Atonement Theories & Guilt, Part 1: Guilt is an Early Stage of Love
Mako A. Nagasawa
Photo credit: rocketsimoon.
Tony Stark: “I Am Iron Man”
In the 2008 movie Iron Man, billionaire scientist, industrialist, and playboy Tony Stark has a rude awakening: His own company, Stark Industries, was making weapons that were being used to terrorize and kill people around the world. In war-torn Afghanistan, he found that out the painful way: by almost being killed by one of his own rockets. Tony, bleeding to death because of the shrapnel in his chest, was found and taken hostage by a terrorist cell group. Another prisoner, a kind surgeon and scientist named Dr. Ho Yinsen, implanted an electromagnetic device into Tony’s chest to stop the shrapnel from reaching his heart and killing him. Yinsen had been abducted by the terrorists while serving his people in Afghanistan. The terrorists had killed his wife and child. When Tony recovered, Yinsen challenged him to see his real legacy. Determined to survive, Tony built the first arc reactor to power the device in his chest, along with a primitive version of the Iron Man suit by which he could escape. But Tony ran out of time to power up the suit. Yinsen gave his life to buy time for Tony, whispering, “Don’t waste your life.”
After a narrow escape and rescue, Tony came home. He declared that his massive company will no longer manufacture weapons. Now a man haunted by guilt, Tony dedicates himself to building better versions of the Iron Man suit so he could undo some of the damage he has caused. In a short video clip,[1] Pepper Potts walks into Tony’s lab, where he is working on the Iron Man suit. He planned to use it to personally stop his own company’s weapons from being used to kill.
Tony: “I’m going to find my weapons and destroy them.”
Pepper: “Tony, you know that I would help you with anything. But I cannot help you if you’re going to start all of this again.”
Tony: “There is nothing except this. There’s no art opening. There is no benefit. There is nothing to sign. There’s the next mission, and nothing else.”
Pepper: “Is that so? Well, then I quit.”
Tony: “You stood by my side all this time while I reaped the benefits of destruction. And now that I’m trying to protect the people that I put in harm’s way, you’re going to walk out?”
Pepper: “You’re going to kill yourself, Tony. I’m not going to be a part of it.”
Tony: “I shouldn’t be alive, unless it was for a reason. I’m not crazy, Pepper. I just finally know what I have to do. And I know in my heart, that it’s right.”
Tony feels guilty. But, interestingly, he does not sink into despair or feel personally worthless. Instead, Tony allows his guilt to become real remorse and grief. Moved especially by Yinsen’s self-sacrifice for him, Tony ultimately allows his guilt to become love – a love that matures him as a person, enabling him to recognize Pepper Potts’ moral qualities and abilities, and even charting the course of his vocation from that point on. As Tony says, “I just finally know what I have to do.” At the end of the movie, Tony says – rather foolishly, and to his own surprise – to a room full of reporters, famously, “I am Iron Man.”
The Marvel movie arc also shows Tony’s growth as a person. Two more examples are especially important. In 2012, in the first Avengers movie, when the heroes come together for the first time as a team, Steve Rogers as Captain America and Tony Stark as Iron Man voice their skepticism about each other. Steve doubts Tony’s character. He asks pointedly what Tony is without the Iron Man suit. To which Tony says, jokingly, “Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist.” Then, they have this important exchange, which foreshadows Tony’s growth as a person:
Steve: “The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You’re not the guy to make the sacrifice play -- to lay down on the wire and let the other guy crawl over you.”
Tony: “I think I would just cut the wire.”
The 2012 Avengers movie ends by Tony making “the sacrifice play.” In the Iron Man suit, Tony guides the nuclear missile heading for New York City into the space portal instead. The space portal starts to close, potentially leaving Tony stranded somewhere else in the universe, left to freeze in cold space. Tony lets go before going unconscious, and the nuclear missile later detonates in the midst of the enemy’s forces. Tony falls back to Earth through the space portal just as it closes. The Hulk catches him and breaks his fall. The happy ending and humor of the story is, in large part, built on the fact that Steve Rogers had been wrong: Tony Stark was the guy who made the sacrifice play. Rather, he became the type of person who makes the sacrifice play.
Of course, the resolution of Tony’s character arc occurred in the 2019 Avengers Endgame: Through some clever and compelling storytelling on the part of Marvel, Tony Stark completely retold his own story. He replayed the music of his life but in a redeemed key. Tony was reluctant to leave the retirement he had fashioned for himself, Pepper, and their daughter. But he figured out quantum time-travel, which would bring past versions of the Infinity Stones to the present in a time heist.
