Every Christian ought to want to know more of the Father’s great love for us and our Savior’s dying work for us in the atonement. The cross is at the heart of the Gospel, the heart of the Christian faith and the heart of the Christian life. The cross of Christ is at the very center of Gospel proclamation, and thus a thorough, biblical grasp of this central truth is necessary for every Gospel minister.
The following lists and the following select, annotated bibliography are intended for growing Christians and Gospel ministers who are thirsting for more good material that will aid them in deepening their understanding of the meaning and significance and consequences of the death of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I hope that these reading suggestions will be helpful to many (not only as a “must read” list on the atonement for themselves, but also as a list that could be recommended by them for the use of other church leaders and members).
If you have no idea where to start, look at the following lists of suggestions. If you don’t know anything about the books in the various lists provided, take a look at the annotations to the full alphabetical bibliography following. In those annotations I hope to provide enticing and summarizing comments that will help draw you to books that will be helpful to your soul and ministry.
Ten on the Atonement
I’m about to give you a bunch of lists and then a fairly extensive annotated bibliography, so a shorter “best-of” list may help. This list of ten books leans to the popular and devotional side, but all the entries are sound and substantial. I’ve tried here to put them in a good order for reading.
1. John Piper, Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die (Wheaton: Crossway, 2006).
Very short chapters. Plenty to chew on theologically and devotionally.
2. Frederick S. Leahy, The Cross He Bore, The Victory of the Lamb, and Is It Nothing to You? (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1996, 2001, and 2004).
Maybe the least widely known author in this list. Powerful, pastoral expositions of the cross.
3. Philip Graham Ryken and James Montgomery Boice, The Heart of the Cross (Wheaton: Crossway, 2005).
Clear and edifying presentation of the atonement from two great American evangelical preachers.
4. B.B. Warfield, The Saviour of the World (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1991).
Sermons on the Savior by one of the greatest theologians of his age. Enough said.
6. Leon Morris, The Atonement: Its Meaning and Significance (Leicester: IVP, 1983).
A short treatment of this biblical truth by the beloved Australian Anglican.
7. John Murray, Redemption Accomplished and Applied (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1955).
Originally prepared for Sunday School, this book will challenge your vocabulary, but worth it.
8. John R.W. Stott, The Cross of Christ (Leicester: IVP, 1986).
The largest book on this list. Stott’s greatest theological work.
9. J.I. Packer and Mark Dever, In My Place Condemned He Stood: Celebrating the Glory of the Atonement (Wheaton: Crossway, 2008).
A number of Packer’s classic essays on the cross all in one place. Don’t miss it.
10. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., F.L. Battles trans. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960), esp. 1:464-534.
The theologian. On the cross. Seventy glorious, devotional, doxological pages.
Short, Popular Introductions
If you are looking for a good launching point into the vast ocean of sound teaching available on the doctrine of the atonement, and you’d like to read something accessible that would give you a feel for the subject and be edifying at the same time, try the following. To find out more about them read the annotated bibliography at the end of this section.
Jerry Bridges and Bob Bevington, The Great Exchange (Wheaton: Crossway, 2007).
Jerry Bridges loves Smeaton on the atonement – an important work that this book popularizes.
R.C. Sproul, The Truth of the Cross (Orlando: Reformation Trust, 2007).
Respected theologian, prolific writer and prominent popularizer of solid doctrine teaches us the cross.
Ian J. Shaw and Brian H. Edwards, The Divine Substitute: The atonement in the Bible and history (Leominster: DayOne, 2006).
In under 150 pages Shaw and Edwards provide a sound biblical and historical introduction to the doctrine of the atonement.
Tom Wells, A Price for a People: The Meaning of Christ’s Death (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1992).
Wells’ book focuses on the biblical material. He is a Baptist pastor in Ohio.
Sermons
Make a habit of reading and listening to sermons on the atoning work of Christ. There is no better way to prepare to teach and preach and live the cross yourself. So read and listen to the masters preach the cross.
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Romans: Atonement and Justification (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1970).
What can one say about Lloyd-Jones? Piper listens to him! These sermons contain powerful models for preaching atonement and justification.
Hugh Martin, Christ for Us (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1998).
If you think Martin’s The Atonement is truth on fire (and it is!), then buckle your seatbelts for his preaching.
C.H. Spurgeon, Spurgeon’s Sermons on the Cross of Christ (Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1993).
The prince of preachers. Read any and everything you can get by him, and make a beeline for the cross.
B.B. Warfield, The Saviour of the World (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1991).
You’ll never be able to think about John 3:16 in the same way again after reading Warfield’s sermon.
Mark Dever and Michael Lawrence, It Is Well: Expositions on Substitutionary Atonement (Wheaton: Crossway, 2010).
Sermons preached at Capitol Hill Baptist Church on great biblical texts on the cross.
Pastoral Application of the Doctrine of the Atonement
Need help in seeing how the cross applies to life and ministry? Here are two good examples.
D.A. Carson, The Cross and Christian Ministry (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2004).
Carson shows us how the cross works out (or should work out) in the church’s Gospel ministry.
C.J. Mahaney, Living the Cross-Centered Life (Sisters: Multnomah, 2006).
Nobody applies the truth like C.J. Want the atonement worked into your bones? Read this.
Systematic Theologies
If you wanted to dip into some representative systematic theologies, but you don’t know where to start, here are five good entries with strengths all their own.
Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology, New Combined Edition (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), esp. 367-399.
Berkhof is hard to beat for historical overview, clear orthodox presentation and discerning evaluation.
James P. Boyce, Abstract of Systematic Theology (Hanford: den Dulk Foundation), esp. 295-340.
A classic, solid, Baptist presentation on the atonement, by the Al Mohler of his day!
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., F.L. Battles trans. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960), esp. 1:464-534.
The fountainhead of the Reformed tradition. Do not miss Calvin on this topic!
Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), esp. 568-607.
Probably the easiest to read of these five. Great for using as a teaching outline on the subject.
Robert L. Reymond, A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1998), esp. 623-795.
An extensive exegetical-theological treatment by a solid, conservative, contemporary theologian.
Chronological Listing of Works of Historic Significance on the Atonement
Two criteria above others have ruled in the making of this brief list: significance and edification. One could have made a very long list that stretched back in time (I can hear some saying: where are Irenaeus, Origen, Augustine, Anselm and Luther?), or that ranged a bit more broadly in more recent literature (again, one could ask: where are Ritschl, McLeod Campbell, F.D. Maurice, P.T. Forsyth, Aulén, Denney, Brunner and Barth?). But this list is deliberately restrictive. The works included are significant in themselves and in their contexts, and are of the highest value for the positive edification of the reader. Again, see the annotated bibliography at the end for fuller descriptions of these authors and books.
(1559) John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., F.L. Battles trans. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960), esp. 1:464-534.
Most important theological work of the last half-millennium.
