[0:00] Well, just about a year ago, last October it was, we did a study in Sunday School on the doctrine of the Word. It was a systematic study on what the Bible teaches about itself.
[0:15] Now, we looked at things like the inerrancy of Scripture, its infallibility, the necessity of it, the sufficiency of Scripture. We used Kevin DeYoung's book, Taking God at His Word, as something of a guide for our study.
[0:29] We also used our confession of faith. We considered much of what the confession says in chapter 1 regarding the Holy Scriptures.
[0:40] So we drew from that chapter as well as we studied systematically the doctrine of the Word. Well, we're going to do another Sunday School this fall that also involves our confession of faith.
[0:52] And like last year, this is another systematic study. We're going to look at the doctrine of Christ, both His person and His work. And we're going to be using chapter 8 of our confession to guide our study.
[1:07] It is one of the longest chapters in our confession. It is only smaller in size to chapter 26, which is on the church. And it is equal in size to chapter 1, which covers those, the teachings on the Holy Scriptures.
[1:22] There's much that the writers of the confession wanted to make sure that they spelled out clearly about what the Bible teaches on Jesus Christ. After all, He is central to our faith.
[1:33] And so it makes sense that much ink was spilled in the chapter devoted to Him. So if you don't have a confession of faith, I would encourage you after Sunday School, talk to me.
[1:44] I would love to get a confession into your hands. And I also want to mention another book that guided something of our study last year as we looked at the Holy Scriptures. And it will guide our study as well this year.
[1:56] Now, this is an exposition of the confession, newly-ish published. It was newly published last year. I don't know how new it is now, considering it's a year old, but it still feels new to me. And this is a helpful guide as well as it explains and unpacks what the confession is saying.
[2:12] So I'll be referencing this exposition as well during our study. Now, before we dive into chapter 8, I want to begin by asking this question, and I am looking for responses.
[2:25] What is good about a confession of faith, like the 1689? Why have one at all? What is the benefit to a confession? Looking for answers.
[2:44] Yes, good. It keeps us focused. It keeps us on our theological center. As we heard in prayer meeting a couple weeks back, we considered the Scriptures are our theological center, and the confession helps us to keep to what the Scriptures teach.
[3:00] Good. Molly? Yes, to contend for the faith, to defend, to know what the Bible teaches.
[3:12] And in that sense also, it's helpful because it's concise. You look at the Scriptures, there's much the Scriptures teach that we need to know, we ought to know, but it's also concisely stated here.
[3:22] And so we can more readily defend the faith as we understand what the Scriptures teach as contained in the confession. What else? What else? What else? Very good, Mary.
[3:49] Yeah, two things there. The unity and also the historical continuity. Good. I saw a hand in the back. Jim? Good.
[4:04] I've said it a couple times, and now you're hitting on it. That systematic approach. The idea that it teaches in the topical sense, you can readily go to and say, here it is in a well-defined structure what it is that the Bible teaches.
[4:17] Good. Any other thoughts? These are all great answers. Very good. Well, it is. It is concise.
[4:28] It helps to maintain our unity. B.H. Carroll was a pastor, he was a theologian, and he was the first president of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.
[4:40] He said this in 1948. The modern cry, so still applicable even this many years later. The modern cry, less creed and more liberty, is a degeneration from the vertebrae to the jellyfish, and means less unity and less morality, and it means more heresy.
[5:01] Definitive truth does not create heresy. It only exposes and corrects it. Shut off the creed, and the Christian world would fill up with heresy, unsuspected and uncorrected, but nonetheless deadly.
[5:17] And so the confession is helpful in clarifying the truth of Scripture. It provides us with a very helpful summary of all that the Bible teaches. And when I say a helpful summary, it's a robust helpful summary.
[5:31] It is longer than just a few sentences covering any particular doctrine, and it is filled with references to Scripture. And so it's robust, and yet at the same time, you could easily sit down and read the confession in one sitting.