Tony, hesitant and unsure of the risks of time travel, asked Pepper what he should do. In so doing, he retold a key aspect of their relationship, but in a redeemed way. He sought Pepper’s wisdom and blessing. Tony showed that he was no longer a rogue and impulsive decision-maker, on the one hand. Nor was he driven by his sense of fear and guilt to seek government oversight, on the other.
Tony reunited with Steve Rogers and the full Avengers team. He retold his relationship with him by reconciling with Steve, giving him a new shield. That act showed Tony had long wanted to help Steve fully return as Captain America, despite their conflict in Captain America: Civil War when he said Steve didn’t deserve the shield. He redeemed that moment by reversing it.
Going back in time allowed Tony to retell parts of his own story in more redemptive ways. After reliving the Battle of New York, Tony told Ant-Man how to exploit a weakness in an earlier version of his Iron Man suit. Tony chuckled at himself, recognizing the hubris of his younger self. Going further back in time, Tony met his father, Howard Stark. Without disclosing his true identity, Tony appreciated and encouraged his dad, and even hugged him, something he never had the chance to do.
The Avengers came back to the present; the Hulk snapped people back into existence. But Thanos from the past followed them to the present, and the great battle ensued. During the final battle with Thanos, Tony had a moment of closure with the revived Peter Parker on the battlefield. Tony gave Peter a full fatherly hug, which retold the awkward moments of affection they had before, like in Spiderman: Far From Home, when Tony reached over Peter, not to hug him, but to open the car door to let Peter out. Tony’s Endgame hug reversed all the fatherly misses he had with Peter. He fulfilled his longing to show his love and affection for a son, and Peter’s longing to know the love and affection of his closest father-figure.
The final battle revealed Tony at his heroic, not just his fatherly, best. Tony retold the story of his never-ending quest to build the most powerful Iron Man suit. In each previous movie, Tony had built a new suit of armor to adapt to a threat he had faced, and to protect his own life from that threat in the future. In Age of Ultron, Tony had wanted to build a suit of armor around the world, which backfired on him. And in Spiderman: Far from Home, the immediate post-Endgame movie, Tony’s satellite robots – the closest thing to a suit of armor around the world – were manipulated by Mysterio and used against Peter Parker. But in Endgame, Tony showed that he had built his final suit of armor – the best he could ever build and the limit of his genius – to give up his life for others. He designed his nano-tech armor and his nano-gauntlet to house the Infinity Stones and to make the snap. The true suit of armor around the world was people willing to give up their lives.
Tony engaged Thanos in hand-to-hand combat again, retelling their battle on Titan in Avengers: Infinity War. An overconfident Thanos knocked Tony aside and declared, “I am inevitable.” He snapped his fingers in triumph, only to realize, when nothing happened, that Tony had snatched the Stones away from him using the nano-tech armor. The energy of the Infinity Stones – the very same energy which had knocked out the Hulk and burned out the Hulk’s arm – was partially absorbed by Tony’s armor and arc-reactor. But the energy coursed through the armor and started creeping over Tony’s face, overwhelming him. With only moments left, Tony snapped his fingers to vaporize Thanos and his forces. He repeated the words that he once said in hubris in the first Iron Man movie: “I am Iron Man.” This time, though, he said it with solemn resolve, knowing he was giving up his life for others.
Simon Peter Retelling His Own Story in John 21
The same pattern occurred when Jesus called Simon Peter back into full fellowship. It teaches us a lot about guilt, emotional development, and spiritual maturity. Jesus called Simon Peter to retell his own story. In John 21, Jesus has Peter catch a big net of fish again. That act retold another incident a few years earlier, when Jesus called Simon Peter to follow him while Peter caught a big net of fish in Luke 5:1 – 11. That must have been startling, and encouraging, and wondrous.
Jesus also has Simon Peter stand by a charcoal fire, and answer three very challenging questions about following him. The last time Simon Peter stood by a charcoal fire, he failed to answer three very challenging questions about whether he followed Jesus. Simon Peter had been trying to stay close enough to Jesus while Jesus was being interrogated by the chief priests and the temple leaders. He lingered in the shadows at this kangaroo trial. But people there recognized him. They suspected him of being Jesus’ disciple. Simon Peter denied those questions, slipping further into the shadows to disguise himself while his Galilean accent kept giving him away. When the rooster crowed, Simon Peter realized that Jesus had foreseen his betrayal. Simon Peter had ran off into the night, in tears. Now he stood before Jesus in the bright light of morning. Jesus was asking him three questions about his love and loyalty. He was making Simon Peter relive those painful three questions. Why?
