The Argument in Brief

How did Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross save us? This is my brief summary of the argument. The majority of this book is the result of my studies, but the theory about how Jesus saved us is based on the “ransom theory” as proposed by the great church father, Gregory of Nyssa in his work “The Great Catechism.” This story is about creation, promises, the fall, salvation, redemption, resurrection and ultimately justification.

Creation

• Chapter 1: Nothing existed before God, and nothing exists without god.
  • God really exists
  • God is existence itself.
  • All things good, true and beautiful come from God.
• Chapter 2: God is the creator of all things.
  • First He created the angels
  • Next He created all of reality - the universe of planets and stars, and ultimately earth
  • Next he filled earth with plants and animals
  • Finally, He created man in his own image, and made him free.
• Chapter 3: God ordered the universe and all living beings with law.
  • Eternal, Natural, Divine, and Human law.
  • These laws govern all things in the universe, and all things are obedient to His divine will.
  • But these laws also govern God Himself. They do not limit Him or reduce His infinite power, but they are limitations He places on Himself because of His infinite love for us.
• Chapter 4: God ultimately created everything for love.
  • God is love in all its forms.
  • Love is a relationship, fully given and fully received.
  • Love is not love unless it is free.
  • God does not need us, but we need His love.
  • Love when shared is not divided but multiplied.
  • Love must be shared and needs to be given away.

God’s Promise

• Chapter 5: The fullest expression of love is covenant.
  • A covenant is an unbreakable bond, a new creation under God.
  • God wanted intimacy with us, to be connected with us in every way. And that way was through a covenant.
  • God said I will be your God and you will be my people, and He sealed the promise in a covenant.
• Chapter 6: The First Covenant - The Adamic Covenant
  • Adam and Eve lived in Heavenly perfection.
  • God enters into the covenant of marriage With Adam and Eve. He promises to honor and bless the union of marriage forever.
  • The Message is Prudence - we must learn to discern what is right and wrong, and trust in God above all things.

The Fall

• Chapter 7: Sadly, love can be rejected.
  • A free choice can lead to the rejection of God’s love.
  • The choice ultimately results in three consequences – Power, Desire, Pride (aka. three fold concupiscence)
• Chapter 8: First, Satan and a third of the angels fell because of Pride.
  • God showed all the angels his plan for the salvation of man.
  • Satan and one third of the angels said they would not serve, and that choice was permanent and final.
  • Satan and his demons would forever be the antagonist of God and would forever try to destroy His creation.
• Chapter 9: Next, mankind was given the freedom to choose and fell because of pride.
  • The form of our sin was to choose ourselves, and that sin separated us from God and His protection.
  • Adam and Eve were expelled and would now die, because they chose their will over god’s will for their lives.
• Chapter 10: Sin has consequences.
  • Satan chose himself and was cast out of the light of heaven, and took dominion over the world.
  • When we fall we remove ourselves from God’s protection, and by default, choose both spiritual and material death instead.
  • Most importantly, this choice whether you like it or not, puts us directly under the dominion of Satan.

Salvation

• Chapter 11: God did not abandon us.
  • Man was fallen and stained by sin, but God still loved us, and wanted us with him in heaven.
  • He created a way to save us from sin while at the same time not break His law, or compell us to forgo our free will.
  • The story of salvation is God’s plan to restore us to communion with Him, and this gift comes in the form of a covenant.
  • The covenants were designed to move God’s people, slowly step-by-step, from broken and sinful people in this world to perfected and righteous ones in heaven.
• Chapter 12: But Man continuously breaks God’s covenants.
  • Man breaks his promise, but God never does. But there are consequences for breaking a covenant.
  • By his merciful will he allows us to fall and be restored. And as such we learn about God’s nature and his love for us.
  • He uses these moments as lessons to teach us a better way, and He moves us closer and closer to reconciliation with Him.
• Chapter 13: The Second Covenant - The Noahic Covenant
  • The sons of Adam and the daughters of Eve have given themselves over completely into sin. Sin that cries out to God for justice. Only the household of Noah remained faithful.
  • God promised to remove the evil from their midst and to make Noah into a great people and He will never curse the ground again, and they will be fruitful and multiply.
  • The message is justice - we must understand that death is the just punishment for sin, but those that are faithful to the Lord will go on to be fruitful and multiply.
• Chapter 14: The Third Covenant - The Abrahamic Covenant
  • The sons of Noah would grow and fill the land, and many were totally lost to sin, but a remnant remained faithful and became a small tribe.
  • God promised to honor Abrams fidelity, and make of him a great nation.
  • The message is fortitude - we must have courage to persevere in hard times, and to always know that God keeps His promises.
• Chapter 15: The Fourth Covenant - The Mosaic Covenant
  • The sons of Abraham through Isaac and Jacob are now the nation of Israel. But because of infidelity they find themselves enslaved in egypt.
  • God promised to save His people from slavery.
  • The message is faith - If you believe in God and his promises you will be protected.
• Chapter 16: The Fifth Covenant - The Davidic Covenant
  • The people of Israel strong in their faith, have moved into the promised land, vanquished their enemies and grown into a great kingdom with David as their King.
  • God promised to make David a prosperous kingdom, and from his heritage the messiah and great king will come.
  • The message is temperance: with great power comes great responsibility. We must have moderation and self control in our lives, but despite our weakness God can make greatness from sin.
• Chapter 17: The Sixth Covenant - The Prophetic Covenant
  • The people of Israel are being lead by flawed and fallen leaders and are not faithful. They find themselves in a perpetual cycle of sin and repentance.
  • God warns that if they repent, follow His commandments, and listen to His messengers that they will be protected from the wolves.
  • The message is hope: we must always hope for god’s providence and believe that He will rescue us from slavery.

