Christ The Mediator (LBCF 8.1)
Preface to this section - foundational lessons
That God has from eternity sovereignly chosen a definite number out of the fallen human race to be saved by means of the redemptive work of Christ. (3:3 - 3:6)
3:3 By God’s decree, and for the demonstration of His glory, some human beings and angels are predestined (or foreordained) to eternal life through Jesus Christ, to the praise of His glorious grace. Others are left to live in their sin, leading to their just condemnation, to the praise of His glorious justice.
3:4 These predestined and foreordained angels and people are individually and unchangeably designated, and their number is so certain and definite that it cannot be either increased or decreased.
3:5 Those people who are predestined to life were chosen by God before the foundation of the world, according to His eternal and unchangeable purpose and the secret counsel and good pleasure of His will. He chose them in Christ for eternal glory, purely as a result of His free grace and love, without anything else about them serving as a condition or cause moving Him to do so.
3:6 Just as God has appointed the elect to glory, so He has by the eternal and completely free purpose of His will foreordained all the means. Therefore, those who are elected, being fallen in Adam, are redeemed by Christ and effectually called to faith in Christ by His Spirit working at the appropriate time. They are justified, adopted, sanctified,15 and kept by His power through faith to salvation. None but the elect are redeemed by Christ, or effectually called, justified, adopted, sanctified, and saved
That God has from eternity formed a covenant of grace with his Son, in which the Father gave the Son a people to be his seed, and promised their salvation as his reward, and in which the Son engaged to perform and suffer all that was necessary to that end. (7:2-7:3)
7:2 Since humanity brought itself under the curse of the law by its fall, it pleased the Lord to make a covenant of grace. In this covenant He freely offers to sinners life and salvation through Jesus Christ. On their part He requires faith in Him, that they may be saved, and promises to give His Holy Spirit to all who are ordained to eternal life, to make them willing and able to believe.
7:3 This covenant is revealed in the gospel. It was revealed first of all to Adam in the promise of salvation through the seed of the woman. After that, it was revealed step by step until the full revelation of it was completed in the New Testament. This covenant is based on the eternal covenant transaction between the Father and the Son concerning the redemption of the elect. Only through the grace of this covenant have those saved from among the descendants of fallen Adam obtained life and blessed immortality. Humanity is now utterly incapable of being accepted by God on the same terms on which Adam was accepted in his state of innocence.
This Section teaches:
Discussion
The Motive of Christ the Mediator
The Roles of Christ our Mediator
A mediator is one who intervenes between contesting parties for the sake of making reconciliation. The term is sometimes applied to independent and disinterested parties called in to arbitrate a difficulty; sometimes to a dependent messenger or agent of one of the parties to the contest employed to carry overtures to the other party.
Mediator (Isa 42:1; 1Pe 1:19-20)
the mediatorial office involves all the three great functions of prophet, priest and king, and Christ discharged them all, both in his estate of humiliation and exaltation. These are not three distinct offices meeting accidentally in one office, but three functions inhering essentially in the one office of mediator. And they each so belong to the very essence of the office that the quality peculiar to each gives character to every mediatorial action.
Prophet (Act 3:22)
A prophet is a spokesman: one sent from God to man to make known the divine will. In this sense Moses and all inspired men were prophets. But Christ was the personal “Word of God” incarnate, he who had eternally been “in the bosom of God” and “known the Father,” and consequently as mediatorial prophet is that original fountain of revelation of which all other prophets are the streams. He is the Prophet of all prophets, the Teacher of all teachers.
Priest (Heb 5:5-6)
A priest is (a) one taken from among men, (b) to appear in the presence of God and to treat in behalf of men, and (c) in order thereto to make propitiation and intercession. It is declared to be essential to the priest (a) that he be a man chosen to represent men before God.
King (Psa 2:6; Luk 1:33; Eph 1:22-23; Heb 1:2; Act 17:31)
He executeth the office of a king (a) in calling out of the world a people to himself, and giving them offices, laws and discipline, by which he visibly governs them; (b) in bestowing saving grace upon his elect, rewarding their obedience and correcting them for their sins, preserving and supporting them under all their temptations and sufferings; (c) restraining and overcoming all their enemies, and powerfully ordering all things for his own glory and their good; and also (d) in taking vengeance on the rest, who know not God and obey not the gospel.