1. Many people react to the teaching to the Restoration of All by saying, “then what is the purpose of the cross?” Let us ask you, what’s the point of a hospital that has discovered the cure for all diseases? Just because Calvary will prove to be 100% successful does not render Christ’s sacrifice unnecessary. What undermines the atonement is the teaching that either Christ died an ineffectual death or that He died for only a few, thereby a limited atonement.
2. If the view of eternal hell is supported by the Penal Substitutionary Atonement what about the fact that the ransom theory was held until Anselm and the PSA was not fully introduced until the Reformation? How is eternal hell defended in light of these models if neither were the model for the first thousand years of the Church? If the early Church held to a ransom/Christus Victor model then were they weaker or inferior believers since they did not have an understanding of the PSA in place?
3. Are there not many models of the atonement and is it not true that the Atonement defies our understanding leaving much to mystery leading to an understanding that encompasses many models and not just one? (See Scot McKnight’s book, A Community Called Atonement).
“We should not expect that our theories will ever explain it fully. Even when we put them all together, we will no more than begin to comprehend a little of the vastness of God’s saving deed.”
Leon Morris
4. If the fall of mankind was universal through Adam, and Christ is named the “second Adam” then why was His redemption not universal? Was the fall of man more powerful than the cross and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ?
“Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.” (Rom 5:18)
5. How would this passage sound if we were to read it with qualifications? “… Just as the result of one man was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification [for a few].”