Solus Christus: The Judge

Not only did God promise that His Redeemer would be a prophet like Moses, not only did He foreshadow Jesus’ priesthood in the high priests of the Old Testament, but He also told us through the prophet Isaiah that Jesus would be the righteous Judge of the world from the line of King David:

¹ There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
    and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
² And the Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him,
    the Spirit of wisdom and understanding,
    the Spirit of counsel and might,
    the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD.
³ And his delight shall be in the fear of the LORD.
    He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
    or decide disputes by what his ears hear,
⁴ but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
    and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
    and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,
    and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
⁵ Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist,
    and faithfulness the belt of his loins. (Is. 11:1-5)

Our Redeemer is the Messiah who will one day judge the world in righteousness. But, what did Isaiah mean when he prophesied that the Messiah would judge the world “in righteousness”? Well, let’s turn to what Jesus Himself has to say about this judgment in Mt. 25:31-34, 41, 46:

³¹ “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. ³² Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. ³³ And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. ³⁴ Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world…. ⁴¹ “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels…. ⁴⁶ And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

With His “wisdom and understanding,” “counsel and might,” and “knowledge and… fear of the LORD,” Jesus will separate the righteous from the unrighteous; those whose name is written in the Lamb’s Book of Life from those whose is not. Then He will judge them according to their righteousness. This is good news (indeed the gospel!) for believers because we’ve been given Christ’s righteousness and will be judged according to that imputed righteousness. But, Advent should remind us that for this to be good news, we must be in Christ—we must have His righteousness credited to our account. Those who are in Christ are the sheep who’ll be placed on His right and who will hear the words, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” Those who are outside of Christ will also be judged in righteousness, but since they are not righteous, the righteous judgment on them is condemnation and “eternal punishment” in hell. This should remind us that we need to spread the good news of Christmas to the world.

On this day of Advent, think about your non-Christian friends and family members. Jesus is the righteous Judge and He always judges in righteousness, but for that judgment to be “Well done, good and faithful servant,” one must accept Him as Lord and Savior in this life. This is a solemn reminder of Advent but a much-needed one for all of us (especially me). The Judge is coming, and we need to be spreading the good news of Christmas: “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.”

By His Grace,

Taylor

Solus Christus: The Great High Priest

In yesterday’s meditation we saw that Jesus is our prophet and that He fulfills that office by revealing to us (through His Word and Spirit) God’s will for our salvation. For today’s devotion, we need to remember that Jesus fulfills other offices for us as our Redeemer and one of those is the office of a priest. Remember, the Westminster Shorter Catechism asks in question #23, “What offices doth Christ execute as our Redeemer?” and it answers, “Christ, as our Redeemer, executeth the offices of a prophet, of a priest, and of a king, both in his estate of humiliation and exaltation.” Indeed, Jesus is our Great High Priest.

But, why do we need a high priest? What advantage does the high priest give us? The Westminster Shorter Catechism answers that question for us as well by telling us how Jesus serves as our Great High Priest:

Q. 25. How doth Christ execute the office of a priest?
A. Christ executeth the office of a priest, in his once offering up of himself a sacrifice to satisfy divine justice, and reconcile us to God, and in making continual intercession for us.

The author of the book of Hebrews, looking back on the Old Testament law, also tells us in a similar, inspired, and concise fashion why sinful man needs a high priest, "For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins."

