The Bible uses the phrase “glory to glory,” and that’s what we’ve been experiencing in our communion series, “Looking Unto Jesus, Till Glory Shine.” This is our 11th communion sermon. God willing, if this series becomes a book, I want to call it Heartwarming Christology. Many books have been written about Christ, but think of the full scope we have studied so far: we went back before creation and saw Jesus in His pre-creation, Old Testament, birth, life, death, and resurrection.
Most people stop there, but then we follow our Lord to see how He applies redemption through His heavenly ministry: His ascension, session, and Holy Spirit mission. We know all these things not just theoretically; each of them is like going from one glory to another. If we go back and meditate on this, it’s enough to ravish our hearts in any situation, to melt and warm our hearts to love Christ more, until “heaven came down and glory filled my soul.” So, Heartwarming Christology.
Now today, we come to His next act: unceasing intercession. When He sat down in heaven, our Savior didn’t cease from His saving work; instead, He transitioned from His earthly ministry and began a heavenly one. Today, all that you and I enjoy are the effects of His heavenly ministry of intercession. This is a heavenly mystery. We will try to grasp what is truly ungraspable with four headings:
- Scriptural Revelation of Christ’s Intercession
- Nature of Christ’s Intercession
- Goal and Blessings of His Intercession
- Infallible Victory of Intercession
Scriptural Revelation of Christ’s Intercession
All of Christ’s saving work can be grouped into three offices: Prophet, King, and Priest. The work of intercession falls into the priestly work. Jesus Christ, as our priest, continues to intercede for His people. How do we know this? Not because a pastor says so, or because tradition says so, but because the Bible reveals it.
For more than 16 years, we have continuously taught our church members, “Don’t believe anything that you don’t see with your own eyes in the Bible.” Don’t believe something because a pastor says it, or because he says it with authority and conviction, or loudly, or because someone went to heaven and saw it. Believe nothing until you see it with your own eyes in the Holy Scripture. Failing to do this simple thing is how the world is full of false religions spread in the name of Christianity.
How do I know that Jesus Christ does a continuous, unceasing work of intercession for His people? Let me give you two verses that establish this beyond question.
Hebrews 7:25
In this context, the writer of Hebrews is writing to Jews who are considering going back to their old Jewish religion because of suffering. The writer compares the glory of Christ as our High Priest to the imperfection of the old Levitical priesthood.
Verse 23 says, “Also there were many priests, because they were prevented by death from continuing.” Old Testament priests were many because when one died, another had to take his place. But verse 24 says, “But He, because He continues forever, has an unchangeable priesthood.” And verse 25 continues, “Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”
I want you to see with your own eyeballs that verse 25 clearly says Jesus Christ carries on a continuous ministry of intercession. Keep a finger here and turn to another passage.
Romans 8:34
The second passage is Romans 8:34. It asks, “Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.” Do you see it? It starts with the question, “Who shall condemn us?” and the answer is no one. Why? Because Christ intercedes for us.
Notice another pivotal question in verse 35: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” It gives a big list: tribulation, anguish, or persecution, nothing in the universe. Again, why? Sandwiched between the two questions—“Who shall condemn us?” and “Who shall separate us?”—comes the answer. Christ died and rose—this is His earthly priestly ministry, a perfect, non-repeatable sacrifice. His continuing heavenly work is that it is Christ who continually makes intercession for us. The reason no one can condemn us and nothing can separate us from the love of Christ is because of Christ’s intercession.
Another glorious passage in the Old Testament, Isaiah 53, which we studied, talks about the full work of Christ in just one chapter. Verse 12 says, “And He bore the sin of many, And made intercession for the transgressors.”