[5:47] I would encourage you to do that. Now here's another benefit. Dave Chansky, in the chapter that he contributed to the exposition of the confession, spoke to what Mary said.
[5:58] It contributes to our sense of historical continuity. And so we are connected to other faithful believers who have gone before us, and they have clung to the truth as it's expressed, helpfully, in our confession.
[6:13] So this connection to the past also helps to guard us against a very dangerous temptation, one that you, Jeff, gave reference to. The thought that we can discover new doctrine.
[6:25] Many false teachers have led people astray with this allure of new teaching. A good confession helps to keep us grounded in historic Christianity, and it guards us against straying into new truths or new ways of understanding what God's Word teaches.
[6:45] So it's clear. It's concise. It's a summary of what we believe the Bible teaches. It's well-organized, systematic, filled with biblical references, and therefore very helpful to us.
[6:58] There's a good argument that can be made that Christians are less clear about the truth, perhaps more now than ever, and less convicted about the truth, perhaps now more than ever.
[7:10] Less clear. Less convicted. Knowing less about what we believe and holding less to what we believe. And the confession helps to address both of those problems.
[7:22] This summary helps us to understand what the Bible teaches. It brings that clarity. And the more clear that we are on what we believe, the more that we can teach and the more that we can hold to what we believe with confidence.
[7:36] Joyfully, graciously, and confidently. We shouldn't be wishy-washy about the most important fundamental truths that we believe.
[7:47] We shouldn't be ashamed of what we believe. So you can hold to what you believe while being filled with humility and gentleness and patience toward others.
[7:59] You should hold to what you believe and be filled with humility, gentleness, and patience towards others. In 2 Timothy 2, Paul gives instructions to Timothy, a young pastor, to this end.
[8:14] He says, beginning in verse 24, And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome, but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness.
[8:27] God may perhaps grant to them repentance, leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil after being captured by him to do his will.
[8:39] So we should hold firm in the same way, bold enough to correct when needed, and yet doing that with a spirit of gentleness. The confession helps us to hold firm to what we believe.
[8:54] Now we also must remember, for as helpful as the confession is, it is no replacement for the Word of God. It is not equal to God's Word.
[9:05] It is not inspired, nor infallible. It is not sufficient, nor any of the other attributes that are entirely unique to God's Word. It was written by wise, godly men, men who walked closely with the Lord, men who were saturated in the Scriptures, but not men carried along in a special way by the Holy Spirit as the authors of Scripture were.
[9:31] So we need to keep the confession in its rightful place, as greatly helpful to us, but not inspired, a wonderful companion to God's Word, but not a replacement for God's Word.
[9:46] Now we may fall into one of two categories here as we're thinking about the confession. For some of us, perhaps not many, but for some of us, this might mean that we need to temper our affection for the confession.
[10:05] We might be in danger of treating the confession as though it is the Word of God. Maybe guilty of going and opening the confession, but not the Word.
[10:17] Maybe guilty of having a love for the confession that is crowding out love for God's Word. So that may be some of us. Others of us, perhaps, may be on the opposite end of the spectrum.
[10:28] We aren't opening the confession at all. We know very little of what the confession says. Perhaps we have a copy of it, but maybe it's collecting dust on the shelf somewhere in our homes.
[10:42] So the encouragement for us, then, is to read it more often, to better acquaint ourselves with it, and to appreciate more fully what it teaches us and how it is a helpful companion to God's Word.
[10:55] So I hope that this study of chapter 8 of the confession increases our understanding and our appreciation of it without elevating the confession to a place in which it is superseding God's Word.
[11:10] Dave Chansky again says this, A good confession is not the very Word of God, but if it is faithful to the Word of God, it is saying what God's Word says, similar to the way that a faithful preacher says what God's Word says.
[11:26] Someone who truly loves God's Word should truly love a good confession. He shouldn't love it as much as he loves Scripture itself, but he should love it for the way that it speaks, expounds, and illumines the Word of God.
