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REVIEW 'Madonna fears no one at the Chicago Theatre in a late-night, cell phone-free clash between old and new'
Madame X Tour, Madonna NewsBy Kimberly October 17, 2019
Madonna does what she wants, when she wants, for whatever reason she wants. In fact, the Madonna of today may be more stubborn. Yes, she has amassed a trove of hits from each decade of her career. But the hits matter less to the artist than the intention behind her music. Known as something of a chameleon,…
Like a Prayer era discographies updated
Discography, Madonna News, New Madonna itemsBy Kimberly October 16, 2019
Like a Prayer era has been updated with these discography items: Dear Jessie – Australian CD single Cherish – 1990 Summer Hits compilation cassette Oh Father – 7″ Australia Like a Prayer (album) – Canada Enjoy
Madonna covers 1,000th Issue of Hot Press magazine (pre-order now)
Madonna NewsBy Kimberly October 16, 2019
Hot Press: The 1,000th Issue. It's a big one…. –––––––––––––––––––––––– The 1,000th Issue of Hot Press hits the streets on October 17 – and it's gonna be a big one. Hot Press started out in 1977 with the avowed intent of making Ireland safe for rock 'n' roll. Since then the country has been transformed…
Madonna's Hollywood single discography online – 31 different pressings
Next up is the discography to the second single taken from Madonna's American Life album 'Hollywood'. Madonna performed the track on an extensive promotional tour, European performances included: Absolut Madonna (Germany), Jonathan Ross (U.K.), CD:UK (U.K.), TOTP (U.K.), La Chanson Nr.1 (France). Madonna has yet to perform it live during a (world) tour. A remix…
Madame X Tour Chicago…..it's starting!
An Interview with The Most Sought After Doctor in New York: Dr. Paul Jarrod Frank
Madonna News, MDNA SkinBy Kimberly October 14, 2019
Bhavna: It is common knowledge that you work with Madonna. Every time I've seen her, she appears ageless. Can you talk a little bit about how you met, how has she changed your perspective on aging and beauty in general and the MDNA skincare collaboration? Dr. Frank: So, we met about five years ago and she came…
WRAPS UP MADAME X TOUR IN NEW YORK … With Possible Dancer/Boyfriend
Backgrid Madonna wrapped up her Madame X Tour in New York Saturday night, and by the looks of things, she's back in the game. Madge left the Howard Gilman Opera House at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in NYC with Ahlamalik Williams, a 25-year-old dancer and choreographer. He was also featured in Madonna's music video she released last June…
More new Madame X tour memorabilia available
New Madame X Tour memorabilia in the official Madonna store! Now available are the cosmetic case and the guitar pick set. Click HERE to buy
The Virgin Tour original promo ad from Interview magazine
Check out this seldom seen official promotional ad for The Virgin Tour homevideo originally published in Interview magazine. We have photographed the ad and added it to our dedicated Virgin Tour page HERE
45 of the most iconic music video looks of all time
Madonna put an edgy spin on bridal wear for her "Like a Virgin" (1984) music video. Madonna pushed fashion boundaries. Madonna/YouTube Throughout her career that spans multiple decades, Madonna cemented herself as the queen of pop in a series of iconic music videos, one of the earliest being her 1984 hit "Like a Virgin." At the…
25 candid photos of icons who shaped pop culture (Madonna on the set of Who's That Girl)
Madonna News, Madonna's FilmographyBy Kimberly October 11, 2019
This image of Madonna in 1986 is also one of the photographer's favorites. Madonna. Courtesy of Oscar Abolafia In 1986, Madonna was filming the movie "Who's That Girl" in New York, and production closed off one of the city's blocks. To get close, Abolafia lied and told the officials he lived on that block,…
The Mix: Madonna live, Chicago Film Festival and more cool things to do Oct. 11-17
Looking for some cool things do to and see in Chicago in the week ahead? Here are some highlights: Into the Madonna groove Leave it to Madonna to always shake things up. Her Madame X tour, a series of multi-night residencies in smaller venues than usual, began with 17 nights at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Gilman…
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After Apple (AAPL) blew away analyst consensus earnings estimates of $10.07 a share on January 25 by announcing December quarter earnings of $13.87, Wall Street analysts rushed to push up their price targets for Apple stock. FBR Capital put in a one-year target of $525. Morgan Stanley said $515. Citigroup went wild and said $600 a share.
The stock, which closed at $446.66 before the company announced earnings, hit $509.46 a share on February 14. It pegged a high of $526.29 the next day. And despite some amazing volatility recently, shares closed at $516.29 on February 23.
Wall Street analysts rushed back to their models. $570 a share said Oppenheimer. Credit Suisse upped that with $600. Morgan Keegan and Canaccord went to $650. Searching on February 22, I found a price target on SeekingAlpha.com of $790.
It's enough to remind you of the heady days just before the dot.com crash in 2000 when analysts raced to see who could get 15-minutes of Internet play by topping the audaciously higher target price of yesterday with one even more outrageous today. In October 1998 it was Amazon.com (AMZN) to $400. By December 1999 it was Qualcomm (QCOM) to $1,000.
We all know how that came out. The technology-laden NASDAQ Composite Index hit its all time closing high of 5048.62 on March 10, 2000—and then fell off a cliff. By May 2007, it had clawed its way back to half of its 2000 high. On February 22 the index closed at 2933.17.
Investors who remember the technology crash of the NASDAQ fear that if they buy Apple now they're jumping in just before the plunge. And even more frightening, some investors who remember the 2000 crash also think of Apple as company built on fashion. They worry not just about a replay of 2000 but what happens when Apple misses the next fashion trend.
To these investors I'd say, Hey, it is different this time. Apple stock cheap right now. Yes, you heard me, cheap—because of these very worries. I think $600 a share is a very conservative target price for Apple. I think you have to go out to $650 before you come up with any barriers that might limit the stock—and even then the barriers are mostly in the heads of investors.
Apple sports the biggest market cap of any company in the world--$478 billion--but it trades at just 12.1 times projected fiscal 2012 earnings per share. (Apple's fiscal year ends in September.) Take away net cash of $100 billion (yes, that's billion) and the stock is even cheaper. Sales grew by 66% in fiscal 2011 and Standard & Poor's forecasts 48% sales growth in fiscal 2012. And gross margins are climbing, not shrinking, with size. Standard & Poor's forecasts that 2012 gross margins will climb in fiscal 2012 from Apple's 40% in fiscal 2011. This isn't a stock trading at 100 times revenue and on the distant promise of earnings.
Here you've got a company that has grown earnings per share by 82.7% in fiscal 2011, by 66.9% in fiscal 2010, and by 69.4% in fiscal 2009, and it trades at a trailing 12-month price to earnings ratio of 14.6? The price to earnings/growth rate (PEG) ratio for this stock on the projected five-year earnings grow rate is just 0.62. (The PEG ratio divides the PE ratio by the earnings growth rate to give an investor an idea of how cheap of expensive a company's growth is.) Know what kind of companies have trailing 12-month PE ratios like that? Solid but stolid Blue Chips like 3M (MMM) at 14.72 or electric utility like American Electric Power (AEP) at 12.77. And you know what the PEG ratios on projected five-year earnings growth are for these stocks? For 3M it's 1.38—growth at this stock costs more than twice as much as at Apple. The PEG for American Electric Power is 3.37.
If there's an expensive stock in this bunch, it's not Apple but that solid utility stock.
And to these investors I'd say, despite all the hype around Apple, I think it is one of the least understood stocks on the market. Apple isn't a gadget company at the whim of fashion. It has built at least two major competitive advantages. It keeps investing heavily in each. And it looks like each advantage is just getting stronger. I don't see anyone out there ready to eat away at Apple's two major edges.
And what are those advantages?
First, Apple has built an extraordinary hardware/software ecosystem that yields products that better integrate hardware and software, that therefore presents a significant difference in the quality of the user experience, and that gives the company a way to introduce what are in many ways products pre-sold to consumers.
Apple designs and controls the production of its own hardware and software. That control may rankle companies that work with Apple but it means that the company's app store is cleaner and easier to navigate than the Android store, that it's products are easier to set up out of the box than the conglomeration that is a Microsoft/Intel/Hewlett-Packard PC, and that it's products—to an imperfect but still extraordinary degree—work with each other.
To really, really compete on this level Google (GOOG) would have to not just buy Motorola Mobility (for $12.5 billion) but also find a way to finesse its relationships with all the companies that produce their own flavors of Android phones.
Importantly for investors, Apple understands its advantage here and is building on it. Take the new iCloud product. Are consumers really prepared to differentiate the quality of one cloud-based service from another? Not really—short of a service producing massive outages or data losses. But they do know how easy it is to access cloud-based storage, upload, and download, and how easy it is to use the service from any of their multiple devices. iCloud comes with my iPad and iPhone? Sure, I'll try it. And once the consumer has tried it, every use makes changing a bigger and bigger hassle.