(1647) John Owen, The Death of Death in the Death of Christ (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1959).
The classic work by the greatest of the British Calvinists.
(1679) Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 3 vols. Giger trans., Dennison, ed. (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1994), esp. 2:375-499.
The “queen of the sciences” according to the “king” of seventeenth century Protestant Orthodoxy.
(1861) Heinrich Heppe, Reformed Dogmatics, trans. G.T. Thomson (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1978), esp. 448-509.
Quotations from the main continental Reformed scholars during the age of “Protestant Orthodoxy.”
(1867) A.A. Hodge, The Atonement (Memphis: Footstool, 1987).
The classic nineteenth century Princeton treatment of this subject.
(1868) George Smeaton, Christ’s Doctrine of the Atonement (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1991).
One of the Free Church of Scotland’s brightest lights expounds and defends the doctrine.
(1870) George Smeaton, The Doctrine of the Atonement according to the Apostles (Peabody: Hendriksen, 1988).
The sequel to the previous volume by one of the leading Scottish pastor-theologians of his day.
(1870) Hugh Martin, The Atonement (Greenville: Reformed Academic Press, 1997).
Heat and light. Truth on fire. A combination of orthodoxy, originality and passion.
(1887) James P. Boyce, Abstract of Systematic Theology (Hanford: den Dulk Foundation), esp. 295-340.
Classic nineteenth century treatment. Clear and sound, really helpful for outlining the subject.
(1895-1901) Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 4 Vols., Vriend trans. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2003-2008), esp. 3:323-482.
Major early twentieth century orthodox Dutch work, now (finally) fully available in English.
(1902-1917) B.B. Warfield, The Person and Work of Christ (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1950).
Greatest of the Princeton theologians. But reading Warfield makes you mad at him that he didn’t write a systematic theology!
(1939) Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology, New Edition (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), esp. 367-399.
The standard English-language Reformed systematic theology. The starting point for all reading in systematics on any topic for English readers.
(1955) John Murray, Redemption Accomplished and Applied (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1955).
This is, simply put, a “must read.” If you haven’t read it, you are not ready to talk theology.
(1965) Leon Morris, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross, (Leicester: IVP, 1965).
The classic, modern, evangelical exposition and defense of the historic Christian doctrine.
(1986) John R.W. Stott, The Cross of Christ (Leicester: IVP, 1986).
Stott’s magnum opus. Essential reading.
(2007) Steve Jeffrey, Mike Ovey, Andrew Sach, Pierced for our Transgressions (in UK -Leicester: IVP / in US – Wheaton: Crossway, 2007).
A strong, recent evangelical entry into the fray with those denying penal substitution. Excellent.
(2008) J.I. Packer and Mark Dever, In My Place Condemned He Stood: Celebrating the Glory of the Atonement (Wheaton: Crossway, 2008).
Classic J.I. Packer expositions of the meaning and significance of the atonement.
(2013) David Gibson and Jonathan Gibson, From Heaven He Came and Sought Her: Definite Atonement in Historical, Biblical, Theological, and Pastoral Perspective (Wheaton: Crossway, 2013).
The most powerful recent evangelical defense and exposition of the doctrine of definite atonement.
Important Confessional Statements on the Atonement
Don’t cheat yourself by not reading what the evangelical churches have confessed about the meaning and accomplishment of the death of Christ over the last 500 years. As important as the theological works I’ve just listed are, Protestants have always given even more weight to what the churches have corporately confessed as their public theology (that is, what the churches have professed to be the teaching of Scripture and their public embrace of it). You can read these short, confessional statements in a matter of minutes, but spend the rest of your life understanding them more deeply, and appreciating their beautiful and faithful testimony to biblical truth.
(1530) Augsburg Confession (Lutheran) 3. http://www.ctsfw.edu/etext/boc/ac/augustana03.asc
(1536) Smalcald Articles (Lutheran) Part One, Second Part,1-5 Office and Work of Christ, or Our Redemption. http://www.lcms.org/graphics/assets/media/LCMS/smalcald.pdf
(1560) Scots Confession (Presbyterian) 9. http://www.creeds.net/reformed/Scots/scots.htm#Passion
(1561) Belgic Confession (Reformed) 21. http://www.carm.org/creeds/belgic.htm#Article%2021
(1563) Thirty Nine Articles (Anglican) 2 and 11. http://www.acl.asn.au/39articles.html
(1562/4) Second Helvetic Confession(Reformed) 11. http://www.sacred-texts.com/chr/2helvcnf.htm
(1618/19) Canons of Dordt (Reformed) 2nd Head. http://www.mb-soft.com/believe/txh/dort1.htm
(1647) Westminster Confession (Presbyterian, Anglican, Congregationalist) 8.3-8. http://www.reformed.org/documents/wcf_with_proofs/
(1658) Savoy Declaration (Congregationalist)8.3-8 http://www.creeds.net/congregational/savoy/index.htm
(1689) London Confession (Baptist) 8.3-10. http://www.vor.org/truth/1689/1689bc08.html
(1833) New Hampshire Confession (Baptist) 4. http://www.spurgeon.org/~phil/creeds/nh_conf.htm#4
(1858) Abstract of Principles (Southern Baptist) 7. http://www.founders.org/abstract.html
Annotated Bibliography
Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 4 Vols., Vriend trans. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2003-2008), esp. 3:323-482.
Bavinck (1854-1921) was a giant of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century Protestant theological world. His complete massive systematic theology is finally now being made available in an English translation. The third volume contains his treatment of the work of Christ. Bavinck groups his presentation of this material under the headings of “Christ’s Humiliation” and “Christ’s Exaltation” – a classic way of approaching this subject in dogmatics.
Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology, New Combined Edition (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), esp. 367-399.
Berkhof (1873-1954) has probably been the most widely used modern Reformed systematic theology text in English since the middle of the twentieth century. It is an important reference work for the shelf of every Protestant pastor. I highly recommend the most recent edition by Eerdmans (they are calling it the “New Combined Edition”) with a new preface by Richard Muller, which includes Berkhof’s Introduction to the Study of Systematic Theology. Berkhof is brilliant at giving good, clear, quick summaries of the history of a doctrine and various schools of thought, and he is superb at outlining the main points of discussion in relation to any given doctrine. His treatment of the doctrine of the atonement is solid and helpful.
James P. Boyce, Abstract of Systematic Theology (Hanford: den Dulk Foundation), esp. 295-340.
Boyce (1827-1888) was the founder of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (and really “the leading founder of the vision for organized theological education within the Southern Baptist Convention”) and a man of powerful intellect, great learning and cultural breadth. He was the son of one of the wealthiest men in South Carolina, and grew up in one of the most cultured cities in America of his day (Charleston, SC). He was educated in some of the best institutions of that time (Charleston College, Brown University and Princeton Seminary), sat under the preaching of outstanding ministers in his youth (Basil Manly, Sr., Richard Fuller and James Henley Thornwell) and studied with the principal conservative American theologians of his era (including Archibald Alexander and Charles Hodge). These are his classnotes from SBTS. They give insight into the mainstream Baptist theology of the atonement in the nineteenth century and provide a useful outline for study. By the way, no one who has occupied the presidency of Southern Seminary since Boyce is more like Boyce in intellect, theology and attainments than the current president, R. Albert Mohler.
