“What Orthodoxy says is that Christ took the sins of the whole world and offered himself to Death in exchange for our captivity. That was his sacrifice.
How is this not satan holding power over God? What if God did not want to pay satan? I mean, did they strike a mutual agreement among relative equals? I’ve never understood this part of Orthodoxy. If God sacrifices to meet His own standards, then I can understand, but if God is all jammed up and “owes” another for the freedom of His children then it makes no sense to me.”
And yet for 2000 years this is what The Church in the East has believed and taught. This is the consensus patrum. The West believed the same thing though expressed a bit differently. Prior to the 16th century, contrary to subsequent theological spin, no one believed the bloody slaughter to satisfy the wrath of a monster god theory of theosis that some groups of reformed theologians have taught over the past 400 years. As I have said before, FK, given such a theology, it doesn’t surprise me in the least that the West has fallen deeply into apostasy, atheism and secularism. If I thought for one minute that God was some divine blood thirsty Dagon Who created men in His image and likeness so he could torment the majority of them in everlasting hellfire, the massacre of His Son not really quite cutting it in the slaking of wrath area, why FK, I’d loath that monster with every fiber of my being.
I suppose that a weak God's succumbing to a more-powerful-than-Him ransom demand does sound nicer. :)
If I thought for one minute that God was some divine blood thirsty Dagon Who created men in His image and likeness so he could torment the majority of them in everlasting hellfire, the massacre of His Son not really quite cutting it in the slaking of wrath area, why FK, I’d loath that monster with every fiber of my being.
ME TOO, BROTHER! :) Remember, it's my side that believes Christ's sacrifice actually accomplished something important, and final. It's you guys who say that what Christ did was great, but not good enough to secure the salvation of a single person.