Atonement is not an end in itself

On the other hand, atonement is not an end in itself, any more than the judgement of sin and the expiation of guilt are ends in themselves. The purpose of atonement is to reconcile humanity back to God so that atonement issues in union between man and God, but it issues in union between man and God because the hypostatic union is that union already being worked out between estranged man and God, between man's will and God's will in the one person of Christ. It is the hypostatic union or hypostatic at-onement, therefore, which lies embedded in the very heart of atonement. All that is done in the judgement of sin, in expiation of guilt, in the oblation of obedience to the Father is in order to bring humanity back to union with God, and to anchor that union within the eternal union of the Son and the Father, and the Father and the Son, through the communion of the Holy Spirit.—T. F. Torrance, Incarnation: The Person and Life of Christ, 196