[11:41] So let's dive into our study of the confession. If we do it right, then we're going to come away better understanding not just what the confession says, but what God's Word says.
[11:52] That's the goal. Not just to know the confession, but to know our Bible, to which our confessions point. So let's dive into our study of Christ in chapter 8.
[12:04] Maybe you've played a word association game before. Somebody says a word like ocean, and then you kind of just shout out any words that come to mind when you hear the word ocean.
[12:16] Lots of words that we could say when we hear that. So let's do that together now, not with ocean. Let's do it with a different word. Jesus. What words come to mind when you hear Jesus?
[12:31] Savior. Cross. Master. Messiah. I hear love. Love. Only begotten Son.
[12:46] Humility. Shepherd and Lamb. Lion and Lamb. Morning Star.
[12:59] Judge. I get the feeling we enjoyed that. That was good for our souls, wasn't it? Many words that we could say that capture who Jesus is.
[13:11] Much that we could say about him this morning. So many good answers and more that we could give. There are some answers that come to mind more quickly, though, than others, aren't there? Like Savior. Lord.
[13:22] God become man. The second person of the Godhead. Our confession of faith devotes this whole chapter to Jesus Christ. Both his person and his work. And it titles that chapter Jesus Christ the Mediator.
[13:37] Mediator. That wasn't a word that we said. If we had, then I wouldn't have a point to prove. But nobody said it because perhaps it didn't come to our minds as readily as many other words.
[13:50] Now this chapter covers much about Jesus Christ. And yet, Christ as Mediator is the overriding theme of this chapter. There's ten paragraphs in this chapter.
[14:02] We're covering one paragraph this morning, Lord willing. And in that one paragraph, we see the beginning of this understanding of him as Mediator. And then it flows throughout this whole chapter.
[14:15] We see that even as we look at... Where did I set it? Even as we look at the first two paragraphs. So this is paragraph one, number one at the top. That's what we're covering this morning.
[14:26] And then there's paragraph two that we're going to cover, Lord willing, next week. But look at how paragraph one ends. The mediator between God and humanity. And then look at how paragraph two ends.
[14:39] The only mediator between God and humanity. So these two paragraphs, they both end with an emphasis on his role as mediator. So I'm looking for answers here.
[14:51] What is a mediator? How would we define what a mediator is? Go between.
[15:09] Ambassador, good. Everybody's like, yeah, they nailed it. I have nothing more to say. Go between. First words that came to my mind. Yes, a mediator is a go between.
[15:20] A go between for two parties. It's speaking to one party on behalf of another. And it usually involves conflict between those two parties.
[15:31] They need help. They need their strife. And we see that conflict. It's certainly true when we think about our need for a mediator between us and God.
[15:42] Our sin has created conflict between us and God. Think about the role of the priests in the Old Testament. They served as mediators, go-betweens for God and the people of Israel.
[15:56] Because of the people's sin, the people of Israel could not just enter into God's presence in the temple. They didn't have that unfettered access. They needed priests to go into God's presence on their behalf.
[16:11] And even then, the priests could only enter into the most holy place of the temple once a year. It wasn't even as though those priests had this unfettered, always access to God going in whenever they pleased to be in His presence.
[16:27] And those, of course, those priests were imperfect mediators as men themselves who were sinful and needed to offer sacrifices for their own sin.
[16:38] Imperfect mediators. Jesus Christ is the perfect mediator. The only perfect mediator. The only perfect go-between for us and God.
[16:51] Now, we're going to get into the why of that more as we continue in our study, but that's coming in the weeks to come. The Confession doesn't have a theme verse for this chapter, but if we could assign a theme verse to this chapter, I think this one would be appropriate.
[17:08] 1 Timothy 2.5 For there is one God and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ.
