Mark 15: The First Penal Substitution

"So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released Barabbas for them; and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified."

Many theologians have struggled to explain just what happens at the cross of Jesus Christ that produces salvation in the lives of believers.  What kind of spiritual transaction occurs that can bring life to us out of death for Christ?

While such waters are bound to be too deep for us to ever fathom them completely, a leading theory of the atonement has to do with penal substitution.  Christ is offered as a substitute in our place; we go free, and the punishment that was upon us goes on Him instead.  This is reminiscent of the ram offered in the place of Isaac in Genesis 22 and the prophecy of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 53:4-6:

⁴     Surely he has borne our infirmities

and carried our diseases;

yet we accounted him stricken,

struck down by God, and afflicted.

⁵     But he was wounded for our transgressions,

crushed for our iniquities;

upon him was the punishment that made us whole,

and by his bruises we are healed.

⁶     All we like sheep have gone astray;

we have all turned to our own way,

and the Lord has laid on him

the iniquity of us all.

The theory of penal substitutionary atonment is also exemplified in the release of the murderer Barabbas.  Just like us, he went free and Jesus died in his place.

We don't know what happened to Barabbas after this moment of his deliverance, but the rest of the story of our salvation is up to us!