WWUTT 583 One Mediator Between God and Men?

When Jesus died on the cross for our sins, did He accomplish something with that work? Or did

He just make it possible for something to be accomplished with that work? Dare I say, He accomplished what had been predestined from the foundation of the world when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand the Text, a daily study of God's Word, that we may be filled with the knowledge of His will.

For questions and comments send us an email to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com

Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. We continue with our study of 1 Timothy chapter 2, and as with yesterday,

I'll be reading through verse 7. The Apostle Paul writes, First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.

This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

For there is one God, and there is one Mediator between God and men, the man

Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.

For this I was appointed a preacher and an apostle, I am telling the truth, I am not lying, a teacher of the

Gentiles in faith and in truth. Perhaps you were a little disappointed yesterday in the way

I quickly brushed past verse 4, which says, God desires all people to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

That's the most controversial verse in this paragraph that we are studying this week, if not the most controversial passage in all of 1

Timothy. But I did give it the proper understanding. We are to know that God desires that the gospel would be preached to everyone.

There is no one from whom we should withhold the gospel. God desires that the truth of Jesus Christ would be preached to the whole world.

That's what the verse means. If I were to expound on that any further, it would only be to address the controversy or what makes this verse so controversial.

And it usually has to do with the extent of the atonement of the cross of Christ.

First of all, let us outright dismiss that this is not an argument for universalism.

The idea that Christ's blood covers every single human being who has ever lived, past, present and future.

Basically, everyone is going to heaven. That's universalism. That's not what Paul is arguing for here.

For it would contradict other parts of the letter. In chapter 4 verse 1, Paul says,

Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and the teaching of demons.

In chapter 5 verse 24, Paul says, The sins of some people are conspicuous, going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later.

In chapter 6 verse 10, Paul says, For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils.

It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.

So there are other places in the letter where Paul talks about the condemnation of sinners.

So chapter 2 verse 4 is not an argument for universalism. By the way, that verse in chapter 6 verse 10 where it says,

The love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. That's a good example of understanding the word all in a proper context.

Because it does not mean that the love of money is the root of all evil. It isn't.

There are sins that you can commit that have nothing to do with your desire for money.

So the love of money is not the root of all evil. Rather, it is the root of all kinds of evils.

And this is one of the ways that the English Standard Version of the Bible differs from the King James.

When you go to the King James, it will say that the love of money is a root of all evil.

And that verse has led many people astray to believe that the love of money is the root of all sin.

It's not. It isn't. I can attest to that personally. There are sins that I've committed that had nothing to do with money or a desire for riches or gain.

So anyway, that's framing in a proper context the use of the word all.

And the way that we're using all here, even in chapter 2, verse 4, is like that. God desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

Specifically, God desires all kinds of people to be saved. Just as we were talking about all kinds of people in verse 1.

And kings and all kinds of people in verse 2. So we have it the same way in verse 4.

God desires all kinds of people to be saved, whether they are rich or poor, slave or free, male or female, barbarian or Scythian, Roman, Gentile, or Jew.

God desires all kinds of people to come to a knowledge of Christ. So again, there's no one from whom we should withhold the gospel, the message that Jesus Christ, the

Son of God, died on the cross, shedding his blood, atoning for our sins, so that all who believe in him will be forgiven their sins and stand before God as justified and will receive the gift of eternal life.

So here's where verse 4 gets controversial. What is the extent of that atonement?

Is God's ultimate purpose to make that atonement available to everyone, preserving human free will?

And in doing so, God must allow that there are people who will reject this free gift of grace, but those who genuinely love

God will choose to follow him because of the human freedom that God ultimately desired to preserve.

Because it's only through human freedom that we can genuinely love God. That's one argument on the atonement.

The reason why I don't like that argument is because it actually limits the atonement.

Now that's ironic, considering that one of the doctrines of Calvinism is called limited atonement.

I hate that name because I really don't think the Calvinist understanding of the atonement is limited.

It's the one where our human free will chooses whether or not to accept the atonement.

That's the viewpoint in which the atonement is really limited. Why? Because it limits the atonement to a mere possibility rather than something that God actually accomplished.

When Jesus died on the cross for our sins, was something accomplished with that sacrifice?

Or was simply the possibility of an accomplishment made with that sacrifice?

See the argument that I'm making here? So this is why I do not think that you can use 1

Timothy 2 .4 to argue for the preservation of the human free will, especially when that argument would dismiss every other passage that talks about the bondage of human free will.

The very thing that Martin Luther wrote about in his book, Bondage of the Will. And he wasn't writing about anything that we don't find in Scripture.

Romans 3, 10, 11, and 12. None is righteous. No, not one.

No one understands. No one seeks for God. All have turned aside, together they have become worthless.

No one does good, not even one. So reason with me here.

If no one does good, then how could you choose to accept the atonement of Jesus Christ, which would undoubtedly be a good thing?

