2. II. Thing. What kind of advocate Christ is.
II. Thing. What kind of advocate Christ is.
. An authoritative advocate. He intercedes not without a commission and without a command. God owns himself as the cause of his drawing near and approach to him: Jer. 30:21, 'I will cause him to draw near, and he shall approach unto me,' both in his first mediation and his following intercessions. He manages not an intercession merely in a way of charity, but in a way of authority, as a person entrusted by God, and dignified to this end; not only as our friend, but as a divine officer; as an attorney may manage the suit of his kinsman, but not only as being related to his client, but as being admitted by the court into such an office. Christ is not only admitted as one of kin to us, but commissioned as mediator for us.
This was promised, that he should be 'a priest upon his throne,' Zech. 6:13.
The commission takes date from the day of his resurrection; when he was declared to be the begotten Son of God, he had an order to ask, Ps. 2:8. This charge was given him at his solemn inauguration, and was to precede all the magnificent fruits of it. God settles Christ a priest and intercessor, while he commands him to ask the heathen for his inheritance; which connection the
apostle confirms: Heb. 5:5, 'Christ glorified not himself to be made an high priest, but he that said unto him, Thou art my Son.' But the priesthood doth not appear to be settled upon Christ by any other expression than this, 'Ask of me.'* The psalm speaks of his investiture in his kingly office; the apostle refers this to his priesthood, his commission, for both took date at the same time; both bestowed, both confirmed, by the same authority. The office of asking is grounded upon the same authority, as the honour of king. Ruling belonged to his royal office, asking to his priestly. After his resurrection, the Father gives him a power and command of asking, and obligeth himself to a grant of what he should ask. The same power that admits him to be an advocate, assures him he should be a prevailing one; the obligation to give is as strong as his order to ask. As his death was the end of his incarnation, so his intercession was the end of his ascension: his dignity in heaven was given him for the exercise of this particular office, Heb. 7:25. As he had his life from God, so he had it for this end, to make intercession. He had a command to be a sufferer, and a body prepared him for that purpose; so he had likewise a command to be an advocate, and a life given him, and a throne prepared for him at the right hand of God to that end. The like commission is mentioned Ps. 89:26, 'He shall cry unto me, Thou art my
Father, my God, and the rock of my salvation;' and this after his exaltation, ver. 24, 25. Yet for the full completing of it, ver. 27, the matter of his plea is there mentioned, 'Thou art the rock of my salvation,' the foundation, the first cause, of all thy salvation I have wrought in the world, being the first mover of it, and promising the acceptance of me in the performance of what was necessary for it. As he hath authority to cry to God, so he hath an assurance of the prevalency of his cry, in regard of the stability of the covenant, the covenant of mediation, which shall stand fast with him, or be
faithful to him: 'and my mercy I will keep for him for evermore,' ver. 27.
The treasures of my mercy are reserved only to be opened and dispensed by him; and the enjoying of his spiritual seed for ever, and the establishing of his own throne thereby, is the promised fruit of this cry, ver. 28. Christ indeed was a surety by authority, but by a greater right an advocate. That he was accepted in the capacity of a surety, was pure mercy; it was at God's liberty whether he would accept a surety for us, or accept Christ for our surety; but after he had accepted him, upon the doing of his part in the work of redemption, he hath a right to the application of redemption, and consequently to the office of advocate, to see right done us, to see our debts discharged, and to put justice in mind of the full payment he hath made. He hath a right to it, a commission for it, a command to discharge it; he is as much bound to intercede as he was to sacrifice, for it is as much belonging to his priestly office as the other.