So, we see the scriptural revelation of Christ’s intercession. In all these passages, Christ’s sacrificial death and intercession are inseparably mentioned as the cause of our salvation. In a way, we are not only saved by the sacrifice of Christ, but we are also saved by His intercession. Many Christians know something about His sacrifice, but oh, how few know about His intercession. If someone asks you what you know about the intercession of Christ, you might scratch your head and say, “Intercession! My pastor didn’t teach on that.” You should not blame me, so I am going to teach you the intercession of Christ today. Listen carefully without sleeping.
Meaning and Nature of Christ’s Intercession
Let me start with a caution. With our small brains, when we are trying to grasp the glorious heavenly ministry of the exalted Christ, we are entering a world of mystery. There will be things that we cannot grasp and that may perplex us, not because they are irrational, but because they are supra-rational, beyond the ability of small human minds.
What is the basic meaning of intercession? It is a third party coming between two others and appealing on behalf of one of them. In this concept, Jesus Christ is the third party standing between the holy God and believing sinners. We see an example of Moses being a great intercessor. Every time the Israelites sinned, God was angry and wanted to destroy them, but Moses came in between and interceded for them.
To grasp this mysterious heavenly ministry, God gave some Old Testament types showing us the need for such a ministry. We can better understand this, as we studied in the Book of Leviticus. For sinners to be accepted before the holy God, we need two things: a sacrifice and the intercession of a High Priest. The primary act of the High Priest is to offer a sacrifice on behalf of the guilty sinner, and then take the blood of that sacrifice, enter the Holy of Holies, sprinkle the blood on all vessels of worship, and then seven times on the mercy seat, and on the basis of the sacrifice, intercede on behalf of the sinner. Two acts—sacrifice and intercession—are the God-ordained High Priest ministry in the Old Testament for accepting sinners. The sacrifice was done outside the tent, and the intercession was done inside the Most Holy Place. For thousands of years, daily, by means of millions of sacrifices, guilty Israelites were taught that their acceptance and blessing from God were on the basis of the sacrifice and intercession of their High Priest.
The Book of Hebrews majestically shows how Christ fulfilled this as the true High Priest and how the glory of Christ’s intercession is greater than that of the Old Testament priests. Let me show you a few things:
- The Old Testament priest had to offer daily sacrifices, but Christ offered Himself as one perfect, once-for-all sacrifice and made a complete atonement. The Old Testament priesthood went into the earthly tabernacle, a model of heaven, but our High Priest passed through the heavens and entered heaven itself, carrying Himself.
- The Old Testament High Priest needed all these types—a temple, an altar, a sacrifice, a censer, and the smoke of incense covering the mercy seat. Christ fulfilled all that. As the God-man, He is the true temple. His deity is the altar that sanctifies the sacrifices, and His perfect humanity is the perfect sacrifice. His merits are the cloud of sweet-smelling incense. He fulfilled all that at His death, tearing the veil, and then rose, ascended, entered heaven, and started His intercession ministry.
- His heavenly intercession ministry is based on the one sacrifice He offered on earth. He is not like an Old Testament priest going once a year to sprinkle blood; Christ is always in God’s presence. He never dies like the Old Testament High Priest. He lives forever to intercede for sinners on the basis of the merit and virtue of His work on earth on our behalf. The smoke of the incense of His intercession ascends forever without intermission.
- Think of Him as the God-man High Priest, who pleads with all of the omniscience of Godhood, but also with all of the felt sympathy of true manhood. He understands God’s perspective perfectly (He is God), and He understands our human struggles and weaknesses perfectly. This makes Him uniquely perfect. His intercession isn’t just wishful thinking; it’s based on His definite, finished work on the cross. He atoned for all our sins by His death and purchased perfect righteousness by His life. He covers us with that and prays to the Father to accept us as righteous. He doesn’t plead our goodness or works, but His own merit applied to us. He isn’t pleading from afar; He is seated at the right hand of the Father—the position of ultimate authority, honor, and power. His requests have weight.
