Pt. 12 LBCF Chapter 8: Of Christ the Mediator

Christ the Mediator in the Covenant of Redemption

This evening, we're moving along in our exposition of the Confession of Faith. We come to Chapter 8, and notice it says, Of Christ the Mediator. Now, I want you to remember that in the beginning of this study, we broke the Confession into four major parts.

Last week, when we were talking about Of the Covenant, Chapter 7, that starts the second major part, and that goes on right through Chapter 20. So, Chapter 7 introduced the idea of how God relates to his creation through the covenant, and then now, as we move to Chapter 8, we see the title of it is Of Christ the Mediator, and this is the second chapter of Part 2, with the general heading Of the Covenant.

Now, notice that the authors of the Confession chose to expand on the doctrine of Christ not in Chapter 2, which was Of God and the Holy Trinity, but in the section On the Covenant, and that is important.

And the reason is actually explained right in the title of this chapter. Notice how Christ, the Mediator. What is he the Mediator? He is the Mediator of the New Covenant. And that's the reason why the authors of the Confession chose to expand upon the doctrine of Christ, not in Chapter 2, Of the Holy Trinity, but in Chapter 8, Dealing with the Covenant, because most of what is revealed about Christ in the Scriptures is in relationship to him being the Mediator of the New Covenant.

So, again, it makes very logical sense to include the exposition on Christ in this chapter and not in Chapter 2. So, I just wanted to take some time to talk about that. Now, this chapter has 10 paragraphs, which can be divided into four major sections.

Paragraph 1 is titled His Ordination to the Office of Mediator. Paragraph 2 is His Incarnation for the Office of Mediator. Chapter 3 is the Qualifications for the Office of Mediator. And then from 4 through 10 is the Execution of the Office of Mediator.

That's the general headings. And, again, these titles are not given in the Confession itself, but most of them were given by Sam Walton as he broke it down in his exposition of the Confession. All right, so we're going to look at Paragraph 1, The Ordination of Christ to the Office of Mediator.

And this is the first paragraph. So I'll read the first paragraph, and then we'll break it down. It pleads God in His eternal purpose to choose and ordain the Lord Jesus, His only begotten Son, according to the covenant made between them both, to be the mediator between God and man, the prophet, priest, and king, head and savior of the church, the heir of all things and judge of the world, unto whom He did from all eternity give a people to be His seed and to be by Him in time redeemed, called, justified, sanctified, and glorified.

Again, you read it in one reading, and it says a mouthful. But the first part, if you want to break it down, is the author of the ordination, and it's God. All right, just very simple, it pleads God. And we always want to make sure that as we're going through this that we understand who is behind each of these sections.

And again, this whole idea of Christ being the mediator was authored by God, it pleads God. The second thing that we see in this paragraph is the time of the ordination in His eternal purpose. Remember, we talked last week, when we talked about the covenant, that we talked about when the new covenant was commenced, and that it is still based upon the eternal covenant.

It was from eternity, from all eternity, that God ordained that Christ should be the mediator. There came a time in history when it actually took place, but it was part of His eternal purpose. So then we look at the framework of the ordination.

To choose and ordain the Lord Jesus as only begotten Son, according to the covenant made between them both, to be the mediator between God and man. Now again, this is expanding upon last week's chapter that we looked at on the covenant, on God's covenant.

Notice, this is the framework, this is what the plan is. To choose and ordain the Lord Jesus, His only begotten Son, according to the covenant made between them both. Again, this is talking about the eternal covenant now.

This is all things that happen from all eternity. And what was to be the mediator between God and man. Remember last week, because there's a distance, an ontological difference between God and man, there has to be a mediator, there has to be a covenant, and therefore there has to be a mediator of the covenant.

And Christ was ordained to be the mediator of the covenant by God Himself, from all eternity, according to the covenant that was made in eternity. Okay? Making sense?

Okay.

Then it tells you this first chapter again. And remember, keep in mind always that the first chapter of every, I'm sorry, the first section of every chapter is kind of like an introductory chapter, an introductory paragraph.

And then we fill in a lot of details as we go through. But it's the character of the ordination. What is the character of the ordination? What was Christ ordained to? To be the prophet, priest, and king, to be the head and savior of the church, the heir of all things, and the judge of the world.

All of this is part of the ordination of Christ as the mediator of the covenant.

Okay?

And then the purpose of the ordination. What was the whole purpose behind this? Again, this is the same first paragraph. I added, notice the lines, the underlining is different. I found something new.

