Why we need a mediator

This cropped up in a comment on my last post so I thought I'd write a whole new post on this one!

The key question is this:

if God made us, why do we need a mediator to make a way between us and Him? Why can't we just freely know Him and talk to Him?

This is really the key question of the whole Bible! And answers can be found from very early on in Scripture.

In Genesis 1-2, it is made clear that man has a special role to play in God's amazingly vast and varied creation. God breathes life into the man, and says He has made men and women in His image. Adam and Eve enjoy the garden of Eden but most of all they enjoy fellowship with God, who walked with them in the garden. They were perfect and sinless in a perfect creation.

However, it's worth saying here that even in their perfect, sinless state, they did not deserve the privileges they were given. However amazing humans are, they are nothing in comparison to the great and awesome God who spoke an entire universe into being. 'and God said, "Let there be light...' (Gen 1:3) However wonderful we are, God is far more wonderful. That He chose to make us and He chose to walk in the garden are wonderful examples of His grace- His undeserved favour given to those who do not deserve it.

We see further evidences of His grace in the beautiful creation that surrounds us. Look at all the wonderful varieties of butterfly, bird and flower. Look at the astounding intricacy and delicacy of bees building a honeycomb, and we can see that God has made us an interesting, complex and beautiful creation. He didn't have to create colours, shades and tones. He didn't have to make all the textures and sounds and movements in creation. But He did, out of His infinite grace and His creative wisdom and imagination.

Psalm 8 really encapsulates the awe we should feel when we look at the world around us:
'When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?' (v3-4)

When we compare ourselves to the gigantic splendour of the sun and stars, we get some perspective of how small we are in this universe, and of how much greater God is. We don't deserve His grace and favour, yet He still gives it! And even when we rebel against Him...

Because that's the story of Genesis 3. Adam and Eve, despite their wonderful privileges, did the one thing they were asked not to do. They ate the fruit and their sin separated them from God. They were exiled from Eden.

Ever since then, men have needed a way to be made right with God. And in the rest of the Bible, there is an increasing revelation of how God makes that possible. In the rest of Genesis, God chooses Abraham to make a covenant with him and his future descendants. All an act of grace. Abraham's descendants, the Israelites, end up in slavery in Egypt, and God raises up Moses to lead them out. Moses becomes a mediator, the one who speaks to the LORD and conveys His commandments to the people. But Moses feels his own inadequacies as a mediator. He longs for the day when God's Spirit will be poured out on all believers (Num 11:29). Over the next generations, God raises up leaders for the people, from Joshua to the judges like Samuel, and then kings like David who sought God's heart. But there are many kings who lead Israel into further idolatry and rebellion, and the Old Testament ends with a much diminished Israel, a remnant, post-exile to Babylon, looking forward to the day when God will make things right again with His anointed one: the Christ.

Jesus is the mediator that the whole of Scripture points towards:

'For there is ...one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.' (1 Tim 2:5)

All other human mediators before this point had their failings (Moses disobeyed God by striking the rock, David committed adultery with Bathsheba and murdered her husband Uriah, to provide just two examples). Jesus was completely without sin, so therefore His mediation was perfect. Hebrews teaches that He acted like a High Priest... in fact, He is the High Priest to end the Levitical priesthood for ever, because He is the High Priest of a new covenant which is superior to the old and replaces it (Heb 7:22,27; Heb 8:6). He made the perfect sacrifice for sins once for all, and then sat down at the right hand of the Father (Heb 8:1). His unique status as the Son of God enables Him to mediate for us in a way that no one else could. He was fully man and this meant that He could fully take the penalty for sin in His flesh, without at all deserving it because He resisted sin. 'God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God' (2 Cor 5:21).

Let's go back to Psalm 8. The Psalmist continues:
'Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.
You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet,
all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field,
the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas.'

But we find out in Hebrews 2 that this passage actually refers to Jesus! The writer quotes it and explains: 'In putting everything under Him, God left nothing that is not subject to Him.' (Heb 2:8) Jesus had to be 'made like His brothers in every way, in order that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that He might make atonement for the sins of the people' (Heb 2:17) This is why we need a mediator. We need Christ's substitutionary atonement for us, dying on the cross for our sins, and we need His imputed righteousness, the positive effect of His holy life, projected onto us so that in God's sight we are made righteous.