2. He is a wise and skilful advocate. Every advocate must understand the law of the state and the cause of his client, that he may manage it to the best advantage. This advocate hath an infinite knowledge as God, and a full and sufficient knowledge as man. His deity communicates the knowledge of our cause to his humanity, and excites the compassion of his nature. He knows the sincerity of his clients' hearts, their inward groans and breathings which cannot be expressed. He knows our cause better than we do ourselves, he needs not the representing our own cause from ourselves: 'He needs not that any should testify of man, he knows what is in man,' John 2:25. He understands the best and the worst of our cause; he hath a clear view of all the flaws in it better than they are visible to ourselves. If he had no more skill and knowledge of us than what our outward expressions might furnish him with, he might mistake the business of a stammering spirit, and on the
other side be imposed upon by the voluble expressions and flourishing gifts of others; he might be cheated by the hypocrisy of some, and mistake the concerns of his own people, who often mistake themselves, and are not able to express their own wants; but it cannot be so with him; 'he knows all things,' he knows those that love him and those that hate him, John 21:17.
He understands our cause, he understands the law according to which he is to plead, the articles of agreement between the Father and himself, and he understands the fulness and redundancy of his own merit. He uses arguments proper to the cause he pleads, and drawn from the nature of the person he applies himself to. When he meets with the church in weakness and distress by potent adversaries, and would have the Jews delivered and the temple rebuilt, he solicits God as the Lord of hosts, Zech. 1:12. When he finds his people in danger of sin and temptation, he petitions God under the title of holy, John 17:11. When he would have promises performed to them, he appeals to the righteousness of the Father, John 17:25; it being part of his righteousness to fulfil that word which he hath passed, and make good the grant which so great a redeemer merited. He pleads the respects he had to the divine will in the exercise of every part of his office, both of priest and prophet: Ps. 40:9, 10, a prophetic psalm of Christ, 'I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart, I have declared thy faithfulness, and thy salvation; I have not concealed thy loving-kindness and thy truth from the great congregation.' The adding thy to every one of them is emphatical: it was thy righteousness I had commission to declare, thy faithfulness I had order to proclaim, thy mercy I had a charge to publish; thou wert as much interested in all that I did as I myself was. I shall be counted false and a liar, thou wilt be counted unjust and cruel, if all be not fulfilled as I have spoken.
Since it was thy rule I observed, and thy glory I aimed at in declaring it,
disgrace not thyself and me in refusing the petition of such a supplicant, who believes in my word which I gave out by thy authority. Surely as Christ observed the will of God upon earth, so he is wise to intercede for nothing but according to those rules he observed in his humiliation, which was whatsoever might honour and manifest the righteous ness, faithfulness, salvation, truth, and loving-kindness of the Father. This is a part of his wisdom, to plead for nothing but what he hath the nature of God to subscribe to his petitions, and back him in them. It is not for the honour of an advocate to undertake a cause he cannot bring to pass, nor will any wise man engage in a suit which he hath not some strong probability to effect.
Our Lord, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, stands more upon his honour than to undertake a cause he cannot accomplish.
3. He is a righteous and faithful advocate. He is as righteous in his advocacy as he was in his suffering. His being without sin rendered him fit to bear our sins on the cross: 1 John 3:5, 'He was manifested to take away our sins, and in him is no sin;' and it renders him fit to plead for the pardon of our sins upon his throne. As he was manifested to destroy the works of the devil, so he is exalted to perfect the conquest by his intercession. If he had sin, he could not be in heaven, much less a pleader there. God tried him, and found him faithful in all his house, in all his own concerns, and the concerns of his people, which are his spiritual temple. The altar of incense, which was overlaid with pure gold all about the sides of it, Exod. 37:26, and set before the ark of the testimony, Exod. 40:5, signified the purity of his soul, and his freedom from any kind of corruption in those pleas he makes in the holy of holies above, where 'he ever lives to make intercession for those that come to God,' Heb. 7:25. But in what state? Ver. 26, an high
priest, 'holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners.' He lives in heaven a pure person, fitted by his purity to such an office. The words refer not to Christ's life in the world,* but to his life in heaven; 'separate from sinners' in regard of communion in their sins, but not in regard of compassion to their miseries. He hath nothing of his own concerns to divert him from our business; as he had no sin of his own to suffer for in the world, so he hath no sin of his own to solicit the pardon of in heaven. He having an incomparably righteous nature, will be exactly righteous in his office. After Christ's resurrection, when he had finished his work on earth, and was to begin it in heaven, God saluted him with a great deal of kindness: Ps. 2:7,
'This day have I begotten thee.'† God regarded him as his only begotten Son, of the same holy and righteous nature with himself; justified him as his righteous servant, and thereupon gives him a power of asking; so that the prevalency of his intercession depends upon the righteousness of his person, and the righteousness of his cause; he pleadeth his own righteousness, which carries with it a necessity of having sin pardoned; which the righteousness of God is as ready to remit, as the righteousness of Christ was to purchase the remission of it. Whatsoever Christ intercedes for is righteous; if it were unrighteous, it were not fit to be moved to God; this would be to endeavour to persuade him to an unworthy act, contrary to his nature. If any proposal of his were unrighteous, Christ would be false to God, and his own principles, in making and defending such a motion. This would be to destroy all the ends of his coming, and design of his death, which was to declare the righteousness of God, advance it in the world, and in the souls of men. If Christ should undertake an unrighteous cause, what ground of confidence and security could any righteous man have in him?