Or take the new operating system for Apple's Macs, Mountain Lion, due this summer. It won't try to make the Mac experience just like that on the iPhone or iPad—that would actually be disruptive to loyal Mac users. But it will move the computer and mobile operating systems into closer alignment so that users of any device will feel that flash of recognition that this too is an Apple environment.
Oh, and industry rumor has it, Mountain Lion will have improved hooks to Apple TV. Anybody really think that Apple TV, in some form, isn't Apple's next big product direction?
Second, Apple is one of the technology industry's great manufacturers—although it makes almost nothing in factories that it owns itself.
Apple's integration of hardware and software doesn't just happen, especially for a company that manufactures so little itself of what it actually sells. One of Apple's biggest areas of investment each year is in its supplier network as the company spends billions to make sure that the companies that make Apple products make them to Apple standards (Yes, Apple could do a much, much better job making sure that its suppliers take care of their workers and I hope the company has been shamed into a serious effort to fix this problem) and get them to where they need to go on Apple schedules. In fiscal 2011 Apple's capital budget came to $4.4 billion. Of that about $612 million went into the continued build out of Apple's stores. The rest went into a category called manufacturing and engineering—and of that $3.8 billion went into international investment, most of that in the company's suppliers.
I think there are two great manufacturing stories in the technology industry today. The first is Intel (INTC), which builds its own factories and relentlessly uses manufacturing technology to drive its competitors into irrelevance. The other is Apple. The two models are entirely different but they both work.
The big question for investors is how long Apple can keep this up. I think that's a legitimate worry. Where will Apple's next 80% in earnings growth come from?
We can see part way down the road. It looks like March will bring the iPad 3 with a higher resolution display. And on last year's schedule for the iPhone 4S, in September or October Apple will introduce the iPhone 5 with a bigger 4-inch screen (likely) and with Qualcomm's quad mode chip to enable the phone on 3G and LTE networks.
The iPad 3 will enable Apple to drive the still immature tablet market. BIP (that is before iPad) sales of tablet devices ran at about 200,000 units a year. In fiscal 2010, the first year of availability, Apple sold 7 million iPads. In fiscal 2011 sales came to 32 million iPads. And this is essentially without a significant penetration of any developing economy.
Over time I'd expect that Apple will lose market share in tablets, but over time Apple is picking up share in the smartphone market. Credit Suisse estimates that Apple will grow its share of the smartphone market to a 24% in 2012/2013. That would be a huge increase since Apple had just 12.4% of global smartphone subscribers at the end of 2011, according to comScore. Still it's not totally outlandish since Apple picked up two percentage points of share from the end of September to the end of December. And the LTE enabled iPhone 5 would, again industry rumor has it, be compatible with the network operated by China Mobile (CHL), the world's largest wireless carrier. That should be good for a few points of global market share.
Credit Suisse estimates that there will be a total of 244 million potential customers in developing economies by 2015 with income profiles that would make them potential buyers of iPhones and iPads. These customers represent potential incremental sales of $84 billion for Apple by 2015.
The most likely method, the market consensus now holds, would be through a dividend. If you subtract Apple's trapped offshore cash and a reasonable reserve for capital investments, Apple still has enough to pay out a dividend yield equal to the 2.1% yield on the S&P 500.
A payout like that would certainly provide major support for the stock not only because a 2.1% yield is itself attractive these days, but also because paying a dividend would add potential new buyers for Apple's stock as institutional investors who are prohibited from buying stocks without dividends suddenly found themselves able to add Apple to their portfolios.
None of this makes Apple a buy and forget stock. If Apple TV is Apple's next big product, will it be any good? Can the iPhone keep picking up share once Nokia (NOK) stops bleeding smartphone sales?
And there's an important barrier at $650 or so. Credit Suisse calculates that at that price Apple would make up 5% of the S&P 500 index. Very few companies have ever become 5% of the index. ExxonMobil (XOM) and Microsoft (MSFT), yes, but not General Electric (GE) or Wal-Mart (WMT) or Cisco Systems (CSCO). IBM (IBM) managed to reach 6% of the index in the 1980s.
At $650 a share investors would have to be convinced again that this time it's different. And maybe at $650 it won't be. But $650 is almost 27% from there. Let's talk again then.


We have created a 2019 ranking of the best colleges in Arizona that offer Human And Social Sciences degrees to help you find a school that fits your needs. Each school's ranking is based on the compilation of our data from reliable government sources, student surveys, college graduate interviews, and editorial review. In addition, you can view our entire list of all 44 Human And Social Sciences schools located within Arizona. We also provide reviews, facts, and questions and answers for schools on our site and offer you access to get valuable information from colleges and universities today.
Arizona State University-Tempe offers 100 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a large public university in a mid sized city. In 2015, 2,890 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 2,228 Bachelor's degrees, 442 Certificates degrees, 138 Master's degrees, and 82 Doctoral degrees.
University of Arizona offers 92 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a large public university in a large city. In 2015, 2,381 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 1,958 Bachelor's degrees, 263 Master's degrees, 89 Doctoral degrees, and 71 Certificates degrees.
Arizona Christian University offers 24 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a very small private university in a large city. In 2015, 63 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 63 Bachelor's degrees.
Northern Arizona University offers 57 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a large public university in a small city. In 2015, 777 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 651 Bachelor's degrees, 85 Master's degrees, 21 Doctoral degrees, and 20 Certificates degrees.
Prescott College offers 28 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a very small private university in a small city. In 2015, 103 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 55 Bachelor's degrees, and 48 Master's degrees.
Grand Canyon University offers 21 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a large private university in a large city. In 2015, 1,758 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 981 Master's degrees, 775 Bachelor's degrees, and 2 Doctoral degrees.
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University-Prescott offers 6 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a small private university in a outlying rural. In 2015, 109 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 109 Bachelor's degrees.
Arizona State University-West offers 16 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a medium sized public university in a large city. In 2015, 413 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 375 Bachelor's degrees, 36 Master's degrees, and 2 Certificates degrees.
Arizona State University-Downtown Phoenix offers 21 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a large public university in a large city. In 2015, 865 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 422 Master's degrees, 352 Bachelor's degrees, 77 Certificates degrees, and 14 Doctoral degrees.
University of Phoenix-Arizona offers 12 Human And Social Sciences Degree programs. It's a large private university in a mid sized city. In 2015, 7,354 students graduated in the study area of Human And Social Sciences with students earning 3,330 Bachelor's degrees, 2,876 Associate's degrees, 1,109 Master's degrees, 38 Certificates degrees, and 1 Doctoral degree.


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Whether it is a sudden emergency or an ongoing crisis, CARE fights to aid people in need around the world.
CARE / Josh Estey
In 2020, 168 million people need humanitarian assistance — a number that has continued to grow over the last decade.
70.8 million people have been forcibly displaced from their homes. The human consequences of these crises are devastating. Families struggle to find shelter, to get enough to eat, and to find safe places to rebuild their lives. One in five women in crisis has experienced sexual assault.
On average, humanitarian crises are more complex than at any time in the last 15 years, and last nearly three years longer than they used to. Conflict, migration, and climate change are the key trends driving these crises — with 8 of the worst food crises in the world linked to conflict and climate change. And so far, we have only raised 54% of the money we would need to help all of the people in crisis.
CARE COVID-19 Response
For people already living in crisis, the effects of COVID-19 will be devastating.
These trends to longer, more complicated crises have a huge impact on our ability to support the people in need.
We need to think about funding over the long term, and not just to fill immediate gaps. We need to think about ways to prepare people and communities to cope with shocks and respond to emergencies themselves. We need to strengthen local institutions that can respond to people on the ground. And we need to find ways to address trends like climate change and conflict that make the situation worse.
Health in Emergencies
Natural disasters, armed conflict, and political unrest increase women's and girls' vulnerability.
Women's Leadership in Emergencies
Supporting women's leadership and collective action during emergencies.
Hunger in Emergencies
As inequality continues to rise, increasingly unjust and broken food systems – and the pressures of conflict and increasing climate change – have led to over 800 million hungry people, a number that is growing.
Current Disaster Response Efforts
For people already living in crisis, the effects of COVID-19 will be devastating. Read More
The cyclone, the strongest to hit Southern Africa, has affected at least 3 million people in Malawi, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe. Read More
Yemen Humanitarian Crisis
With millions on the brink of famine, the UN is calling the civil war in Yemen the world's worst humanitarian crisis. Read More
Venezuela Refugee Crisis
More than 3 million people have fled the country - the largest exodus in Latin America in a century. Read More
The ongoing armed conflict in Syria has left up to 13.5 million people, more than half of whom are children, in need of humanitarian aid. Read More
Myanmar Refugee Crisis
More than 915,000 people have fled to Bangladesh after an escalation of violence in Myanmar's northern Rakhine State. Read More
See all current emergencies
Help CARE respond to emergencies.
