A Case for Universal Grace and Unlimited Atonement, Part I

Introduction

Since the latter days of the Reformation, the Christian church has experienced great turmoil over the extent of both God’s saving will for mankind and its corollary, the extent of Christ’s substitutionary atonement on the cross. On the one hand are those who argue that God genuinely desires all men to be saved and that Christ therefore genuinely died for all men, even those who ultimately perish in unbelief and thereby experience God’s eternal wrath. On the other hand are those who contend that God’s saving will only extends to the elect, and that Christ therefore only died for those who will ultimately be saved.

This article provides a brief treatment of the Scriptural and dogmatic basis for the doctrine of God’s universal saving will for mankind, devotes significant attention to the challenges posed by the Calvinist doctrine of limited atonement, and explains the practical implications of belief in an unlimited atonement, as opposed to the rejection of it.

What Is the Biblical Teaching on the Extent of the Atonement?

In discussions of the nature of Christ’s atonement, it is necessary to consider three factors: God’s saving intent, the extent of Christ’s substitution, and the application of Christ’s merits.[i] These issues are often conflated, such as when Calvinists argue that a universal intent and extent must also necessitate a universal application that would lead to universalism.

Henry Eyster Jacobs masterfully describes the relationship between God’s saving will and the actual application of redemption: “[Redemption] is as comprehensive in its provisions as it is limited in its realization . . . [the provisions of Redemption] have been made and are intended for all.”[ii] Yet the fact that the former is universal while the latter is particular is due not to God’s design but to man’s sinful resistance. Due to man’s inherent sinfulness, God must elect us unto salvation, but He does not elect anyone unto damnation either actively or passively, nor does He limit the extent of the atonement only to the elect.

It is necessary to understand the Lutheran doctrine concerning God’s election and man’s self-condemnation if one is to understand how God’s saving will can be universal and yet some men can still die in their sins. Jacobs summarizes the Lutheran doctrine of the relationship between election and damnation as follows: “All man’s help must thus come from God; all his ruin comes from himself. . . . Every child is born, both a child of wrath and a child of grace. . . . It remains a child of wrath so far as the efforts of divine grace to aid it are defeated by the persevering resistance of its will.”[iii] The reason for a man’s damnation lies not in a lack of desire from God to save him, nor in a limited extent of the Son’s propitiatory atonement, nor in a limitation on the Holy Spirit’s desire to apply saving grace. Jacobs explains, “But God’s purpose has nothing to do with the unbelief and resistance, the sin and condemnation of men. God’s Eternal Plan of Redemption has to do with the salvation, and not with the destruction of men.”[iv]

The plan of redemption to which Jacobs refers is encapsulated in the Scriptures by the word “grace,” which Francis Pieper defines as “God’s feelings in Christ toward lost mankind, namely, God’s love.”[v] This grace of God is a Trinitarian reality. Pieper highlights the way in which “the love of the Father . . . the merit of Christ, and . . . the efficacious operation of the Holy Ghost” are all universal,[vi] such that Pieper views “saving grace” and “universal grace” as synonymous terms. In other words, “God’s gracious disposition in Christ is not limited to a part of mankind, but extends over all men without exception.”[vii] God the Father intends for all men without exception to be saved, God the Son died for all men without exception as their ransom and substitution, and God the Holy Spirit desires to apply the merits of Christ’s saving work to all men without exception.

Pieper argues this point in a threefold manner: 1) Scripture describes all of mankind as the object of God’s grace through Christ; 2) Scripture describes God’s grace as extending to every individual person without exception; and 3) God’s grace in Christ touches even those who ultimately perish eternally.[viii] The Bible is filled with ample proof texts for each of these points, but perhaps the most suitable verses for each of the three contentions respectively would be 1 Tim. 2:3-4,[ix] Ezek. 33:11,[x] and 2 Pet. 2:1.[xi]

In addition, both 1 Tim. 4:10[xii] and 1 Jn. 2:2[xiii] make it clear that Christ died both for those inside and outside of the Church. The former text makes it clear that Christ’s salvation is intended for all but has special reference to believers, while the latter text directly states that Christ’s substitutionary work is not limited to the saints to which St. John is writing but indeed extends to the entire cosmos. It is difficult to imagine more explicit terms that the Scriptures could use to describe the universality of God’s saving grace in Christ.