[17:20] So this morning, we are covering paragraph one of this chapter of the Confession. I said there's ten paragraphs in total. We're going to be combining some of those paragraphs together as we go, so this is not, Lord willing, a ten-week study of the Confession, but today, we're looking at just the first paragraph.
[17:38] Now, let's read the whole thing together. You don't have to read it out, sorry. That gave the impression that you're reading with me. You don't have to read with me. Follow along as I read. If you can see it, I'm sorry if I made it a little too small.
[17:51] God was pleased in his eternal purpose to choose and ordain the Lord Jesus, his only begotten Son, according to the covenant made between them to be the mediator between God and humanity.
[18:03] God chose him to be prophet, priest, and king, and to be head and savior of the church, the heir of all things, and judge of the world. From all eternity, God gave to the Son a people to be his offspring.
[18:18] In time, these people would be redeemed, called, justified, sanctified, and glorified by him. Now, you can see there that I kind of split this into three sections, so this is a little confusing, I will admit.
[18:34] We are looking at chapter 8, paragraph 1, section by section. Okay? So, section 1, we will first look at together, trying to keep this as orderly as possible.
[18:46] So, there is section 1, and it is in larger font for us to be able to see. So, we see right at the beginning there, the pleasure of God. God was pleased.
[18:58] It delighted him. To do what? To choose and ordain the Lord Jesus. So, here we have God the Father.
[19:08] That is who is pleased, the first person of the Godhead. And he was pleased to ordain and to choose God the Son, the Lord Jesus. We see that pleasure of the Father for the Son.
[19:21] We see that choosing of the Son by the Father in Isaiah 42.1, which is referenced in this first section of the paragraph. In Isaiah 42.1, God is talking about his chosen servant.
[19:35] And in the Gospel, according to Matthew, this verse, Isaiah 41, 42.1, is quoted. And this verse is said to be fulfilled by Jesus. So, we know the chosen servant that is talked about in Isaiah 42.1.
[19:49] We know that this is God the Father speaking of God the Son. And this is what he says. Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights.
[20:05] So, there we see the Father's delight for his Son and his choosing of the Son, his ordaining the Son. And ordaining simply means appointing, setting apart.
[20:17] The Son was set apart by the Father. And it's often for a unique role. To be appointed for something is often unique to that person. You're given a special task, a special responsibility.
[20:30] And that is what we see here for Jesus. Now, this appointing was all according to God the Father's eternal purpose. We kind of skipped that.
[20:41] But we see that clarifying phrase there. In his eternal purpose to choose and ordain. God the Son. His only begotten Son.
[20:52] So, God's only Son, chosen in eternity past to accomplish the eternal purpose of God the Father. And what was that purpose?
[21:04] Well, we see it there at the end of the sentence. To be the mediator between God and humanity. Now, some people think that it wasn't until after the fall in Genesis 3 that God purposed to send His Son to be our mediator.
[21:24] He purposed to send His Son to rescue us from our sins. Some people think that's the case. Yet that's not true. This was an eternal purpose.
[21:35] Simply meaning, God's plan of redemption was not a reflex by God at all. It wasn't as though God was reactionary. He's never caught off guard. Sin didn't enter the world.
[21:47] And then God scratched His head and said, hmm, what will I do about this? No, He's sovereign over all things. All that comes to pass, He has decreed.
[21:58] Listen to Isaiah 46, beginning in verse 9. God Himself says, for I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is none like Me.
[22:10] Declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet, saying, my counsel shall stand and I will accomplish all my purpose, calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country.
[22:28] I have spoken and I will bring it to pass. I have purpose and I will do it. So all of this makes clear. Even before sin entered into the world, God had a plan.
[22:40] God had an eternal plan. And that plan included the entrance of sin into this world. That even was a part of God's plan.
[22:51] Though we must be clear, God is not responsible for sin. God is not to be blamed for our sin. But sin coming into the world was a part of God's decrees, His plan.