Give today to provide disaster relief aid to the poorest communities in the world.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Because of this, the city and McFall decided to draft a new contract that correctly stipulated McFall's interim city manager status per CalPERS regulations.
The new contract specifies that McFall will be paid $86.06 per hour — less than the $125 his previous contract stipulated. The new contract also does not include the $1,700-per-month housing allowance its previous incarnation did.
The new contract will cost the city an estimated $82,617, according to the report, based on eight months of work, not exceeding 960 hours.
McFall has 34 years of experience in the public sector, 22 of which were spent as the Glendale assistant city manager before he retired in 2010.
He will temporarily replace former city manager Dianne Thompson, who was fired after less than a year because of "differences in style" with the City Council. Her predecessor, Steve Adams, also left the city under less-than-favorable circumstances following public outcry over a July 2014 incident when he was found alone with a subordinate late at night in City Hall.
McFall served as interim city manager during the switchover between Adams and Thompson.


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Jorge Bartual es un exfutbolista español.

Trayectoria
Jorge Bartual Medina Empezó jugando en el equipo de su colegio, el Don Bosco, donde pasó por alevín, infantil y juvenil.Ingresó a mitad de temporada 88/89 a las categorías inferiores del Valencia CF con 17 años, gracias a José Manuel Rielo que fue quién recomendó su fichaje. Realizó la pretemporada 89/90 con el primer equipo a las órdenes de Guus Hiddink.Jugó durante temporada y media en el Valencia sub-19 y en la campaña 90/91 pasó al Valencia B donde coincidió con José Francisco Molina. En el segundo equipo valencianista no logró continuidad, ya que jugó muy poco. A pesar de eso, se hizo con un puesto en el primer conjunto en la temporada 95/96.En un amistoso contra el Ajax, sufrió una rotura de ligamentos cruzados. Le operó el doctor Gullén y estuvo cinco meses de baja.Solo disputó 3 partidos en competición Europea, copa de la UEFA en 1996.

Debutó en Primera división el 24 de enero de 1996, en un Real Valladolid-Valencia CF (2-5) correspondiente a la jornada número 23, debido a la lesión que sufrió Andoni Zubizarreta en el calentamiento. Coincidió con , Andoni Zubizarreta, Gustavo Campagnuolo, Santi Cañizares y Andrés Palop, por lo que apenas tuvo muchas ocasiones de demostrar su valía y tras pasar a ser el 3* portero del primer equipo, el jugador abandonó el club ché y marchó al Club Deportivo Tenerife de Segunda División de España en busca de más minutos. Solo estuvo una única temporada y no jugó ni un solo minuto debido al gran nivel que poseía su compañero Sergio Aragoneses. Tras su etapa fallida, fichó por el Club Deportivo Quintanar del Rey de Tercera División. Esta vez disfrutó de minutos, y tuvo muy buenas actuaciones. Tras retirarse, volvió a Valencia, esta vez como entrenador de porteros de la cantera valencianista.

Clubes

Palmarés

Campeonatos nacionales

Copas internacionales

Referencias

Enlaces externos

Futbolistas de Valencia
Futbolistas del Valencia Club de Fútbol en los años 1990
Futbolistas del Club Deportivo Tenerife en los años 2000
Nacidos en Valencia
Guardametas de fútbol

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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PodCulture 55: The Summer Movie Special
Click your seatbelts and hold on tight, it's gonna be a bumpy ride as The PodCulture Crew are joined by their friend, Ryan, for the Summer Movie Special!
Brad and Christina enjoyed their 4th of July with a double dose of sci-fi, seeing Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, and Transformers, Glenn has spent more time working than he'd like, and Ryan is in town from New York.
Glenn and Ryan review Live Free Die Hard, which opens up a discussion about MPAA ratings, and how they've been approached by movie makers, and how we've evolved as an audience. Although they haven't seen it yet, Christina laments the lack of Alan Rickman, and Brad's interest is piqued by the cameo by Kevin Smith.
All four have seen Fantastic Four:Rise of the Silver Surfer, and enjoyed it, but there were some nit-picks by the boys. Despite the eye candy of Jessica Alba, they dislike the portrayal of Doctor Doom. The guys disagree with the avoidance of Galactus and speculate the character decisions, but all agree that Laurence Fishburne's talent shone through the silver.
There's no disguising the blockbuster hit, Transformers, and we all loved it. The boys, having liked the cartoon as a kid, were suspicious before the release, but came out wonderfully impressed. Christina, who already enjoyed Shia LaBeouf in Constantine, loved it. We talk about the crossover with G.I. Joe, special effects, military portrayal, Michael Bay, the soundtrack and just about everything else under the hood of this summer hit.
Promos include Cup Car Update, and musical guest is Luke Ski with "The Ballad of Optimus Prime". Transform and roll out!
PodCulture 54: Bring On The Boohkie – Part B
PodCulture 56: Living La Vida Geek


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Volume 7.1 / Different Cultures, Different Atonement Model? Penal Substitutionary Atonement and Fear-Power Cultures
Different Cultures, Different Atonement Model? Penal Substitutionary Atonement and Fear-Power Cultures
Matt Deaver
In recent years, some have argued that the doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement is not viable in certain cultures because they are fear-power-based, rather than guilt-based like the West. Some theologians and missiologists go so far as to say that penal substitutionary atonement, whether biblical or not, should not be presented in such contexts because it will not be effective in reaching the lost with the Gospel. They argue that other atonement motifs, especially Christus Victor, should be used instead since it is more plausible in this cultural context. This article will argue that penal substitutionary atonement is not only viable within a fear-power culture, but it is vital for presenting a biblically faithful doctrine of the atonement in any culture.
In Western culture prior to the turn of the twentieth century, the Judeo-Christian tradition played a foundational role in establishing the moral boundaries of society. Within that tradition, the emotion of fear often conveyed positive moral connotations such as reverence and respect, especially in relation to God.[1] The rise of science and secularization in the West, however, has redefined how we interpret fear. Our threats and dangers are no longer evaluated in relation to God and evil, but only in relation to our psychological well-being.[2] Fear has taken on a therapeutic dynamic, rather than a moral one.[3] Paul Tillich made a similar argument when he said that sixteenth-century angst was born out of a fear of damnation and guilt, but twentieth-century angst springs from the fear of meaninglessness.[4] Psychiatrists are the new arbitrators in a postmodern culture untethered from a system of meaning.[5]
But traditional religious authorities, such as shamans, still play a pivotal role in cultures outside the West, and as we shall see, an increasing role in the West as well. Animistic cultures have not yet jettisoned their religious paradigms that provide clarity for how to address one's fears and give guidance for how one should live within a particular people. People in such cultures consciously employ fear and power dynamics in order to navigate their daily lives. The psychiatrist and the shaman thus hold at least one thing in common—both claim to remove anxiety and fear from a person's life in order to gain a sense of control and safety.
How can the Christian pastor or missionary effectively preach the cross of Christ in cultures such as these? Does the atonement of Jesus Christ address issues of fear as perceived by these different cultures, and if so, which model of the atonement speaks to their fears most directly? In recent years, some theologians and missiologists have questioned whether or not the doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement is viable within certain cultures because these cultures lack the categories necessary for understanding it. Scholars and practitioners who take such a stance, argue that the West is still primarily dominated by a culture that is based on legal and individualistic categories and people therefore still operate on the basis of guilt rather than fear.
In addition, some theologians have argued that penal substitutionary atonement is a culturally-conditioned model of the atonement that is dependent on Western legal categories, and is therefore, not only unnecessary for preaching the cross today, but is unviable in certain contexts. For instance, in Recovering the Scandal of the Cross, Mark Baker and Joel Green argue that "the popularity of the penal-satisfaction model of the atonement has less to do with exegesis and historical theology and more to do with the cultural narrative in the West, with its emphases on individualism and mechanism."[6] Furthermore, Green and Baker recount how one missionary in Japan found the doctrine of penal substitution ineffective in a shame-based culture and conclude that penal substitutionary atonement should thus be discarded in favor of other theories.[7]
At the same time, some missiologists argue that while penal substitutionary atonement is biblical, it is only one metaphor among many for how to understand the atonement and should not be elevated above others. In the name of contextualization, they argue that different atonement motifs should be utilized when preaching the gospel to people in non-western, fear-power cultures. For instance, Jayson Georges identifies three different types of cultures: guilt-innocence, shame-honor, and fear-power, and argues that different atonement motifs speak more directly to each of these cultures and should be utilized over and against others when sharing the gospel.[8] Jackson Wu makes a similar case when he argues that the gospel should be contextualized in Chinese cultures of honor and shame.[9] There are a number of valuable contributions these authors make, a few of which will be mentioned below, but they seem to indicate that penal substitutionary atonement is not viable in certain cultures, including animistic fear-power cultures.[10] At the very least, they argue that this atonement theme should be deemphasized in fear-power cultures.