- When the Old Testament High Priest went into the Holy of Holies, he didn’t go as an individual person; he went as a representative with the names of all the tribes engraved on stones on his shoulder and on his heart. When Christ went to heaven, He also went there as our representative to present us as justified and acceptable persons before God on the basis of His finished work and merit. His continuous intercession ensures that our persons are presented as acceptable to God. Not only our persons, but all our services, prayers, worship, and works, though defiled and full of faults, are as “filthy rags.” But Christ, through His marvelous intercession, sanctifies, perfects, and adds His merit and prayers, presenting them as a well-pleasing, sweet aroma to God.
- As the Old Testament High Priest went into the temple bearing the names of the twelve tribes on colored stones on his chest and names engraved on stones on his shoulder, so when our High Priest entered heaven, He not only carried our names on His shoulder, but all the names of all believers are engraved upon His heart. This shows His intercession is not general, like “Lord bless the GRBC church today, amen,” and then “Chennai.” Being God with infinite capacity, His intercession is specific for each person. He prays 24/7 as if you are the only one He is praying for. If you are a believer today, Christ prays for you; otherwise, you would not be a believer for even an hour. All the blessings you enjoy and all the perseverance you have in life are because He never forgets and continuously prays for you. It is so strongly said in Isaiah 49:15, “Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet I will not forget thee.”
Our confession on Christ as mediator says that Christ makes intercession for them, uniting them to Himself by His Spirit, revealing to them, in and by His Word, the mystery of salvation, persuading them to believe and obey, governing their hearts by His Word and Spirit, and overcoming all their enemies by His almighty power and wisdom. All this is invisible, marvelous work that He is continuing to do, which you don’t realize now. All that we need to live a godly life is provided. Like Jacob’s ladder, there is an invisible, two-way divine flight transport system from heaven to us. He is daily sending down graces from heaven, sending His Holy Spirit into our hearts to help our infirmities, and to teach us what to pray and how to pray, revealing His Word, and comforting us.
In our perseverance, when we stumble and sin, and struggle with guilt, who can grasp what all He needs to do to get forgiveness and restoration for the sins we commit as believers? You just have to study the types in the Old Testament Book of Leviticus, the activities of the High Priest to atone for sins. It makes your head spin; it’s a maze of activities, just physical types. Reading them is so tiresome that you scratch your head and read them 10 times, still not able to grasp. Oh, what all He must be doing as our heavenly High Priest. We are studying the seven consequences of a believer’s sin in our 1689 class. One person said, “Now I understand why our forefathers said the greatest thing a believer should fear is sin.”
When we sin, we first incur defilement. To remove our defilement from God’s holiness, just like the Old Testament High Priest after a maze of activities would sprinkle blood on all the vessels of the tabernacle, and then go into the Holy of Holies and sprinkle the blood of the sacrifice seven times on the mercy seat, in the same way, Christ in heaven, our High Priest, metaphorically, had to sprinkle His blood over the whole heaven for our sins. Hebrews says His blood speaks better than Abel’s blood. Though our sins shed His blood, it pleads always for our forgiveness. Christ’s blood has a tongue; it speaks, it cries, it prays, it intercedes; it fills heaven with its pleas for us. Oh, we are accepted in every corner of heaven because the whole heaven is all besprinkled with His blood for us, metaphorically.
Not only defilement, we also incur legal guilt in God’s court by sin and the displeasure of God. 1 John says, “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father.” At God’s court of justice, as an advocate, He pleads our case, presents His suffering, and answers all the accusations that are brought in by Satan or our own consciences. As a mediator, like Paul says about Onesimus, writing to Philemon, “I beseech thee for my son Onesimus; if he hath wronged thee, or if he owes you anything, put that on my account, I will repay it.”
Oh, believer, every sense of forgiveness you felt in your conscience after sinning and praying with repentance involved the tremendous heavenly intercession work of Christ. It is because of His intercession ministry that you experience peace of conscience and enjoy the joy of salvation again. The power, merit, and virtue of Christ’s blood are so powerful and complete. Christ takes off all accusations so we can challenge the universe: “Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect?” He not only purchased our peace on earth, but in heaven, He maintains our peace with God.
