections Considered |
| Chapter
12 |
The
Subject of the Atonement –Man |
| Chapter
13 |
Hopes
for Life Everlasting and Immortality Secured by the Atonement |
| Chapter
14 |
The
Necessity for the Atonement –The Curse |
| Chapter
15 |
“A
Ransom for All” the Only Basis for At-One-Ment |
| Chapter
16 |
The
Ministry of Reconciliation or At-One-Ment |
| Index |
|
“The
Path of the Just is as the Shining Light,
Which
Shineth More and More
Unto the
Perfect Day.”
“There
is One God, and One Mediator Between God and Men, the Man Christ Jesus;
Who Gave Himself a Ransom for All, to be Testified in Due Time.”
“We Also Joy in God Through our Lord Jesus Christ, by Whom We
Have Now received the Atonement.”
1 Timothy 2:5,6; Romans 5:11
To the King of Kings and Lord of
Lords
In
the interest of
His
consecrated Saints,
Waiting
for the adoption,
—
And of —
“All
that in every place call upon the Lord,”
“The
Household of Faith,”
—
And of —
The
groaning creation, travailing and waiting for the
manifestation
of the Sons of God,
This
Work Is Dedicated.
“To
make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery which from the
beginning
of
the world hath been hid in God.” “Wherein He hath abounded toward
us
in all wisdom and prudence, having made known unto us the
mystery
of His will, according to His good pleasure which
He
hath purposed in Himself; that in the dispensation
of
the fulness of the times He might gather
together
in one all things, under
Christ.”
Eph. 3:4,5,9; 1:8-10
Written
in
1899 by Pastor Russell
[foreword i]
“The
At-one-ment Between God and Man”
THE AUTHOR’S FOREWORD
THE
FIRST EDITION of this Volume was published in 1899. It is now in the hands of large numbers of God’s people in
various languages throughout the civilized world. Numerous letters tell us
of great help received from its pages in the elucidation of Divine
Truth—in the explanation of the Bible.
Some have found special help along one line, some along another;
and some along all lines. The
chapter entitled, “The Undefiled One,” relating to our Lord’s
assuming earthly conditions when born the babe at Bethlehem, has attracted
special attention, and has been declared by many to reflect a great light
upon a variety of Scriptural and scientific subjects.
With a system of theology which acknowledges its own fallibility,
and asks and expects Divine guidance and enlightenment to the end of the
Church’s journey, it seems remarkable that this Volume, written 19 years
ago, requires little correction, in order to be in full line with the
latest thought of Bible students respecting the teachings of the Divine
Word.
The keynote of this Volume is the Ransom-price.
Apparently this doctrine, from which radiates all other doctrines
connected with our salvation, has been in a great measure lost sight of,
obscured, from the time the apostles fell asleep in death until now. Bible students have found the Ransom to be the key which
unlocks the entire Bible—which decides at once what is Truth and what is
error.
It is not surprising that, appreciating the subject and studying it
so carefully, our views respecting it have become more and more clear.
The Bible statements respecting the Ransom have not in any wise
changed, nor has our confidence in them changed; but they are more
luminous; we [foreword ii] understand
them better. We hold that the
Bible statements on the subject are infallible, and that it is because we
are not infallible that our views are capable of expansion as we search
the Scriptures and are guided into the understanding of them as promised,
by the holy Spirit. We are
not demurring against the Divine Plan of gradual unfoldment, but rejoicing
in it. We have nothing to
apologize for. The Ransom looms before us more grandly with every fresh
ray of Divine Light.
Now we see that our Lord Jesus left the Heavenly glory that He
might accomplish a ransoming work for Adam and his race.
We see that His change of nature from a spirit to a human being was
with a view to enabling Him to be the Ransom-price—a perfect man for a
perfect man—Antilutron—a corresponding price.
We now see that Jesus gave Himself to be a Ransom-price for all at
the time of His consecration at thirty years of age at Jordan.
He continued in giving the Ransom-price, that is, in laying down
His life, which in due time would constitute the Ransom-price for Father
Adam and his race. He
finished this work of laying down His life, surrendering it, sacrificing
it, permitting it to be taken from Him, when He on the cross cried: “It
is finished!” Nothing more could be laid down than was there laid
down—a Ransom, a corresponding price, for Father Adam.
But it was not paid over as a price in settlement of Adam’s
account, else Adam and the entire sinner race would then and there have
been turned over to Jesus. The
price was merely laid in the hands of Divine Justice as a deposit, to the
credit of the One who had died, that He might apply it later in harmony
with the Divine Plan. Our
Lord Jesus was raised from the dead a spirit being of the Divine nature,
as a reward for His faithfulness and loyalty to God in surrendering His
earthly life sacrificially. “Him
hath God highly exalted and given a name above every name.”
Jesus could not make any use of the Ransom-price while [foreword iii] still on earth.
He could not even bring His disciples into fellowship with the
Father. Hence He declared:
“I ascend to My God and to your God, to My Father and to your Father.”