Jerry Bridges and Bob Bevington, The Great Exchange (Wheaton: Crossway, 2007).
Jerry Bridges (1929- ) is one of the very best and most reliable popularizers of sound Bible teaching today. This book is subtitled “My Sin for His Righteousness – An Exposition of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, Patterned after The Apostles’ Doctrine of the Atonement by George Smeaton.” Smeaton’s book is one of Jerry Bridges’ all-time favorites, and so, in this more easily readable rendition of Smeaton, Jerry and Bob Bevington give the reader a feast for the soul. If you want to put a book into the hands of layfolk that covers the ground that Smeaton covers (see the entries on Smeaton in this annotated bibliography), but is more accessible, this is it. By the way, in terms of applying the cross and the Gospel to daily life, no one does a better job than Jerry. My friend C.J. Mahaney highly recommends Jerry’s book The Gospel for Real Life (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2002).
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., F.L. Battles trans. (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960), esp. 1:464-534.
Calvin (1509-1564) is generally regarded as one of the best exegetes and theologians in the whole history of Christian theology. Usually ranked with Augustine and Aquinas in stature and influence, Calvin is one of the principle fountainheads of the now half-millennium old Reformed tradition. The Institutes is his magnum opus. I commend to you the Battles edition (rather than the older Beveridge translation). Calvin’s treatment of the atonement comes in Book II of the Institutes under the heading “The Knowledge of God the Redeemer in Christ, Disclosed to the Fathers under the Law, and then to us in the Gospel.” Especially beginning with chapter XII and running through chapter XVII, Calvin’s treatment of the person and work of Christ will well repay your study. To be noted is Calvin’s deliberate and emphatic retention of the category of “merit” in relation to the work of Christ. He says: “There are certain perversely subtle men who–even though they confess that we receive salvation through Christ–cannot bear to hear the word ‘merit,’ for they think that it obscures God’s grace.” In contrast, Calvin asserts that the Bible teaches that “By his obedience, Christ truly acquired and merited grace for us with his Father.”
D.A. Carson, The Cross and Christian Ministry (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2004).
Don Carson (1946- ) is yet another important evangelical figure whose writings are mentioned in this bibliography. Long considered among the very first rank of international evangelical scholarship, Carson was born in Canada (thus his fluent French), studied chemistry and mathematics at McGill University in Montreal, then graduated from Central Baptist Seminary in Toronto, thereafter pastoring Richmond Baptist Church in British Columbia. He did his PhD at Cambridge under the renowned scholar Barnabas Lindars and then taught at Northwest Baptist Theological College in Vancouver, serving as founding dean of the Seminary there. Ken Kantzer, the dean of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois, coaxed him there to teach in 1978 (and he remains there to this day, now as research professor of New Testament). Carson has held editorial posts with the Trinity Journal (editor, 1980–86) and the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society (book review editor, 1979–86), is editor of the New Studies in Biblical Theology series (IVP/Apollos), as well as editor of the Pillar Commentary series (IVP/Apollos/Eerdmans), just to name a few. This book focuses on 1 Corinthians and by careful exegesis draws applications from the work of Christ on the cross for the church’s manner of ministry. Carson (along with Tim Keller) gives leadership to the Gospel Coalition (see www.thegospelcoalition.org).
James Denney, The Death of Christ (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1902).
Denney’s work is a classic, and reflects its author’s intense evangelistic passion. Denney (1856-1917) was a Scottish Presbyterian minister and professor (in the Free Church, and then the United Free Church of Scotland). He was brilliant (earning a rare “double first” in classics and philosophy from Glasgow University) and pious (reading Spurgeon’s sermons helped him retain evangelical and Reformed convictions while many of his most admired contemporaries and teachers were falling under the influence of liberal theology). He is famous for his statement: “I haven’t the faintest interest in any theology which doesn’t help me to evangelize.” Though Denney held views that made evangelicals (on both sides of the Atlantic) somewhat uneasy, his book is in the main a robust defense of classic penal substitionary atonement (though he doesn’t want to use legal, judicial or forensic terms in relation to the atonement). Denney also rejects the category of “merit” in relation to the work of Christ, as well as any doctrine of mystical union with Christ (he only allowed for a consequent moral union).
Mark Dever and Michael Lawrence, It Is Well: Expositions on Substitutionary Atonement (Wheaton: Crossway, 2010).
This book is made up of a series of expository messages on the topic of Christ’s substitutionary atonement for sinners, based on fourteen key texts from the Old and New Testaments, and originally preached to the congregation of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, DC by pastors Mark Dever and Michael Lawrence. It Is Well “not only encourages pastors to preach this essential doctrine for the strengthening of the church, but it helps individual believers understand and exult in the richness of God’s love in Christ.”
P.T. Forsyth, The Cruciality of the Cross (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 1997).
Forsyth (1842-1921) was a Scottish Congregational pastor and theologian who studied at Göttingen (under Albrecht Ritschl). Though Forsyth was early influenced by higher critical approaches to Christianity, he increasingly rejected and polemicized against liberal theology. A central issue of conflict and resolution in his own theological journey was the doctrine of the atoning work of Christ. This book (first published by Hodder and Stoughton in London in 1910) is one of his best known and helpful expositions of this theme. Forsyth (under the lingering influence of Adolf von Harnack) unfortunately held on to a kenotic doctrine of the incarnation (although he had a twist on his view, different from the well-known version of Bishop Charles Gore). His rebuke of liberal Christianity is set out in what may be his most famous work, The Person and Place of Christ (1909). Forsyth is often considered a sort of proto-neo-orthodox theologian (accurately or not).
David Gibson and Jonathan Gibson, From Heaven He Came and Sought Her: Definite Atonement in Historical, Biblical, Theological, and Pastoral Perspective (Wheaton: Crossway, 2013).
This book is a formidable and persuasive historical, exegetical, systematic and pastoral presentation of definite atonement. By the time you have read the first chapter, those familiar with this terrain will realize that the editors know exactly the key issues and figures to address in this debate. They cite all the right discussants and their footnotes highlight the most important texts. And none of the authors who follow disappoints. There is much to be learned in every chapter. The tone is calm and courteous, the scholarship rigorous and relentless, the argument clear and compelling. This is an impressive discussion that takes into account the major modern academic criticisms of definite atonement (Barth, the Torrances, Armstrong, Kendall and others) as well as more popular critiques (like Clifford, Driscoll and Breshears). Students will get an education in systematic theology even in the historical sections. An impressive team of scholars adorns their subject and aims to help Christians (as John Piper explains) toward a deeper gratitude to God for grace, a greater assurance of salvation, a sweeter fellowship with God, stronger affections in their worship of Him, more love for people and superior courage and sacrifice in witness and service, and indeed to propel us into the global work of missions with compassion and confidence. Let it come to pass, Lord.
Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), esp. 568-607.
Wayne Grudem (1948- ) is a well-known evangelical scholar, who along with John Piper has done as much as anyone to foster a wider understanding and embrace of the Bible’s teaching on male-female role relationships in the home and church (a view known as “complementarianism”) in the context of our dominant egalitarian culture. Grudem is also an accomplished teacher of biblical doctrine. His Systematic Theology has a very helpful section on the atonement (he argues for “definite atonement” or “particular redemption” but proposes some cautions), with a good bibliography of works by Anglican, Arminian, Baptist, Dispensational, Lutheran, Reformed, Charismatic and Roman Catholic systematic treatments of the doctrine of the atonement. Grudem may be the most concise and accessible, comprehensive, one-volume systematic theology on the market today. Though it is not a factor in this discussion, the reader may want to note that Grudem is a “non-cessationist” or “continuationist” on the issue of NT Spiritual gifts.
Paul Helm, Calvin and the Calvinists (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1982).
Since at least the time of Perry Miller and Karl Barth, a myth has been popular in some circles of historical theological studies that there is a major divide between Calvin and the so-called Protestant Scholastic theologians of the seventeenth century. Consequently, if you are reading this material, you’ll find Calvin contrasted with Owen, or pitted against the Westminster Confession or the Puritans. The shorthand description of this historiography is “Calvin versus the Calvinists” and no one has done more to explode this myth than Richard Muller (read Christ and the Decree). Well, Paul Helm (1940-, brilliant, English, Baptist, professor of philosophy) is responding in this little book to a “Calvin versus the Calvinists” dissertation by R.T. Kendall called “Calvin and English Calvinism to 1649.” Helm focuses on the question of the atonement. The book gives you a good, short, historical and theological introduction to the subject matter. And Helm is right. By the way, Banner of Truth is a publisher that you need to have bookmarked – www.banneroftruth.org.
Martin Hengel, Crucifixion: In the Ancient World and the Folly of the Message of the Cross (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977).
This volume contains tremendous background information on the act of crucifixion. One reviewer says of it: “In a comprehensive and detailed survey on its remarkably widespread employment in the Roman empire, Dr. Hengel (1926- ) examines the way in which ‘the most vile death of the cross’ was regarded in the Greek-speaking world and particularly in Roman-occupied Palestine. His conclusions bring out more starkly than ever the offensiveness of the Christian message: Jesus not only died an unspeakably cruel death, he underwent the most contemptible abasement that could be imagined. So repugnant was the gruesome reality, that a natural tendency prevails to blunt, remove, or domesticate its scandalous impact. Yet any discussion of a ‘theology of the cross’ must be preceded by adequate comprehension of both the nature and extent of this scandal.” Hengel taught New Testament and Early Judaism at Tübingen.
Heinrich Heppe, Reformed Dogmatics, trans. G.T. Thomson (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1978), esp. 448-509.
This book, first published in German in 1861 (translated and published in English in 1950, and then reprinted by Baker in the U.S. in 1978), is an important source-book of quotations in the main topical headings of systematic theology drawn from the writings of some of the most important Protestant Scholastic (better, “Protestant Orthodox”) theologians of the seventeenth century. It will give you a quick feel for the language and categories they employed, and supply you with great quotes to use for teaching. Karl Barth himself was deeply respectful of this volume, even though his own theology departed from it. Indeed, Barth paid these theologians a great compliment when he said of them (in contrast to the theologians of his day, – and many of our own!) “You always know what they are saying.” Heppe (1820-1879) himself was (to borrow the words of Lowell Zuck) “a Melanchthonian Liberal in the Nineteenth-Century German Reformed Church” but the theologians and quotations he assembles in this important collection are thoroughly evangelical and orthodox. This book may be hard to get a hold of (I keep hearing that Richard Muller is working on producing a more accurate, expanded and re-translated edition), but it is well worth finding, obtaining, having and reading (it has been recently reprinted by the Wakeman Trust in England).
Charles H. Hill and Frank A. James, eds., The Glory of the Atonement (Downers Grove, IVP, 2004).
This is a solid collection of exegetical, historical and practical essays on the atonement by well-known evangelical scholars (among them, Don Carson, Dick Gaffin, Henri Blocher, Sinclair Ferguson, J.I. Packer, Kevin Vanhoozer, Joel Beeke and more) produced as a festschrift for the important, modern, French, evangelical and Reformed, Baptist theologian Roger Nicole (himself one of the leading historians and theologians of our era regarding the doctrine of the atonement).The volume offers a scholarly overview of the Old and New Testaments’ teaching on atonement, then provides a scholarly historical treatment of the doctrine of atonement in the theology of select, key figures in Christian history, and concludes with two excellent pieces focused on applying the doctrine of the atonement (Packer on atonement and the Christian life; and Ferguson on preaching the atonement). Nicole himself provides a little gem at the end of the book in his “Postscript on Penal Substitution.” By the way, Chuck Hill (1956 – ) is a world-class NT and patristics scholar, and Frank James (1953 – ) is a recognized Peter Martyr Vermigli expert.
A.A. Hodge, The Atonement (Memphis: Footstool, 1987).
The son of famous Princeton theologian Charles Hodge, A.A. Hodge (1823-1886) succeeded his father as professor of systematic theology at Princeton. Known for his powerful, reverent and acute mind, A.A. Hodge (along with B.B. Warfield) played an important role in defending the historic, Christian, high view of Scripture (inerrancy). He wrote this little treatise on the atonement in 1867. If you can find it, in any edition or printing, get it. It offers an excellent presentation of the nature and application of the atonement of Christ.
Steve Jeffrey, Mike Ovey, Andrew Sach, Pierced for our Transgressions (Wheaton: Crossway and Leicester: IVP, 2007).
Aptly subtitled “Recovering the Glory of Penal Substitution,” this important book is a team effort at expounding, commending and defending the historic, evangelical, biblical doctrine of the atonement – a view very much under assault from a variety of directions in modern day evangelicalism. If you have been shaken by these recent attacks on penal substitution, you need to read this book. The utterly impressive list of endorsers of the volume tells you (1) how important this doctrine is, (2) how neglected, misunderstood, unknown, underappreciated and unpreached it is, (3) how endangered it is and (4) how good a job this book does of defending it. Anglican Bishop N.T. Wright thought this volume important enough to issue a scathing review of it. In their completely courteous but devastating rejoinder to Bishop Wright – Jeffrey, Ovey and Sach showed themselves every bit a match to his prodigious scholarship, and superior in their grasp and presentation of this vital doctrine. Go to http://piercedforourtransgressions.com/ and read the exchange, and find more resources on this vital doctrine. Jeffrey and Sach are Anglican clergymen, and Ovey is Principal and Lecturer in Doctrine and Apologetics at Oak Hill Theological College in England.