[23:04] And so of course God had a remedy for the problem of sin, sending His Son. That remedy was already completely mapped out. It was ready to implement. And it was an eternal purpose.
[23:18] R.C. Sproul. It's a rather lengthy quote, but it's worth saying. This is what R.C. Sproul says. It is a matter of theological urgency that Christians not think of God as a ruler who ad-libs His dominion of the universe.
[23:37] God does not make it up as He goes along. Nor must He be viewed as a bumbling administrator who is so inept in His planning that His blueprint for redemption must be endlessly subject to revision according to the actions of men.
[23:53] The God of Scripture has no plan B or plan C. His plan A is from everlasting to everlasting. It is both perfect and unchangeable as it rests on God's eternal character which is among other things holy, omniscient, and immutable.
[24:12] So this plan that Sproul is speaking of there, this plan that we see in Scripture is really the main theme of this first paragraph of chapter 8 of the Confession.
[24:24] If there was just one word that we could use to summarize paragraph 1, it's the word plan. So if you're going to remember what is it that paragraph 1 of chapter 8 of the Confession says if you're in a place where you need to remember that exact paragraph, it's plan.
[24:39] This is the plan. Now next week, Lord willing, we're going to unpack paragraph 2. And that paragraph describes how the plan was accomplished.
[24:50] So if plan is the word for this morning, next week the word is fulfilled. How is it that God brought that plan to fulfillment? How is it that He executed that plan?
[25:03] So the Father had this plan, worked up with the Son from eternity past, that He would save His people, that He would use His Son as mediator to do it.
[25:13] The Father plans it, and the Son executes the plan. So in that relationship between the Father and the Son, we see this harmonious agreement.
[25:27] And that agreement, the Confession draws out. It calls this covenant between the Father and the Son. We see that there. According to the covenant made between them.
[25:41] So they've made this covenant. Now covenants are found throughout the Bible. We have covenants made between God and man. We have covenants made between men.
[25:53] Covenants are simply formal agreements. Two parties that are committing themselves to an agreed-upon purpose or an agreed-upon end. And the parties have obligations in that covenant, responsibilities that they are upholding.
[26:08] There's roles that they each have in this covenant. covenant. And so though the word covenant isn't found in the Bible to describe any particular agreements between the Father and the Son, we still see a description of what we could call a covenant in several places in Scripture.
[26:27] A covenant made between the Godhead involving the persons of the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Theologians down through the centuries have called this the covenant of redemption.
[26:41] The eternal plan of God the Father to send God the Son to redeem His people from their sins and to apply that redemption to us by the work of the Holy Spirit.
[26:54] There we see the whole Godhead. So it was according to this covenant made between the Father and the Son, especially emphasized here, that the eternal purpose of God was carried out.
[27:05] They worked in perfect harmony together. We see this in Scripture, say, 1 Peter chapter 1. As Peter is talking about our redemption, that we were purchased with the precious blood of Christ, this is how Peter describes Christ.
[27:23] Verse 20. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you who through Him are believers in God.
[27:37] You hear that language there? He was foreknown before the foundation of the world. It was already decided upon that Christ would be this perfect sacrifice to save us from our sins before God had even spoken the words, let there be light.
[27:55] And it wasn't as though Christ agreed to this plan begrudgingly. All through the Gospel of John, Jesus shows the perfect, harmonious relationship between the Godhead and especially between Himself and the Father.
[28:13] He would say things like, I have come in my Father's name and I have come down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me.
[28:25] He would pray to the Father in John chapter 17 saying, I have glorified you on earth having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And what was that work?
[28:37] Ultimately, to go to the cross for our sins. Even in describing that, that going to the cross for our sins, Jesus helps us to see the oneness between Himself and the Father, the covenantal agreement between them.
[28:53] He says in John 10, for this reason, the Father loves me because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.