Contrary to those who question its effectiveness in certain contexts, this article argues that penal substitutionary atonement is not only viable, but also vital for presenting a biblically faithful doctrine of the atonement in an animistic fear-power culture or any culture. Furthermore, we will see that penal substitutionary atonement actually addresses issues of fear and power in any culture, but these must be understood in light of the Bible's own categories if they are going to address the true spiritual need of people dealing with fear-power dynamics. In the name of contextualization, various attempts have been made to present Christ by starting with extra-biblical categories of indigenous cultures and worldviews rather than starting with Scripture. Ultimately, these methods can lead to a deficient and superficial faith among converts. In order to faithfully contextualize the gospel in other cultures, one must first formulate a doctrine of atonement from within a Biblical framework and only then seek to contextualize the message to a particular culture.
Several scholars have responded critically to the claims made by Green, Baker, and Georges as they relate to shame-honor cultures,[11] but there has been little discussion regarding the relationship between the doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement and fear-power cultures. This article will draw on the insights of those who have addressed penal substitutionary atonement in relation to shame-honor cultures, but will also explore several elements unique to fear-power cultures. In order to demonstrate that penal substitutionary atonement is not only viable, but also vital when sharing the gospel in animistic fear-power cultures, we will first examine the basis of fear-power culture the way anthropologists and missiologists define it. We will also consider how certain missiologists today are employing the category of fear-power in their models for proclaiming the atonement. We will see that while there are some benefits to categorizing cultures in this way, there are also several problems that emerge from the 3D gospel model proposed by Georges. Then, we will consider Scripture's own categories and framework for how to understand fear and power dynamics. The Bible speaks often about fear and power and the atonement addresses these issues, but we must understand them in relationship to penal substitutionary atonement because it is the means by which God delivers us from bondage to the fear and the power of Satan.
2. Animistic Fear-Power Culture
The concept of dividing cultures into "guilt" or "shame" cultural categories was based upon the book The Chrysanthemum and the Sword (1946) by Ruth Benedict.[12] In her book, Benedict sought to apply sociological patterns she had previously developed to social aspects of Japanese culture.[13] A few years later, anthropologist Eugene Nida added fear as a third response to transgressions committed against religiously sanctioned codes in his book Customs and Cultures (1954).[14] It is clear from Nida's writing that he never intended for it to be a framework for categorizing cultures at large, but rather was simply highlighting different types of reactions people have when they violate religious expectations.
Many missiologists since Nida have postulated that there are certain dynamics of fear and power in animistic cultures that do not appear as clearly in Western society. Perhaps most notable is Paul G. Hiebert's article "The Flaw of the Excluded Middle," which first appeared in 1982.[15] Hiebert argues that secularization in the West has resulted in a two-tiered worldview instead of a three-tiered worldview. On the highest tier, Westerners think of God in cosmic history and his role in the creation and destiny of all things. On the lowest tier, they think of the natural world in terms of autonomous scientific laws. The middle tier, which is often excluded in Western thinking, is where beings and forces that cannot be directly perceived exist. In animistic cultures, these include spirits, ghosts, ancestors, and demons that have distinct influence over certain spheres of nature such as trees, water, animals or over locations such as mountains and forests, or over human beings. These spirits exercise their power by causing sickness or evil behavior among those they influence.[16]
As missionaries such as Hiebert engaged people in animistic cultures, they noticed that their own two-tiered worldview created a blind spot that kept them from being able to address the daily issues faced by people in such cultures. According to anthropologist Charles H. Kraft, gospel messages about faith, love, and forgiveness of sins are not likely to impact a people in a power-oriented culture.[17] Kraft argues that gospel presentations in such cultures should include a "power encounter," modeled after the pattern of Jesus' healing and miracle working ministry.[18] Power encounters generally include a visible demonstration, such as physical healing or exorcism, to show that the power of God is greater than that of the local pagan god.[19]
3. Fear-Power Missionary Strategies Today
More recently, missiologists like Georges, have embraced the tripartite division of guilt, shame, and fear cultures and utilized it as a foundational framework for understanding cultures. Georges acknowledges that this paradigm is overly simplistic when writes, "Each cultural worldview is a unique blend of guilt, shame, and fear… Like all cultural paradigms, the guilt-shame-fear trichotomy simplifies complexities into categories for the sake of clarity."[20] Despite this qualification, however, he goes on to argue that each culture has a dominant cultural bent, which means that people in particular cultures can understand certain metaphors of the atonement better than others and we should present the theory that is most culturally plausible.[21]
Georges highlights three theories of the atonement—ransom, satisfaction, and penal substitution and argues that these speak most effectively to the three types of cultures—ransom (fear-power), satisfaction (shame-honor), and penal substitution (guilt-innocence).[22] While he maintains that all "three strands of the gospel never function in isolation," he nevertheless concludes that presenting the gospel in a particular culture "may warrant an emphasis on one approach above others."[23] Thus, for those in a fear-power culture, Georges argues that we should present the ransom or Christus Victor model of the atonement rather than the penal substitution view because what is needed in that context is a power encounter. In a modified version of the Four Spiritual Laws, he proposes the following gospel presentation for a fear-power culture:
1. God is sovereign and offers you spiritual authority. God created us to rule his entire creation (seen and unseen) and experience his spiritual blessings. 2. People fearfully live under the authority of Satan. Our idolatry separates us from divine power. The powers of darkness rule over all people, causing sin, death, and harm. 3. Jesus is the warrior who restores our power. Jesus conquered evil powers and death to bring God's power and blessings. His death disarmed powers and provides spiritual authority to us. 4. You must know Jesus to access divine power. Relationally trust Jesus Christ alone for protection and power. Turn from magical rituals and occultism for authority and blessings.[24]
When sharing the story of salvation with those in a fear-power culture, Georges contends that we should use language that denotes combat, rather than language that reflects a courtroom (penal substitution) or community (shame-honor) because this is the language that shapes their worldview.[25] Before we look at Georges' 3D model more closely and examine some of its weaknesses, it is worth highlighting some of its strengths.
First of all, Georges is right to draw attention to the fact that the atonement is multi-faceted and that these various facets help us better understand the scope and beauty of our salvation in Christ. He writes, "a one-dimensional gospel threatens the veracity and integrity of the Bible. We misread Scripture and construct a sub-biblical view of God. If God does not save us from shame and fear… we severely minimize his glory as God."[26] Scripture does, in fact, speak at length to how the cross of Christ addresses both our shame and fear and Georges is right to draw attention to these important biblical categories. Another strength is that Georges takes Hiebert's law of the excluded middle seriously and thus avoids an unbiblical two-tiered worldview. As Christians consider how to communicate the gospel in any culture, they must be cognizant of the spiritual forces at work and how the gospel addresses these real powers. Scripture is clear that there are evil spirits at work behind idolatrous forms of worship and they have the ability to blind and lead unbelievers astray from true worship of God (Deut. 32:16-17; 1 Cor. 10:20). When the gospel is communicated in an animistic context, it is vital to reframe a person's perspective so that it is in accordance with a Biblical understanding of spiritual powers. A gospel that does not address these issues is truncated and can result in a syncretistic understanding of the gospel, where a person maintains allegiance to spiritual rituals and practices in the "excluded middle" despite his claim to follow Christ.[27] The atonement motif of Christus Victor, that is, Christ's victory over Satan and the powers, has not had as prominent of a place in Western theology as it should, and those who are ministering among people in an animistic culture would do well to give proper biblical emphasis to this doctrine. Notwithstanding these strengths, there are at least two serious weaknesses in what Georges proposes—his parsing of culture and his theological method.
4. The Complexity of Culture
Although Georges acknowledges that his trifurcation of cultures into fear-shame-guilt categories is overly simplistic, he does not perhaps recognize how such a simplification can distort our understanding of a person's culture and result in a distorted gospel presentation. The main distortion in his model as it relates to culture is that penal substitution makes sense in the West because its cultural heritage is one of guilt. According to Georges, the penal substitution view makes most sense in a guilt-oriented culture because the West is shaped by the language and values of Western law.[28] In other words, Georges believes that penal substitution is understandable and accepted in the West because the West has a cultural heritage where the legal metaphor for salvation makes the most sense. Christianity has thus taken root in the West because the legal metaphor has been the predominant gospel presentation and Westerners have a category for guilt. If those in Majority World cultures are to hear and understand the gospel, so Georges and others argue,[29] then we need to utilize a different gospel presentation that appeals to their dominant cultural orientation.
