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TEXT: I Timothy 2:5
SUBJECT: Christ the Mediator
"Mediator" is a fairly familiar word. It is someone who stands between opposing parties and tries to bring them together. Take, for example, the field of labor relations. If a company and its employees cannot agree on a new contract, a mediator will be brought in. If he does his job well, an agreement is reached and both sides go away happy.
This is how the word is used in the Bible. The opposing parties are God and man. God is holy and must punish sinners. Man is fallen and cannot but sin. God and man, therefore, are enemies; bitter and intractable foes.
The two parties, therefore, are not easily reconciled. God will not overlook sin or justify the wicked. And man will not change his ways. If the two are ever to be reconciled, therefore, a mediator must be employed.
But who is up to such a task? The answer is clear; only one who is impartial or equally sympathetic to both sides.
But who can sympathize with God? Who can be as offended as He is by sin? Who can burn against it as He does? Only one who shares His nature. Thus the mediator must be Divine.
But this is only one side of the equation. Who can sympathize with man in all of his infirmities? Only another man. The mediator, therefore, must be human.
Thus, only one Person is can mediate between God and man. And He, of course, is our Lord Jesus Christ.
For Jesus is God. On this the Bible speaks without equivocation.
1.Jesus claimed to be God.
a.In John 10:30, our Lord said "I and my Father are one". Critics of a supernatural Christ have tried to blunt the force of this argument. They aver that what Jesus meant here was something like this: "My Father and I are on the same wavelength, we're united (or one) in purpose". This is a plausible explanation until you read the context. For as soon as Jesus said this "the Jews took up stones again to stone him...saying we stone you for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God". Now it is possible that the Jews misunderstood Him or tried to twist His words. But if they did, then why didn't Jesus correct them? If evidently agreed with the interpretation they put upon His words.
b.On this point, C.S. Lewis made an astute observation: "I am trying to prevent anyone from saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him. They say, `I am ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God. This is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man, and said the sort of things that Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic or a devil. You must make your choice. Either this man was and is the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up as a fool, you can spit at Him, and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him, Lord and God. But let us not come up with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."
2.Our Lord exercised prerogatives unique to God. The forgiveness of sin is perhaps the most conspicuous. One day Jesus healed a paralyzed man with these remarkable words: "Son, be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you". Now, this was not necessary. He could have just as easily said "Arise and walk". But He didn't. He went out of His way to demonstrate that "the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins". But, in one respect, our Lord's critics were right, "Who can forgive sins but God?" No one. Therefore, Jesus is God.
3.The Apostles also acknowledged the deity of Christ. Thomas' profession is best-known: "My Lord and my God!" But Thomas, of course, was an uncouth man and thus liable to outbursts. But Paul was not. He was a refined man, well-educated and self-controlled. Yet he too confessed the Godhood of Christ. In Romans 8:9, for example, he equated the "Spirit of God" with the "Spirit of Christ", thus making Jesus equal to God.
4.But best of all, the God (who will not share His glory with another) acknowledged the deity of Mary's Son. To the heavenly host, He commands, "Let all the angels of God worship Him"...but to the Son He says, "Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; therefore, God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows" (Hebrews 1:6,8,9).
Jesus, therefore, is half-qualified (at least) to be the Mediator between God and men. For by sharing in the Divine nature, He is fully sympathetic to the cause of God. He is as angry with sinners as His Father is. Thus we read those words--at first incongruous--"The wrath of the Lamb".
But what about the other side? Can the Mediator be fair? Can He sympathize with humans too? Yes, for Jesus is a man. At the Incarnation, Jesus united a human nature to His Divine nature. Thus He was (and is) fully human.
1.He is genetically related to men. Matthew traces His genealogy to Abraham; Luke goes back to Adam. But kind only begets kind. If therefore, our Lord's ancestry is human, then He must be human as well.
2.He called Himself a man and accepts the name without objection.
3.He suffered the wants of a man: hunger, thirst, exhaustion, loneliness, pain and despair.
4.He enjoyed the blessings of human life: eating, drinking, family, friends, and children.
5.When it comes to our Lord's humanity, John is insistent. This man, often called "the Apostle of love" was as unyielding on the subject as the most narrow-minded bigot: "For many deceivers are come into the world, who do not confess that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist".
Make no mistake about it. "The mediator between God and men is the man Christ Jesus".
Thus, there is only one person qualified to be an "honest broker" between a holy God and a sinful race, and that is our Lord Jesus Christ. For only He can truly sympathize with God and man equally.
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But how does our Lord mediate between us and God? By exercising His three-fold office of prophet, priest, and king.
1.Prophet.
a.A "prophet" is one who represents God to man. He receives a revelation from God and faithfully transmits it to man. Thus the ancient prophets began their sermons with the formula: "Thus saith the LORD".
b.The prophets spoke for God. As such, they were infallible. Their revelations, however, were only partial or fragmentary.
c.But in the ministry of Christ, God gave His final word. For only our Lord could say, "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father". And only about Him could it be written, "No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, has declared Him".
d.Thus, in Christ God has spoken with finality. He exercises His prophetic office by:
1.Speaking the truth personally.
2.Demonstrating the truth by His life.
3.Inspiring the Apostles to complete the Bible.
4.Opening our minds to receive its teaching.
e.Hence, Christ the prophet brings us to God by purifying our minds of error and stocking them with truth.
2.Priest.
a.A "priest" is sort of the reverse of a prophet. He represents man to God. Thus, under the Old Covenant, priests would offer sacrifices on behalf of others. And pray for them. Ordinary men would not draw near to God themselves; they would use an intermediary.
b.Under the New Covenant, this arrangement is rescinded. The reason is simple: Christ is now our priest. It is He who represents us to God. This He did (and does) in two ways:
1.He offered a sacrifice to expiate God's wrath and cover our sins. This offering, of course, was Himself, "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world".
2.Now He intercedes on our behalf in the presence of God.
c.Thus by our Lord's priestly work, the believer can shout, "Who is he that condemns? It is Christ who died, yea, rather is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us".
3.King.
a.A king's authority and duties are self-evident.
b.That Christ faithfully exercises this office is well put by the Shorter Catechism, "in subduing us to Himself, in ruling and defending us, and in restraining and conquering all of His and our enemies".
This, in brief, is how our Lord mediates between God and men.
But how successful is He? What are the effects of His work?
By His prophetic office, Christ enables us to know the truth. Once done, the quarrel with God is over. We "think God's thoughts after Him".
By His priestly office, Christ bears our sins and imputes His righteousness to us. Once this is accomplished, God has no more legal complaint with us.
By His kingly office, Christ changes our lives and makes us like Him.
Once this is done, God has no moral objection to us.
Thus, by the mediation of Christ, man is reconciled to God. "And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and irreproachable in His sight..."
Hence, Christ the Mediator does not make our salvation possible. He makes it certain. Thus we are urged to believe and rejoice in the Gospel by which we are taught,
"God was in Christ, reconciling the world
unto Himself,
Not imputing their trespasses unto them,
and has committed to us the word of
reconciliation".
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