Now you can make right moral choices. A person can look at you and say, well, that is a good person.

He does what is right. But that doesn't mean the decisions that you make are worshipful toward God or desirous of God.

For your heart is rebellious against the Lord. That is the natural disposition of every man.

This is original sin. Everyone who was born in the line of Adam is born into sin.

And you are enslaved to various passions and pleasures, as Paul talks about in Titus 3 .3.

You can only do what is in your nature to do, and that is rebel against God.

Just like a cow can only do the things that a cow wants to do. A cow can't bark like a dog.

It's not in the cow's nature to bark like a dog. Something would have to change about the cow.

It's genetic makeup in order to get it to make another sound other than sounds that cows make or graze in a field or wander in herds.

A cow can only do what is in its nature to do. You as a human being can only do what is in your nature to do, and your nature is sin.

That is the sinful nature that every man, woman, and child is born with in the line of Adam.

We must be set free from this bondage to sin. And that is what Christ did with the atonement on the cross.

The Holy Spirit comes into our lives and frees our hearts from the hardness that has infected us because of the inherent sin that plagues all of mankind.

We are all born with hearts of stone. It is the Holy Spirit that softens that heart to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ and respond to it.

We would not even be able to do that, which again would be a good thing to do if it were not for the work of the

Holy Spirit to make us aware of our sin nature and our need for a

Savior which was spoken to us about in the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so the gospel must be preached to everyone so that those with hardened hearts would be softened by the

Holy Spirit and come to a knowledge of the truth. But this is only going to happen in those that God had elected from the beginning of time would be the recipients of this atonement.

Now, again, like I said yesterday, it is not for us to know who that is.

So we must preach the gospel to everyone. But what we know from Scripture is that God has purposed who is going to receive the atonement from the beginning of time.

This is the decree that he made from the foundation of the world. He is now actively working in time to bring about the fulfillment of what he had planned from the very beginning.

This is what we read in Ephesians 1 verse 3, blessed be the God and father of our

Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.

In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the beloved.

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven, and things on earth.

There it is. There's the extent of the atonement explained for us plainly in Ephesians 1 verses 3 -10.

Amen, glory, hallelujah, praise be to God. It was all for the purpose of his will, as it is expressly stated here in Ephesians 1, not for the preservation of the autonomous human will.

But praise the Lord that your will has been set free. It's been set free from your bondage and slavery to sin, so that you may now worship

God where previously you were unable to do because of your sin nature. But now you have been given a new heart and one that loves righteousness and seeks after God.

Previously you couldn't seek after God. Now you do, because God sought after you.

Remember that Jesus said in Luke 19 .10, for the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.

There's nothing in there about you seeking after Christ, and so Jesus showed up so that you might find him.

He came to seek you. And you have your salvation because God effected it through the cross of Christ, bringing to fulfillment what he had decreed before the foundation of the world, to the praise of his glorious grace.

Now you may not agree with me in that argument that I'm making related to 1

Timothy 2 .4, which is why I did not go into that whole explanation yesterday.

What you and I should agree on, regardless of your understanding of the extent of the atonement, you and I should agree that every single person needs to hear the gospel.

And that ultimately is the argument being made in 1 Timothy 2 .4. We cannot come to an ultimate conclusion concerning the extent of the atonement based on 1

Timothy 2 .4, because it isn't given to us there. That's why that verse tends to be so controversial and so debated, because you cannot find the answer related to the extent of the atonement in that passage.

You have to go elsewhere. So this verse simply means to instruct us in understanding that the gospel must be preached to everybody, all kinds of people, and there is no one from whom we should withhold the gospel.

I think you and I can agree together on that, right? Regardless of our views on the extent of the atonement or whether God had purpose from the foundation of the world, who would receive that atonement?

You and I can agree. We must share the message of the atonement in the gospel of Christ with the whole world.

Let us go on from there. I've got five minutes left in our devotional today, but I think I can still finish up this paragraph.

As we go on in verse five to read, there is one God and there is one mediator between God and men, the man,

Christ Jesus. Why is Jesus called the man? Because he's the perfect man.

He is the ultimate embodiment of the perfection and holiness that we are supposed to have, and we cannot have it in any way but through faith in Christ.

And Jesus bridges the gap between sinful man and a holy

God, that gap that was created because of our sin. We cannot cross that gap.

We can't get to it through any other way, any other means except through Jesus Christ, who has bridged that gap.

So now we may cross it because of the cross of Christ. And Jesus is mediating for us before the

Father. In the gospels, Jesus is referred to as son of God and son of man.

Why is that? Why would he have both nicknames? Well, son of God implies his deity and son of man implies or is in reference to his humanity.

As the son of God, he is the eternally begotten one who comes forth from the

Father forever. He has no beginning and no end. But as the son of man, he does have a definitive beginning.