By His intercession, He provides “a continual supply of the Spirit and grace that we may be strengthened in temptations, trials, confirmed in tribulations, delivered from every evil work, enabled to every good duty, and finally preserved unto His heavenly kingdom.” Just as Christ knew Peter would face temptation and fail, He prayed specifically for Peter’s faith not to fail ultimately. Intimately knowing all your personal needs, ways, struggles, and temptations, Jesus prays for our specific needs, our protection from temptation, and our perseverance in faith, even when we are unaware or unconscious.
And yes, don’t worry about all our physical needs. Remember He is not sitting there as just God, but as a man with endless sympathy for our body pains, trials, and needs. Hebrews 7:15 says, “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.” Verse 16 continues, “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” His intercession takes care of all physical needs.
The foundation of Christ’s intercession is the death of Christ on earth. His death was once for all on earth. His intercession in heaven is a continuous work until He comes back for us. Does He pray vocally, pleading? We don’t know; there is a big debate. Whatever we think of His intercession, it will be according to His exalted, majestic position. We should not imagine Him begging, falling prostrate before the Father with tears as He prayed on earth in humiliation. Instead, according to His glorious, exalted state, He is presenting the perpetual virtue of His sacrifice. Someone said His intercession is the presenting of His gracious will and desire for our salvation and glorification on the basis of His merit. He is performing the office of mediator with authority. Our persons and all our services are accepted by God because of this intercession.
The Goal of His Intercession
Let us go back to our text, Hebrews 7:25: “Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.” Here we are told that the end goal secured by the intercession of Christ is uttermost salvation. Now, it doesn’t say He is able to save from the uttermost. People use this verse saying He can save the worst sinners. Yes, the Bible teaches that, but this verse is not teaching saving from the uttermost, but that He is able to save to the uttermost. That is, salvation that is complete, full, whole, lacking nothing.
He is able to save to the consummation of everything that’s bound up in salvation. To an extent, as it says in Ephesians, He might become holy and blameless, not having a spot or wrinkle or any such thing. This is the full glorification of our beings where we can behold His full glory. Remember this is the goal for which He prayed in His high priestly prayer in John 17. He prayed for many things: “Father, keep them in this world, sanctify them by thy truth, protect them,” and all for what? See the final goal of His intercession in John 17:24: “Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me.”
In other words, the goal of His intercession, which is salvation to the uttermost, is nothing less than you and I reaching a stage of a perfected product with a resurrected, deathless body, with all weakness, diseases, and pain gone, and a sinless soul. Negatively, every last stain of sin will be removed from our souls. Positively, we will be endowed and filled with every positive virtue of righteousness, so much so that we will be fully conformed to the image of Christ, as it says in 1 John, “when we see him, we shall be like him.” That is saving to the uttermost.
Notice what the passage says that is the goal of His unceasing intercession. See the relationship: He is able to save to the uttermost. Why? Because He ever lives with a view to making intercession. Our ultimate salvation is infallibly secured by His constant intercession.
Now, how does He achieve that end goal? This answers the difficult question of what the blessings of intercession are. If the end goal secured is my ultimate salvation, and the intercession is the means that accomplishes it, then the intercession must be the instrument by which every single thing needed to come to that point is provided. What do I need to come to ultimate salvation? Oh, the list is unlimited. I am here now, with a thousand and one weaknesses, and I have to go where I become completely perfect and holy like Jesus Christ, inside and out. What do I need? My mind cannot think of everything. I need grace to overcome all my remaining sins that drag me to the gutter of the world again and again. I need to persevere in faith, holiness, and obedience. I need unlimited grace to grow more and more. I need to be sanctified by His truth regularly. And yes, of course, I need all my worldly needs met to live in this world until the time where all these blessings are effectual in my life. I need to persevere in faith until the end.