But Georges puts the cart before the horse when he starts with Western culture and tries to explain theological motifs. In his article reviewing the empirical data for whether or not there is a basis for the guilt-shame-fear trichotomy, Simon Cozens points to a comprehensive study,[30] which indicates that Christianity itself has actually produced a guilt-oriented culture in the West.[31] In other words, the reason penal substitution and the categories of guilt, law, retributive justice, are so prominent in the West is because Christianity and the Bible have been so influential over the centuries. The Christian faith has influenced the West to develop and reflect biblical categories in ways that the Majority World has not because Christianity has not been prominent there. Therefore, rather than minimizing these biblical categories and starting with the dominant cultural categories of other cultures, Christians have a responsibility to find ways to communicate these biblical truths to people in other cultures.
Not only does Georges misdiagnose the causation for the popularity of penal substitution in the West, but he also underestimates the prevalence of fear-power dynamics in the West. As the West continues to move away from its Christian heritage and embraces postmodernity, more Westerners find themselves operating on the plane of the "excluded middle." If there is no transcendent God who can be known via revelation (top tier) and the natural world has been emptied of all spiritual meaning by an evolutionary and naturalist worldview (bottom tier), then the fear of meaninglessness, as Tillich put it, drives a person to fill the void with some kind of spiritual meaning and control (middle tier). In order to discover meaning and cope with daily life in the West today, one does not usually seek after religious doctrine to get rid of guilt, but rather looks for a source of spiritual power and new techniques, which include things like horoscopes, crystals, and tarot cards.[32] Thus, animism and fear-power dynamics are not limited to Africa and Latin America in remote tribal settings but are very much prominent in so called guilt and shame-oriented cultures. Georges hints at this when he says that the dynamics of fear and power "also influence a Brazilian businessman praying to a saint or a Washington politician consulting an astrologer."[33]
In spite of this brief qualification, Georges underestimates the rise of neo-paganism in the West and the pervasiveness of animism throughout all religions. For instance, Georges labels Muslim, Indian, Buddhist, and Japanese civilizations as shame-honor cultures, but fails to acknowledge that each of these cultures, with their respective religions, have their own forms of folk religion (animism) operating below the surface of their high religion.[34] In fact, Van Rheenen estimates that at least 40 percent of the world's population is animistic.[35] This is not surprising when one realizes that idolatry is at the heart of animism—people worship and serve the creature rather than the Creator (Rom 1:18-32).
While Georges' tripartite model for culture has broad explanatory value for thinking about the dynamics of fear/power, guilt/innocence, and shame/honor at play within various cultures, it lends itself to be used in an overly simplistic manner in which the interrelated dynamics of guilt, fear, and shame that operate in every culture are isolated from each other in an exaggerated manner. Beech has demonstrated that dividing whole countries or regions into one of the three categories is methodologically erroneous.[36] In an empirical study among Hispanic Bolivians and mestizo Quechua communities, he determined that Hispanic Bolivians, whether urban or rural were more concerned with shame-honor dynamics whereas the Quechua in rural areas were more fear-power oriented. Thus, even people groups in neighboring communities exhibit various dynamics, so research and categorizing of cultures needs to be done in close relational proximity. In an increasingly globalized and urbanized world, we need to resist simplistic explanations of culture that collapse complex realities into inaccurate stereotypes.[37]
In conclusion, practitioners who utilize this model need to be cognizant that the distinction between shame and guilt, for instance, is considerably less clear-cut and more complex than the tripartite model indicates.[38] Furthermore, as we will see, there is a causal relationship between guilt before God and the resulting experience of fear and shame. Our gospel presentations, therefore, must address all three elements in an integrated manner and not separate atonement motifs from one another depending on the culture. Even though Georges may agree with this in principle, his model functionally isolates these dynamics of culture from one another as well the corresponding atonement metaphors.
5. Theological Method
More troubling than an undue division of cultural dynamics is Georges' theological method of the atonement. As mentioned earlier, Green and Baker contend that penal substitution is not necessarily the fruit of biblical exegesis, but rather the result of a cultural narrative in the West.[39] Elsewhere, drawing on Herman-Emiel Martens, Green argues that interpretations of Jesus' death are tied to particular cultures and times so that no interpretation can be regarded as the only authentic or definitive one.[40] To establish his point, Green points to Anselm's Cur Deus Homo and argues that his satisfaction theory of the atonement is not the result of biblical exegesis, but rather a result of doing theology in a feudal world where honoring one's liege was critical. Green does not believe, however, that Anselm's theory is wrong, because even Paul was necessarily speaking about the atonement in terms relative to his cultural context.[41]
For Green, therefore, atonement theories, whether found in Scripture or historical theology, are valid interpretations of what Jesus' accomplished on the cross relative to a particular society at a particular time. In his estimation, no one atonement metaphor should be elevated above the others, but we should view them each as various colors of a kaleidoscope. The potential danger of such a view, as Greg Boyd indicates in his response to Green, is that it is relativistic and reduces atonement themes to the product of human contexts.[42] Of course, Green is right to indicate that we should understand Jesus' death and Paul's interpretation of that death in light of the historical context in which Scripture was written. But Schreiner rightly reminds us that that Scripture is not merely a human perspective on our dilemma confined to a cultural setting; it is God's transcendent Word to all people in all cultures and times and reveals the genuine predicament of humans before God.[43]
Green's kaleidoscopic view of the atonement means that one can, and in fact must, begin with one's own cultural categories as the lens by which to interpret and understand the death of Jesus. For Anslem, this lens was colored by an honor-shame dynamic. For Augustine and Luther, their interpretive lens was colored by a guilt-innocence dynamic. For those in African and tribal settings, their lens is primarily colored by fear-power dynamics. Since this is inevitably the case, it makes sense to present the metaphor or theory of atonement that most clearly resonates with a person's cultural orientation. Georges seems to be following a similar line of thinking to Green and Baker when he writes:
The penal substitution theory emerged from Reformed legal scholars in the mid-1600s. Since 1800 it has become the dominant atonement theory in Western Christianity, perhaps since it uses the language and values of Western law (esp. retributive justice) to explain how guilty individuals can be legally exonerated in heaven.[44]
As explored already, however, it was not the cultural setting that caused an emphasis on penal substitution and removal of guilt among the Protestant reformers, rather it was the influence of the Scriptures upon the reformers, and subsequently on Western culture, as they rediscovered the heart of the gospel after it had been obscured by the Roman church. But the point to be made here is that Georges views penal substitution as a Western, contextualized theology that causes problems when it is elevated to the level of biblical truth and exported to those in shame-honor or fear-power contexts.[45]
On the one hand, Green and Baker argue that penal substitution is not only an unnecessary hindrance for people of other cultures to come to faith but is also a misrepresentation of biblical data.[46] On the other hand, Georges maintains that penal substitution is a valid theory of the atonement, but one that is contextually derived from Western categories, and therefore, ineffective in Majority World cultures. Furthermore, Georges claims that Western missionaries tend to present a truncated form of the gospel by focusing only on penal substitution in their gospel presentations. Georges proposes his 3D model as a solution to this perceived deficiency and argues that we should begin with the cultural context of those with whom we are sharing the gospel, then communicate the metaphor of the atonement that best connects with the culture.
Despite Georges claim that all three strands of the gospel should not function in isolation, his 3D model ultimately proposes this very thing. For instance, his fear-power gospel presentation (Christus Victor) given above includes nothing about penal substitution or satisfaction. While Georges argues that Western missionaries present a truncated version of the gospel when communicating penal substitution to non-Western listeners, his model advocates for the presentation of a different, yet still truncated strand of the gospel in other cultures—a honor-shame gospel for Asians and Middle Easterners and a fear-power gospel for Africans.[47] The biblical authors, however, move from one view of the atonement to another effortlessly, as Georges even highlights from the letter to the Ephesians. In order to show that the atonement bears on all three facets of guilt, shame, and power, Georges points the following verses from Ephesians:
Guilt-Innocence—"In him we have redemption through the blood, the forgiveness of sins" (1:7a). God "made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions" (2:5). Shame-Honor—"In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ" (1:5). "You are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household" (2:19, cf. 2:12-13). Fear-Power—"That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at this right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion" (1:19-21). "Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes" (6:10-11).[48]
Georges is right to point out that Christ's work has ramification for our issues of guilt, fear, and shame, but the model he proposes fails to follow the lead of the biblical authors in presenting the multifaceted work that Christ accomplished. Georges argues that the cultures of the biblical world were primarily shame and fear based but fails to see how this fact, when coupled with Paul's presentation of the gospel in Ephesians, contradicts his claim that "the driving forces of a particular culture may warrant an emphasis on one approach above others."[49] If we grant that Paul was writing to a shame and fear based culture, why then does he have no trouble presenting the gospel in such a way that it connects with all three elements? Did Paul not realize that these Ephesians would not grasp why they needed to have their sins forgiven and guilt removed? Would not their cultural background prevent them from accepting and receiving the gospel as Paul was presenting it? If we develop a theology of the atonement by starting with the lens of culture rather than with Scripture, numerous problems such as this arise. In short, we end up constructing and communicating a deficient, unbiblical gospel. The potential danger of such a model is nothing short of syncretism.[50]
In fact, if we examine Georges fear-power gospel presentation above more closely, it is not hard to imagine how such a presentation of the gospel could easily result in what Hiebert calls a "Christianized animism."[51] In Georges' Christus Victor gospel message there is no mention of the gravity of our sin against God or the need for forgiveness. The overall focus is on how one can get power and spiritual authority so that they are freed from oppressive forces. This partial gospel presentation, like animism, provides a human-centered worldview that neglects the God-centered vision of reality revealed in the biblical worldview. It addresses our sources of fear and power at a horizontal level regarding our relationship to spiritual powers but neglects the vertical dimension of our salvation upon which the achievements of the cross are based. At the end of the day, such a message falls short of addressing our deepest need as revealed in Scripture.