Frederick S. Leahy, The Cross He Bore, The Victory of the Lamb, and Is It Nothing to You? (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1996, 2001, and 2004).
Leahy (1922-2006) was a revered minister in the Reformed Presbyterian Church (Northern Ireland). He served in the chair of Systematic Theology, Apologetics and Christian Ethics in the Reformed Theological College, Belfast, and also as College Principal from 1993-2002. A much-appreciated writer, his trilogy on Christ’s atoning work is not to be missed – The Cross He Bore (1996), The Victory of the Lamb (2001) and Is it Nothing to You? (2004) .
Robert Letham, The Work of Christ (Downers Grove: IVP, 1993).
Robert Letham (1947- ) teaches at Wales Evangelical School of Theology and is a Visiting Professor of Theology at Reformed Theological Seminary, Washington DC, and Adjunct Professor of Systematic Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia. Before going to Wales he was Senior Minister of Emmanuel Presbyterian Church (OPC), Wilmington, Delaware, and before that Senior Lecturer in Christian doctrine at London Bible College. He is author of a number of significant works including, The Holy Trinity (P&R, 2004) and Through Western Eyes (Mentor, 2007). This solid treatment of the work of Christ is organized around what theologians call munus triplex, the threefold office of Christ as prophet, priest and king. The volume shows insights from significant interactions with the Scottish Barthian school of theology, and contains an appendix that recasts the traditional debates on the extent of the atonement by refocusing on the question of the intent of the atonement.
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Romans: Atonement and Justification (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1970).
Lloyd-Jones (1899-1981), a (perhaps the) major British evangelical leader of the twentieth century, was one of the great preachers of his day, and a key contributor to the present resurgence of Reformed theology in the English-speaking world. J.I. Packer calls him “the greatest man I have ever known.” His influence on men who themselves would become major evangelical figures was immense. “The Doctor” was a past master of doctrinal, applicatory, experiential expository preaching. Read more about him at Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones Online (www.misterrichardson.com) or hear his sermons at MLJ Recordings Trust (www.mlj.org.uk). Read Iain Murray’s two volume biography of him David Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The First Forty Years 1899-1939 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1982) and David Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The Fight of Faith 1939-1981 (1990). The sermons in this volume are from a series he preached in March of 1968. This volume covers Romans 3:20-4:25 and contains riveting messages on “Propitiation,” “The Blood of Jesus Christ” and “The Vindication of God.”
H.D. McDonald, The Atonement of the Death of Christ (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985).
This is an excellent reference work. It gives a helpful doctrinal, biblical and (especially) historical overview of the doctrine of the atonement. McDonald (c.1910-2001), lectured for many years at London Bible College and served as Vice Principal. The evaluations of various historic views of the atonement are even-handed and sympathetic, but discerning.
Donald Macleod, The Humiliated and Exalted Lord (Greenville: Reformed Academic Press, 1994).
Donald Macleod (1940-, former Principal and Professor of Theology at the Free Church of Scotland College, Edinburgh) is, perhaps, Scotland’s best kept secret in the late twentieth/early twenty-first century. No one preaches the cross better than Macleod. This little book is based on lectures originally given at a Theological Studies Fellowship conference in Swanwick, Derbyshire, England in the mid-1970s. They were transcribed and published with minor editing (under the title Philippians 2 and Christology) by the Universities and Colleges Christian Fellowship’s (UCCF, formerly Inter-Varsity Fellowship or IVF) Theological Studies Fellowship (TSF). By the way, Macleod’s chapter entitled “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling” in his book Behold Your God (Christian Focus Publications, 1995) contains a compelling exposition and defense of the historic Reformed doctrine of the unique love of God for the elect. Very significant in setting forth the doctrine of the nature, effect and extent of the atonement. Visit christianfocus.com and reformedacademicpress.com.
Donald Macleod, Christ Crucified: Understanding the Atonement (IVP Academic, 2014)
This is Donald Macleod’s magnum opus on the work of Christ (and should be read along with his magisterial volume on The Person of Christ, IVP Academic, 1998). Professor Macleod, whose whole cycle of systematics lectures I devoured while studying next door at New College, University of Edinburgh, is now retired. He earned the MA from Glasgow University and received the DD from Westminster Theological Seminary. He served as professor and chair of systematic theology at the Free Church of Scotland College in Edinburgh (now called Edinburgh Theological Seminary – visit them here: http://www.freescotcoll.ac.uk/ ) and also as the school’s principal. He pastored Kilmallie Free Church and then Patrick Highland Free Church in Glasgow, Scotland. He was editor of The Monthly Record of the Free Church and a columnist in the West Highland Free Press and The Observer newspapers.
C.J. Mahaney, Living the Cross Centered Life (Sisters: Multnomah, 2006).
C.J. Mahaney (1953- ) loves to joke at his own expense about his lack of academic attainments, but I’d give my degrees, my academic credentials and my ecclesiastical honors if I could live and preach the cross-centered life like C.J. does. C.J. summarizes the Gospel like this “God sent his Son to the cross to bear his wrath for sinners like you and me.” That all-important message is the core of Living the Cross Centered Life, subtitled Keeping the Gospel the Main Thing. This book weaves together content from C.J.’s two previous books, The Cross Centered Life and Christ Our Mediator. The revision retains all the wisdom of both previous books while adding even more material, showing how to center every day around the life-giving reality of the gospel.
Hugh Martin, The Atonement (Greenville: Reformed Academic Press, 1997).
This work is yet another classic. Hugh Martin (1822-1885) was a minister in the Free Church of Scotland, pastoring in Panbride and Edinburgh. He was editor of the famed The British and Foreign Evangelical Review and The Watchword. Martin was not alone amongst Scottish defenders of the atonement (Robert Candlish, George Smeaton and Thomas Crawford come readily to mind), but his work was “unsurpassed as a synthesis of orthodoxy and originality.” This important work relates the biblical doctrine of the atonement to the covenant of grace, federal theology, Christ’s priestly office, including Christ’s work of intercession, and (implicitly) responds to various contemporary (nineteenth century) errors on the subject. Again, find it at reformedacademicpress.com .
Hugh Martin, Christ for us (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1998).
This collection of sermons displays Martin at his best, preaching the cross. Principal John Macleod of the Free College says this of him: “Dr. Martin was, in respect of sheer intellectual and spiritual power, in the very first rank of the Scottish Reformed Church during all the course of its history.” Another book that displays his preaching of the cross is still in print as well, The Shadow of Calvary (Banner of Truth). It would be a good habit for every evangelical preacher always to be reading something on the atonement, and especially the best sermons on the atonement. Such a practice gets our hearts ready to run to the cross in our own preaching.