Where can such grace come from? He is able to save to the uttermost, seeing He ever lives to intercede. It is the intercession that will bring every needed grace for my perseverance and for my continuance until the end of my life on this earth. His intercession doesn’t stop there, because we don’t become like Jesus as soon as we die.
One day, when they take me to the hospital, my vitals monitor will show a flat line, and my body will be separated from my soul. You know, I may die, but He ever lives to make intercession. He will continue to intercede so that my body may rest on this earth until His second coming. What happens to my soul? There is a real spirit world where millions of demons want to swallow and drag my soul to the pit for all the sins I have committed. But it is His intercession that not only protects my soul from all those demons, but as our Catechism says, makes my soul perfect in holiness the moment I die and immediately takes my soul to glory to be with Him. How does that happen? He ever lives to make intercession.
And that body goes into the grave. And what will see to it that that body, though it disintegrates and is consumed into a million forms of worms, mud, dust, and vapor, will yet be gathered together and raised up at the last day so that that glorified body joined to that perfected spirit will constitute my perfected salvation? He ever lives to make intercession. Our being kept in the intermediate state and our being raised at the last day are all attributed, not in some secondary way, but fundamentally and directly, to the intercession of Christ.
Then, He prayed as a glorified being, “I need to see His full glory.” Oh, what will that glory be? To behold the splendor, majesty, and beauty of His divinity through His humanity? We cannot see His inherent glory. Now, the Father is exalting Him above everything and glorifying Him. Oh, the ravishing sight! Men and angels will be continually viewing Christ for all eternity. Christ will be so lovely that the saints for all eternity will not even want to wink their eyes from seeing that glory. Revelation says they will “follow the Lamb wheresoever he goes.” That is saving to the uttermost. Everything involved in that uttermost salvation is secured by the intercession.
Is this all a dream? Will all this truly happen? What if some sin condemns me? What if some powerful demon separates me from Christ? Remember Paul’s two questions in Romans 8:34-35: “Who is he that condemns?” and “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” No one and nothing in the universe can, because Christ intercedes for us. As long as He intercedes, nothing in the universe can separate us from Christ or condemn us. I shall never be condemned for any of my sins, and I shall be preserved until all for which He died is applied effectually in my being.
One preacher beautifully says that the evidence will demonstrate that every need of the believer and every grace requisite to complete his redemption are brought within the scope of Christ’s intercession. Think of it. Every need of the believer, and you can think of what your needs are in just one day, and every grace requisite to complete salvation, think what that means. Every need, every grace, are brought within the scope of Christ’s intercession. No grace is bestowed, no blessing is enjoyed, and no benefit is received without the direct intercession of Christ, and the intercession is the guarantee that every difficulty will be met by its efficacy. The security of salvation is bound up with our Lord’s intercession, and outside of that intercession, we may say, there is no salvation.
Do you see the great importance of the intercession ministry? All other parts of His saving work would never succeed without it. Just as the sacrifices in the Old Testament had no value without the High Priest entering into the holy place and interceding on the basis of the blood, all that Christ ever did or suffered on earth would have been ineffectual for us had He not entered into heaven, “to appear there in the presence of God for us.” His life and death were the meritorious cause, but His intercession is the applying, effectual cause of our souls’ salvation.
Infallible Victory of Intercession
This intercession is always effectual and victorious. First, if God ever lent His ear to anyone, it was to the High Priest He ordained. Think of Christ as the God-man and High Priest. It is God who appointed Him to this office with an oath: “The Lord has sworn and will not change His mind: ‘You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.’”
