Our Advocate and Mediator…

Oddly, some people close to our granddaughter and involved in the legal profession have told her she needs an advocate to stand up for her and make sure she gets all that is her right to have. I understand their concern, yet also know that our prayers for her are received by a Mediator who stands for her far above any power or negative force in the universe. Our God is not only sovereign over the medical systems and government agencies here, He also rules the healing of her bones and the well-being of her attitude. To see her with casts or braces on all four limbs, unable to get out of bed, bruised and bleeding, and given morphine and other painkillers every few hours, yet joyful and laughing brings only one response: Only God!

This echos a tiny bit of what Jesus experienced in Gethsemane: 

And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. And when he rose from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping for sorrow, and he said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation.” (Luke 22:43–46)

The disciples didn’t realize the fullness of His angst, nor do I. But He had already yielded to His fate by saying, “Thy will be done” after asking if there was another way. Is that not the big key to comfort in great trials? They stop hurting me if I refuse to fight with them or with the God who allows them. I’m not aware of what is going on in her heart, but this grandchild of ours has peace on her face and acceptance in her words. I can almost see those strengthening angels who are ministering to her.

As for the attitudes, only Jesus can deal with the finger-pointing and anger that we so easily feel when life hands us a painful trial. He said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do…” even as they cast lots to divide his garments. (Luke 23:34)

This passage, plus some of what I see in her attitude, gives an example of what it means to have a mediator. No thoughts of punishment or retaliation or suing the medical people who messed up in their attempts to fix things. I looked it up. A mediator stands between two parties to reconcile their differences or to establish a relationship between them. In our world, this covers a broad array of roles. However, in the Bible, it is about relationships between deity and humanity. Scripture says mediation presupposes that we have been alienated from God by sin but that He desires to bridge the gulf separating us and restore harmonious relations (Isaiah 59:1–2). This is why Jesus came:

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

But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises. (Hebrews 8:6)

Mediation can be directed towards God, as in intercessory prayer, or towards humans, but Scripture primarily represents it as God’s initiative in reaching down to us through revelation and redemption. He sent His sinless Son — qualified because he is both fully human and fully divine — to fill three mediatorial offices of prophet, priest, and king. By his atoning death, in which he became both high priest and sacrifice, Jesus once and for all opened the way into God’s presence and now rules in believers’ hearts and is also seated at the Father’s right hand where He intercedes for us, as does the Holy Spirit. This is mainly about sin and forgiveness, but also covers all our needs.

PRAY: Every time a prayer is answered, I know that it was prayed in harmony with Your will and Your role to mediate our human needs, both for forgiveness and to supply those things we request that fit with Your will. If my prayer goes up with any kinks in it, it reaches the Father’s ears properly — for You are my Advocate, the One who makes sure I receive what the Father wants for me. My thoughts are hard to put into words. Given the events over the past little while, Your love and goodness is exceedingly overwhelming again, so I thank You, again and again.