EVA:Barabbas' Theory of the Atonement  by C.I. Scofield

   Barabbas was condemned to die. No one has ever questioned the
justice of his sentence. He was a rebel against the law, a robber and a
murderer. And now the outraged law had laid strong hands on him, and he
lay bound, under the sentence of death. He was not under probarion, but
under doom. He was not awaiting trial, but execution. Just before him,
as his only prospect, was the awful death of crucifixion. He knew what
that meant; long hours of unspeakable agony, the hands and feet forn by
great spikes, the wrists and shoulder dislocated by the dragging down
of the body, each quivering nerve a separate torture through tension, a
burning, unquenchable thirst, and, all around, a jeering, taunting mob.
All the horizion on his life is narrowing to that. The only question
is, when?

   Even this begins to be answered. The jailers prepare three crosses.
Ah! He well knows the three sockets cut in the hard rock out there in
the Place of the Skull. Is one of these crosses for him? The very
thought gives him a sense of suffocation, and of something clutching at
his heart. Then he is told: yes, he is to suffer in the morning. Two
malefactors are to die with him, but he, as the greater criminal, is to
have the place of eminence, is to have the middle cross.

   Then the night falls. Bit it is a disturbed night. Even in the
prison it is percieved that something unusal is occuring. Confused
noises, outcries, the tramping of feet, penetrate the thick wall.
Perhaps it is another insurrection such as he, poor fool, raised
against the majestic, inflexable Law. But the night wears on, and at
last it is daylight - the light of his last day! And now he hears
footsteps, the key grinds in the lock, his prison door swings open,
but, just as he is summoning all his brute's fortutude for the odeal
which awaits him, he hears the joyful words: "Go free, Go free!
Barabbas; another takes your place; another is to die between the two
malefactors.

   As Barabbas emerged into the free, glorious sunshine, the crowd was
already surging out toward the Place of the Skull. And then, if not
before, the desire must have arisen to know who had been condemned to
die in his place. One can easily imagine how Barabbas followed the
throng, striving eagerly to see the Man who was to die for him. Perhaps
it was not until the sound of the hammer driving the nails had ceased,
and the cross - Barabbas' cross - had been upreared, bearing its awful
burden, that Barabbas saw the Sufferer. We may well believe thet, moved
by a strange irresistable drawing (John 12:32) Barabbas pressed his way
through the howling mob until he stood looking up into the face of
Jesus.

   Barabbas knew Him, of course. His substitute in agony there was the
new Teacher out of Galilee, the Man whose life had been absolutely
without sin. Adam sinned, and Abraham and Moses, and all the prophets,
but not this Man. And, besides, He healed even leprosy by a touch or a
word. One day when the crowd got hungry He manufactured enough food for
five thousand men, not to mention women and children, out of five loves
and a few small fishes. Because of these, and like things, Basrabbas
perhaps really was convinced that He was the Messiah, the Son of God.
But he had not become His disciple because he loved sin.

   However that may have been, it is easy to see that Barabbas had no
need to be a theologian to form a good working theory of the atonement.

   FIRST, he knew that he was a guilty wretch, under the righteous
condemnation of the law. (Luke 23:25) And in both respects Barabbas was
a representive of all men. (Romans 3:10-20; Galations 3:10)

   SECOND, Barabbas knew that the Sufferer before him had done no sin.
(John 8:46; John 19:4; 1 Peter 2:22)

   THIRD, he knew that Jesus was, for him, a true substitue. He was
verliy (truely) and actually dying in his place and stead; an innocent
and Holy Being bearing the very penalty which the law had decreed to
him, Barabbas. Whoever, in the coming ages, might question wheather
Christ's death was vicarious and substitutional, he could never
question it. (2 Corinthians 5:21; Galations 3:13; 1 Peter 2:22-24;
3:18; Isaiah 53:5-6)

   FORTH, he knew that He had done nothing what ever to merit the
marvelous interposition of that substitional death. What ever may have
been back of it, it reached him as as act of pure grace. (Psalm
69:19-20; Ephesians 2:4-9; 2 Timothy 1:9; Titus 2:11; Romans 4:4-5)

   FIFTH, he knew that Christ's death for him was perfectly efficaious.
There was, therefore, nothing for him to add to it. Just beacuse Christ
was dying, he was living. The only question before Pilate was whether
Chrsit should die or Barabbas. When it was decided that Christ should
die, Barabbas was set free. His assurance was complete that instant his
Substitute said, "It is finished," and gave up the ghost. (John 19:30;
Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14; Romans 5:9; 1 John 1:7; Colossians
1:20; Hebrews 10:10,14)

   John McNeill, the great Scotch preacher, well says; "My brethren,
let me commend to you Barabbas' theory of the atonement. It is a good
theory to preach on, pray on, sing on, die on. Do you know any other
theory that will stand the tests?

   C.I. Scofield