Probably Peter would have been stuck until he dealt with his sense of guilt and his concrete failures. If his failure had gone unaddressed, he might wonder if Jesus forgot all about it. But he might also wonder if his Lord trusted him less. Jesus therefore addressed the situation, and reinvited Simon Peter to follow him again, this time including this humble and sobering self-awareness. Simon Peter, then, recognized that he had to relive and retell that episode in a better way, with Jesus. That episode of failure in his own life will reverberate for him – not just in a poignant breakfast for a few minutes until the charcoal fire burned out, but throughout his entire life (John 21:18 – 22). Peter would have to retell his own actions, but faithfully – and not by himself, but in partnership with Jesus by the Spirit whom Jesus had breathed into him (John 20:22).
Jesus did not automatically and unilaterally “take Simon Peter’s guilt away,” contrary to what Penal Substitutionary Atonement suggests. Instead, Jesus took Peter back through his failure, and walked him through it again, until Peter could retell the story with faithfulness rather than failure. That is Jesus’ approach to Simon Peter’s redemption. It is embodied, relational, personal, and storied.
Jesus did not set Simon Peter “free from the past.” Jesus set Peter free from the self-centeredness of his past. Like Tony Stark, Simon Peter could say, “I just finally know what I have to do. And I know in my heart, that it’s right.”
Emotionally, what does this mean for us? It means we are meant to feel guilt, discern our shortcomings and failings, and talk to Jesus about it. Those feelings are meant to guide us into feeling grief and a fuller feeling of love in the company of Jesus. Jesus will help us repent.
The Normative Human Experience with Jesus in the Gospel of John
Simon Peter was not alone. When we read John 21, we are all meant to ask ourselves, “How have I failed Jesus? How is Jesus leading me forward, to retell my story with him, but better?” Why am I so confident about that? Because the entire literary structure of John’s Gospel tells us that Jesus leads all of us this way.
In John’s Gospel chapters 1 – 20, Jesus is portrayed as God in creation. Jesus brought forth a new creation and new humanity. How do we see that? The narrative begins with the phrase, “In the beginning,” (Jn.1:1) which echoes the same phrase in the creation hymn, “In the beginning” (Gen.1:1). This clues us in right away: We are supposed to think about the original creation.
Then, like the narrator of Genesis organizing Genesis 1:1 – 2:3 around seven “days,” or eras or epochs, John organizes his narrative around seven miracles (Jn.2:1 – 10; 4:46 – 54; 5:1 – 15; 6:1 – 14; 6:16 – 21; 9:1 – 41; 11:17 – 44), seven discourses (3:1 – 21; 4:1 – 42; 5:16 – 45; 6:22 – 71; 8:12 – 59; 10:1 – 38; 13:1 – 17:26), and seven “I am” statements of Jesus (6:35; 8:12; 10:7, 11; 11:25; 14:6; 15:1). That cannot be a coincidence.
What comes next? Like God breathed life into Adam, Jesus breathed the Holy Spirit into his disciples (Jn.20:22). The big picture literary allusion to the creation hymn of Genesis 1:1 – 2:3 and the beginning of the creation genealogy of Genesis 2:4 – 4:26 makes clear that Jesus retold God’s role in the original creation. Jesus brought about a new creation and new humanity.
Therefore, Simon Peter’s story in John 21 is not a weird appendage, or a footnote. It is exactly what being human means, to John the narrator, and to Jesus. We should expect that Simon Peter’s story arc in John 21 will become our story. We should expect that Jesus will take us on a similar journey. Jesus’ gift of new creation and new humanity for us does not mean severing us from our past. It means revisiting our past, building upon it. Jesus will take moments of our faithfulness and expand on it, like when Simon Peter caught a huge number of fish (Luke 5:1 – 11); Jesus retold that story in John 21. Jesus will also have us revisit moments of our unfaithfulness; Jesus will review with us the self-centeredness that characterized our past, and limited us before. Jesus’ goal is repair.