So, okay. All right. Unto whom he did from all eternity, there gives another reference to the eternal covenant. Give a people to be his seed, and to be by him in time redeemed, called justified, sanctified, and glorified.

That's the purpose of the covenant.

All right?

Remember, without the covenant, man falls, he's doomed. He's dead, and only meant to be judged. But because of the eternal covenant, all right, he promises that his seed will be redeemed, called justified, and sanctified, and then glorified.

Now, look at that last phrase, redeemed, called justified, sanctified, and glorified. You'll see that each one of those, maybe not all, but most of those have their own chapter in this section. So, again, this is, and we're still pretty much introductory in this, even though this is the second chapter in this part.

Okay.

But you can see how the framers of our confession lay it all out and giving us all the major points of Christology. Not every single point. This is not, the confession is not a detailed systematic theology.

I mentioned that earlier in our introduction, and I want to keep reminding you of that. This is not a detailed systematic theology. It's hitting the high points, the necessary points. Remember when we talked about creeds and confessions?

What's the difference between a creed and a confession? No, close. A creed is what we must believe, and a confession is what we should believe.

All right?

Remember, if you have a disagreement with any of the tenets of the major creeds, it moves you outside the realm of orthodoxy. That's why it says what you must believe.

Okay.

All right. So now we move to paragraph two, still talking about Christ the mediator, and paragraph two talks about the incarnation of Christ. First was the, remember the first chapter, the first section?

How many times have I taught this confession? It's got to be 12 times already, and I still misstate chapters and paragraphs. I don't know why. It's just a thing. Paragraph two, all right, is the incarnation of Christ for the office of mediator, and this gives us the subject.

Now, again, this is all of chapter two in paragraph two. I'm going to change them, you know? This is paragraph two, and we're going to break this down too, first looking at the subject of the incarnation, all right?

The subject of the incarnation, the Son of God, the second person in the Holy Trinity, being very an eternal God, the brightness of the Father's glory, of one substance and equal with him, who made the world, who upholds and governs all things he has made.

That's the subject of the incarnation. Who was incarnated? The second person of the Trinity, all right? Notice that's a pretty good summary of our Christology, isn't it? Again, it's not exhaustive, but it's an excellent summary of what we should be believing about who Jesus Christ is, and he is the subject of the incarnation.

God the Son, second person of the Trinity, took upon himself human flesh, okay? The time of the incarnation, when the fullness of time was come. Have you ever wondered why that specific time? What if God had ordained things that Christ came now?

Would there be a difference? I mean, you might think, well, look at how many people he could reach with all of our modern technology, you know? So why at that particular time?

I don't know.

It's one of those things. It's in God's time, and there's a reason that has not been explained to us why he chose at that particular time, but we know that this comes right from the scriptures, in the fullness of time, at the perfect time, and that's all we really need to know.

Sometimes people get way off on speculation about, well, what if this could have, what if that, but no, when God does something, it's in the perfect time, and that's why it's only a short phrase. When the fullness of time was come, it was the perfect time, okay?

The essence of the Carnation? That he would take upon him man's nature, with all the essential properties and common infirmities thereof, yet without sin. Now this is, again, notice how our doctrine, our Christology, is woven all the way through this, albeit in a very logical and cogent way.

What was the essence of the Incarnation? God became man. God took upon himself human flesh, okay? Took upon him man's nature. That's what I mean by man, not the, got to be careful how we phrase those things.

Took upon him man's nature with all the essential properties and common infirmities thereof, yet without sin. Common infirmities, what do we mean by that? Jesus tired, he got hungry. All the things that you and I experience, the only thing that he did not experience is sin, okay?

And we're going to pick up in the next couple of paragraphs exactly what this is talking about in a little bit more detail. What does it mean that he took upon him man's nature, okay? Paragraph two, talk about the mode of the Incarnation.

This is still paragraph two, this is the second. This was a long paragraph, so I had to break it up. The mode of the Incarnation is the Holy Spirit. Being conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin Mary, the Holy Spirit coming down upon her and the power of the Most High overshadowing her, and so was made of a woman of the tribe of Judah, of the seed of Abraham and David, according to the Scriptures.

Notice it gives you everything that you need to know about that. How was Jesus conceived? By the Holy Spirit. How did that take place? I don't know. That's another one of those mysteries. It's not explained for us, and whenever we have something in Scripture that is not explained, we should not venture in and try to speculate the mechanism of how that took place.