Challenges to the Doctrine of Universal Saving Grace

Those who reject God’s universal saving grace instead teach the “limited atonement,” sometimes referred to by the synonymous terms of a “definite atonement” or “particular redemption.” In defining limited atonement, Ian McFarland states that “although Christ’s death is of infinite value (and thus more than sufficient to atone for the sins of the whole world), Christ did not die for all people, but only for those whom God had eternally elected to salvation.”[xiv] As will be explored below, Calvinists are required to argue for a limited atonement in order to uphold their view of double predestination.

Citing Calvin’s Institutes, Pieper describes the Calvinist argument for a limited atonement as stemming from a logical argument: “Whatever God earnestly purposes must in every case actually occur; and since not all men are actually saved, we must conclude that the Father never did love the world, that Christ never did reconcile the world, and that the Holy Ghost never does purpose to create faith in all hearers of the Word.”[xv] Pieper cites Eduard Boehl and Charles Hodge to similar effect, concluding that such arguments are drawn not directly from Scripture but rather from rational deduction and philosophic inference.[xvi]

Loraine Boettner’s comparison of Lutheranism and Calvinism on the points of predestination and the extent of the atonement reveal an implicit agreement with Pieper’s thought: “Lutheranism was more the religion of a man who after a long and painful search had found salvation and who was content simply to bask in the sunshine of God’s presence, while Calvinism, not content to stop there, pressed on to ask how and why God had saved man.”[xvii] For the Calvinist, it is not enough to leave in place Scripture’s tensions of God’s universal saving will alongside the reality of eternally damned individuals for whom Christ died. Instead, the Calvinist seeks to provide a logical explanation for the “why” of salvation vs. damnation, with the conclusion being a lack of saving will from the Father, a lack of propitiatory offering by the Son, and a lack of efficacious application of redemption by the Holy Spirit.

The logical necessity of limited atonement within the Calvinist system is indicated by Carl Trueman when he argues that limited atonement is the result of “implications of a series of strands of biblical teaching, from the foundations of redemption in the intra-Trinitarian relationship.”[xviii] Similarly, Boettner claims that double predestination and limited atonement are inseparably linked, writing that “We cannot logically accept one and reject the other. If God has elected some and not others to eternal life, then plainly the primary purpose of Christ’s work was to redeem the elect.”[xix] Indeed, most of the arguments that Boettner deploys in favor of limited atonement in his book, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, rely less on Scriptural exegesis and more on various logical formulations.[xx]

One of the most prominent arguments for the limited atonement (and one which Boettner employs[xxi]) is the “double jeopardy” or “double payment” argument put forth by Puritan theologian John Owen in his book, The Death of Death in the Death of Christ. Owen’s argument highlights the seemingly illogical and unjust nature of God punishing people for whom Christ died, which would be necessary under a system of universal saving grace and a universally propitiatory atonement. Owen contends that it falls short of “the Lord, as a just creditor,” to hold obligations against sinners whose debt has been paid, including the debt of sinful unbelief.[xxii] Owen further asks if it is “probable that God calls any to a second payment, and requires satisfaction of them for whom, by his own acknowledgment, Christ hath made that which is full and sufficient.”[xxiii] To use a modern analogy, it would be unjust for a bank to insist on house payments from a homeowner whose mortgage had already been paid in full by a generous third party.

At first blush, Owen’s argument appears to be quite effective, especially from a rhetorical perspective. However, citing Neil Chambers, David L. Allen points out several logical problems with Owen’s famous “double payment” argument, namely: 1) that it turns grace into something the elect are “owed” as a payment; 2) that it suggests that the elect ought to have been justified at the moment of Christ’s death on the Cross; 3) that it denies faith as a condition for salvation; and 4) that it removes the urgent aspect of preaching as a call to repentance, since preaching under Owen’s view is simply an act of revealing to the elect their status of already being saved.[xxiv] Related to Allen’s second objection, Eph. 2:1-3[xxv] demonstrates that it is possible for a group of people for whom Christ most certainly died (in this case, the saints at Ephesus) to be under the wrath of God, effectively invalidating the central premise of Owen’s argument.[xxvi] So much for the apparent logical rigor of Owen’s most famous argument.