Leon Morris, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross, (Leicester: IVP, 1965).
Leon Morris (1914-2006) was one of the leading evangelical New Testament scholars of the twentieth century, and served as principal of Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia. This work, rightly deemed a modern-day evangelical classic, delves into the biblical doctrine of atonement by looking at the terms and ideas of redemption, covenant, blood, Lamb of God, propitiation, reconciliation and justification. The content is evangelical and scholarly. Written against the backdrop of (for instance) C.H. Dodd’s denial of the concept of propitiation in favor of the idea of expiation (because of his rejection of the idea of the personal wrath of God, which Dodd called “a thoroughly archaic idea”), and informed by a massive, decade-long investigation not only of the biblical data, but also of its contemporary context, Morris’ work established the scriptural basis of the historic, confessional, orthodox approach to the preaching of the cross. He called it not a “full-scale study of the atonement, but a necessary preliminary.” Get the third revised edition. If you just can’t get enough of Morris (and he is so good!) read his massive The Cross in the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1965).
Leon Morris, The Atonement: Its Meaning and Significance (Leicester: IVP, 1983).
Think of this book as a popularized version of The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross. From the very beginning of his academic career, Morris made the doctrine of the atonement a special point of study. It shows.
John Murray, Redemption Accomplished and Applied (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1955).
John Murray (1898-1975) was professor of Systematic Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. An outstanding theologian and exegete (if you don’t have his commentary on Romans [Eerdmans], you should), Murray penned this short but heavy classic, based on a series of Sunday School lessons! Fred Zaspel says: “Every pastor should read and re-read John Murray’s Redemption Accomplished and Applied until the entire book is completely digested and has thoroughly affected his entire frame of reference. It is one of the most helpful little volumes on the work of Christ you can ever get your hands on.” I agree. As I first read this book, thunder and lightning exploded all around, as my heart encountered blazing evangelical truth expressed with precision, erudition and passion. I never fail to be moved when I return to it.
Roger Nicole, Standing Forth (Fearn: Mentor, 2002), esp. 244-385.
Roger Nicole (1915-2010) was one of the founding fathers of modern evangelicalism. He was a charter member of the Evangelical Theological Society (and one of its first presidents), co-founder of the Gordon Review (now the Christian Scholar’s Review), professor at Gordon-Conwell and Reformed Seminaries (for a half-century!), helped organize the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy, has been a contributing editor to Christianity Today for more than fifty years, and assisted in the production of the NIV and in the New Geneva Study Bible. He was also one of the world’s leading experts on the theology and history of the atonement (very few there were who could have had an intelligent conversation with him on the subject, such was his command of the literature, history and issues). The center section of these collected scholarly writings of Nicole is devoted to the atonement. In six chapters he tackles: (1) a definition of the atonement; (2) the nature of redemption; (3) Calvin’s view of the extent of the atonement; (4) the controversy over universal grace in the mid-seventeenth century; (5) covenant, universal call and definite atonement; and (6) C.H. Dodd on propitiation. Masterly.
John Owen, The Death of Death in the Death of Christ (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1959).
John Owen (1616-1683) was the Vice Chancellor of Oxford. Learn more about him at johnowen.org. Modern-day giants J.I. Packer and Sinclair Ferguson say this about him, “To read John Owen is to enter a rare world. Whenever I return to one of his works I find myself asking ‘Why do I spend time reading lesser literature?’” (Sinclair B. Ferguson). “I owe more to John Owen than to any other theologian, ancient or modern” (J.I. Packer). “There is constantly in Owen, even when we are in the thick of him (and some of his writing is dense indeed) a doxological motive and motif. If we can persevere with his style (which becomes easier the longer we persevere), he will not fail to bring us to the feet of Jesus” (Sinclair B. Ferguson). It is not surprising then to hear theologians speak of “the three Johns” as the greatest of all Reformed thinkers – John Calvin, John Owen and Jonathan Edwards. Owen’s first published work dealt with the subject of the atonement (A Display of Arminianism, 1642) and the whole of volume 10 of his collected works is devoted to this topic (The Works of John Owen: Vol. 10 – The Death of Christ, Banner of Truth). The Death of Death in the Death of Christ (which can be accessed online at ccel.org/ccel/owen/deathofdeath.html – but buy the book anyway!) is John Owen’s definitive work on the extent of the atonement. It is a polemical work, engaging the ideas of universal redemption in Arminianism and Amyraldianism.
J.I. Packer and Mark Dever, In My Place Condemned He Stood: Celebrating the Glory of the Atonement (Wheaton: Crossway, 2008).
This little book contains classic recent evangelical essays on the subject of the atoning work of Christ, written by the great J.I. Packer. Mark Dever came up with the idea of collecting them in one book and got Dr. Packer to agree to it, but Al Mohler, C.J. Mahaney, yours truly and Dr. Packer himself also insisted that we include Mark Dever’s brilliant piece on the atonement (from a Christianity Today article), over Mark’s own loud but unavailing protests, it should be said. I added a brief annotated bibliography and wrote the introduction.
David Peterson, ed. Where Wrath and Mercy Meet (Carlisle: Paternoster, 2001).
This is a scholarly collection of essays defending the doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement in the face of current challenges. Peterson (1944- ), well known for his book Engaging with God, was until recently the Principal of Oak Hill College (an evangelical theology faculty in England that prepares students for Anglican ministry, though it also trains students from other denominations). One of the contributors to this volume Michael Ovey is one of the authors of Pierced for our Transgressions and is now Principal at Oak Hill College. The book concludes with a good piece on justification by faith by the well-regarded former Vice Principal of Oak Hill, the prolific Alan Stibbs.
Robert Peterson, Calvin and the Atonement (Fearn: Mentor, 1999).
Robert A. Peterson (1948- ) is professor of systematic theology at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, MO. This excellent little book first appeared with the title Calvin’s Doctrine of the Atonement (P&R, 1983). The book is the first and only introduction to Calvin’s teaching on the atonement that follows Calvin’s own outline of the subject (the threefold office of Christ, and the six biblical themes of (1) Christ, the obedient second Adam; (2) Christ the Victor; (3) Christ our legal substitute; (4) Christ our sacrifice; (5) Christ our merit; and (6) Christ our example. It is commended by both Packer and Ferguson (themselves recognized Calvin scholars), and is now in a revised edition from Christian Focus under their Mentor imprint, published in 1999). I used this book to help outline my original lectures on the atonement for my systematic theology classes at Reformed Theological Seminary. Very helpful. Shows again, by the way, the importance of the category of merit in Calvin’s theology of the atonement, and beautifully sets it in the context of Calvin’s devastating rejoinder to the Socinian rejection of the same.
John Piper, Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die (Wheaton: Crossway, 2006).