Contrary to Green, Baker, and Georges, this article contends that if we are going to construct and present a theology of the atonement that reflects the biblical teaching on the cross, even in so-called animistic fear-power cultures, then we must do so from within the Bible's own framework and categories, rather than from extra-Biblical categories such as one's culture.[52] It is true that every interpreter comes to the Scriptures with cultural and philosophical presuppositions that potentially influence the way we understand certain passages, and that God's revelation comes to us via the cultural context of the biblical authors.[53] Nevertheless, with faithful exegesis and the Spirit's illumination, we can actually understand the meaning of Scripture as intended by its original author, no matter what cultural background we may come from or reside within. We are greatly influenced by our cultural presuppositions and categories, but we are not trapped inside of them. The Bible gives new categories and transforms worldviews so that we can understand what Christ has done for us on the cross. God's Word illuminates darkened minds and confronts and creates a new culture among those who hear the gospel and respond.[54]
Certain biblical themes may certainly stand out more lucidly to those in differing cultures, but if we approach the atonement from within the interpretive framework of Scripture, we discover that penal substitution is essential to a biblical theology of the atonement and the gospel and cannot simply be set aside in favor of other views that we deem more effective in a given culture. Furthermore, the Bible often speaks about fear and power and how the cross addresses these issues, but we must understand them in relationship to penal substitutionary atonement since it is the means by which our fear and power issues are rightly dealt with before God.
6. Penal Substitution and Fear-Power Dynamics
When we trace the history of fear, we have to begin in Genesis 3:10, as God calls out to Adam in hiding. Adam's response, "I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid" reveals the source of Adam's fear.[55] He is afraid because he has disobeyed God's commandment to refrain from eating the fruit of the tree and has already experienced one consequence of his disobedience—awareness of his nakedness (shame). But there is little doubt that Adam was afraid of God finding him out because of a greater consequence that He had forewarned Adam about. In Genesis 2:17, God told Adam that the consequence for violating the one law in Eden was death. Was God now on His way to execute this judgment on Adam? We have every reason to assume this was the case based on God's clear commandment.
According to Matthew Schlimm, the Hebrew word for "fear," occurs 419 times in the Old Testament and of the more than 200 references that refer to a fear of God, three-quarters of them indicate a fear derived from the perception that God will judge them for their sins.[56] There is clearly a causal relationship between our guilt and fear in the Bible. This does not discount the reality that many animists today live in fear of evil spirits as also many people did during the earthly ministry of Jesus. Nor is it to undermine the importance of the Christus Victor motif evident in the storyline of Scripture. It is simply to highlight that the source of all our fear, and the correlated desire to gain power in order to minimize that fear, is a result of our first ancestor's transgression against God.
The Christus Victor metaphor of the atonement has experienced a renaissance in the past century, especially since Gustaf Aulen published his work Christus Victor in 1931.[57] Since then, theologians have increasingly drawn attention to the warfare motif in Scripture and Christ's victory over the cosmic powers.[58] This theme in Scripture is undoubtedly an important one that is all too often neglected by evangelicals in Western cultures. As a result of the "flaw of the excluded middle," many Westerns live as if there were no such thing as spiritual principalities and powers, nor a literal Satan who exercises power over institutions, ideas, and people. As Rutledge says, "most biblical interpretation in the modern age has been done as though there were only two dramatis personae, God and humanity—thereby demystifying the New Testament, which presents three."[59]
The Christus Victor theme of the atonement helps us appreciate and live in light of Christ's victory over the powers of darkness and has profound implications for how we understand our sanctification in this life and our future hope in the life to come.[60] Not only should it be proclaimed from the Scriptures to those in animistic fear-power cultures, but it should also be heralded among Western evangelicals. What Green, Baker, and Georges propose, however, fails to account for the biblical teaching that Christ's victory over Satan and demonic powers was actually made possible by Christ's penal substitution for sinners on the cross. Georges' 3D model enables him to separate the various themes of the atonement from one another in order to place emphasis on that which is most culturally plausible. But should we not place emphasis where Scripture does and not separate what Scripture holds together? How does Scripture portray penal substitution and Christus Victor as relating to one another?
Two significant New Testament passages that reveal the interconnectedness of both motifs are Colossians 2:13-15 and Hebrews 2:14-17. We will briefly consider these in turn. First, let us consider Colossians 2:13-15:
And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.
In this passage, Paul clearly sets forth the forensic aspect of our salvation when he indicates that Christ's death canceled the record of debt against us with its legal demands. Our "record of debt" is the result of breaking God's law with all its legal demands. Melick puts it well when he writes, "the slate of human lives was soiled with an I.O.U. that stems from the law and its requirements."[61] As the representative of His people, Jesus paid the penalty we were under by dying our death.[62] In this one verse, we are given a concise description of penal substitution. Notice how Paul then moves effortlessly in verse fifteen to describe the cosmic victory likewise achieved at the cross. The rulers and authorities, undoubtedly the evil powers against us, were put to open shame and God triumphed over them in Christ. Bruce points out that rulers and principalities had possession of the "damning indictment" that "was a means of controlling" Christ's people.[63] In other words, the way in which Christ overthrows the powers is by the payment of our sin debt.[64]
A similar concept is found in Colossians 1:13-14 where Paul tells us that believers are rescued from the domain of darkness and are transferred into the kingdom of God's beloved son, "in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." Thus, the work of Christ on the cross brings forgiveness of our sins and simultaneously effects deliverance from Satan.[65] Smeaton aptly explains how the atonement of Christ results in victory over the Satan:
Sin was the ground of Satan's dominion, the sphere of his power, and the secret of his strength; and no sooner was the guilt lying on us extinguished, than his throne was undermined, as Jesus Himself said (John 12:31). When the guilt of sin was abolished, Satan's dominion over God's people was ended; for the ground of his authority was the law which had been violated, and the guilt which had been incurred. [66]
A similar picture emerges in Hebrews 2:14-17:
Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.
The author of Hebrews indicates that Jesus, through his death, destroyed the devil and delivered those who were enslaved to him as a result of their fear of death. But why did Jesus have to share in flesh and blood with the human race and die in order to destroy the work of the devil? Why did Jesus not simply wage war on the devil and annihilate all the armies of hell with a word? His earthly ministry demonstrates that there was no contest between Satan's power and his own. Why not just call on legions of angels from heaven to overthrow Satan instead of the horrific suffering of the cross? These questions bring us again to that early scene in Eden where the ancient serpent tempted Adam to sin and Adam hid in fear from God.[67]
Genesis 1 tells us that Adam was made in the image of God and was to have dominion over all God's creation (Gen. 1:26-28). In other words, Adam and the human race that would come from him were to rule over God's creation as his representatives.[68] In Genesis 3, however, we are told that Satan, in the form of a serpent, entered the garden and deceived the first man. Satan did so by getting Adam to question God's command and to rebel against his Creator. Rather than submitting to God and exercising dominion over creation, Adam sinned and as a result, Satan gained dominion over him and all humanity. Bondage to Satan, therefore, is a result of Adam's rebellion against God, and his disobedience had cosmic implications for the whole human race.[69]
It is first and foremost Adam's sin against God, therefore, that necessitates the death of the Last Adam, Jesus Christ. The whole letter to the Hebrews makes it clear that the judgment of death comes as a result of sin (Heb. 9:27) and we are freed from punishment as Jesus, our representative and true image of God, makes propitiation for our sins (Heb. 2:17).[70] Once Christ has removed our guilt for sin, Satan no longer has power over us and there is no fear of punishment or death (1 Jn. 4:18). Here, as in Colossians 2:13-15, we see that the Christus Victor theme is operative through penal substitution because Satan's primary weapon against us is accusation (Rev. 12:10-11).[71] Thus, Christ's obedient death as our sinless substitute has cosmic repercussions over the powers of sin, death, and Satan. Once our greatest problem is addressed—the need for the forgiveness of sins, all other problems that were the result of Adam's sin, are also resolved.