Another logical proof employed by Boettner against universal saving grace is the claim that the universality of the Atonement is at odds with the efficacious, salvific nature of redemption. Specifically, he contends that if Christ’s atonement applies to all men, including those ultimately damned, “the conclusion is that it makes salvation objectively possible for all but that it does not actually save anybody. . . . The work of Christ can be universalized only by evaporating its substance.”[xxvii] When making this claim, Boettner not only conflates the issues of the atonement’s extent with its application, he also makes the error of interacting only with the Arminian view. At least in Boettner’s estimation, the Arminian view of the atonement consists of a universal redemption that can be applied only through God’s will working in concert with man’s will (i.e. synergism). Boettner apparently does not conceive of a single predestinarian system in which God’s universal saving will (contra Calvinism) works in tandem with God’s monergistic election unto salvation (contra Arminianism), meaning that the atonement makes salvation objectively possible while also genuinely saving rather than just making someone “savable.” In other words, Boettner’s objection fails to refute a non-Arminian “middle way,” namely, the Lutheran view.

This failure to acknowledge a theological system of predestination and the atonement apart from the typical Calvinist vs. Arminian debate is one of the great weaknesses of Boettner’s work on predestination and the atonement, though it is hardly unique to him.[xxviii] He defines the state of the question of the atonement’s extent as follows: “In other words, was the sacrifice of Christ merely intended to make the salvation of all men possible, or was it intended to render certain the salvation of those who had been given Him by the Father?”[xxix] Boettner then contrasts the Arminian view of general or universal grace with the Calvinist view of saving grace as applying only to the elect. Again, there is no acknowledgment of a theological system that combines a universal saving will with a sure and certain salvation, i.e. Lutheranism.

Elsewhere, Boettner explicitly claims that “there are just two theories which can be maintained by evangelical Christians upon this important subject; that all men who have made any study of it . . . must be either Calvinists or Arminians. There is no other position which a ‘Christian’ can take.”[xxx] Such a thesis is, to be frank, historically laughable in light of the robust tradition of theological debates over election and the atonement for centuries before either Calvin or Arminius drew their first breaths.

By contrast, Allen, himself an Arminian Baptist, is to be commended for acknowledging that “It is inaccurate to lump all people into the categories of ‘Arminian’ or ‘Calvinist.’ There are many who affirm theological positions between these two.”[xxxi] While Allen makes the curious decision later in his book on The Extent of the Atonement to group Martin Luther among what he terms the “Moderate Calvinists”[xxxii] (i.e. those who believe that Christ’s death paid for all and made all “saveable” [sic] but with special reference of only truly saving the elect),[xxxiii] he nevertheless acknowledges the Lutheran doctrine of a universal atonement and the strong opposition to Calvinism within the Lutheran Confessions.[xxxiv]

The next of Boettner’s logical arguments for the limited extent of the atonement, namely, that the Law requires perfect, substitutionary obedience imputed to individual sinners, once again only is valid if one is arguing against the Arminian perspective.[xxxv] If one holds to a synergistic view of salvation, then Boettner’s point (i.e. that a universal atonement essentially only creates “an easier way of salvation—[God] accepts fifty cents on the dollar, so to speak, since the crippled sinner can pay no more”)[xxxvi] is a compelling one. However, if one holds to a monergistic view of salvation while allowing for both a universal atonement and the resistibility of God’s free grace (as taught in Scriptures such as Mt. 23:37[xxxvii] and Ac. 7:51)[xxxviii], then the force of Boettner’s argument evaporates.

One of the only exegetical arguments offered by Boettner in his treatment of limited atonement as part of the Calvinist system is the fact that Matt. 20:28[xxxix] refers to Christ giving His life as a ransom for “many” rather than “all.”[xl] He argues similarly from Jn. 10:15[xli] that for Christ to say that He lays down His life for His sheep is to imply that He does not lay down His life for those who aren’t His sheep.[xlii] However, the argument derived from the former text quickly shifts from being exegetical to logical again, with Boettner simply providing a version of Owen’s double payment argument addressed above.