John Piper (1946- ) needs no introduction. Along with R.C. Sproul and John MacArthur he may be the most well-known (nationally and internationally) current advocate for the doctrines of grace. He was the longtime pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, MN (www.hopeingod.org) and is now the Chancellor and Professor of Biblical Exegesis at Bethlehem College and Seminary (http://www.bethlehemcollegeandseminary.org). This book was originally published (under the title The Passion of Jesus Christ) in 2004 to take advantage of the evangelistic opportunity presented by the release of Mel Gibson’s movie The Passion of the Christ (2004). It was re-released with the above title in 2006. Piper grabs your attention in the book’s very opening lines: “The most important question of the twenty-first century is: Why did Jesus Christ come and die? To see this importance we must look beyond human causes. The ultimate answer to the question, Who killed Jesus? is: God did. It is a staggering thought. Jesus was his Son! But the whole message of the Bible leads to this conclusion.” To get the book, or learn more about it, visit Desiring God www.desiringgod.org or Crossway Publishers gnpcb.org (you can browse the full text online at Crossway, which, incidentally, has proven to be among the most faithful publishing houses in our time). Piper then proceeds to present an answer to the question “What did God achieve for sinners like us in sending his Son to die?” by giving fifty short, clear, devotional expositions of key Bible texts. Goldmine.
Robert L. Reymond, A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1998), esp. 623-795.
Bob Reymond (1932- ) taught for many years at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, and since that time at Knox Seminary in Ft. Lauderdale. I had the privilege of sitting through the whole course of his systematics lectures in St. Louis, including the outstanding material recommended here on what Reymond calls the “cross work” of Christ. Reymond is at his best defending classical Christian Christology (despite his nonstandard views on the filioque clause and monogen s) as can be seen in his outstanding book Jesus, Divine Messiah (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1990). His treatment of the work of Christ is perhaps the most extensive in any recent one-volume systematic theology, and is a real treasure.
Philip Graham Ryken and James Montgomery Boice, The Heart of the Cross (Wheaton: Crossway, 2005).
Phil Ryken (1966- ) and Jim Boice (1938-2000) provide us with a superb devotional book on the cross. Good, easy, sound, helpful, rich reading. Boice, a major figure of twentieth century evangelicalism, was a key leader in the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy and the founder of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals (www.alliancenet.org), and Ryken is his successor as Senior Minister of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, PA (visit www.tenth.org when you can, and make sure to read Phil’s “Windows on the World’ or read Phil’s blog posts at www.reformation21.org). Phil is a good friend, and a prolific and respected author in his own right. Don’t miss Phil’s and Jim’s other related collaboration, The Doctrines of Grace, also published by Crossway, and especially its fifth chapter on Particular Redemption, 113-134.
Ian J. Shaw and Brian H. Edwards, The Divine Substitute: The Atonement in the Bible and History (Leominster: DayOne, 2006).
Shaw and Edwards have provided a good, quick overview of the biblical teaching (about 40 pages) and then a brief, helpful survey of the doctrine of the atonement in church history (about 90 pages). The latter is like a mini-H.D. McDonald (see the notes earlier in this bibliography under H.D. McDonald’s The Atonement of the Death of Christ). To find this book or to get more information about DayOne (another good, reliable Christian publisher you should bookmark), go to www.dayone.co.uk or dayonebookstore.com .
George Smeaton, Christ’s Doctrine of the Atonement (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1991).
George Smeaton (1814-1889) was a Church of Scotland, then Free Church of Scotland minister, later becoming a professor at the Free Church College in Aberdeen and then at New College, Edinburgh. The noted Reformed pastor, author and leader W.J. Grier of Belfast (with whom my dear friend and colleague Derek Thomas once worked) rightly said of Smeaton that he “was one of the brilliant galaxy of men” in the Free Church of his time (his contemporaries concurred in this assessment, James MacGregor saying of him that he possessed “the best constituted theological intellect in Christendom”). Principal John Macleod describes Smeaton as “the most eminent scholar of the set of young men who with McCheyne and the Bonars sat at the feet of Chalmers.” This is the first of a twin set he wrote on the doctrine of the atonement in the New Testament. It was written in the context of widespread academic defection from the historic Christian doctrine of the atonement, and is rightly judged as a classic, evangelical, orthodox exposition of this truth.
George Smeaton, The Doctrine of the Atonement according to the Apostles (Peabody: Hendriksen, 1988).
Smeaton undertook the writing of this volume upon the completion of the one just above, and considered the two works as parts of a whole, intending the reader to be familiar with the principles expounded in the first volume as he or she reads the application of them in the second. Smeaton was acquainted with all the main liberal academic treatments of the atonement of his day, in Britain and on the Continent, including Ritschl, and said of them “with all their acknowledged learning and ability, they have too much forgotten the simple function of the interpreter, and deposited their own unsatisfactory opinions or the spirit of the age in the texts which they professed to expound.” A salutory and serious warning to us all.
R.C. Sproul, The Truth of the Cross (Orlando: Reformation Trust, 2007).
R.C. Sproul (1939- ) has been one of the most consistent, eloquent, popular spokesmen for resurgent Reformed theology in the last half-century in the English-speaking world. So, needless to say, we greet his book on this vital topic with anticipation. Bruce Waltke says of this new gem: “The Truth of the Cross is the best book on the cross I have read. It is a ‘must’ for every church library and a book that I will give away many times to friends. This is so because it is sober (i.e., it contains historically informed reflections on salient biblical texts), sensible (i.e., it is well-argued), simple (i.e., it holds the reader’s attention through grabbing illustrations and even a seventh-grader can grasp its substance), and spiritual (i.e., it comes from a heart set ablaze by the Spirit).”
C.H. Spurgeon, Spurgeon’s Sermons on the Cross of Christ (Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1993).
Where do you begin when it comes to the prince of preachers? Well, here’s a little collection, but you need to read anything and everything you can get by Spurgeon (1834-1892). He is always and everywhere preaching the cross, but here are a few leads. Read “Particular Redemption,” preached on February 28, 1858 in Spurgeon’s Sermons: Volume 4, #181, and also “The Death of Christ” (January 24, 1858) in Spurgeon’s Sermons: Volume 4, #173. My friend Phil Johnson, master of all things Spurgeon, gave me a bunch of good ideas, all available via the internet (speaking of which, bookmark Phil’s www.spurgeon.org and for no extra charge http://teampyro.blogspot.com/). Phil reminded me about Tom Nettles’ excellent article on Spurgeon and the atonement in the Founder’s Journal: http://www.founders.org/FJ14/article1.html and then went on to say: “here is a handful of Spurgeon’s best sermons on the atonement, in chronological order of their publication. These are all from the New Park Street and Met Tab Pulpit series, so even though my web pages don’t give full academic citations with page numbers, etc., these should be very easy to find documentation for: http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0007.htm, and also (same url plus) /0054.htm, /0118.htm, /0139.htm, /0141.htm, /0153.htm, /0173.htm, /0181.htm, /0228.htm, /0255.htm, /0310.htm, /0493.htm, /1004.htm, /1910.htm, /2133.htm and /2656.htm.” Get The New Park Street Pulpit and the Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit which continue to be available in various editions (Baker, Pilgrim, etc.).