Guilt and Repair in Scripture: The Broader Theme
In fact, there is a much broader pattern of reparations in the biblical story in which this story rests quite comfortably. In Jewish law, we find that pattern beginning in Exodus 21. Right after God gives Israel the Ten Commandments, he gives various examples of how to apply the commandments. What we have done in the past to others matters. For example:
“If men have a quarrel and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist, and he does not die but remains in bed, if he gets up and walks around outside on his staff, then he who struck him shall go unpunished; he shall only pay for his loss of time, and shall take care of him until he is completely healed.” (Exodus 21:18 – 19)
“Until he is completely healed.” That is reparation and restitution, done through service and compensation. Numerous case law situations of bodily harm are covered after this one: if you injure your servant, you are accountable and must set him or her free (Exodus 21:20 – 21, 26 – 27);[2] if you are in a fight where a pregnant woman gets involved and you cause her to miscarry, you must pay compensation for that miscarriage and any other bodily harm you cause her (Exodus 21:22 – 25);[3] if your ox gores someone else, you must pay compensation according to whether you knew your ox was dangerous and according to the family and work relationships that person had with other people (Exodus 21:28 – 36). The principle of “an eye for an eye” appears in this context (Exodus 21:23 – 25). This language meant equivalent harm in the Code of Hammurabi in Babylon but it means service and compensation in Jewish law. If I injure your eye, I become your second eye. In that sense, truly it is “an eye for an eye.” I help you “until you are completely healed.”
Then, Jewish law commands that thieves must return two to five times the original value of what they stole, because they need to restore trust. Restitution is mentioned nine times, in 21:34, 22:3, 5, 6, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15. But if I stole one ox or one sheep, why can’t I give just one ox or one sheep back? Why do I need to pay back two to five ox or sheep? Perhaps because such a consequence would make theft not a violation but rather forced lending. But more fundamentally, because the thief has to restore trust (22:9). Rebuilding trust and community is part of reparation and restitution.
In a parallel passage in Numbers 5:5 - 8, God says that when one man or woman wrongs another in some way that is not theft per se, then that person must confess his or her guilt, and make restitution, adding one-fifth of the value to it. Restitution can also be made to a relative if the victim is not available.
Both King David and Zaccheus, respectively, honored this principle of reparation. When King David was baited into judging himself as a thief by the prophet Nathan, he said that the offender should repay four times as much (2 Samuel 12:6). When Zaccheus showed his love for Jesus and his community, he said he would give away half his vast wealth to the poor straightaway, and repay four times whatever he had defrauded anyone, because he had acted like a thief (Luke 19:1 – 10). That is what restitution, reparations, and repair of relationship entail.
Scripture invites us to wrestle with our guilt in passages like Psalm 51, in which King David repented. We seek and grow in “the joy of our salvation,” as David found in Psalm 51:10. For “salvation” is not simply God letting you exist, but having God’s truth in your innermost being, as David also said, in Psalm 51:6.
We find ourselves wrestling with guilt in Jesus’ declaration that “blessed are those who mourn" in Matthew 5:4. Only by mourning can we really progress to the next beatitudes – for instance, being “filled” with righteousness in Matthew 5:6. The premise of all of Jesus’ beatitudes (Matthew 5:1 – 12) is that they are personal and corporate, and are probably a sequence or pattern for emotional and spiritual growth in his kingdom. Only by mourning our own personal and collective sins will we develop the conviction that we need to obey his radical, heart-level commandments in the entire Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:21 – 7:29).
Then, when we get to Paul’s writings, we find more explorations of guilt, regret, and repentance. In 2 Corinthians 7, the Corinthians were experiencing godly sorrow of some sort. I will examine that passage in more depth later, as well.
But even more broadly, we find it in the key pattern in Scripture: the retelling of stories, the pattern in which God calls people to retell their own stories of failure. Simon Peter retelling his own story is an important example of that. Because Jesus is with us, and moves with us at a human pace, we do not sink into despair or feel personally worthless.
Jesus, therefore, gives us the opportunity and the mandate to participate in God’s repair of us. We need to undo our wrongs, make amends, and set things right to the extent we can, with the power of Jesus’ Spirit in us.
Atonement Theories, Guilt, and Emotional Development
Penal Substitutionary Atonement interferes with how we process guilt. What is Penal Substitutionary Atonement? PSA is a theory about why Jesus died. It sees Jesus as absorbing our guilt before God, the ultimate reality. So when other people approach us in a way that makes us feel guilty – holding us accountable for the guilt of our past actions – we have already been conditioned to not sit for long with our feelings of guilt. Relationally, PSA allows people to say that when other people call for concrete repentance and reparations, that such requests are a violation of God's grace itself. People who have grown accustomed to being told that Jesus, at the cross, took away their guilt before God have difficulty with the notion that they have some guilt in social and/or systemic problems.