Regarding the latter text, even Matthew Harmon, while attempting to argue that Jn. 10:15 refers to Christ dying only for the church, tacitly admits, “True, the claim that Jesus laid down his life for his sheep does not logically demand that he died only for the elect.”[xliii] Indeed, Allen demonstrates the lack of logical validity in using Jn. 10:15 as a prooftext by pointing out that the argument, “Christ died for his sheep. / Pharisees are not his sheep. / Therefore Christ did not die for them” is no more valid than the argument, “John loves Mary. / Bill is not Mary. / Therefore John does not love Bill.”[xliv]

Moving from exegetical arguments supposedly in favor of limited atonement to exegetical arguments against the “universalistic” texts, Boettner responds to the classic prooftexts for the universality of God’s saving will for mankind (e.g. 1 Tim. 2:3, Ezek. 33:11, and 2 Pet. 3:9)[xlv] by claiming that “These verses simply teach that God is benevolent.” He argues that these texts simply can’t teach that God wills the salvation of the non-elect, lest the verses that teach God’s sovereign purposes be contradicted.[xlvi]

On the contrary, Pieper refutes this major Calvinist claim that God never fails to accomplish His purposes by pointing to Scriptural texts that teach exactly that. These prooftexts include those which contrast God’s intention to save the entire world through the saving work of Christ in Jn. 3:17[xlvii] and the condemnation of some people (despite God’s previously stated purpose) in Jn. 3:18[xlviii].[xlix] Pieper also points to texts that suggest the destruction of a person for whom Christ died, such as Rom. 14:15[l] and 2 Pet. 2:1-2 (the latter quoted above).[li]

Ultimately, the exegetical weight against the Calvinist view of limited atonement is so strong that in his treatment of objections to the five points of Calvinism, Boettner concedes that “It is true that some verses taken in themselves do seem to imply the Arminian position. This, however, would reduce the Bible to a mass of contradictions; for there are other verses which teach Predestination, Inability, Election, Perseverance, etc. and which cannot by any legitimate means be interpreted in harmony with Arminianism.”[lii] Boettner, of course, argues that the seemingly pro-Arminian verses must be read in light of and in harmony with the seemingly pro-Calvinist verses, rather than conceiving of a third system that holds both sets of verses as true yet in tension—in other words, the Lutheran system of theology.

In addition to the lack of Scriptural support for the doctrine of a limited atonement and the exegetical difficulties in refuting passages proclaiming God’s universal saving will, the idea of particular grace contra universal grace also raises questions of God’s honesty in connection with the sincerity of the Gospel proclamation. Boettner claims that double predestination and the limited atonement do not reduce the sincerity of God’s Gospel offer to those who will ultimately be damned.[liii] To support this claim, Boettner uses several analogies, such as a man providing an invitation to those he knows who will refuse, a military general offering pardons to opposing rebel soldiers even though he knows many will decline the offer, and a man offering his hired boat to passengers of a sinking vessel who nevertheless may choose to stay with their ship.[liv]

However, in each of these analogies, the person extending the offer has every intention of fulfilling it if it were to be accepted. The would-be host would genuinely have provided a meal to the invitees, the general would genuinely have given a pardon to a surrendering foe, the boatman would genuinely have granted an open spot on his vessel, etc. However, in the case of limited atonement, God has nothing to give those who reject the Gospel offer. Because Christ never died for the damned, God is not offering anything genuine to them, unlike the host, the pardoning general, or the boatman. Thus, Boettner’s analogies fail to make his case.

Similarly, Boettner claims that “while it is certain that the non-elect will not turn to God, repent of their sins, and live good moral lives, it is, nevertheless, their duty to do so.”[lv] It is unclear why a member of the non-elect would have any duty or obligation to repent and believe in a Gospel that is not actually intended for him. Therefore, on grounds of both Scriptural support and logical reasoning, the challenges to the doctrine of God’s universal saving will and an unlimited extent of the atonement fail.

In part two of this article, I will discuss the application of the doctrine of universal grace.

[i] Cf. David L. Allen, The Extent of the Atonement: A Historical and Critical Review (Nashville: B&H Publishing Group, 2016), xix, https://ebookcentral-proquest-com.theoref.idm.oclc.org/lib/dtl/detail.action?docID=4719185.

[ii] Henry Eyster Jacobs, Elements of Religion: A Treatment of Christian Doctrine (Ithaca, NY: Just and Sinner, 2020), 47.

[iii] Jacobs, Elements of Religion, 47-48.

[iv] Ibid., 50.

[v] Francis Pieper, Christian Dogmatics (St. Louis: Concordia, 1950-53), 2:7.

[vi] Ibid., 2:22.

[vii] Pieper, Christian Dogmatics, 2:21.

[viii] Ibid.

[ix] 1 Tim. 2:3-4, emphasis added: “For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”

[x] Ezek. 33:11, emphasis added: “Say to them: ‘As I live,’ says the Lord God, ‘I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways! For why should you die, O house of Israel?’”

