050 Atonement: Did Jesus Have to Die?

This week we talk theories of the atonement of Jesus.  We discuss some major models of atonement, many of them substitutionary and most of them blood atonement in some fashion.  We talk about the illustrations we use to teach these theories and how they all get conflated.  By no means do we address all theories of the atonement of Christ.  But we do ask the question again and again...did Jesus really HAVE to die?  Why?  For whom?  To what end?