So we know it was by the Holy Spirit, came down upon her, the power of the Most High overshadowing her, and he was made of a woman of the tribe of Judah, according to the Scriptures, seed of Abraham, seed of David, all according to the Scriptures.

Now again, we know that there's a lot more prophecies that were fulfilled in the birth of Christ, but this is some of the essence of it, the important ones. So that's the mode of the Incarnation. He was born of a woman.

The result of the Incarnation, and I'm breaking this down even more, the result of the Incarnation keeps him as a single personality. Joined together, one person, without conversion, composition, or confusion, yet one Christ, the only mediator between God and man.

Christ is not two persons. Sometimes people start talking about Christ and they talk about humanity and deity, and that's acceptable, but he's one person. And we call it his single personality. Notice, joined together in one person.

And notice that the natures, the distinct natures, without conversion, composition, or confusion. He maintained, though there's a distinction between those two natures, the divine nature and the human nature, and we'll look at those in just a few minutes.

But joined together in one person, that's the important thing. Remember, throughout the history of the church, the deity or the humanity of Christ has always been, especially for the first 800 years, was always in question.

People saying he was only a man or people saying he was only God. But that's not what the scripture teaches. The scripture teaches that he is one person and with two natures. So we see his single personality.

We also see his true deity. So that the two whole perfect and distinct natures, notice distinct natures, were inseparably joined together in one person, without conversion, composition, or confusion, which person is very God.

Person of Jesus Christ is God. Confession is very clear. Why? Because the scripture is very clear. And then, besides his true deity, we see his true humanity. Went too fast there. One click too many. So that the two whole perfect distinct natures, I underline that again, notice two distinct natures, which person is very God and very man.

Is Christ fully God, truly God? Yes. Is he truly man? Yes, he is. Is he two persons? No, he's one person. Does he have two natures? Yes, he has two natures. And yet those two natures, without conversion, composition, or confusion.

This is a high mystery. Just like the Trinity, when we talk about the Trinity, how can we have three persons in one essence? I don't know. But that's what the scripture teaches. That's what our confession teaches.

And here we have one person with two distinct natures. Okay. Very good. That's paragraph two. Now, paragraph three talks about the qualifications for the office of mediator. And this is extremely important as well.

All right.

First is the anointing of the Holy Spirit. The Lord Jesus, in his human nature, thus united to the divine in the person of the Son, was sanctified and anointed with the Holy Spirit above measure, having in him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

There is an anointing that had to take place.

All right.

He was anointed with the Holy Spirit in order for him to be qualified to be the mediator of the new covenant.

Okay.

And we see that throughout all of scriptures. Remember, because he was truly human, that he had to learn. He had to grow.

All right.

And that's why he needed to be anointed as a qualification, anointed by the Holy Spirit for that office. And he grew into, as a young man, he grew into that. And, of course, he's anointed at his baptism.

Okay.

So it's the anointing of the Holy Spirit, but it's also the commissioning of the Father.

All right.

In whom it pleased the Father that all the fullness should dwell. Remember, all the fullness of deity dwelt in him.

Okay.

To the end that being wholly harmless, undefiled, and full of grace and truth, he might be thoroughly furnished to execute the office of mediator and surety.

All right.

In other words, God commissioned him and gave him everything that was necessary, which office he took not upon himself.

Okay.

We see that several times. Remember, Christ always prayed, not my will but thine be done.

All right.

He was in submission. Though he was equal, is equal, with God the Father, yet he is submissive to the Father.

All right.

Okay.

Not upon himself, but was thereunto called by his Father, who also put all power and judgment in his hand, and gave him commandment to execute the same.

All right.

So when Jesus, in his earthly ministry, and he was walking around and performing miracles and teaching, that's why he could say, you've seen me, you've seen the Father. I and the Father are one.

All right.

And at the same time could say, yet not my will, but thine be done to the Father. Because of the perfect submission, perfect complement of how the whole covenant was put together. It was a covenant between the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit from all eternity.

Okay.

Now we move to the last, the last part, part four of this chapter, which is titled, The Execution of the Office of Mediator. And here we have, we have seven chapters that go through this. First one's a big one.

This is an historical description.

Okay.

The office the Lord Jesus did most willingly undertake. Submission does not imply oppression. There was a willing submission.

Okay.

And this should actually be the the model. We're supposed to submit to certain authorities just as the son submitted to the father.

All right.

