Does Romans 4:7 bring the thought of atonement into the New Testament?

This text is from a transcript of a talk by David Gooding, entitled ‘God’s Power for Salvation’ (2005).

Romans 4:7 says, 'Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.' Well, yes, but that is another way of speaking, isn't it? God says, 'I shall cast all your sins into the depths of the sea' (see Micah 7:19). That's a metaphor. Have you have ever seen a bundle of sins? Have you seen what happens to them when they are put in water? I don't think you've actually seen that. It's metaphor, isn't it? We see where they are—all swallowed up and forgotten. So a sin being 'covered' is one way of saying that God has, to put it in another sense, 'blotted them out'. 'I'll blot out your transgressions' (see Isaiah 43:25). Or, your sins are 'covered'; that is, from the eyes of God.

Those metaphors denote a reality but, as you rightly say, it wasn't until Christ paid the actual price that the iniquity was finally put away. And you have on your side the argument in what the writer says in Hebrews 10 in the early verses. When the Old Testament saints offered their sacrifices according to the law, they had to keep on repeating them. And what does that show? It shows that their sacrifices never made them perfect as pertaining to the conscience. For if they had once been made perfect, as pertaining to the conscience, they would have ceased offering them.

The logic of that is simple. Suppose you and your wife have a mortgage with a building society, and it's a bit of a burden; every month it comes around and you've got to scrape the pennies together, and go without a new suit and all the rest, to pay the mortgage. And you've been doing this for thirty-five years and got in the habit of doing it every month. When you've made the monthly payment you feel good for the first week, and half way through the second week; and then you begin to think, 'I mustn't spend that, because I've got the mortgage . . .' and then the worry of it comes up again. When you have finally paid the last contribution to the mortgage, would you find yourself saying, when the next month came around: 'Oh my dear, I think, just to make sure, we'll go down to the building society and pay just a bit more. It will make us feel better'? You don't, do you? Once the whole lot is paid you don't carry on the process of paying! No, because your conscience is clear. The debt is paid; it's final and finished.

Under the law they brought their sacrifices, and they were told that they were forgiven (see Leviticus 5). When they sinned again they had to give another sacrifice. And so it went on. They were forgiven, but they never had a 'conscience made perfect' (see Hebrew 9:9; 10:1–2). For once they had realized that the whole of the debt of sin is paid then they wouldn't have offered any more sacrifices. The wonder of the sacrifice of Christ is that it pays the whole lot, and God gives us the guarantee: 'their sins and their iniquities, I'll never haul them up in court again' (see Hebrews 10:17). And because that is so, where such forgiveness like that is, says Hebrews 10, 'there is no more offering' (Hebrews 10:18). That doesn't mean: 'You don't need another offering—something else in addition to Christ'; it means: 'There is no longer any process of offering. You don't have to offer anything to get the forgiveness of sins.' A believer doesn't have to keep on offering. To keep on offering is a grievous mistake. If you find somebody who keeps on offering anything at all (the supposed blood and body of Christ, for instance), and they keep offering it on the altar to get forgiveness, the New Testament says, 'Well, you'll know that person doesn't yet have a conscience made perfect. Because if his conscience had been made perfect he would have stopped offering anything—body and blood of Christ, or anything whatsoever!' For when you have complete forgiveness, then there is no more process of offering. Christ doesn't keep offering. He is sat down (Hebrews 10:12).

So that, yes, in the Old Testament they were told they were forgiven. Leviticus 5 says so—'Bring this offering and you shall be forgiven' (see Leviticus 5:10, 13, 16, 18). But they didn't have a conscience made perfect. They had to repeat it for each individual sin, so to speak. The nation had to do it once a year—every year—and in those there was a legal remembrance of sins. It was not merely: 'I remember being rude to my grandmother'; it is the sin brought up before God. That is the solemnity for Jews to this very present day of the Yom Kippur. When their sins are confessed before almighty God it is a solemn occasion, and they have to fast and afflict their souls. They do it to this day; but next year they'll do it again. They never have a conscience made perfect. The wonder of the gospel is that through the salvation of Christ and his sacrifice we have a conscience made perfect. There is no need to offer anything anymore in order to get forgiveness of sin.

So, yes, if you like to think about the Old Testament as 'covering', that is to my mind a metaphor for the Jews, like 'casting them into the sea' or 'blotting out their transgressions' or whatever. For though that was a real forgiveness, in a real sense, and David can say the principles upon which it was given, they didn't yet have a conscience made perfect through the Lord. Now David knows, of course, because he's in glory. He is what the Bible calls, 'the spirit of a just man made perfect' (Hebrews 12:23).