Take two related patterns in white evangelical communities, which I will examine in more depth in future posts. First, notice the discussions about repentance and reparations for racial injustices. In The Gospel Coalition network, for example, Thabiti Anyabwile has recently called for reparations. “Possession of stolen property” is a crime. Past violations of the “equal treatment under the law” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment require some form of repair and restitution to victims under ordinary circumstances. Yet many evangelicals claim that other people concerned about historic and present injustices to African Americans and Native Americans should invite them into voluntary charity, not demand obligatory repair.
Why? They claim that they are trying to respect Christ’s atonement in a Penal Substitutionary framework. That is, according to them, Jesus absorbed all their guilt. So when other people want them to acknowledge their ongoing guilt, consider the presence of institutional guilt and injustice, and even make different policy choices, they resist. Thabiti Anyabwile’s fellow PSA advocates inside and especially outside TGC insist that his call for reparations violates "the gospel" itself -- that is, "the gospel" understood through a PSA frame. To say that some people “owe” others because of past sin violates what they think God did in “removing guilt.” Many evangelicals therefore insist that advocates of reparations drop the guilt-restitution language for compassion-charity language.
A second pattern is leaders abusing power in various ways. When men (in the vast majority of cases) abuse the pastor’s office, or another leadership role, other people may try to hold them accountable and call for restitution. But they have difficulties receiving it. The abusers deny, deflect, and distract. And they sometimes use Penal Substitutionary Atonement – explicitly or implicitly – do to so. Calling the offender to enact some kind of relational repair creates a category that, some believe, should not exist. Do I need to atone for my own mistakes? I thought Jesus atoned for all sin?
Medical Substitutionary Atonement, by contrast, allows for a proper handling of personal guilt that accompanies forgiveness. MSA helps us spiritually, emotionally, and relationally. MSA differentiates between our human nature and our human actions. The atonement per se begins with Jesus taking our human nature to himself, overcoming the hostility to God that had set in to human nature, and offering himself back to us, with his human nature fixed and fulfilled, saturated by the Spirit of God. Jesus gives us "forgiveness of sins" as N.T. Wright explains it, as “restoration from exile.” Jesus restored human nature from the exile from the garden of Eden that Adam and Eve imposed on it at the fall. Jesus did that through his human struggle to be faithful to the Father, by the Spirit. Restoration from exile is fundamentally something that relates to our human nature, human journey, and human choices: God has, in Jesus, burned away and cut away the corruption of sin, so he can now lead us back into the garden.
Behind each theory of atonement are rival theories about divine justice and rival theories about human motivation. Behind Penal Substitutionary Atonement is the theory of divine retributive justice: God, when people break His laws, moves to punish and inflict suffering. Key to the traditional Reformed understanding of God’s motivation is to seek satisfaction. When God’s sense of holiness is not satisfied by our obedience, He will seek to satisfy His retributive justice. The theory of human motivation we encounter with Penal Substitution is one in which we are more motivated to ensure our own survival and welfare more than we are to seek and love God. God must therefore first threaten our survival and welfare, making us feel guilt and anxiety, in order make us feel relief and gratitude with Jesus as a penal substitute.
If, however, divine justice is restorative and not retributive, the doctrine of the atonement shifts in focus along with the response God desires from us. Medical Substitutionary Atonement rests on the theory of divine restorative justice, in which God demands, calls forth, and enables our participation. The human motivations evoked are arguably wider in range: positive desires to be more loving, just, truthful, and beautiful, as well as negative desires to avoid becoming addicted to sin. These views are connected to a definition of atonement connected to what Jesus did to his own humanity. Rather than Jesus bearing away our guilt before God by exhausting divine retributive justice at the cross, Jesus bears away the corruption of sin from his own human nature through his faithful human life, restoring his human nature by the power of the Spirit through the entirety of his incarnation, life, death, and resurrection. Therefore, with Medical Substitution, we need not – indeed, must not – deflect realizations of our guilt and complicity as if by admitting guilt, we are diminishing the “finished work of Christ.” Rather, God desires a response from us of participation, by the Spirit, in Jesus’ own humanity and human journey. For our participation in Jesus’ human journey is the spiritual space in which we experience God’s restoration of our own human nature. The Eastern Orthodox understanding of Paul’s statement, “For it is God who is at work in you, to desire and do His good pleasure” (Phil.2:13).