We know when that was. It was 2000 years ago in a little town in Bethlehem. And this is when

God took on human flesh. God incarnate. He became very man and very

God. And this was necessary for him to become our substitute in his life, that he would go through and experience everything that we experience.

He was tempted, yet he was without sin. So becoming our substitute in life and that he lived his life perfectly.

He lived the life that we were supposed to live. He died the death that we were supposed to die and took the wrath of God upon himself so that we would not have to experience that.

Jesus is our substitute in his very life and death. And then by his resurrection from the grave, we are given that resurrection and that eternal life of Jesus Christ for all who believe in him.

Now, it's not just that Jesus was once a man. And then we when he ascended into heaven, he was no longer a man.

He's still a man. He is the man, the one who is able to stand in the presence of God as all of us need to.

But can't because of our sinfulness. But because Jesus was perfect, died for our sins,

God received that sacrifice and raised him from the dead. Now, he stands before God mediating for us.

And he is our admission into the holy of holies. He is the veil that we pass through in order to get to God.

Our prayers are received and heard by God, the father, through Jesus Christ, who is our great high priest entering into the holy of holies.

There's all of that explained in the book of Hebrews. And so this is how Christ is what was not just a man.

He is still man, very God and very man in the presence of the father mediating for us.

That's what we needed. That's the kind of substitute that we needed in order to have passage to the presence of God.

And it is through Jesus Christ. He is our perfect mediator and the mediator.

And there's no other. Mary does not mediate for us before Christ or the father or anyone else.

There is no other saint who is in the presence of Christ whom we can pray to and will carry our prayers before him.

It's absolutely absurd to think that you have to do that, that you would have to pray to a saint or pray to Mary or anyone else when you have direct access to God himself,

Jesus Christ. You have access to the father through Christ. Jesus taught us to pray our father who art in heaven.

So why would you make any kind of appeal to any other dead person or, or I, you know, buying the argument that they're not really dead.

They have fallen asleep and they are alive together with Christ. Okay. I will give you that argument.

That's still not permission to pray to that person. That is not given to us anywhere in scripture.

Your prayers are not heard by them and they are not taking those prayers to anyone.

You pray to Christ. He's our mediator. He is the way that we are heard by God and only through him.

There is one mediator between God and men. That one verse first Timothy two, five blows up the entire

Catholic doctrine concerning patron saints. There is one mediator between God and men and that is

Christ who gave himself as a ransom for all, but he didn't ransom every single person.

See, this is again where we have to understand the context of the word all the ransom that he paid was not paid for every single person, but it was paid for a whole lot of people.

In fact, all kinds of people. So again, he gave himself as a ransom for a great multitude that is full of all different kinds of people.

Remember that Jesus said in Mark 10 verse 45 that the son of man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

So there Jesus doesn't say a ransom for all. He says a ransom for many. And that's the same way that we should understand this verse in first Timothy two, six that Christ gave himself as a ransom for many, for all kinds of people.

But it's a huge multitude of people, many people, which is the testimony given at the proper time.

This is the message of the gospel that we should announce at this time for such a time as this.

For this, I was appointed a preacher and an apostle, Paul says in verse seven, and we talked about yesterday how he was appointed to this work.

God had elected him for this work even before the foundation of the world. Paul says, I am telling the truth.

I am not. I am not lying. And that is in contrast with those who would call themselves apostles, but they're not apostles.

You can read about that argument in Second Corinthians, chapter 11, where Paul makes the arguments against the the men who called themselves super apostles.

But Paul is a teacher of the Gentiles. He was the one apostle.

He's not the only apostle that taught to the Gentiles, as we talked yesterday about Peter preaching at the house of Cornelius.

But he was the one that was appointed that would go out and do all those missionary journeys, specifically reaching out to Gentile people in Gentile places.

He was a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth. And remember that Paul previously said that the aim of our charge is love.

The motivation for why we preach the gospel to all people is in love.

That issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.

That faith that is grounded in the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Lord God, I thank you for this salvation that we have been given in Christ our

Lord. And I pray that as we grow in our understanding of what you have said in your word, that we devote ourselves regularly to studying deep truths.

For Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. By studying truth, we grow deeper in our relationship and understanding of Christ our

Savior himself, who laid down his life, paid so great a price for our souls.

We were bought with a price. So let us not waste our bodies, our minds, our spirits, but devote ourselves completely to this

Savior who paid our ransom and guaranteed our inheritance in a forever kingdom with God.

What a wonderful, precious gift. And I pray that that gift is on our minds as we go throughout our day, continually rejoicing in God for the salvation that we've been given and the forgiveness of sins by the blood of Christ that was shed on the cross.

We reflect upon these things and desire to live out our salvation. To your glory, for to you belongs the glory forever and ever.

Amen. You've been listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, Gabe will be going through a

New Testament study. Then on Thursday, we look at an Old Testament book. On Friday, we take questions from the listeners and viewers.