4. He is a compassionate advocate. His compassion to us is joined with his faithfulness to God in his priestly office, Heb. 2:17; so that, if he be not tender to believers in misery, he is not faithful to God in the exercise of his office. His intercession springs from the same tenderness towards us as his oblation, and both are but the displaying of his excessive charity. His compassion to us was a lesson he learned, together with obedience to God, by his sufferings, Heb. 5:8. He learned how necessary obedience was to God, and how grievous the misery of man was; and being instructed in one as well as the other, his pity to us had as deep an impression as his sense of obedience to the divine will. And since one part of his obedience was to make way for the opening the treasures of his mercy, he cannot be obedient to his Father without being merciful to us. He was exposed to such a condition as wrested from him strong cries for himself, that he might send up strong cries for us in our misery. He was a man of sorrows, that he might be a man of compassions. He indeed had pity of old; for with such an affection he redeemed the Israelites, Isa. 63:9. His compassions are not lessened by an assumption of our humanity, but an experimental compassion gained in his human nature, which the divine was not capable of, because of the perfection of impassibility. By a reflection upon his own condition in the world, he is able to move our cause with such a tender feeling of it, as if he had the smart of it present in his own heart and bowels.
The greatest pity must reside in him, since the greatest misery was endured by him in our nature; what he had a real feeling of on earth, he must have a memorative feeling of in heaven. He cannot forget above what he experimented below, since one part of his priestly office, in suffering, was to fit him for a more faithful and merciful exercise of the other part in his intercession; not an affliction was laid upon him but was intended to
compose his heart to a sympathising frame with his people: Heb. 4:15, 'We have not an high priestwhich cannot be touched'; (two negatives affirm it strongly). Not a taste of bitterness in any temptation he endured, but was more deeply to engrave in his heart a tenderness to us; nor can those compassions in him be equalled by any creature; no angel nor man can be touched with such a sense as he is, because no angel nor man ever smarted under such extremity as he did. Our pity to ourselves cannot enter into comparison with his pity to us. With what a sense of his disciples' condition did he pray for them upon earth! John 17. The glory of heaven hath made no change in his judgment and affections; he hath the same will in heaven that he had on earth; the same human will, and therefore the same human compassions in league with his divine. He was God-man on earth, man to suffer for us, and God to render that suffering valuable; he is God-man in heaven, man to pity us, and God to render that compassion efficacious for us. This fits him for a zealous prosecution of our cause in heaven. His intercession receives a sharper edge from the things which he suffered; the taste that he had of the infirmities of men, and the wrath they are obnoxious unto, warms his heart, and strengthens his pleas, and makes him a more zealous solicitor at the throne of divine grace; as an earthly advocate that had drank deep of the same cup, and had had the same suit for himself as he hath for his client, better understands the cause, and is able to manage it with a deeper sense, than if he had never felt the like misery. Our advocate was framed in the same mould with us in regard of his nature, and was cast into the same furnace of wrath which we had merited; and thus knowing the miseries of man, not by a bare report, but experience of the heaviness of the burden, is more careful to solicit the liberty and absolution of every comer to God by him from the sentence that hangs over them; and the greater their
miseries are, the more are his compassions exercised. The more deplorable the misery is, the greater object of pity the person is that feels it; and to exercise compassion, when the object stands most in need of it, is very agreeable to a compassionate nature, such as Christ's is; and therefore, if he had so much pity to procure the redemption of the Israelites from a temporal and bodily captivity, much more will he be careful to free believers from the spiritual captivity they groan under, since in that condition they are more suitable objects of compassion than any man can be under a mere bodily and temporal affliction. And therefore, whenever the knowledge of our condition comes to his humanity by the assistance of his divinity, we cannot have a more powerful solicitor than the experimental sense he hath in his own breast and bowels. To conclude, he is a compassionate intercessor, because he was a great sufferer, as compassionate to us as he is valuable with God; his merit for us is not greater than his pity to us.