Christ is more than God’s High Priest; He is God’s beloved Son, who has never once offended His Father by disobedience. My heart will not bear it if such a beloved Son pleads with the Father, especially not for Himself, but for poor sinners. Oh, again, dive into that awful depth of that relationship between the Father and the Son, in unity, oneness, love, and equality. Jesus said, “I and my Father are one.” If so, if the Father should deny anything the Son asks, the whole bond between them would cease, and they would not be one, which can never be. Oh, then how victorious and prevalent must Christ’s intercession be with God! Our salvation needs are bound up in that great, awe-inspiring bond between the Father and the Son. Christ is touched by our weakness, so He will pray. The Father is touched by the compassion of the Son, so He will surely answer. See how we are bound. When Christ prayed on earth, He was ever heard. When Christ prays in heaven, we can be sure the Father ever hears and answers. When Christ as a man prayed for Himself, He was heard in that which He feared. But now, Christ as mediator, praying for us, is ever heard. Every request He makes will be answered.
So, we have seen the scriptural revelation of Christ’s intercession, the nature of Christ’s intercession, and the goal of His intercession. And now, the infallible victory of intercession. What shall we say about these things? Can I ask you to do three things more? Love Christ more, meditate on Christ’s intercession more, and believe Christ’s intercession more.
1. Love Christ More
We should come to communion with an ever-increasing love for Christ. Many acts of Christ’s love have appeared before, and every one is sufficient to draw our love to Him again. But here is an act that should make us all love Him more than we ever have. Behold—looking unto the Lord, even at this moment in heaven, there is the real, actual, physical body of the glorified Christ, unceasingly interceding for believers. Ever since His ascension into heaven, He has been doing this work; it has already been 2,000 years. Summer and winter, night and day, Christ has been still praying, still interceding; no vacation, no cessation at all. Yes, even now as you are hearing me, He prays for you, standing right opposite the eye of His Father, as if the first opening of the eyelids of God should see the slain Lamb of God, not us depraved sinners for whom He prays.
Why should He do this personally? Cannot this be delegated to some angel? Let me give a simple example to explain this. Imagine a man who is in great debt. He has taken on debt from 7 million people. Imagine that back in those days, they would put you in jail or take you and your family as slaves. All 7 million creditors are about to pounce upon him like an army. He is begging and pleading with all of them. A generous man feels deep pity for him and decides to show selfless love. He says, “Okay, I will pay the amount to all these creditors.” He could have just asked for the total amount and paid it into this man’s account to clear the debts, or told one of his own servants to pay all his creditors. He says no. “When your creditors come, call me. I will personally come, take it out of the bank, and I will personally pay back each of your creditors.” Now, what in the world kind of love is that? Isn’t it enough that he puts the whole amount in his account? Why does he have to personally go and draw and pay each of them? Well, I guess he wants to show the infinite measure of his love to this poor debtor.
You know, that’s precisely what our Lord has done. Oh, it’s grace beyond grace that the Son of God should come from heaven, so condense and constrict Himself to an invisible small cell in a virgin’s womb, subject Himself to the jeering and the spittle and the unbelief and the mockery of a cruel world in order to pay our debt. “Okay, I have purchased all the deposit of merit and virtue in My death; that is enough to pay all your debts of sin. It is finished, My work is finished. Father, please let the angels pay each creditor.” No. As the great high priest, He Himself pays out every benefit He purchased for us. Why?
Behold the infinite measure of the unwearying love of Christ. Isn’t it enough that He should suffer so much, be tortured, bleed, and die? Now our text says, “He ever lives.” To do what? Not primarily to receive the praises of the angels. But why does He ever live? He ever lives for the self-giving love of interceding. He keeps applying the virtue He purchased and paying all creditors, and He does that until He fully redeems us and takes us to heaven.
Have you ever really interceded for someone? Do you know what it is? You know how demanding that is. Whatever joyful situation you are in, you leave that; you forget yourself and your situation. You have to put yourself in someone’s shoes, feel what they feel, their pain, their sorrow; to weep with someone who is weeping and to turn their tears into yours and then your tears into really pleading with God. Intercession is a very demanding exercise of the soul.