7. The Need for an Integrated Atonement Model
Before drawing some final conclusions about Georges' 3D model, it will be helpful to summarize what we have covered to this point. First, we explored how some missiologists believe that people in an animistic culture will have difficulty grasping or resonating with a gospel presentation that is framed in forensic or substitutionary terms. Instead, they propose that different atonement metaphors should be prioritized above penal substitution since people in these cultures already have categories to understand these concepts and these are the issues faced in daily life. Next, we examined Georges' tripartite model of culture and determined that while there is some explanatory value in thinking about cultures in this way, there is also a danger in mischaracterizing the complexity of culture. Then, we considered how Georges' model is in line with Green's "kaleidoscopic view" of the atonement and noted some of the dangers inherent in this theological method. Such a view rejects any supracultural and Scriptural framework for how the atonement metaphors might be intrinsically related and integrated together. The result of this atonement theology is a "choose your own metaphor" approach to preaching the gospel depending on the cultural context. Furthermore, even though Green indicates that all metaphors should be considered valid and utilized where appropriate, he rejects penal substitution as a biblical metaphor.[72]
While Georges does not reject the penal substitutionary nature of the atonement, his 3D model of culture isolates dynamics of guilt and fear in an exaggerated way. Despite his contention that that all atonement metaphors should not be isolated from one another, in practice, Christus Victor becomes prioritized over and against penal substitution. The practical implication of his model is that there are three different gospels for three different types of cultures. But as we have briefly seen in our examination of Colossians and Hebrews, Scripture presents a unified or integrated model for the atonement in which each aspect is vital for understanding the whole. Missiologists, like Georges, would do better to develop their methods for contextualizing the atonement using theological models that integrate the atonement metaphors rather than isolating them from one another like Green's kaleidoscopic approach does.[73]
If we emphasize Christus Victor without first grounding it in the penal substitutionary work of Christ, we undermine the reality that our greatest problem is first and foremost that we need to be rescued from God Himself (Ps. 51:4) and we separate what Scripture holds together. Both atonement motifs are essential to what Christ accomplished on the cross. They should not be viewed as competing models in which we have to choose the most plausible one depending on the cultural situation; rather they should be viewed as complementary and integrated.[74]
Furthermore, we must recognize that the doctrine of penal substitution holds a biblical and logical priority over Christus Victor because the former explains and secures the latter.[75] In telling the Corinthians of what is of first importance to the gospel message, the apostle Paul reminds them that Christ died and was buried and resurrected in accordance with the Scriptures "for our sins" (1 Cor. 15:1-4). It is true that we need to be delivered from the power of Satan if we are to live as God's image bearers, but we are not merely passive captives who need to obtain greater spiritual authority over the powers that keep us bound in fear. We need to have our sins forgiven through the substitutionary death of Christ so that we can be set free from our bondage to Satan and evil powers.
Fear is an emotion experienced by people of all cultures ever since sin came into the world. Most often our fear is sinful and misguided because it is not oriented in right relationship to God. Since the so-called death of God inevitably led to the death of transcendent meaning, many in the postmodern West live with a low-grade level of anxiety and increasingly turn to psychiatrists, psychics, and even shamans to address their fears. In animistic cultures, people still live with fear and trembling because evil spirits and "ancestors" wield control over them.
The way to address these fear-power dynamics in any cultural context is not to present a truncated view of the gospel that only proclaims Christ's victory over the powers. Such a view would no doubt appeal to those who live in animistic, fear-power cultures as they constantly seek new rituals, spells, mediums or powers to overcome daily challenges. The same was true for Simon the magician as he marveled at the miracles and signs performed by Philip and sought to gain such power by monetary means (Acts 8:9-25). He gladly "believed" in the name of Jesus Christ for his own gain, but what he failed to do was repent before God and experience forgiveness for the guilt of his sins (Acts 8:22).
A better way to address issues of fear and power is to do the hard and sometimes slow work of faithfully teaching people a biblical worldview, which includes giving them categories of sin, guilt, and God's righteous judgment where these are lacking. Addressing these issues first, provides hearers with a biblical framework from which they can rightly understand biblical dynamics of fear and power, especially as they relate to spiritual forces of evil and their relationship to our sin. Any gospel message that presents our victory over the powers and principalities of darkness without the explanation of how this victory is achieved through Christ's vicarious substitution on the cross, falls short of the biblical gospel. In the end, such an approach has the potential not only to undermine someone's understanding of his or her greatest need before God—the forgiveness of sins, but also to undermine how one should think about issues of fear and power in relation to God and the evil spirits. Presenting the penal substitutionary nature of the atonement is thus vital for faithful gospel preaching in every culture.
[1] Frank Furedi, "Fear Today," First Things 289 (January 2019): 9–11.
[2] Carl R. Trueman, The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2020), 301-37.
[3] David F. Wells also explores this shift from a moral foundation to a therapeutic one in God in the Whirlwind: How the Holy-Love of God Reorients Our World (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2014).
[4] Paul Tillich, The Courage to Be (New Haven, CO: Yale University Press, 2000), 40 as quoted in Fleming Rutledge, The Crucifixion: Understanding the Death of Jesus Christ (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2017), 303.
[5] Michael Reeves, Rejoice and Tremble: The Surprising Good News of the Fear of the Lord (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021), 25. In addressing what Western culture does with anxiety and fear, Reeves says, "Given its essentially secular self-identity, our society will not turn to God. The only possible solution, then, must be for us to sort it out ourselves. Thus Western, post-Enlightenment society has medicalized fear. Fear has become an elusive disease to be medicated."
[6] Mark D. Baker and Joel B. Green, Recovering the Scandal of the Cross: Atonement in New Testament and Contemporary Contexts, 2nd edition (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2011), 42. For other works with similar claims see Mark D. Baker, Proclaiming the Scandal of the Cross (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2006) and Mark D. Baker, "Embracing a Wider Cross: Contextualizing the Atonement" in Out of the Strange Silence: The Challenges of Being Christian in the 21st Century, ed. Brad Thiessen (Winnipeg and Hillsboro, KS: Kindred Productions, 2005).
[7] Baker and Green, Recovering the Scandal of the Cross, 192-200.
[8] Jayson Georges, The 3D Gospel: Ministry in Guilt, Shame, and Fear Cultures (N.p.: Timē Press, 2014). Jayson Georges and Mark D. Baker, Ministering in Honor-Shame Cultures: Biblical Foundations and Practical Essentials (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2016).
[9] Jackson Wu, Saving God's Face: A Chinese Contextualization of Salvation through Honor and Shame (Pasadena, CA: William Carey International University Press, 2013).
[10] Wu is addressing shame-honor cultures and not fear-power cultures in his work, but he elsewhere endorses and promotes Georges work, which includes the fear-power category. Underlying both of these authors is a similar trajectory toward emphasizing particular atonement models in certain cultures over and against penal substitutionary atonement.
[11] See for instance David E. Rennalls, "How Penal Substitution Addresses Our Shame: The Bible's Shame Dynamics and Their Relationships to Evangelical Doctrine," The Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 23.3 (2019): 77–98. Aubrey Sequeira and Anand Samuel, "Nothing To Be Ashamed Of: Penal Substitutionary Atonement In Honor-Shame Cultures," 9Marks Journal: The Heart of the Gospel (August 2019): 96-104. Aubrey Sequeira and Anand Samuel, "Still Not Ashamed: A Response to Jackson Wu," 9Marks, September 3, 2019.
[12] Ruth Benedict, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword (Boston, MA: Mariner Books, 2006).
[13] These patterns were first explored in Ruth Benedict's Patterns of Culture (Boston, MA: Mariner Books, 2006), which was originally published in 1934.
[14] Eugene A. Nida, Customs and Cultures: Anthropology for Christian Missions (New York: Harper & Row, 1954), 150.
[15] Paul G. Hiebert, "The Flaw of the Excluded Middle," Missiology 10.1 (1982): 35–47.
[16] Douglas J. Hayward, "The Evangelization of Animists: Power, Truth or Love Encounter?" International Journal of Frontier Missions 14.4 (1997), 155.
[17] Charles H. Kraft, "What Kind of Encounters Do We Need in Our Christian Witness," Evangelical Missions Quarterly 27.3 (1991): 258–65.
[18] The term power encounter was coined by missionary anthropologist Alan Richard Tippett, People Movements in Southern Polynesia: Studies in the Dynamics of Church-Planting and Growth in Tahiti, New Zealand, Tonga, and Samoa (Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1971).
[19] Charles H. Kraft, "Three Encounters in Christian Witness," Perspectives on the World Christian Movement: A Reader, ed. Ralph D. Winter and Steven C. Hawthorne (Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library, 2013), 445.
[20] Georges, The 3D Gospel, 16.