What is our part, in Medical Substitution? To participate in Jesus’ human nature, human journey, and human choices. We have to participate by the Spirit in Jesus retelling our particular, personal stories. We have to own our actions and our personal responsibility – yes, even guilt. To the extent that we have committed harm or been complicit in a larger system of harm, we help restore the harms we have done to ourselves and others, which is at the heart of restorative justice. Relationally, we are meant to retell the actions by which we broke trust with another person, but by repairing and restoring the damage we caused. Because when we damage our relationships, we also damage our own human nature. Like when Cain killed Abel, he damaged his own human nature and made himself unable to bring forth life from the ground (Genesis 4:11).
Perhaps Western Enlightenment individualism has convinced us that emotions of attachment are unhealthy. A desire for love is a weakness, in that interpretation. An affection for a group is irrational. And guilt is a form of emotional coercion. Certainly these emotions can reflect codependence, idolatry, or simply belief in a lie. But perhaps these emotions can also serve as signals of real interdependence, windows into the deep relational fabric of reality appropriate our being made in the image of the Triune God, and deeper insights into the imago dei. It is curious that Penal Substitution tends to reinforce this Western individualism in various ways. “Forensic justification” and “forgiveness” in the PSA framework cuts us off from our own past sins, and the need to repair the harm we’ve done.
Guilt Is Love in an Early Stage
Guilt can be healthy, because it is a signpost. We feel guilty when we realize that we have failed to love appropriately. Guilt is meant to not be a long-lasting motivation for action, but to lead us into deeper participation in love. True forgiveness from Jesus is rooted in his desire to partner with us to retell our stories with our partnership.
Thus, one of the archetypal paths of the hero is deep repentance and growth. Often, in many stories, the hero realizes how other people have sacrificed themselves for him. That is the case with Tony in his relationship with Yinsen the doctor, Pepper Potts, his father Howard Stark, and then the Avengers team. Tony decided to more fully participate in a love that was there before him. It became his driving force. In fact, in Episode 6 of Marvel’s What If… series, Eric Killmonger, rather than Ho Yinsen, saved Tony Stark in Afghanistan. In this alternate universe, Tony Stark remained self-centered, and never even became Iron Man.[4] It was true, then: Yinsen’s intervention inspired Tony to become Iron Man. Yinsen’s vocation and character of love lay behind the Tony Stark of Avengers: Endgame.
As Iron Man, Tony found a path that was not “free of the past,” but defined deeply by it. Tony’s life as Iron Man was marked by the past at every turn. Tony worried about the future in a way that was haunted by his past. His regrets motivated him to grow – morally, relationally, even technically. At the same time, however, Tony redefined “freedom” itself. He wanted to be “free,” not from his past, but from the selfishness of his past. How did he do this in practice? By participating in the other-centered love that was there before him, undoing his past mistakes, retelling his own story, and marking his character and life with the virtue he had found in that other-centered love.
Was Tony Stark Just Plagued by Guilty Feelings?
I want to point out how white evangelicals – who almost certainly believe in PSA – have interpreted Tony Stark. Prior to Avengers: Endgame, it was possible to interpret Tony differently. Wasn’t Tony motivated by his sense of guilt? After the movie Captain America: Civil War came out in April/May 2016, David Atwell, an American evangelical who comments on movies, art, and culture, wrote this:
“Tony’s sin – and his attempt to atone for it at the expense of freedom – drove a wedge between the Avengers. Bucky’s sin drove it in further. All that Zemo had to do was hit it, shattering the team to pieces.
Tony’s attempts at atonement are dangerous at best, and self-destructive at worst. Unfortunately, he brings his friends along for that ride.
Even more unfortunately, it might be on purpose. See, Tony Stark knows he has sinned. The deaths of those innocent bystanders haunt him so much that his story about Charlie Spencer’s life and death is laced with barely-repressed anger at himself and his team. The thread of Tony’s guilt, built up in the previous three Iron Man films, resolves here in the most painful way: Stark is left broken on the ground, having failed again to atone for his mother’s death. Guilt and shame have consumed him, and through him, the Avengers.
Tony doesn’t have anyone who died for his sins, so he kills himself over and over.