Since man is sinful, deserves God’s judgment, and cannot make atonement for himself, nor can he stand before God himself, he must have a representative who intercedes for him and who makes atonement for his sin through a blood sacrifice. In the Old Testament, this representative—the high priest—stood between the people and God and offered sacrifices for their sins. The high priest was a man chosen from the line of Aaron. He would go into the Holy of Holies of the Tabernacle (or the Temple) to offer sacrifices and intercede for the people as the representative of the people before God. Yet, all those Old Testament high priests with all their sacrifices couldn’t themselves make permanent atonement for God’s people:

¹ For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. ² Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? ³ But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. ⁴ For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. (He. 10:1-4)

A once-for-all sacrifice was needed from a once-for-all high priest. The “shadow of the good things to come” had to eventually make way for the “true form of these realities” or mankind would have forever been lost in their sins. We needed a better high priest than any of those in the Old Testament, even Aaron himself.
Jesus came into the world to be that better high priest. Indeed, He came to be our once-for-all Great High Priest. The author of Hebrews, after showing our need, tells us that Jesus is our Great High Priest:

⁵ Consequently [i.e. because no earthly high priest with an earthly sacrifice was good enough], when Christ came into the world, he said,
“Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired,
    but a body have you prepared for me;
⁶ in burnt offerings and sin offerings
    you have taken no pleasure.
⁷ Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come to do your will, O God,
    as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.’”
⁸ When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), ⁹ then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the first in order to establish the second. ¹⁰ And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.¹¹ And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. ¹² But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God.… (He. 10:5-12)

As our Great High Priest, Jesus offered the once-for-all sacrifice that His people needed to take away their sins. It wasn’t a sacrifice of a bull or a goat or any other earthly animal; it was a sacrifice of Himself. Jesus is our Great High Priest—our final and perfect representative before God—who offered Himself to God as “a single sacrifice for sins,” and then “He sat down at the right hand of God” showing that His work of redemption—atonement for the sins of His people—is done. Yet, even though His work of redemption is done, His work as our Great High Priest continues. He is ever before the throne of God the Father making continual intercession for us as our eternal and perfect representative, so we can never again be condemned before God:

³⁴ Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. (Ro. 8:34)
²⁵ Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. (He. 7:25)
²⁴ For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. (He. 9:24)
¹ My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. (1 Jn. 2:1)

Christian, Jesus came into the world to become your permanent, eternal Great High Priest. Because you are in Christ, you can never be condemned before God the Father. Not satan, not our hearts, not anyone in this world, nothing can condemn us before God because Jesus is ever before the throne as our Great High Priest. Consider that on this day of Advent. Remember that He came into the world to be your Great High Priest so that you’d never have to make atonement for your sin. Indeed, you can’t! But, that’s okay because Jesus has offered the once-for-all sacrifice you needed and continually intercedes on your behalf before God. Remember that you have confidence before God of which the Old Testament saints could only dream of having—you “have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus” and “draw near” to God in Christ. Bask in that on this day of Advent. Go to God confidently with your sin and your needs because Christ is your perfect representative interceding for you before God.

By His Grace,

Taylor

Solus Christus: The Prophet

God’s promise of redemption through the Messiah took many different forms in the Old Testament. Most often this promise took the form of prophecies about the Messiah to come. These prophecies are throughout the Old Testament, and today we will look at one given by Moses in Dt. 18:15-19:

¹⁵ “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers—it is to him you shall listen— ¹⁶ just as you desired of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.’ ¹⁷ And the LORD said to me, ‘They are right in what they have spoken. ¹⁸ I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. ¹⁹ And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him.

Jesus is the prophet of whom Moses spoke, and those who saw His earthly ministry knew it. Nearly fifteen hundred years after Moses foretold about a prophet like him, Jesus called Philip to be an apostle. When He did, Philip went to get his brother Nathanael and exclaimed, “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” The people who followed Jesus, listened to His teaching, and saw His miracles knew it as well for they said, “This is indeed the Prophet who is to come into the world!” When Peter addressed the Jews in Solomon’s Portico, he reminded them that Jesus is the prophet who was to follow Moses (cf. Ac. 3:22). And, finally, when Stephen (the first recorded martyr) was before the Sanhedrin charged with preaching the gospel, he too told his accusers that Jesus is the prophet Moses promised (cf. Ac. 7:37-38).