These are massive concepts! And there is so much complexity and depth to them. But for now I want to keep it within reasonable reading length, and I realise I have probably moved far beyond that already.

To sum it up: even if we were perfect, to know God and be in relationship with Him would be a gift of His grace (and He was willing to give this freely, as Genesis 1-2 show). Because we are sinful, to know God and be in relationship with Him is only possible through the mediation of Jesus Christ. We need Him to take away our sin, and we need Him to clothe us with His righteousness so we can stand before God and be made holy and blameless in His sight (Eph 1:4).

Some thoughts on the book of Job

The wisdom of Job's friends

In the past I have always been taught to disregard what Job's friends say to him because they are mistaken in assuming that God is punishing him for his sins with the suffering he has to endure. Whilst the book makes it clear that Job was righteous and therefore the terrible things that happened to him were not because of any sin he had committed, I have been really struck that other things his friends say do contain helpful truths, backed up by other parts of Scripture:

Don't lose heart when trouble strikes: let your reverence for God give you confidence (4.5-6)
Know that resentment and jealousy destroy people, so don't fall into these traps when bad things happen to you and you look at other people's lives and start wishing you were in their shoes (5.2)
Know that God does great things beyond our understanding (5.9) This is really the core message of the book, because it is God's own answer to Job later on.
God may wound, but He also bandages. He keeps his people from evil (5:18-19) Rather than meaning He stops his people ever coming into contact with evil, I think this means He helps us to stand whenever evil comes.
God doesn't twist justice (8.3)
Remember that the hopes of the godless [that is, those who have no thought of God, just live their lives without thinking about Him or giving Him time. It doesn't necessarily mean wicked people] evaporate. They are leaning on a spider's web. They cling to their home for security, but it won't last. (8.13-15)

Job's friend makes a prophecy which does come true by the end of the book: 'If you pray to God and seek His favour, if you are pure and live with integrity, He will surely rise up and restore your happy home. And though you started with little, you will end with much.' (8.5-7) And again: 'God will not reject a person of integrity, nor will He lend a hand to the wicked. He will once again fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of joy.' (8.20-22)

The gospel in Job

Job's problem is essentially the gospel problem: how can men approach God? He needs a gospel solution. The advice of his friends on its own is not enough ('prepare your heart and lift your hands to Him in prayer. Get rid of your sins and leave all iniquity behind you' 11:13-14); he needs Jesus to get rid of sin for him! Job recognises that he needs a mediator to come between him and God (16.21), even though he is righteous, because he is just a man. Just dust. Even if we never sinned (which is not the case), it wouldn't be our right as humans to know God and be in relationship with Him. It's a gift.

But let's take this further. Even if we never sinned (again I stress this is not the case!), it wouldn't be our right to enjoy blessings and privileges from God - like children, a home, wealth, possessions... Just like Job had at the start of the book, then lost when God allowed Satan to test him.

The warning of Job
The sober message of Job is that those who trust in the Lord are not exempt from tragedy. If your situation is like Job's in his days of glory, this book gives a warning to you. At any time, God could take it all away. It's His prerogative, and He would still be righteous and just if He did, because we don't deserve all the blessings we have. Read Chapter 29 and see if you identify with Job's enjoyment of being able to bless others (v13) and his respected position where everyone listens to his advice (v21,25). I was really struck by this! It feels like a warning not to become arrogant in this or attribute these gifts to your own merit or as something you deserve. I'm not saying Job did, but he really struggled when God took those things away and suddenly, he was the one who needed to be blessed by others (and unfortunately, he had friends whose advice wasn't always the most sensitive or helpful!). It was very humbling for him. It's an inspiration to see how he still chooses to worship and he catches glimpses of the gospel's solution in the midst of his suffering:
'Can the dead live again? If so, this would give me hope through all my years of struggle, and I would eagerly await the release of death.' 14.14
'For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another.' 19.25-27

The key to Job's problems is not to know all the answers, but to know that in this life we have suffering, but in eternity we will be freed from all death and pain forever (Revelation 21). That's why we can trust God now, because He's made promises which He will keep. Jesus has dealt with our sins on the cross, so that our death will not be final: like Him, we will be resurrected and given glorified bodies to serve God forever in the new creation. (1 Thess 4, 1 Cor 15)

(Just as an end note, I've been really challenged recently by the story of Keith Green and the testimony of his wife, Melody. He was killed in a plane crash with two of their children when he was just 28. That is such a terrifying thing to go through and yet she has still trusted God and has an incredible ministry. There are so many examples of Christians today who are going through such tough times, like Job did. And God is still faithful!)