Like many people in our own world, he doesn’t have anyone who died for his sins, so he kills himself over and over. Then he kills his friends. He does whatever he can to atone for his sins, all the while unintentionally forcing his friends to atone for theirs. And all the while failing to atone for anything.”[5]
Of course, there is some truth to this interpretation of Iron Man as a character, and his character arc as a whole. After Avengers: Age of Ultron, Tony felt deep remorse for the lives lost because of his runaway creation, Ultron. Tony added that guilt to his fears of an alien invasion and the PTSD he got from the Battle of New York in Avengers. So, in Captain America: Civil War, burdened by all this, Tony wants the Avengers to sign the Sokovia Accords requiring government oversight of superheroes. His sense of guilt leads him into another conundrum that Steve Rogers had just exposed in Captain America: Winter Soldier: government agencies can be corrupted, too. But Tony argues that only this type of accountability would work.
There is also some truth to this in real life, and we probably know people who try to atone for their own mistakes, only to make things worse. Marvel explores that in the story of Bucky Barnes in the series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Or they think that shifting the location of a problem will make the problem itself go away. But I believe David Atwell is forcing the story of Iron Man into the emotional framework that Penal Substitutionary Atonement needs and creates, an emotional framework where guilt requires someone else’s atoning action, rather than one’s own. Is it true that Tony’s actions were simply driven by his sense of guilt?
Or Was Tony Stark Becoming a More Loving Person?
Another film critic, Mima Holt, said in 2019 – after Avengers: Endgame came out – that under Tony’s actions and fears is love.
“What has made Tony Stark indelible to the MCU is not because he is the first, nor the smartest, nor the richest Avenger – it is because his story is the overarching narrative that has driven this universe for the past 11 years. More specifically, his fears have been a prime mover in a chess game that has been going on for over a decade.
Tony Stark’s fears are, at its core, a manifestation of how much he loves. That is the ultimate realization in Iron Man, which is why it is such a satisfying origin story. The rest of his films are about how he nurtures that love – we see that so clearly in Spider-Man: Homecoming and even the rest of the Iron Man trilogy – and the mistakes he makes along the way while trying to protect it. Avengers: Age of Ultron and Captain America: Civil War are examples of the lengths Stark will go to keep his found-family alive and together.”[6]
After Avengers: Endgame, David Atwell did not release a commentary, to my knowledge and as of this writing. I think Mima Holt’s 2019 article, coming after Avengers: Endgame, is more accurate. Why?
Consider what happens when we step out of a transactional framework where we see everything through the lens of people trying to make up for external deficits they have accumulated, and into a virtue ethics framework of real internal character development: Who was the person Tony became? Tony became the person who made the sacrifice play. In the first Avengers, Tony had been willing to offer his life for others. In Endgame, he accomplished it. He fulfilled the meaning of his own words, “I just finally know what I have to do.” He had become the opposite of the earlier version of Tony Stark, the man who once built weapons for others to use, for his own profit. He became a man who wielded the ultimate weapon – the Infinity Gauntlet – to benefit others, and to ultimately absorb the cost of wielding that weapon by giving up his life. That is the final meaning, the fulfillment, of Tony saying, “I am Iron Man.” He had come full circle.
Pepper Potts, knowing what Tony had wanted to accomplish, said to him as he fought to stay alive for a few more seconds, “You can rest now.” Tony’s eyes registered that he understood her. Then they closed, as he passed on wordlessly.
The Evidence of Love
Avengers: Endgame gave us a last glance at Tony Stark’s legacy, his last words, and a last sound of it. The last glance was a shot of Tony’s first arc reactor. It rested in a case that read, “Proof that Tony Stark has a heart.” It reminded us of Tony’s sense of guilt, that is true. It reminded us of the start of Tony’s journey in Iron Man to stop manufacturing weapons through Stark Enterprises, sending the stock downward and enraging Obadiah Stane. It reflected his “change of heart” in the first Iron Man movie. But that was a very early stage of his more mature later love, the motivating force by which he retold his own story. Tony’s change of heart culminated in him giving his life for others.
Tony’s last words are poignant as well. Before jumping back in time, Tony recorded a message to his daughter, Morgan Stark:
“Everybody wants a happy ending, right? But it doesn’t always roll that way. Maybe this time. I’m hoping if you play this back, it’s in celebration. I hope families are reunited. I hope we get it back like something like a normal version of the planet has been restored, if there ever was such a thing.
God, what a world. Universe, now… If you told me ten years ago that we weren’t alone – let alone to this extent – I mean, I wouldn’t have been surprised, but come on: the epic forces of darkness and light have come in to play. And for better or worse, that’s the reality Morgan’s gonna have to find a way to grow up in. So, I thought I probably better record a little greeting in the case of an untimely death on my part. Not that death at any time is ever timely.