He also declared: “Except I go away, the holy Spirit will not come.” Ten days after our Lord ascended, His followers, having met
according to His direction in the upper room, received the Pentecostal
blessing—the evidence that they had been accepted of the Father through
the merit of Jesus’ sacrifice. Jesus
had used as an imputation the Ransom merit which He had deposited in the
Father’s hands; but He did not give it to His disciples. It was not for them as a possession, but for the world—”a
Ransom for all.” All of
Jesus’ disciples renounced their share in the Ransom blessings that are
coming to the world at the Second Advent of our Lord, that they may have a
share with the Redeemer in a still greater blessing—honor and
immortality. The Ransom-price is designed to bring to Adam and his race
the earthly life and earthly rights and honors which were lost by Father
Adam, when by disobedience he became a sinner, the loss being entailed
upon all of his family, the entire human race.
The time for giving the results of the Ransom, viz., Restitution to
Adam and his race, is after our Lord’s Second Advent, when He shall set
up His Kingdom, designed for the very purpose of bringing back the
rebellious race into full fellowship with the Father and to eternal
life—as many as will.
The Call of the Church is not to give an additional Ransom-price,
nor to add to that which Jesus gave; for His is sufficient.
The Church’s invitation is to demonstrate that they have the same
spirit, disposition, that Jesus had, to do the Father’s will at any
cost—even unto death; and those demonstrating this may be accepted of
the Father as members of a Royal Priesthood, of which Jesus is the Head;
as a Bride class, Jesus being the glorious Heavenly Bridegroom. It is
required that these come back to God under a Covenant [foreword iv] the
same as Jesus made, “Gather My saints together unto Me, those that have
made a Covenant with Me by sacrifice.” Psalm 50:5
Not until these shall have been called and chosen and found
faithful and been glorified, will the time come for Christ and His Bride
class to take control of the world for their uplift; and not until then
will it be proper for the Savior to transfer to Divine Justice the merit
of His death, which He placed in the Father’s hands as a deposit when
dying, with the words: “Father, into Thy hands I commit My
spirit” — My life and all of its rights.
When this Ransom-price shall have been formally delivered over to
Justice in the end of this Age, it will no longer be a deposit
at the command of the Savior but will have been exchanged for Adam and his
race, all of whom will be immediately transferred by the Father to the
Son, that His Millennial Kingdom may begin and all the families of the
earth be subjected to the Redeemer, that He may uplift them out of sin and
death conditions to all that was lost in Adam—to all for which Jesus
died to regain for man.
But the Church class, in process of selection for nearly nineteen
centuries, could not be acceptable sacrifices to God as was their
Redeemer, Jesus, because He alone was holy, harmless, undefiled—we are
imperfect, sinners, and God does not accept imperfect, blemished, sinful
sacrifices. What, then, could be done to make us acceptable sacrifices and
to permit us to be associated with Jesus on the spirit plane?
The proper thing was done—an imputation of the merit of Jesus was
granted by Divine Justice on behalf of all who would enter into a Covenant
of Sacrifice, and for whom Jesus would become Advocate, or Surety.
This imputation of the merit of His sacrifice to the Church by
Jesus might be likened to a mortgage, or an encumbrance, upon the
Ransom-sacrifice, which would hinder it from being applied to the world
until its application to the Church shall be completed.
[foreword v]
The Church’s Covenant is to sacrifice all their earthly life and
rights, that they may become New Creatures in Christ and joint-heirs with
Him on the spirit plane.
It was on the basis of this imputation of our coming Restitution
blessings, and our own personal consecration to the Lord, that our
Redeemer, acting as our great High Priest and Advocate, brought us into
that relationship with the Father’s Plan which permitted us to receive
the begetting of the holy Spirit, and to cease to be of the human family
and become members of the spiritual family, of which Jesus is the Head.
All of the Church, therefore, are sharers with Jesus in a work of
self-sacrifice, in that we tender ourselves to the Lord and He, as God’s
High Priest, offers us up as a part of His own sacrifice.
Thus we “fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of
Christ.” Thus we suffer
with Him that we may also reign with Him.
Not until all of the spirit-begotten ones shall have passed into
death will the merit of Christ, placed on deposit in the hands of Justice
when He died, and mortgaged in the interest of the Church, be released
from that mortgage and be ready for full application in the purchase of
Adam and his race under the terms of the New Covenant.
If we were writing this Volume again, we would here and there make
very minor differences of expression in harmony with what we have here
presented. We ask our readers
to have this in mind. The
differences are not of a kind that will permit us to say that the
expressions in the book are wrong—merely they are not as full and clear
as they might have been if the writing were to be done now.
For some up-to-date comments on the New Covenant, we request the
new readers to note the author’s foreword to “Studies,” Volume VI.
Your servant in the Lord,
Charles
T. Russell
Brooklyn,
N.Y.,
October
1, 1916
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