Kiran Patel 5F Christianity Beliefs 09/10/2020

“Jesus’ most important role was to achieve

atonement.” Do you agree?
I think that atonement was Jesus’ most important role since He sacrificed himself, which
created the epistemic distance between man and God so that we could have free will. In
John 3:16, in the bible, it shows how God became a human in order to bridge that gap which
human sin created between humans and God, so that we could be at one with God and
have eternal life (the act of atonement), “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only
son, so that whoever believed in him, may not perish, but have everlasting life.” Also, in the
book of Isaiah, in the Bible, he talks of how Jesus stood in as a substitute for the sinful
humanity, and took the punishment for us even though he was innocent, “The Lord has laid
on him the iniquity of us all,” Isaiah 53:5. This is a strong argument as it influences Christians
beliefs’ about God’s nature, such as how loving and forgiving he is.

However other religious people believe that Jesus’ most important role was to spread his
moral teachings because in the Bible there are many occasions of where it mentions Jesus
preaching and spreading his word such as in Luke 24:47, “repentance for the forgiveness of
sins will be preached in his name to all nations. “Another, arguably important role was social
justice; Jesus showed examples of social justice, and how He, the ‘Messiah’ or the ‘King of
the Jews’, accepted people who were poor or disabled. Jesus was humble and never tried to
show off for example when He first came to Jerusalem, he came riding in on a donkey even
though He was treated like a king. In the Bible, Isaiah 1:17 he says, “learn to do good: and
seek justice.” This is a relatively convincing argument since there are several stories of Jesus
treating the poor and also spreading his teachings around the world.

Nevertheless, I believe Jesus’ most important role was to achieve atonement, because it is
the foundation of Christianity. Without atonement, it meant that we could not be forgiven
or receive salvation from God because we were separated from Him, so we would not have
the belief in God and Christianity that people do now. Also, if Atonement had not happened
then none of the other important roles would have mattered, for in the Bible, 1 Corinthians
15:14 it says that, “If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your
faith,” meaning that we would not have this relationship with God that we have now. This
argument is successful because it is true and peoples’ faith in God would be useless if Jesus
had not achieved atonement.

In conclusion, I strongly believe that Jesus’ most important role was achieving atonement -
which literally means at-one-ment (with God) – because it is the foundation of Christianity;
if Jesus had not achieved atonement, then Christians’ faith in God would be useless and it
would have no meaning.