Which is a willing submission. Wives, submit yourself to your husband. Children, obey your parents. We see this this type of example for submission. So this office the Lord Jesus did most willingly undertake which that he might discharge.

He was made under the law and did perfectly fulfill it.

Right.

Remember there's a reason that Christ came as a babe and lived a sinless life. He had to come and live under the law and fulfill the law, the law that Adam couldn't keep.

All right.

And so he did perfectly fulfill it and underwent the punishment due us which we should have borne and suffered being made sin and a curse for us. I mean this gets right to the heart of the atonement. And that is for whom did Christ die?

Yeah.

So I want you to think about this. We think of Christ dying that agonizing death but it was the elect that put him on the cross. Not the ungodly.

Okay.

He died for our sins. And that should be the biggest motivator for us not to sin. When you think that it's our sin that put him up on that cross.

Right.

And during most grievous sorrows in his soul and most painful sufferings in his body. It was real because and this is the importance of understanding the dual nature of Christ. He as a man in his human nature he experienced everything that you and I would experience on that cross but even greater because the wrath of God was poured out upon him.

Without measure.

Alright.

He was crucified and died. Remained in the state of dead yet saw no corruption. That body was in that tomb for three days and three nights. On the third day he rose from the dead with the same body in which he suffered.

That is so crucial because that too is being attacked by many different corners in the church. Some who even claim to be reformed especially those who are what they say full preterists. They're denying that he came out with the same body.

Alright.

That it was a spiritual body. No. That body was the human body went into the grave and it's that body that came out. Which he also ascended into heaven and here's just the remaining of the Christology.

He ascended into heaven. He sits at the right hand of the Father making intercession and shall return to judgment and angels at the end of the world. Making intercession. That's part of his job as the mediator.

He daily intercedes for his church. That's what is known as the historical description. This is what actually happened. Paragraph five is called its central operation. The Lord Jesus by his perfect obedience and sacrifice of himself which he through the eternal spirit once offered up to God has fully satisfied the justice of God procured reconciliation and purchased an everlasting inheritance in the kingdom of heaven for all those whom the Father has given to him.

Notice as we go through this the language of the confession just presumes a Calvinistic soteriology. His perfect obedience through the eternal spirit that he offered up has fully satisfied the justice of God for whom?

For all that the Father has given to him. He's purchased that everlasting inheritance in the kingdom of heaven. That is the hope that we have as believers. How sure is that hope? It's guaranteed because he did it perfectly.

This is why we need to understand exactly what Christ has done because since the fall of Adam and we have been redeemed we are actually in a better position than Adam. Maybe I'll go through that in a future lesson.

Paragraph 6. It's ancient communication. Although the price of redemption was not actually paid by Christ until after his incarnation yet the virtue, efficacy and benefit thereof were communicated to the elect in all ages successively from the beginning of the world in and by those promises types and sacrifices wherein he was revealed and signified to be the seed which should bruise the serpent's head and the lamb slain from the foundation of the world being the same yesterday and today and forever.

Again, you can see how this goes right along with our Reformed Baptist view of the covenant and that even though the new covenant wasn't instituted until the incarnation and of course his death and resurrection on the cross, that's when the new covenant was ratified and put into effect.

It was the future promise. Everyone who believed in that promise in the old covenant dispensation were saved. How could that be? Because the promise of God is sure. When God promises something there is no way that that promise is not going to be fulfilled.

And so that was the efficacy in the belief in the promise. Paragraph 7. It's mysterious.

Communion.

This is almost an understatement here because almost everything we've looked at tonight is mysterious. Christ in the work of mediation acts according to both natures. Follow that? He acts according to both natures.

By each nature doing that which is proper to itself. Yet by reason of the unity of the person that which is proper to one nature is sometimes in the scripture attributed to the person dominated by the other nature.

In other words,.

It's.

Very clear sometimes we see something attributed to Christ in scripture and you say, was that his humanity or his deity? And it doesn't really say. And that's because the scripture just looks at him as one person which he is and even though he may be acting out of one nature dominantly over another, we don't differentiate in that way.

Sometimes you would hear somebody say, well in his humanity, Christ said or Christ did something like that. And that's proper as well. But normally we just refer to whatever Christ did, just this was the work of Jesus Christ.

And we don't differentiate was it his humanity or what is his deity in taking the lead in that. Because we don't really know exactly how that works anyway.

Okay?

But that's what this paragraph is saying. Just because it looks like you're attributing a work of Christ to his deity, to the whole person, get over it.

Okay. Alright.