5. He is ready and diligent. He is never out of the way when the cause should be heard; he always sits at the right hand of the Father, who is the judge of the world, and is never out of his presence. When Stephen, Acts
7:55, 'saw the heavens opened, he saw Christ standing at the right hand of God,' in the posture of an advocate and protector, as sitting is the posture of a prince and a judge. He times his intercession for the church according to the providential state of the world, Zech. 1:11, 12. He had sent out his messengers to view the state of the earth, who, upon their return, brought him word that it was in peace and rest; upon which news he petitions for the restoring of Jerusalem. He would not let slip the opportunity of such an argument, that the church, the seat of the divine glory on earth, should be in misery, when the world, wherein God did less concern himself, flourished
in peace and prosperity. Shall the enemies of the church be in a better condition than the people thou hast entrusted with thy law? His messengers brought him an exact account of things, and he is diligent to take hold of the first occasion to solicit the security or restoration of his people. Now that the princes of the earth have nothing of war to hinder them, put it into their hearts to deliver thy people and rebuild thy temple. It is one property of Christ to be 'of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord,' Isa. 11:3; to be sensible of anything that may promote the honour and worship of God, or may obstruct and lessen it. His sense is as quick as his understanding, and readily interposeth for whatsoever may conduce to the manifestation of the attributes of God, which is the foundation of his fear in the world. He is ready to put in a plea for us to the Father, and is more studious of our welfare, and to bring us off, than we are ourselves. In the midst of his dolours he gave us an evidence of it. Though his disciples were so careless and senseless of his present condition that they fell asleep, when they had most need to watch both for him and themselves; yet, after his reproof for their negligence, he frames an excuse for them from the consideration of their weakness, before they could apologise for themselves: Mat. 26:41,
'The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.' He lays it upon the infirmities of their flesh, though it was also the security of their spirits, as appears by his reproof. Is he not as ready to plead the same for us in his glory? He is always ready at the throne of grace to give out grace and mercy in a time of need, Heb. 4:16. We have no reason to fear his absence from that throne of grace we solicit in our necessities. He is passed into the heaven, seated there in a perpetual exercise of this office, to entertain all comers at all times; and can no more be sleepy than he can be cruel, no more cease to be diligent than he can be bereaved of his compassions.
6. He is an earnest and pressing advocate. When an advocate hath much business for himself, it will cool him in the affairs of his client: Christ hath once offered up himself, and being thereupon advanced, has no need to offer up himself again. He is secure from any further suffering in his person. He hath nothing to do for himself; but all his ardency is employed for his people, which is the reason rendered why he 'lives to make intercession for the comers to God by him,' Heb. 7:25, compared with ver.