[29:04] I have authority to lay it down and I have authority to take it up again. This charge, I have received from my Father. A charge received from the Father and a charge willingly carried out by the Son.
[29:23] Fast forward then to the early church when Peter is preaching his sermon at Pentecost after Christ has ascended into heaven and sent the Holy Spirit. Peter describes Jesus' death this way to a large crowd of Jews.
[29:39] This Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. So put to death by the hands of lawless men, yet all at the same time according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God.
[30:00] Or you could say the eternal purpose of God. It was according to the covenant made between Father and Son that God's eternal purpose came about for Christ to be our mediator.
[30:16] Section 2. God chose him to be prophet, priest, and king and to be head and savior of the church, the heir of all things and judge of the world.
[30:28] Yet again, we see the emphasis on that covenantal relationship between the Father and the Son. It's continuing into this sentence. God chose him.
[30:38] Again, there's that cooperation within the Godhead. And what is it that God chose for him to be? Well, there's quite a list that's given to us here. So far, we've emphasized the role of Christ as mediator and that role is the central focus of this chapter.
[30:56] But there are other roles or offices that the scriptures spell out that Christ possesses. So we don't want to flatten all that the scriptures teach concerning Christ by just saying mediator, mediator, mediator.
[31:08] There's wonderful, beautiful nuance that God gives to us. And so the confession is spelling out several different titles that are appropriate for Christ and that also in some way tie back to his role as mediator.
[31:23] So first we see the prophet, priest, and king language. We're going to skip that this morning only because the confession comes back to it a little bit later and unpacks it in more detail then.
[31:35] So we're going to unpack it in more detail then. So we're going to jump ahead to this title of being the head and the savior of the church.
[31:49] Now this is actually drawing in particular from Ephesians 5 which the confession writers didn't actually even give us in their footnotes. But Ephesians 5, Paul is helping us to understand how the relationship between husband and wife ought to be and he's using Christ and the church as the model for that relationship.
[32:09] So Paul writes this, wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord for the husband is the head of the wife even as, and here it is, Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior.
[32:26] So we see both right there. So as head, Christ has authority. He is in charge. And yet, it's not an authority that he's wielding maliciously or to cause harm to us.
[32:40] It's just the opposite. Paul goes on to say in verse 29, for no one ever hated his own flesh or you could say hated his own body but nourishes and cherishes it just as Christ does the church because we are members of his body.
[32:59] So the head makes sure that the rest of the body is healthy. So it is with Christ and the church. He is the head and we see in the confession he is its savior.
[33:12] Again, that language of him being savior is from the same place in Ephesians 5. Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its savior. Now what does it mean for Christ to be savior?
[33:25] I think we understand that but even so, let's hear how Paul describes it for us in Ephesians 5. Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.
[33:36] So he saved us. How did he do that? The good shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep going to the cross for our sins.
[33:47] The confession goes on to say that Christ is the heir of all things. Taken straight from Hebrews 1 verse 2 which says the son has been appointed the heir of all things.
[34:00] Meaning, he has a great inheritance. An inheritance that will be given to him by the father. And so the father says in Psalm 2, you are my son. Today I have begotten you.
[34:12] Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession. Or similarly, in 1 Corinthians 15, God is spoken of as putting all things in subjection under Christ's feet.
[34:31] And then the wonder of it is Christ shares his inheritance with us. We are made to be co-heirs, Romans 8, 17 says. So we see something of how Christ is mediator as it relates to his being heir of all things.
[34:48] What the father gives to the son, the son then shares that with us. Even in that way, he's the go-between, isn't he? The father doesn't give an inheritance directly to us, but it's mediated through Christ.
[35:03] And finally, the confession describes Jesus as the judge of the world. He's the perfect judge, perfectly qualified. He will execute judgment in perfect fairness.
[35:16] And again, we see how this ties into him as mediator. The father gives the son the role of judge, and it's the son who then judges the world.
