Penal substitutionary atonement refers to the doctrine that Christ died on the cross as a substitute for sinners. God imputed the guilt of our sins to Christ, and he, in our place, bore the punishment that we deserve. This was a full payment for sins, which satisfied both the wrath and the righteousness of God, so that He could forgive sinners without compromising His own holy standard.
Consider what God did to save us. He didn’t hand us a brochure or ask us to attend a seminar, as if our problem was merely ignorance. He didn’t hold an intervention or send us to boot camp, as if our problem was merely stubbornness. He answered our need with the cross, which can only mean that we have really messed up. If the cross is necessary to save us, then What did we do?The cross is a dagger through the happy talk of "you’re okay, I’m okay" and if we just try harder we can get past our issues and change the world. The center of history is a weapon of torture—imagine holding hands around a guillotine or electric chair and you’ll get the idea. The cross informs us that things have gone horribly wrong, and they won’t be right unless somebody dies.
That somebody is Jesus. It’s fashionable to deny that Jesus died to pay the debt which we owed to God (the penal substitution view of the atonement). I agree that penal substitution doesn’t explain everything that happened on the cross (Jesus also defeated Satan and left us an example), but it does express the most important thing. Take away penal substitution, and you can’t explain what happened there.
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