John R.W. Stott, The Cross of Christ (Leicester: IVP, 1986).
One word: classic. What can one say about dear John Stott? Alongside Billy Graham, Carl Henry, Francis Schaeffer, Martyn Lloyd-Jones and J.I. Packer, Stott (1921- ) has been at the very center of the best of modern evangelicalism for over a half-century. He was curate, then rector and then rector emeritus of All Souls, Langham Place, London. He founded the Langham Partnership International and the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. He drafted the Lausanne Covenant, is a prolific author and one of the most recognized and respected leaders of world evangelicalism. Alistair McGrath calls this book, The Cross of Christ, Stott’s “greatest and best work” and J.I. Packer says: “No other treatment of this supreme subject says so much so truly and so well.” Though Stott does not address the question of the design of the extent of the atonement (and perhaps indicates that he follows in the train of J. C. Ryle as a “four-point Calvinist” Anglican that has no interest in polemicizing against five-point Calvinists), this is a kind and intelligent, but robust and rousing defense of a real, penal, substitutionary atonement.
Derek Tidball, The Message of the Cross (Downers Grove: IVP, 2001)
It required some restraint on my part not to add this to the “Short, Popular Introductions” list at the front of this bibliography. Derek Tidball (1948- ) is Principal of the London School of Theology, where he lectures in pastoral theology. He also served for many years as a Baptist pastor. Tidball (with Alec Motyer and John Stott) is one of the editors for IVP’s Bible Speaks Today (BST) series (really good OT and NT expositional commentaries, along with some select topical studies). He is responsible for the BST Bible Themes series, which has some nice entries (I love, for instance, Phil Ryken’s The Message of Salvation in that same BST series). The Message of the Cross is yet another good option to put in the hands of someone wanting to start out reading solid, accessible material on the atoning work of Christ.
Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 3 vols. Giger trans., Dennison, ed. (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1994), esp. 2:375-499.
Turretin (1623-1687) was a towering giant of Protestant Orthodoxy. It is well known that Turretin’s Institutes (in Latin!) served as the basic systematic theology textbook at Princeton Seminary during the time of Charles Hodge. The Giger translation (8,000 handwritten pages!) stayed in a drawer in the seminary library for those struggling with their Latin. I myself used a typewritten version of this translation in my seminary days in the 1980s. So there was much fanfare when the whole translation finally appeared in print. Jonathan Edwards, Charles Hodge and R.L. Dabney (to name only a few) were all dependent upon Turretin, who has been called “prince of scholastic Calvinism” (that’s a compliment!). Everyone from Wayne Grudem to Carl Henry to Sinclair Ferguson to Leon Morris to J.I. Packer to Roger Nicole to Richard Muller to John Frame to John Gerstner hailed the new publication of Turretin. The late, great James Mongomery Boice said, “If ever a great theological work has been unjustly neglected, it has been Francis Turretin’s masterful volumes on the whole of Christian doctrine.” Take it and read!
B.B. Warfield, The Person and Work of Christ (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1950), esp. 325-530.
B.B. Warfield (1851-1921) “out-read, out-thought and out-wrote every man of his generation” (so says Donald Macleod, and he’s right). Time spent reading Warfield is never wasted. This volume contains some of his best work relating to the atoning work of Christ (Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology, page 605, lists some further recommended writings by Warfield on the atonement). Warfield’s exegetical prowess is legendary and it shows in his treatments here. By the way, this volume also contains the justly famous and important essay “The Emotional Life of Our Lord.” Warfield is incisive and dominant in his rebuttal of error in “Modern Theories of the Atonement.” Simply grasping the insights of his “New Testament Terminology of Redemption” will deliver you from all-too-common current errors. Buy the ten volume set of The Works of B.B. Warfield (Baker) if you can get them!
B.B. Warfield, The Saviour of the World (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1991).
These are sermons (originally preached in the Princeton Seminary Chapel – and you’ll be able to tell that by their contents!) by Warfield pertaining to the work of Christ. His exposition of the “all” passages and explanation of the Johannine concept of “world” are both crucial in understanding the New Testament teaching on the effect of the work of Christ. The sermon on the prodigal son needs to be read and digested by every Protestant minister in our time. It is colossally important from a Gospel standpoint (because this parable is often preached in a way that truncates or warps the Gospel).
Paul Wells, Cross Words: The Biblical Doctrine of the Atonement (Fearn: Christian Focus Publications, 2006).
Paul Wells (1946- ), originally from Liverpool, has taught theology for over thirty years at the Faculté Libre de Théologie Réformée, Aix-en-Provence, France. My good friend, Iain D. Campbell (himself a superb scholar and author, read more about him at www.backfreechurch.co.uk) recently heard Paul deliver a brilliant paper at the Affinity Theology Conference (see www.affinity.org.uk) on the fourth word of Jesus from the cross – “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” Iain D. (as friends call him) describes Paul’s book this way: “Cross Words, is not about the sayings of Jesus on the cross; rather it is a study on the significance of the cross-work of Jesus which uses single words as the chapter titles, words like Scandal, Lordship, Violence, Sacrifice, Penalty, and so on. The work of Jesus on the cross for our sins is central to the Christian faith. That work is what atonement is all about; and atonement, as Wells says in the opening sentence, is about right relationships. I think Paul Wells’ book will become a classic too. He is writing against a background of suspicion that the older, classic works got it wrong – that we shouldn’t speak of the cross as an act of Son-giving, or even of penal substitution. Some writers suggest that we need to use our imagination to find new metaphors for the cross-work of Jesus. But Wells answers these charges adequately, showing that the Bible’s own ‘cross-words’ supply us with the only way in which we can rightly understand what Jesus did for us at Calvary. The result is a powerful book, deep yet essentially easy to read, which is extremely helpful.” Paul Wells, by the way, wrote an excellent rejoinder to James Barr’s really bad book Fundamentalism.
Tom Wells, A Price for a People: The Meaning of Christ’s Death (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1992).
Wells in this short, popular treatment, expounds the terms “redemption,” “reconciliation,” and “propitiation,” and then tackles the question “for whom did Christ die?” Good place to start reading for something basic on these subjects. Wells is pastor of The King’s Chapel in West Chester, Ohio (Cincinnati area) and is associated (along with Fred Zaspel) with the movement called “new covenant theology” – which has no bearing on the subject matter of this book.
[…] study through the book of Hebrews. Finally, Ligon Duncan has done everything a favor by posting an annotated bibliography of books on the cross of […]