The COGC affirms the atoning significance of Christ's death: his sacrifice on the cross deals with human sin and provides the basis for God's forgiveness of the repentant. The blood of Christ is the ground of redemption. The COGC is fully Christian in its confession that Jesus died for our sins according to the Scriptures and was raised on the third day (1 Corinthians 15:3-4).

The COGC's atonement theology is connected to its conditionalist eschatology: the full benefit of Christ's atoning work is not merely forgiveness in the present but the ultimate gift of resurrection and immortal life in the coming kingdom. The atonement secures both present forgiveness and future immortality — the complete redemption of the mortal human being into the immortal life God has promised.

The COGC does not typically expound a detailed theory of how the atonement works mechanically (penal substitution, governmental theory, moral influence) but affirms the central biblical language: Christ died for our sins, bore our infirmities, and by his blood reconciled humanity to God. The humanity of Jesus — his genuine mortality and real death — is essential to the COGC's understanding of the atonement: a human being died as the representative sacrifice for humanity.