27, 'He needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sin, and then for the people's; for this he did once, when he offered up himself.' He needs not any solicitousness for himself, as before the time of his death; he hath nothing now to blemish his happiness, and divert his affections from the concerns of his people. He hath no strong cries now to put up for himself. All his affections run in another channel. His whole soul is put to pawn in the business, as the word signifies in Jer. 30:21, 'He hath engaged his heart to approach unto me, saith the Lord.' He hath undertaken it with the greatest cordialness of spirit. His expostulation speaks his earnestness of old: Zech. 1:12, 'O Lord of hosts, how long will thou not have mercy on Jerusalem?' Like an expression we use when we would rouse a drowsy person in a time of danger, and snatch him out of the fire; as if Christ thought the mercy of God too sleepy, and earnestly jogs it to awaken it, and spurs it on to manifest itself. 'How long wilt thou;' thou who hast an affection to the captives, an affection to me, their solicitor; thou who hast mercy to pity them, and power to rescue them; thou who knowest that the set time of their captivity is at an end, and hast faithfulness to be as good as thy word? The seventeenth of John is a map of his carriage in heaven, how he presses his Father for his people. When he prayed for himself, it is 'Father, if it be thy will, let this cup pass from me.' It is then
'Not as I will, but as thou wilt;' but for his disciples' glory and salvation it is,
I will, ver. 24, as though he were more a judge than an advocate, and had more a right to a sovereign dominion than that of a plea. What did the censer full of burning coals of fire from the altar,* which the high priest was to carry within the veil, into the holy of holies, Lev. 16:12, 13, represent, but the ardency of the affections in the soul of Christ, when he presents the incense of our prayers to his Father in heaven? The names of the tribes of Israel were to be not only upon the high priest's shoulders, Exod. 28:12, but also upon his breastplate, ver. 29; near his heart when his face is towards them, and as near his heart when, in desertion, his back is turned upon them. They are next his heart all the time he is in the holy of holies. Great affections cannot be without earnestness in their cause. He desired not more earnestly to be baptized with his bloody baptism on earth than to complete all the fruits of it in heaven. He was not more vehement to shed his blood than he is to plead it. No man is more solicitous to increase the honour and grandeur of his family, than Christ is to secure the happiness of his people.
Our prayers for ourselves, when tinctured with the greatest affection, cannot be so fervent as his pleas for our souls are at the right hand of his Father; for to what purpose did he carry up those human affections to heaven, but to express and act them in their liveliness and vigour for us and to us?
7. He is a joyful and cheerful advocate. He hath not a sour kind of earnestness, as is common among men; but an earnestness with a joy, as being the delight of his heart. When he prayed in the garden for himself, he was in an agony; but in his mediatory prayer, a model of his intercession in heaven, he was in a cheerful frame, John 17; for it was his prayer after the most comfortable sermon he ever preached to his disciples, wherein he had heaped up all the considerations that might be capable to elevate their
hearts; and he makes this use of it in the end, John 16:33, that they should 'be of good cheer' at his victory, because he hath 'overcome the world.' And in this frame he puts up this mediatory prayer immediately, to signify to them both the matter and manner of his intercessions in heaven for them, and that he doth rejoice in putting up these requests above, as well as he did when he presented them at times before, as is intimated: ver. 13, 'These things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves;' that they might have such a joy in the considerations of it, and in the receiving thy favour, as I have in the petitioning for them. Certainly he doth as well rejoice in the habitable parts of the earth, since he hath laid so great an obligation upon it, as he did formerly in the prospect of what he was to do for it. His death was sweet to him after his resurrection; the very remembrance of it was a pleasure, in which sense some understand that: Jer.
31:25, 26, 'I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every sorrowful soul. Upon this I awaked, and beheld; and my sleep was sweet unto me.' It is certain some passages in that chapter are applied to Christ's time, as ver. 15, the weeping at Ramah was a prediction of the slaying of infants by Herod, Mat. 2:17, 18; and ver. 22, the 'creating a new thing in the earth, A woman shall compass a man,' is generally understood of the conception and incarnation of Christ. And the expression in ver. 25 seems to be too magnificent to be understood of any other prophet than that in whom the weary find rest; and the consideration of the success of his incarnation and passion make his sleep, i.e. his death, pleasant to him at his awaking or resurrection. His pleading, therefore, for the fruit of his death cannot be bitter or distasteful to him; he delights as much in the exercise of this office as he did in the first undertaking of it and consecration to it. Since he accounted his priesthood an honour when God called him to it, he will not
think it disgraceful when his people own it, and desire the exercise of it in their behalf.