[35:27] John 5, 22, Jesus says plainly, For the father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the son. So the father is not actually the one directly judging in that sense, but rather the father then gives judgment authority to the son.
[35:45] And all of the son's judgments are upheld, and they are accepted by the father. Every verdict stands. There is literally no use appealing the verdict to the father. Everything the son has said, the father is in perfect agreement with.
[36:01] And then finally, the last slide here. The last two sentences in this section. From all eternity, God gave to the son a people to be his offspring.
[36:12] In time, these people would be redeemed, called, justified, sanctified, and glorified by him. Now we already saw in the first sentence of this paragraph that it was a part of God's eternal purpose for Christ to become our mediator.
[36:30] He was chosen for that. Now we see something of kind of the flip side of it. It was also a part of God's eternal purpose for us to be chosen as well for Christ.
[36:41] So Christ chosen to be our mediator, and we are chosen to be Christ's people all according to God's eternal purpose. So you remember 1 Peter 1.18, Christ was foreknown before the foundation of the world.
[36:58] Well, guess what? Ephesians 1.4 says God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before him.
[37:09] So Christ was chosen for us before the foundation of the world and now we're seeing that we were chosen for Christ before the foundation of the world. Not because he needed us as we most definitely need him, but because it pleased him to choose us and it brought glory to him in choosing us.
[37:28] Ephesians 1 says that he chose us according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace. So the Father gave us to the Son.
[37:39] The confession is just echoing the language of Jesus himself as he prayed to the Father in John 17. Jesus said, I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world.
[37:53] They were yours and you gave them to me and they have kept your word. So a people given to Christ. A people called his offspring drawn from Isaiah 53 verse 10.
[38:08] Offspring given to Christ. Jesus himself is quoted in the book of Hebrews. He's quoted as saying, I will tell of your name to my brothers.
[38:19] Interesting. Often we think of Jesus as our brother. We are co-heirs with Christ, children of God because the Son of God died in our place for our sins and yet also spoken of here in the confession as offspring.
[38:34] What's that mean? We're children of God the Father and yet as his children we have been given to the Son. Remember, he is the heir of all things.
[38:46] He is set to inherit all things and that includes us. We belong to him. So do you see how everything up to this point in paragraph one has been very much tied together by this running theme of God's eternal plan.
[39:02] In his eternal purpose, he chose Jesus. from all eternity, God gave to the Son a people. But this last sentence here reminds us the plan is to be executed.
[39:15] Not just planned out but actually accomplished and accomplished in time. It would be accomplished not in eternity past but in redemptive history.
[39:28] You were not redeemed in eternity past. Your salvation did not occur in eternity past though it was guaranteed in eternity past to happen but it was worked out in time.
[39:43] So the writers of the confession here have Romans 8.30 in mind. There we read, and those whom he predestined, that's the eternity past part of the confession, and those whom he predestined, he also called.
[39:57] And those whom he called, he also justified. And those whom he justified, he also glorified. There's that chain of salvation as the verse is often called.
[40:07] Each aspect of our salvation or you could say our redemption linked together. We who are called are then justified. And then the confession writers added sanctified to help connect the dots here because those who are justified are also sanctified and what follows sanctification is then glorification.
[40:27] all of that taken together were talking about our redemption worked out in time and yet planned from eternity past. We've covered a lot of ground this morning, even in just one paragraph, and we even skipped some things that could have been said regarding it.
[40:44] But I hope that this moves us as we've considered this paragraph to worship our God and to marvel at our God's work. What a wonderful plan.
[40:55] What a perfect plan that God put together in eternity past. A plan that shows forth the perfect fellowship and agreement between the Godhead.
[41:06] A plan that shows forth the perfect wisdom of God in sending His Son to die for our sins. And that plan indeed centers on the Lord Jesus being our mediator.
[41:19] Next week, Lord willing, we'll look at exactly how that plan was fulfilled in paragraph two, we are dismissed. We are dismissed.