[21] Georges writes, "Each culture type accepts a particular conceptual metaphor as most plausible. That means the language and values from one area of life (i.e., courtroom, community, or combat) are used as metaphors to organize their worldview and spiritual life… People can better understand salvation in Christ when we use the language of culturally plausible metaphors. Georges, The 3D Gospel, 58.
[22] Paul Pruyser makes a similar, though slightly different argument to show the relationship between different atonement motifs and emotions of fear, guilt, and shame in Paul W. Pruyser, "Anxiety, Guilt, and Shame in the Atonement," Theology Today 21.1 (1964): 15–33.
[23] The 3D Gospel, 61.
[24] The 3D Gospel, 57-58.
[27] Paul G. Hiebert, Anthropological Insights for Missionaries, 17th ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1986), 223.
[29] See, for example, Werner Mischke, Samuel Chiang, and Steven Hawthorne, The Global Gospel: Achieving Missional Impact in Our Multicultural World (Scottsdale, AZ: Mission ONE, 2015), 60-61.
[30] Jean Delumeau, Sin and Fear: The Emergence of a Western Guilt Culture, 13th-18th Centuries, (New York: St Martins Press, 1991).
[31] Simon Cozens, "Shame Cultures, Fear Cultures, and Guilt Cultures: Reviewing the Evidence," International Bulletin of Mission Research 42.4 (2018), 329.
[32] "The Rise of New Age Spirituality in a Skeptical World," Repeller Magazine, May 2, 2018.
[34] Dean C. Halverson, "Animism: The Religion of the Tribal World," International Journal of Frontier Missions 15.2 (1998), 59.
[35] Gailyn Van Rheenen, Communicating Christ In Animistic Contexts (Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library, 2013), 30.
[36] Geoff Beech, "Shame/Honor, Guilt/Innocence, Fear/Power in Relationship Contexts," International Bulletin of Mission Research 42.4 (2018): 338–46.
[37] Darrell L. Whiteman makes the same argument though he is more sympathetic to Georges than the author of this paper. Whiteman, "Shame/Honor, Guilt/ Innocence, Fear/Power: A Missiological Response to Simon Cozens and Geoff Beech," International Bulletin of Mission Research 42.4 (2018), 352.
[38] Cozens, "Shame Cultures, Fear Cultures, and Guilt Cultures," 333.
[39] Baker and Green, Recovering the Scandal of the Cross, 42.
[40] Joel B. Green, "Kaleidoscopic Response" in Four Views: The Nature of the Atonement, ed. Paul R. Eddy and James Beilby (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2006), 206.
[41] Green seems to be leaning toward a postmodern, non-realism hermeneutic here, which indicates that we cannot arrive at a transcendent meaning in the text because we are captive to our own cultural presuppositions and language. For a helpful exploration of a hermeneutic of critical realism, which says we can arrive at adequate, though imperfect knowledge of a text, see Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Is There a Meaning in This Text?: The Bible, the Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2009).
[42] Greg Boyd, "Christus Victor Response to Kaleidoscopic View" in Four Views: The Nature of the Atonement, 187.
[43] Thomas R. Schreiner, "Penal Substitution Response to Kaleidoscopic View" in Four Views: The Nature of the Atonement, 193.
[45] Georges and Baker, Ministering in Honor-Shame Cultures, 294.
[46] For instance, Baker and Green write, "The Scriptures as a whole provide no ground for a portrait of an angry God needing to be appeased in atoning sacrifice." Recovering the Scandal of the Cross, 51.
[47] Jeremy Yong, "Book Review: The 3-D Gospel: Ministry in Guilt, Shame, and Fear Cultures, by Jason Georges," 9Marks Journal: Missions (Fall 2015): 80-84.
[50] Several scholars have observed that the reason the Charismatic movement has seen explosive growth in Africa is because it emphasizes similar ideas as African Tribal Religion. Rather than leading to transformation (i.e. conversion) at the worldview level, Christian concepts are practiced externally, but ATR remains the operational worldview underneath. See Dominic Umoh, "Superstition and Syncretism: Setbacks to Authentic Christian Practice in Africa," International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Invention 2.7 (2013): 32-40. Matthews A. Ojo, "Pentecostalism and Charismatic Movements in Nigeria: Factors of Growth and Inherent Challenges," The WATS Journal 3.1 (2018): 74-94.
[51] Hiebert, "The Flaw of the Excluded Middle," 47.
[52] See Stephen J. Wellum, God the Son Incarnate: The Doctrine of Christ (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016), 82. Wellum writes, "Regarding the interpretive framework for an evangelical articulation and defense, orthodox Christology today requires an intratextual approach…according to the categories and structure of the Scriptures…we must think about Jesus' identity according to and work from within the interpretive framework of Scripture."
[53] Poythress warns us that, "When we come to the Bible and try to listen to its claims, we can easily misjudge those claims if we hear them only from within the framework of our own modern assumptions." Vern S. Poythress, Inerrancy and Worldview: Answering Modern Challenges to the Bible (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 21.
[54] Paul G. Hiebert, Transforming Worldviews: An Anthropological Understanding of How People Change (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2008), 442. In discussing worldview change, Hiebert (p. 331) says new believers "must be enculturated into a new culture and socialized into a new community."
[55] Emphasis mine. Unless otherwise specified all Bible references in this paper are to The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Standard Bible Society, 2016).
[56] Matthew R. Schlimm, "The Paradoxes of Fear in the Hebrew Bible," Svensk Exegetisk Årsbok 84 (2019): 25–50.
[57] Gustaf Aulen, Christus Victor: An Historical Study of the Three Main Types of the Idea of Atonement, trans. A. G. Herbert (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2003).
[58] See Gregory A. Boyd, God at War: The Bible and Spiritual Conflict, (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1997); Fleming Rutledge, The Crucifixion: Understanding the Death of Jesus Christ, Reprint edition (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2017); and Tremper Longman III and Daniel G. Reid, God Is a Warrior (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1995).
[59] Rutledge, The Crucifixion, 377.
[60] For an exploration of the Christus Victor as it relates to our sanctification, see Greg Boyd, "Christus Victor View" in Four Views: The Nature of the Atonement, 46-47.
[61] Richard R. Melick, Philippians, Colossians, Philemon (Nashville, TN: B&H Publishing Group, 1991), 264.
[62] N. T. Wright, Colossians and Philemon (Nottingham, England and Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2008), 113.
[63] F. F. Bruce, The Epistles to the Colossians, to Philemon, and to the Ephesians (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1984), 110.
[64] John Stott, The Cross of Christ (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2006), 230, 233.
[65] Sinclair B. Ferguson, "Christus Victor Et Propitiator," For the Fame of God's Name: Essays in Honor of John Piper, ed. Justin Taylor (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2010), 183.
[66] George Smeaton, The Apostles Doctrine of the Atonement (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1870), 307-8. Quoted in Ferguson, "Christus Victor Et Propitiator," 184.
[67] Simon Gathercole argues that the basis of substitution should begin in Genesis 1-3 in "The Cross and Substitutionary Atonement," Scottish Bulletin of Evangelical Theology 21.2 (2003), 160.
[68] G. K. Beale, The Temple and the Church's Mission: A Biblical Theology of the Dwelling Place of God, New Studies in Biblical Theology 17 (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2004), 81-93; Peter J. Gentry and Stephen J. Wellum, Kingdom through Covenant: A Biblical-Theological Understanding of the Covenants (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 186-216.
[69] David H. Wenkel and John B. Song, "The Image of God and the Cosmos: A Response to the Individualist Critique of Penal Substitutionary Atonement," The Reformed Theological Review 71.1 (2012), 10.
[70] Thomas R. Schreiner, "Penal Substitution Response to Christus Victor View" in Four Views: The Nature of the Atonement, 53.
[71] Henri Blocher, "The Sacrifice of Jesus Christ: The Current Theological Situation," European Journal of Theology 8.1 (1999), 31.
[72] Joel Green, "Must We Imagine the Atonement in Penal Substitutionary Terms?" The Atonement Debate: Papers from the London Symposium on the Theology of Atonement, ed. Derek Tidball, David Hilborn, and Justin Thacker (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2009), 164.
[73] For an example of an integrated theology of the atonement see Joshua M. McNall, The Mosaic of Atonement: An Integrated Approach to Christ's Work (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2019).
[74]  Barry D. Smith, The Meaning of Jesus' Death: Reviewing the New Testament's Interpretations (London: T&T Clark, 2017), 196. Smith goes so far to say, "These two theories should really be considered as two parts of a more inclusive theory, which may be called the Satisfaction and Spiritual Freedom theory of the atonement, or some such designation."
[75] Treat makes a cogent argument for this in Jeremy R. Treat, The Crucified King: Atonement and Kingdom in Biblical and Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2014), 221-24.
Matt Deaver teaches theology at a seminary in SE Asia and provides non-formal theological training for leaders in the region. He and his family have lived and served in Asia since 2015. He is currently working on a PhD in Systematic Theology through Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.
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