1 Peter: Our God is able!

It's been a very tiring time over the past week with illness, not enough sleep, disturbed sleep, work and other projects all thrown into the mix. I looked up 1 Peter 5:7,10 to remind myself that I need to cast all my anxieties on Him, because He cares for me. And after I have suffered a little while, the God of all grace will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish me.

My cross-refs pointed me to Psalm 55:22- 'Cast your burden on the LORD, and He will sustain you; He will never permit the righteous to be moved.'

And Psalm 40:17- 'I am poor and needy but the LORD takes thought for me.'

But the best verse of all was Rom 16:25 - 'To Him who is able to strengthen you...'

Our God is able to strengthen us through all the tiring times we face. And not only is He able, but He is willing too. Check out these other verses which tell us what He is able to do:

Ephesians 3:20- 'to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us'

2 Timothy 1:12- 'That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet ...I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until that day.'

Hebrews 2:18- 'Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.'

Hebrews 5:2- 'He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray, since he himself is subject to weakness.'

Hebrews 7:25- 'Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.'

Jude 1:24- 'To him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy'

What a God of love, kindness and mercy we serve! These verses just paint such a picture of His tenderness and care for us, in all our weakness and suffering. This gives us hope and reason to rejoice even when things are hard. Be encouraged: our God is able!

About the Rock...

Today at Hill City Church we finished our epic sermon series on the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7. We looked at Jesus' powerful illustration of the wise and foolish builders: the wise one builds on a solid rock foundation'; the foolish one builds on the sand. When the storm comes, the house on sand washes away, but the one on the rock stands firm. Jesus says this is a picture of those who obey His words, and those who ignore them. It's not going to be easy following Jesus, and sometimes building on the sand looks more attractive, but in the end only what's on the rock will last.

I was thinking this afternoon about how the Bible uses the image of a rock, and this led me to some interesting places...

First, the Bible mainly uses rock as an image to tell us who God is and what He is like. He is 'the Rock of Israel' (Gen 49, 2 Sam 23, Isa 30), 'the Rock... (whose) works are perfect, and all his ways are just' (Deut 32). Just as rocks are solid and steadfast, so God is absolutely dependable in all His ways. Everything else may fall apart around us, but we can trust in Him completely. We don't need to go anywhere else!

Rocks become a sign of memorial of God's salvation in Joshua 7, where the tribes each place a rock after crossing the Jordan river. They are a place of sacrifice in Judges 13 and 1 Sam 6, and a means of judgement in 2 Sam 18. So it isn't surprising that they foreshadow Jesus Christ.

When God appears to Moses in Ex 33, he has to stand on a rock. The Psalmist sings of how God 'lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand' (Ps 40). That firm place to stand is Jesus Christ! In the wilderness, God poured forth water from the rock at Horeb (Ex 17), a sign of His miraculous provision for His people. 1 Cor 10 tells us that that rock was Christ. He is the water of life of salvation and the means that it comes to us.

But rocks can be deadly, and Scripture warns us that if we don't come to Christ the Rock for salvation, we will have to face the consequences. Isaiah predicted that the Messiah would be 'a stone that causes people to stumble and a rock that makes them fall.' (Isa 8, see also ch26) Romans 9 and 1 Pet 2 both link this to the judgement of Christ upon those who will not accept Him. Similarly in Daniel 2, Daniel interprets Nebuchadnezzar's dream as foretelling the future. The king sees a rock cut out, but not by human hands. It strikes the statue and becomes a huge mountain and filled the whole earth. Christ's rule and His kingdom is unstoppable! If you're not in it, you have no future.

'On that day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure themselves' (Zech 12)

The Bible gives us great hope that as Christians we are part of God's eternal kingdom. On earth we may suffer and go through tough times, but in the end, we have a certain salvation and we worship a King who cannot be conquered.

'Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock' (Mt 7:24)

Jesus is saying, obey Me! Build your life on what I say, because although this world is against you, it is passing away. My words will never pass away. (Mt 24:35) I want to live like that this week! And this month, this year...

'The LORD lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be my God, the Rock, my Saviour!' (Ps 18)