To feel our pain, “He was in all points tempted like as we are in the world, yet without sin.” He experienced all our outward and inward sufferings, and now in heaven, with that rich human experience, He is touched, says the apostle, with the feeling of infirmities. It is an indication that His bowels are moved, His heart is rolled, and He is melting in sympathy. His compassionate heart makes Him cry to the Father day and night. Oh, suffering souls, this is your comfort. It may be that Christ is giving you a cup of tears, but who knows what oceans of compassion His heart may be feeling in heaven for you.
Oh, we have no clue how busy and how difficult the work our mediator is doing for us now in heaven. Christ is appearing for us, and His blood is crying, and His prayers are ascending, and His righteousness is covering us, even the sins of our good services, and making us acceptable to God. Oh my soul, look up to Jesus. If we could just get a glimpse for 5 minutes of how many things He is doing for you and me; what a great deal of work Christ has to do to sustain us every minute, it would melt our hearts into tears of joy. All of Christ, His mind, heart, soul, blood, righteousness, and prayers, are all at work!
As Christ on earth gave Himself to the death, even to the death of the cross, for the atonement of our sins, so now in heaven, He gives Himself to intercession so that your sins may be pardoned, your services may be accepted, and your soul fully saved. Oh my soul, forget yourself in this love. Look at Him, look at His heart with burning love for you. That fire kept burning from eternity, and the flames are as hot this day as ever. It is that love that makes unceasing intercession for people like you and me. We will not survive 1 minute without this ministry. He is always busy in our salvation. There is not one hour in the day, nor one day in a year, wherein Christ is not busy with His Father in this heavenly work. He loved us before He died for us, His love being the cause why He died for us; and He loves us still, in that now He intercedes for us. It is as much as to say, “Christ has loved us, and He repents not of His love.” Love made Him die for us, and if He were to do it again, He would die over and over again; that is what His intercession ministry proves to us. Oh my soul, may your selfishness melt in this love. We wonder whether He ever lived for Himself. He always lived for us.
As we come to communion, we don’t just come to turn our head 180 degrees, looking back at His sacrifice. Yes, we have to think of His sacrifice for us and praise God, but we don’t remember a dead Christ. We turn our head 90 degrees and with the present actings of our faith towards a living Christ, we love Him and worship Him who ever lives to make intercession for us.
Let us love Him more, brothers. Some have said, “If you had as many hearts in one as there are men and angels in heaven and earth, all these would be too little to love Him with. Love Him with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your might.” And as Christ, this love will lift your soul so high above the world, and above your flesh, and above your life, and above all other lovers, that nothing on this side, whether in heaven or earth, will come in competition with Him. Oh, we pray with Paul that the Holy Spirit may help us to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height of the love of Christ, that surpasses knowledge!
2. Meditate on Christ’s Intercession More
All acts of our redemption—Christ’s coming, living, atonement, rising, and going to heaven—are past. If there is one that He continues presently, it is His intercession. How much we should meditate on this. I long to know what Christ is now doing in heaven for my soul. This is His present ministry. Moreover, in this present ministry lies the application of all Christ’s benefits that He purchased in His past saving acts: His active and passive obedience. This is the ministry through which we saw He is achieving the goal of saving us to the uttermost. All His past acts are the meritorious cause, but intercession is the applying cause. Oh, it is by this ministry that He supplies all our needs now and saves us to the uttermost. How important this should be in our minds, hearts, words, prayers, and preaching. Oh, how much we should meditate on the intercession of Christ often. Learn to follow the stream to its fountain. If you experience any comfort, power, grace, or mercy, say, “Oh, this is because of the intercession of my Lord; it comes on the basis of the merits, mediation, and intercession of Jesus Christ.” Let us praise and bless God and Christ for every transaction in heaven for us.
3. Believe Christ’s Intercession More
All your faith to persevere, grow in grace, overcome sin, and grow in prayer and holiness depends on your faith in Christ’s intercession. The more you believe in His intercession, the more boldly and confidently you will come to God and pray. The more you pray in faith, the more effectual those graces He purchased will work in your life. Even in communion, we have to come in faith to experience the benefits of Christ’s death, right? So, believe in Christ’s intercession.