This time travel thing that we’re going to try to pull off tomorrow has got me scratching my head about the survivability of this thing. Then again, that’s the hero gig. Part of the journey is the end. What am I even tripping for? Everything’s going to work out, exactly the way it’s supposed to. I love you 3000.”[7]
That is a powerful retelling of Tony’s story. But the circumstances of Thanos’ plan so far exceeded what Tony could have possibly felt “guilty” over. And Tony as a person had grown far beyond simply being motivated by guilt. He felt genuine, deep, and true love for others. That is why he could say, “I hope families are reunited. I hope we get it back like something like a normal version of the planet has been restored, if there ever was such a thing.” He meant it. He had grown to the point where he could say it, and truly mean it.
And the last sound of Tony’s legacy was the clanging of Tony’s hammer forging the first primitive Iron Man suit when he was a hostage with Dr. Ho Yinsen. Yinsen lived his life for others and gave his life for Tony. Yinsen had told Tony not to waste his life, and Tony had not. Tony had become a full participant in the love which had moved him from guilt to grief, and from grief to self-giving, other-centered love. In death, Tony joined Yinsen in love, honor, and nobility. Tony even died like Yinsen did, in a similar physical posture, close to the people whose lives he saved. The sound of Tony’s clanging forge was the sound of his character being forged into the likeness of a better man’s character.
After Avengers: Endgame, I don’t recall Christians criticizing Marvel Studios for portraying Tony Stark as a man driven to “atone for his own sins.” Nor did they say that Tony, in the fictional universe, should have instead “trusted in Jesus’ – or someone else’s – atoning death as his penal substitute” to deal with his guilt. I did an internet search on the phrase, “Christian critique was Tony Stark trying to atone for his own sins in Avengers Endgame?” nothing of the sort came up. Why not? I think because the storytelling was too good. Tony’s hugs for others came too spontaneously, his care for others came too freely, his relationships with them were too textured with gratitude and joy and humble knowing. Avengers: Endgame was the highest grossing film in box office history, at nearly $2.8 billion as of this writing. By all accounts, fans and audiences found Tony’s story, and growth as a person, compelling and believable.
That is because we know Simon Peter’s character arc, and growth as a person, is compelling and believable. We know Jesus, the truly human one, had to retell all the great stories of his people. We know Jesus wants to retell our stories in us and through us, by his Spirit. And rightly so. Guilt is an early form of love. There is far more to both guilt and love for us to understand.
[1] Top Movie Clips, “Tony Stark "I Just Finally Know What I Have To Do" - Iron Man (2008) Movie CLIP HD,” Top Movie Clips, May 16, 2020; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zq15nUPm-us.
[2] There are manuscript issues involved in how we interpret this case law; see my notes on Exodus 21:1 – 36, available here: www.anastasiscenter.org/bible-torah-exodus
[3] There are manuscript issues involved in how we interpret the situation of miscarriage; see my notes on Exodus 21:1 – 36, available here: www.anastasiscenter.org/bible-torah-exodus. For a much more extended treatment of abortion, see my book Abortion Policy and Christian Social Ethics in the United States (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2021); see Wipf and Stock; see Amazon for comments.
[4] Kevin Erdmann, “Marvel Confirms Yinsen Was The MCU's Real Founding Hero (Not Iron Man),” ScreenRant, September 16, 2021; https://screenrant.com/what-if-yinsen-phase-1-founding-hero-not-tony-stark/. Erdmann writes, “In the sixth episode of the animated series on Disney+, Tony Stark is saved by Eric Killmonger in Afghanistan, meaning that the Ten Rings never captured him, nor was he forced to build a suit of armor to escape his imprisonment. Furthermore, because he never had those experiences and inspiration from his fellow captive Yinsen, Tony Stark never became a hero in this depicted alternate timeline, making Yinsen absolutely crucial to the foundation of the MCU.”
[5] David Atwell, “Civil War: Explosions and Atonement – David’s Side,” Redeeming Culture, May 18, 2016; https://redeemingculture.com/film/superheroes/2634-civil-war-explosions-and-atonement-davids-side.
[6] Mima Holt, “From Cave to Space: Iron Man’s Legacy,” Discussing Film, April 7, 2019; https://discussingfilm.net/2019/04/07/from-cave-to-space-iron-mans-legacy/.
[7] Thanks to Mansoor Mithaiwala, “Avengers: Endgame – Read Tony Stark’s [Farewell] in Full,” ScreenRant, April 29, 2019; https://screenrant.com/avengers-endgame-iron-man-message-tony-stark-funeral/