The office of prophet is one of the offices that Jesus executes for His people as our Redeemer. The Westminster Shorter Catechism asks in question #23, “What offices doth Christ execute as our Redeemer?” and it answers, “Christ, as our Redeemer, executeth the offices of a prophet, of a priest, and of a king, both in his estate of humiliation and exaltation.” Then, to further explain what this means, in #24 it asks, “How doth Christ execute the office of a prophet?” and it answers, “Christ executeth the office of a prophet, in revealing to us, by His word and Spirit, the will of God for our salvation.” A prophet was God’s spokesman who revealed to the people the will of God for their salvation and bore witness to the Messiah. In the Old Testament, there were many prophets, but now that Christ has come and God’s Word is complete, there is only one and it is Jesus Himself. Through His Word He informs us of all we need to know about God and His will, and through His Holy Spirit He gives us wisdom and understanding of it.

Did you notice why the Israelite people knew they needed a prophet? They had said to Moses, “Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.” They knew that if they had to face God themselves, they would be consumed. So it is with us. We can’t bear to be in the presence of God without a mediator—one who stands between us and God. Jesus as the incarnate God-man is that Mediator, and as our Mediator He reveals to us God’s will. Without Him, we would've been left without “hope and without God in the world.” Thank God for the prophet like Moses, indeed greater than Moses (cf. He. 3-4)!

On this day of Advent remember that you would not know anything about salvation, Jesus, Advent, or God, if it were not for Jesus being your prophet. He is necessary for us to know God and He is also sufficient for us to know God—we need no other prophets in our lives. When you read His Word (one of the means by which He reveals God’s will to us), ask Him to make it clear to you by the Holy Spirit. Don’t be satisfied with your own mental abilities; ask for the Spirit’s illumination. He will give it to you!

By His Grace,
Taylor

Solus Christus: Is There Hope?

Is there hope? As we saw in yesterday’s meditation, Adam’s sin caused the fall of the entire human race. In it, we lost communion with God and were plunged into sin. Is there hope for us? Fortunately, God didn’t leave us without the hope of a Redeemer. Our devotion on this day of Advent moves us forward to the first mention in Scripture of the good news of the gospel, and we find it in the most unlikely of places—God’s curse on creation after the fall of Adam and Eve. Even in the midst of the curse that God places on all of creation because of the sin of Adam, He promises a Redeemer:

¹⁵ I will put enmity between you and the woman,
    and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
    and you shall bruise his heel. (Ge. 3:15)

This is often referred to as the “protoevangelion” because it’s the first promise of the good news of a Savior—God’s first promise of redemption through the Messiah. It’s also sometimes called the “covenant of commencement” (which we'll talk about in a later devotion), for here God commits Himself to redeem His people to Himself and destroy satan, who used the serpent who tempted Adam and Eve as his tool. It is significant that Paul alludes to this commitment in Ge. 3:15 to guarantee the triumph of the redeemed (Christians!) over satan: “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet.” Here begins the work of redemption that Christ would accomplish by becoming one of us, living the perfect life we couldn’t live, and dying the death we deserved to die. Here begins the good news of the story of Advent.

While the beginning may have looked bleak and sin seemed to have triumphed, God gave us a glimmer of hope that anticipates the coming of His Son to redeem His people. Sin may have won a battle in the Garden of Eden, but the war was far from over. God would fight for His people. Indeed, He would send His only Son to fight and die for His people.

On this day of Advent remember that God didn’t waste a moment after Adam and Eve fell but immediately set His plan of redemption into action. God never fails His people, even when His people fail Him. God never leaves us for a moment without hope, even when we put ourselves in seemingly hopeless situations. God is always faithful to His people. That’s the God we serve, and that’s the God whose becoming man we anticipate in Advent and celebrate in Christmas. Ask Him to make His faithfulness so real to you today that it overflows in you and you can’t help but share that faithfulness with a lost sinner. Then, ask Him to give you the strength to do it.

By His Grace,

Taylor

Solus Christus: Where Did It All Go Wrong?