Redemption

• Chapter 18: Jesus Christ comes as the fulfillment of all of the covenants.
  • The covenants lead us from sinners to saints.
  • The covenants prefigure and are ultimately fulfilled in the coming of the lord Jesus.
  • God sent His son, the second person of the trinity to us and was incarnated as a man.
  • Born miraculously to the immaculate virgin, Mary.
  • Jesus grew in wisdom and knowledge from a little child into the missionary Jesus, and lived a completely human life.
  • Jesus was 100% man and 100% God,
  • And while His divinity was somewhat limited in His humanity, He always responded in perfect human obedience to the father.
  • Jesus felt the full weight of temptation to sin and He experienced every emotion and feeling and doubt. The only difference was that He never sinned.
• Chapter 19: Jesus begins His ministry and forms His new church.
  • Jesus gathers His disciples.
  • Jesus assigns Peter His Pope (& Steward).
  • Jesus appoints his Apostles (Bishops)
  • Jesus was a man, like any other, but He would be the answer to our fall and our redemption.
  • Jesus establishes his new church in the upper room on the eve of His passion.
• Chapter 20: Jesus bargains with the devil, offering his passion and death.
  • Jesus offers to die for us.
  • In the garden of gethsemene Jesus battled with the devil.
  • Jesus makes a bargains with the Devil saying: “I will die for them, take me, the son of God as a ransom for the souls of all of the lost and damned.”
• Chapter 21: The Devil accepts the bargain.
  • The devil in this moment, saw only a, weak & frail human man, not the 2nd person of the trinity, God Himself.
  • Satan lusted after the idea of being the lord over the soul of God’s only son, and handed over all of the souls of the lost and damned in exchange.
• Chapter 22: Jesus pays the ransom.
  • But for Jesus this wager would mean mean everything, but it would not be a simple exchange.
  • Jesus would have to endure the greatest suffering any human could ever endure, He would ultimately endure the full depravity of our sins, and then die in excrutiating pain.
• Chapter 23: Jesus descends into Sheol.
  • Like many before him, He would then descend into Sheol to Join the dead. But this is where the wager with the Devil ended.
  • Jesus is GOD, He cannot be held by the confines of death, He cannot be enslaved by one of His own creations.
  • He outsmarted the evil one. He freed all of those souls locked in the prison of death, and raised all of those lost souls up to Heaven.
• Chapter 24: Jesus ascends into Heaven.
  • But more importantly for all of us today, He opened up the gates of Heaven, to anyone who believes is Him.
  • Because of God’s love, and Jesus’ sacrifice, His offer of salvation overcomes death and His “salvation” is thus granted to anyone that asks for it.
• Chapter 25: 7th Covenant - The Messianic Covenant
  • The people are lost, and like sheep without a shepherd.
  • Jesus promise to reconcile us back to the Father, He did this by his sacrifice on the cross and through the institution of the Eucharist.
  • The message is charity - Love God and love your neighbor as yourself. We accomplish both in going to mass and partaking of the Eucharist.

Resurrection

• Chapter 26: Jesus Overcomes Death.
  • If Jesus’ body had stayed in the tomb, nothing on earth would have ever changed. Jesus had to come back, to show us that He had overcome the finality of Death.
  • His resurrection proves that He is God, and that He is Lord, and cannot be held by the clutches of death.
• Chapter 27: Jesus shows us how we too can overcome death as well.
  • By joining our will with His, and we too can overcome the cost of our sins and the grasp of death, and enter into eternity in Heaven with God forever.

Kingdom of Heaven

• Chapter 28: The Church Triumphant
  • From the moment Jesus died on the cross He began a new epoch, and began the work of building the Kingdom of Heaven.
  • Jesus in his ministry said that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, and indeed it is.
  • Jesus is the cornerstone of the great Temple in Heaven, and every soul that dies in a state of friendship with the Lord will eventually go to heaven.
  • Each one of them will become the bricks that are laid side by side with Jesus (the cornerstone) to make the walls of that great church of God.
• Chapter 29: The Church Suffering
  • When Jesus overcame death, He also overcame the devils hold on all of the souls that would make the walls of that great church.
  • But the degree to which we are close to God in heaven is still our choice, and that is the point of purgatory.
• Chapter 30: The Church Militant
  • But while the devil was defeated in Jesus’ death on the cross, the war between Heaven and Hell had just started.
  • Satan’s dominion over the lost sinful souls was forever gone, but the battle for the souls that had yet to come had just begun.
  • Saving souls is our role in this great war.
• Chapter 31: The Damned
  • The Devil knows that he lost, he knows what awaits him. Only one thing gives him any pleasure, and that is corrupting souls from being with God in Heaven.

Justification

• Chapter 32: Why did Jesus die for us?
  • We justify ourselves by staying close to the sacraments and hopefully improving ourselves through a process of sanctification until we die and hopefully go to heaven.
  • I set out to logically explain the story of salvation, and the gift that god offers you from the cross
  • The answer at the end is the same as at the beginning, Love.
  • The point of our life is to reconnect with the source of everything, God.
  • This is what sin does it separates, and reconciliation reunifies.
  • I extend to you the peace of christ.
  • The choice is now yours. What will you choose?
  • When you finally understand the story of God’s passion, the unfathomable depth of God’s mercy, and the undeserved gift of salvation that Jesus offers to you on the cross. That is Pax Christi