8. He is an acceptable advocate. He hath an active joy in his intercession, a passive joy in his acceptation. He is the favourite of the court wherein he pleads, acceptable to the judge in his person, acceptable to him in his office, acceptable to him in the suits he manages. His intercession is nothing else but the presenting to God the sacrifice which restored to him the pleasure of his creation, gave him a rest, and continues it. The savour of that sacrifice in heaven which was offered on earth is grateful to the judge of the world. It is as sweet to God as the Levitical incense, the type of it, can be to man, mentioned Exod. 30:34–36, and reserved for the service of the temple, a composition of the sweetest and most aromatic simples. How much sweeter is the advocacy of Christ to God than the most fragrant scents can be to us!
In the presence of God he meets with a fulness of joy: Ps. 16:11, 'Thou wilt shew me the paths of life, and shew me in thy presence a fulness of joy, and pleasures at thy right hand for evermore.' So Cocceius reads it. It is to be understood of his mediatory pleasure he hath in his being in the presence of God, or appearing in the presence of God for us, Heb. 9:24. You know that psalm is to be understood of Christ, which is evidenced by ver. 10, applied to him Acts 2:31, Acts 13:35. 'Thou wilt shew me the path of life;' thou wilt bring me into glory, as the head of the believing world, of those saints and excellent ones in whom my delight hath been; in this presence I shall have fulness of joy, in the reflections upon my obedience, and the plentiful effusions of thy grace upon the account of it. Pleasures flow with a full and perpetual torrent from the right hand of God by the mediation of Christ. It is as if he should have said, I shall have a fulness of joy after my bitter passion, in the contemplation of thy pleased countenance to the sons of
men; and thy right hand shall communicate spiritual blessings upon the account of this passion, which shall be the delight of my soul. All this thou wilt shew me after my resurrection, to testify how acceptable my mediation hath been to thee. Since God constituted him a priest by an irreversible oath, an oath he would never repent of, Heb. 7:21, and thereby confirmed him in an 'unchangeable priesthood,' ver. 24, as he hath an unchangeable office, so he hath an endless acceptation. He that never will repent of fixing him in it, will never repent of his exercising of it. As God is infinitely pleased with this office, so he is infinitely pleased with the execution of the charge; and the presenting his death for any soul is inexpressibly grateful to the reconciled judge. His deity adds a value and efficacy to his intercessions in heaven, as it did to his passion on earth.
9. He is the sole advocate. Those of Rome distinguish between mediators of redemption and mediators of intercession; the first they appropriate to Christ, in the other they make angels and saints his companions, and thereby snatch the glory from Christ to confer it upon a creature. But since our High Priest alone hath the honour to sit at the right hand of God, he alone hath the honour of this office of advocacy. 'To which of the angels,' or saints, 'did he at any time say, Ask of me, and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance?' The office and power of asking belongs to him who is the begotten Son. Since Christ trod the wine-press alone, he solicits our cause alone, intercession being founded upon propitiation; he, therefore, that is the sole propitiator, is the sole intercessor. He only hath the right to plead for us, who had the right to purchase us. As God never gave any commission to redeem us to any other, so he never gave a commission to any other to appear for us in that court. The entering into the holy of holies with the perfuming incense, was annexed to the honour of the chief
priesthood, which had any of the inferior priests, or any soul alive, usurped, they had incurred the pains of death. It is a disparagement to Christ to interest any creature in it, as though he wanted some other favourite to give him a full credit with the Father, and some monitors to excite his affections to us; or as though the suits he had to manage were so numerous, that he wanted a multitude of clerks to draw up for him the petitions he had to present. It is our Saviour's prerogative to be 'the first and the last,' Rev. 1:11; as he was the first that stepped up to keep the world from perishing by the hand of justice, so he will be the last in securing it; as he was the first in purchasing, so he will be the last in completing, that the whole work of redemption may be ascribed to him alone. As he is the sole author of it by his passion, so he will be the sole finisher of it by his intercession.