[xi] 2 Pet. 2:1, emphasis added: “But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction.”

[xii] 1 Tim. 4:10, emphasis added: “For to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe.”

[xiii] 1 Jn. 2:2, emphasis added: “And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.”

[xiv] Ian A. McFarland, “Limited Atonement,” in The Cambridge Dictionary of Christian Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 281, https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511781285.013.

[xv] Pieper, Christian Dogmatics, 2:26.

[xvi] Ibid., 2:26-27.

[xvii] Loraine Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 5th ed. (San Francisco: Pickle Partners Publishing, 2017), 316, http://www.myilibrary.com?id=992243, emphasis added.

[xviii] Carl Trueman, “Atonement and the Covenant of Redemption: John Owen on the Nature of Christ’s Satisfaction,” in From Heaven He Came and Sought Her: Definite Atonement in Historical, Biblical, Theological, and Pastoral Perspective, eds. David Gibson and Jonathan Gibson (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2013), 202, quoted in Allen, The Extent of the Atonement, 687, emphasis added.

[xix] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 133.

[xx] Ibid., 133-142.

[xxi] Ibid., 137-138.

[xxii] John Owen, The Death of Death in the Death of Christ (Grand Rapids, MI: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, n.d.), 273, https://ccel.org/ccel/owen/deathofdeath/deathofdeath.i.ix.vii.html.

[xxiii] Ibid.

[xxiv] Allen, The Extent of the Atonement, 216.

[xxv] Eph. 2:1-3, emphasis added: “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.”

[xxvi] I am indebted to Dr. Jordan B. Cooper for this insight.

[xxvii] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 135, emphasis in original.

[xxviii] Cf. Garry Williams, “The Definite Intent of Penal Substitution,” in From Heaven He Came and Sought Her, 481, quoted in Allen, The Extent of the Atonement, 729: “An indefinite [sic] atonement must either embrace universalism or it must contradict the biblical doctrine of penal substitution.”

[xxix] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 133.

[xxx] Ibid., 287, emphasis in original.

[xxxi] Allen, The Extent of the Atonement, xx, footnote 22.

[xxxii] Ibid., 766.

[xxxiii] Ibid., xx.

[xxxiv] Ibid., 38.

[xxxv] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 135-137.

[xxxvi] Ibid., 135.

[xxxvii] Mt. 23:37, emphasis added: “[Jesus said:] ‘O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!’”

[xxxviii] Ac. 7:51, emphasis added: “[St. Stephen said:] ‘You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.’”

[xxxix] Mt. 20:28, emphasis added: “[Jesus said:] ‘just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.’”

[xl] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 137.

[xli] Jn. 10:15: “[Jesus said:] ‘As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep.’”

[xlii] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 137-138.

[xliii] Matthew Harmon, “For the Glory of the Father and the Salvation of His People: Definite Atonement in the Synoptics and Johannine Literature,” in From Heaven He Came and Sought Her, 277, quoted in Allen, The Extent of the Atonement, 703.

[xliv] Allen, The Extent of the Atonement, 704.

[xlv] 2 Pet. 3:9, emphasis added: “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.”

[xlvi] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 249.

[xlvii] Jn. 3:17: “For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.”

[xlviii] Jn. 3:18: “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”

[xlix] Pieper, Christian Dogmatics, 2:27.

[l] Rom. 14:15, emphasis added: “Yet if your brother is grieved because of your food, you are no longer walking in love. Do not destroy with your food the one for whom Christ died.”

[li] Pieper, Christian Dogmatics, 2:27.

[lii] Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 256.

[liii] Ibid., 244-247.

[liv] Ibid., 244-245.

[lv] Ibid., 247.

Since 2022, Andrew J. Aulner has been a seminarian with the American Lutheran Theological Seminary (ALTS). By day, he works remotely for Fidelity Investments from his home in Omaha, NE. He serves as vicar at Mighty Fortress Evangelical Lutheran Church (AALC) in Seward. Andrew has been married to Samantha since 2020, and the two of them were joined by a daughter, Latisha "Tish" Kay, in April 2025. When he isn't working, vicaring, husbanding, parenting, or chasing down his kitten Lego, Andrew enjoys reading, writing, and hobbies related to 'The Strenuous Life' adult enrichment program.