We are reading about the Father’s love in electing and predestining. Christ’s intercession is the divinely ordained way by the Father for this goal. “It is God’s own ordinance”; the very wisdom of God found out this way. If this is the way God ordained to save you to the uttermost, do not doubt it, do not dispute it, but rest on this fully in faith. Question no further; only believe and meditate, and look with the eyes of faith until you experience Christ’s intercession’s influence on your soul.
Oh, what faith will fill our heart if we see the great Christ interceding for me! My person and duty may both find acceptance and be well-pleasing with God! Don’t let unbelief miss this joy. Silence, unbelief! If my Savior prays, all is well with me. This is the very nature of faith: it relies upon the promises of Christ. Faith can rise and even see its name in the heart of Christ praying for itself. Oh, let us exercise our faith fully on Christ’s intercession! Let us cast ourselves upon the very intercession of Jesus Christ. “I have heard today, Lord, that there is an office erected in heaven, that Christ, as priest, should be ever praying and interceding for me to meet all my needs. Oh, help me to experience the efficacy of Your intercession! Give me the helping grace I need. I don’t feel like praying today. I look to You and ask You to give me a spirit of prayer. I have this weakness, this problem. Help me, Lord. Lord, teach me to intercede for others like You.”
Can I tell you some practical results of loving Christ more, meditating on and believing in His intercession?
- If Christ appears in heaven for us, we will want to appear and stand for His name on earth. Though you are so sinful, He appears in heaven before saints and angels, and before God and His Father on your behalf. So will we be afraid of worms, mortals, dust, and ashes, in His cause, or for His truth? Shall Jesus Christ own you in heaven, and will you not own Jesus Christ here in this world? Oh, what a need today for true men in these apostasy times to boldly stand for Christ, to live aflame for Christ, who is burning with love and interceding every second, when most people are backsliding.
- Christ spends all His time for us and our salvation; let us spend more of our time for Him and in His service. If He saves us to the uttermost, shouldn’t we serve Him with the utmost strength? The apostle tells us that “He ever lives to make intercession for us.” It is not for a day, or a month, or a year, but He lives forever upon this account. Forever, that is, during all the time from His ascension until the end of the world, without any weariness or intermission, He is ever interceding. How would this engage you in His service? Today my sermon is long, and some of you are feeling tired, wondering when it will end so you can go home. Well, but Christ is not weary of serving you. When you have done your worship, He takes that, sanctifies it, and presents it all to His Father. He prays over your prayers, “Lord, accept a short, poor, imperfect service done on earth, for My sake, and for those merits’ sake which I am continually presenting to You in heaven.” Oh, when will some of us learn the lesson “that they who live, should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him who ever lives to make intercession for them?”
- If He ever intercedes for all believers, we all have to become more like Christ. We become more like Him when we intercede like Him for others.
Unbelievers: I remind you the Bible says He ever lives to make intercession for all who come to God by Him. That’s inclusive and it’s exclusive. He intercedes for all who come—the weakest of His people, the humblest, the most ignorant, the most unstable—He intercedes for them to secure their salvation. But if you do not come to God through Him, He does not intercede for you, my friend. There is no salvation for you unless you come to God through Him. That is, until you have repented of your sin and idols and come to the true, living God who created you, you have no part in the intercession of Christ.
If you think you can go to God without Christ, on the basis of who you are and what you have done, you will face God’s wrath and judgment. And if He is not interceding for you, my friend, your sins are still upon your own head. The judgment of God still hangs over you. The wrath of God is storing like clouds above your head every day. In only a few more days, those clouds will break upon your unprotected soul unless Jesus saves you. Oh, come to God through Jesus Christ. He is willing and able to save every sinner who comes to Him.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 