In Ge. 1, Moses tells us that God created everything good. When God completed the crown of His creation—man—and looked back on all that He created, He called it very good. When He was done creating it was all perfect. Of course, we merely have to wake up in the morning and look around to see that creation didn’t stay in the perfect state in which it was created. Where did it all go wrong? That question brings us to today’s devotion for Advent:

¹ Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.
He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” ² And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, ³ but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” ⁴ But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” ⁶ So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. ⁷ Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.
⁸ And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. ⁹ But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” ¹⁰ And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” ¹¹ He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” ¹² The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” ¹³ Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
¹⁴ The Lord God said to the serpent,
“Because you have done this,
    cursed are you above all livestock
    and above all beasts of the field;
on your belly you shall go,
    and dust you shall eat
    all the days of your life.
¹⁵ I will put enmity between you and the woman,
    and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
    and you shall bruise his heel.”
¹⁶ To the woman he said,
“I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing;
    in pain you shall bring forth children.
Your desire shall be for your husband,
    and he shall rule over you.”
¹⁷ And to Adam he said,
“Because you have listened to the voice of your wife
    and have eaten of the tree
of which I commanded you,
    ‘You shall not eat of it,’
cursed is the ground because of you;
    in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
¹⁸ thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
    and you shall eat the plants of the field.
¹⁹ By the sweat of your face
    you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground,
    for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
    and to dust you shall return.”
²⁰ The man called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. ²¹ And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.
²² Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—” ²³ therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. (Ge. 3:1-23)

Adam’s transgression plunged humanity into sin and made us all in dire need of a Savior. Paul tells us that the “one trespass [i.e. Adam’s sin] led to condemnation for all men.” But, why did Adam’s sin affect the rest of humanity? The sixteenth question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism is helpful here. It asks in question 16, “Did all mankind fall in Adam’s first transgression?” and it answers, “The covenant being made with Adam, not only for himself, but for his posterity; all mankind, descending from him by ordinary generation, sinned in him, and fell with him, in his first transgression.” When God made His covenant with Adam, He made it with all humanity, and therefore, when Adam broke the covenant he did so as the representative of all humanity. His sin was our sin; because of Adam’s sin, we’re all sinners in desperate need of redemption. Since biblical covenants include posterity (cf. Dt. 5:1-3), we fell with him in his first transgression and consequently lost communion with God, are under His wrath and curse, and are made liable to all the miseries of this life, death, and hell itself. We are certainly in desperate need of a Savior.

I have a friend who likes to say, “Don't forget the pigs... the further they get away the better they start looking... Always remember where He found you; don't forget the pigs....” He is alluding to the story of the Prodigal Son from Lk. 15, where the wayward son eventually finds himself in a pig sty, finally comes to his senses, and goes home to his father. His point is that we can’t forget where God found us, and if we do, the greatness of God’s grace and love for us wanes in our eyes and we start to feel like we deserve it. For God’s grace to us in Jesus to look as glorious as it truly is, we need to remember the sinfulness from which He saved us. We need to remember the pigs. During Advent, for the incarnation of Christ to look as glorious as it truly is, we need to remember that He came to save His rebellious people—a people “dead in [their] trespasses and sins.” We weren’t just sick, hurt, or injured. We were dead in our sinfulness. We need to remember the sinfulness we inherited from Adam. We need to remember where He found all of us when He came into the world.

On this day of Advent remember where God found you; don’t forget the pigs. Remember the sinfulness and rebelliousness of your life before He found you. Remember that, because of Adam, you, like the rest of the human race, were dead in your sins when He found you and that you’d still be there without Him. But, also remember that “God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses,” saved you from those sins, gave you new life in Christ, and gave you a heart of flesh for your heart of stone. Ask God to remind you of both the greatness of your need for redemption and the vastness of His grace to you in Jesus. Ask Him to work that truth into your heart so that you can’t help but love Him more and more every day.

By His Grace,
Taylor