Paragraph 8,.

It's.

Effectual application. To all those for whom Christ has obtained eternal redemption, he does certainly and effectually apply and communicate the same, making intercession for them, uniting them to himself by his spirit.

Let me just pause here, just what I've gotten so far. Notice he says effectually apply. We're going to have a chapter that's called effectual calling. And so we're going to get into this in a little bit more detail.

But this is introducing Christ the mediator. Uniting them to himself by his spirit, revealing unto them, in and by his word, the mystery of salvation, persuading them to believe and obey, governing their hearts by his word and spirit, and overcoming all their enemies by his almighty power and wisdom, in such manner and ways as are most consistent, consonant, I'm sorry, consonant, to his wonderful and unsearchable dispensation, and all of free and absolute grace without any condition foreseen in them to procure it.

Mouthful, what's the essence of it? He's going to save you. Alright, that's basically what it's saying. All those who are in this eternal covenant of redemption, alright, will be called, effectually called.

Sometimes we call that irresistible grace, you can call it effectual calling, alright, and then we are united to him by his spirit. There's that union that we have with Christ. We are one with Christ.

Remember how important this is, because Christ says that whatever is done to you, remember, you meaning his church, alright, is done to him. And we see that most clearly when Paul is on his way to Damascus, and what does Christ say to him?

Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

Okay.

And.

Let me, in fact, let me just say something, just an application of this. As you're going through life, and even now, alright, well let me use the circumstance now. We are being prohibited from holding the assembly of the entire church.

Okay, we're being prohibited.

And.

I'm just going to come out and say it. I think there are nefarious motives on behalf of many of the politicians who are doing this. I don't think it's as simple as, oh, we're trying to save lives. I think there are motives, ulterior motives, of a nefarious nature, okay.

And they are poking their finger in God's eye. I fear for them. I fear for them. One of the things that I've done over my life after I became a Christian, and understood this principle, was when somebody wronged me, I would immediately start to think, wow, they're in trouble.

Because, yeah, maybe they wronged me, but I'm one of Christ. They've wronged him. And I feel sorry for them.

And.

That's the way, you know, one thing that we should be looking at with what's going on in our nation here today.

Our.

Ability to worship freely is being taken away from us. And yes, we should be fighting back. We've consulted with lawyers. We've got some legal strategies, and strategies as how we're going to do this, so we can honor God without, you know, without falling prey to mankind's wishes and whims.

But we should be praying for these people, because they're in deep trouble. They're in deep trouble. And because we are one with him. And they really have no idea what they've done. So, all right, so, overcoming all our enemies by his almighty power and wisdom in such manner and ways as are most consistent, consonant, I'm sorry, to his wonderful and unsearchable dispensation.

Notice what it says. His almighty power and wisdom. And he's going to get them.

One.

Way or another. So what we should do is we should be praying for these people that God would save them to spare them from the horrible fate that lies before them.

Okay?

All right. Paragraph nine. It's inalienable possession. Okay, this is short and sweet. And basically what it says, the office of mediator between God and man is proper only to Christ, who is the prophet, priest, and king of the church of God, and may not be either in whole or any part thereof transferred from him to any other.

Sorry, our Roman Catholic friends. No, that pope is not the vicar of Christ on earth. There's one mediator between God and man. The man Christ Jesus. And that can't be translated to any other person. And then the final paragraph, it's necessary functions, this number and order of offices is necessary, and then it goes through and tells us why.

For in respect of our ignorance, we stand in need of his prophetical office. Without Christ teaching us, right, we would be lost. Why? Because we're ignorant.

All right?

And in respect of our alienation from God and imperfection of the best of our services, we need his priestly office to reconcile us and to present us acceptable unto God. You can see that. And in respect to our averseness and utter inability to return to God, and for our rescue and security from our spiritual adversaries, we need his kingly office to convince, subdue, draw, behold, uphold, deliver, and preserve us to his heavenly kingdom.

Prophet, priest, and king. And all are necessary. Questions?

Thoughts?

Or comments? Now again, remember, this is just really an introduction and overview of Christ the mediator. It is not a detailed systematic Christology.

All right?

But this is what the framers of our confession thought was necessary.

To.

Keep the churches together, to keep them on.

The.

Unity of doctrine. We can have some differences, and you can even see here how some of these chapters, some of these paragraphs, I should say, some of these paragraphs would not be in the Westminster Confession.

Because.

Of our view of the covenant. That's not to say that we're out of fellowship with them.