When Job was suffering, he wanted to speak with God to get answers. Job had questions, but he also knew at a deeper level that God was just; there was no way a man could enter a legal dispute with God and win: “I know it is so of a truth: but how should man be just with God? If he will contend with him, he cannot answer him one of a thousand” (Job 9:2, 3). Job lamented that there was no arbiter to settle his dispute with God, saying, “For he is not a man, as I am, that I should answer him, and we should come together in judgment. Neither is there any daysman betwixt us, that might lay his hand upon us both” (Job 9:33). The “daysman” is a mediator. A mediator is a go-between; he stands between two parties that are so opposed that they cannot communicate except through a third party (cf. Gal. 3:20). Job wanted representation but had no right to demand a mediator. Eventually, God did answer Job (chapters 38-39). Job then realized he had no right to question the Almighty (Job 40:3-5); nevertheless, God in His mercy has provided the mediator for which Job longed. The New Testament brings about the realization of the mediator, but the Old Testament enhanced the appreciation of the need for a mediator.
Job offered sacrifices to God on behalf of others (Job 1:5) and interceded for others in prayer (Job 42:8). In that sense he was representing other men in going to God, but mediation would also require representing God to men. When God gave the law on Mount Sinai, Moses functioned as a mediator. Galatians 3:19 says the law was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. Moses went up the mount representing the people to God to receive the law (Ex. 19:3). He also came down from the mount as God’s representative with the tablets in his hand and his face shining to deliver the commandments God had spoken (Ex. 34:29-32). Later Moses recalled his function as mediator, “I stood between the LORD and you at that time, to shew you the word of the LORD: for ye were afraid by reason of the fire, and went not up into the mount” (Deut. 5:5).
Yet, as great as Moses was, he was not sinless. When Moses sinned, he was at odds with God (Num. 20:12). The high priest would go to God to offer sacrifices for the people, but he first had to offer sacrifice for his own sins (Heb. 7:27). Aaron was the high priest, but he and his sons were also guilty of sin (Ex. 32:2-6; Lev. 10:1, 2). Later when Eli had sons in the priesthood who were wicked, he asked them, “If one man sin against another, the judge shall judge him: but if a man sin against the LORD, who shall intreat for him?” (1 Sam. 2:25). No man who has sin on his record can represent God. No mere mortal can. But God has provided the perfect mediator.
“For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Tim. 2:5). We need a mediator to communicate with God, for we have all sinned and come short of God’s glory (Rom. 3:23). God is of purer eyes than to behold evil and cannot look on iniquity (Hab.1:13). Only Jesus can be that mediator between us and God since He is God and man. Jesus is fully God (John 1:1; Heb. 1:8), and yet He is described as “the man Christ Jesus” (1 Tim. 2:5). This is why we pray to the Father through the name of Jesus (John 15:16). In Jesus Christ we have an advocate to represent us before God: “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:1, 2).
The book of Hebrews reveals that Jesus is our great High Priest (Heb. 4:14; 6:20; 8:1; 9:11). The High Priest was the only one allowed to enter the Most Holy Place, to be in the presence of God (Heb. 9:7), and that only on the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16). Jesus entered heaven itself, where God dwells, after He was crucified for us to make atonement for our sins (Heb. 9:24). Because of Jesus’ mediatory work we can approach God boldly for the grace we all need. Hebrews 4:14-16 exhorts us:
Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.
Therefore, no one other than Jesus can stand between you and God. Do not allow anyone dead or living to stand between you and God in your prayers as well as your worship and service.
Though there is one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ, each Christian can be an intercessor for others. An intercessor petitions God on the behalf of another. Though I cannot stand between God and man as a mediator, I can go to God on the behalf of another in intercessory prayer. Abraham interceded for Sodom because he was concerned about his nephew, Lot (Gen. 18:23-33). Jesus commanded, “Pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you” (Matt. 5:44). James 5:16 commands “Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed.” 1 John 5:14-16 even instructs us on when we should or should not intercede for a brother, depending on whether he is penitent:
And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us: And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him. If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.
To be able to approach God is a privilege. We can hinder our prayers and intercessions to God by unrighteous living (1 Pet. 3:7). 1 Peter 3:12 explains, “For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil.”
Let us be thankful for our perfect mediator Jesus Christ; let us also live right and intercede for others:
I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time. (1 Tim. 2:1-6.)
–Mark Day