We continue once again with our forth question, who specifically is the Mediator?
In this study we would like to take a quick look at the “Testator” to see how this is related to the Mediator.
Testator: a person who has made a will or given a legacy.
“And for this reason he is the Mediator of the new covenant by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first (Law) covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. For where there is a testament (a bequest, a will) there must also of necessity be the death of the testator, for a testament is in force only after men are dead, since it has no power at all while the testator lives.”(Heb 9:15-17)
"The Apostle explains that no will or testament or bequest is of validity so long as the testator lives. Whatever covenant of agreement may be had, it awaits a final sealing or completion by the death of the testator. The Apostle applies this to Christ. By His death Jesus passed on to us, the church, the benefit of his merit; namely, the earthly rights of ‘justification’ to all that was lost in Adam and redeemed by the precious merit of Christ’s sacrifice finished at Calvary.
In accepting these earthly blessings, we, as His members, agreed to the terms; namely, that we also surrender our rights to these, as servants or ‘ministers of the New (Law) Covenant’—that these earthly blessings secured by our Lord’s obedience and death should thus pass through us and still be the Redeemer’s asset to be given to Israel, under Israel’s New (Law) Covenant.
The fact that Israel is still outcast from God’s favor is merely evidence that the body of Christ is not yet completely sacrificed, for bear in mind that the covenant is of no validity until the death of the testator. The Lord Jesus, the primary Testator, has accepted consecrated believers, as ‘members of his body,’ and he is working in them by his holy Spirit to will and to do the Father’s good pleasure—that they may lay down their lives in sacrifice, filling up that which is behind of the afflictions of Messiah. As soon as the last member of the church shall have died as a member of His body, the New (Law) Covenant with Israel will be sealed—sealed with the blood of the Testator; the death of THE Christ, Head and members.
Meantime the resurrection change of the church as the body of Christ will have brought the Testator as a whole to the plane of glory, honor and immortality. On this plane THE Christ, Jesus the Head, and the church, His mystic body, will be in antitype the great Prophet, the great Priest, the great King, the great Judge, the great Mediator between God and mankind in general. Then will come the time promised in the Scriptures when this Great One, this Glorified One, the Seed of Abraham on the spiritual plane, will begin the work of blessing all the families of the earth, under the conditions of the New (Law) Covenant, to be made with Israel first. (R4453)
“Hebrews 9:16 reads: "For where a Testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator." In the case of Moses the death of the Testator was represented by the slaying of the bullock AND the goat. In the case of the Anti typical Moses, the death of the Testator is shown in the sacrifice of our Lord AND the Church his Body. The ability of Christ to give a Testament or Covenant, or to make a Covenant, should also be seen. As the man Jesus he could not make this Covenant. Why? Because as a man--not spirit-begotten--he could merely have given his human life for mankind and then would have had nothing left for himself; or if he had retained his earthly life he could have established only an earthly Kingdom and never could have given eternal life to any one subsequently. He might have blessed them with wise laws and regulations and improved conditions over the present time, but never could have given them life and the perfections and blessings that he will be able to give under the New Covenant.”
HOW THE LORD BECAME A TESTATOR
“In order to be a Testator and give eternal life to the world, it was necessary that our Lord should carefully follow the Plan that God had arranged: First, by his own obedience he should demonstrate his loyalty to God and receive life on the divine plane as his reward; second, that then, by taking up his human life which he did not forfeit in anywise, he should have that human life and its rights to give to Israel and through them to all mankind. He is thus a Testator. He is thus one who bequeaths (or wills) something to others. He bequeaths it not while he is alive, as a gift, but he gives it as a Testator, as that with which he parts in death. So our Lord Jesus, as the Great Mediator of the New Covenant, will give to mankind the human rights and privileges to which he had a right by virtue of his perfect obedience to the Divine Law.
He invites us, NOT to share those rights with the world, NOT to come under his Mediatorial reign and be sharers in restitution privileges, but, according to the will of God, to do something else, viz., to join with him in becoming Testator, to lay down our lives and thus be sharers with him in the spirit of his great work, that we may also share with him in the actual features of that work during the Millennium.
In our next post we will see how the Church is joined to the Testator.
In this study we would like to take a quick look at the “Testator” to see how this is related to the Mediator.
Testator: a person who has made a will or given a legacy.
“And for this reason he is the Mediator of the new covenant by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first (Law) covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. For where there is a testament (a bequest, a will) there must also of necessity be the death of the testator, for a testament is in force only after men are dead, since it has no power at all while the testator lives.”(Heb 9:15-17)
"The Apostle explains that no will or testament or bequest is of validity so long as the testator lives. Whatever covenant of agreement may be had, it awaits a final sealing or completion by the death of the testator. The Apostle applies this to Christ. By His death Jesus passed on to us, the church, the benefit of his merit; namely, the earthly rights of ‘justification’ to all that was lost in Adam and redeemed by the precious merit of Christ’s sacrifice finished at Calvary.
In accepting these earthly blessings, we, as His members, agreed to the terms; namely, that we also surrender our rights to these, as servants or ‘ministers of the New (Law) Covenant’—that these earthly blessings secured by our Lord’s obedience and death should thus pass through us and still be the Redeemer’s asset to be given to Israel, under Israel’s New (Law) Covenant.
The fact that Israel is still outcast from God’s favor is merely evidence that the body of Christ is not yet completely sacrificed, for bear in mind that the covenant is of no validity until the death of the testator. The Lord Jesus, the primary Testator, has accepted consecrated believers, as ‘members of his body,’ and he is working in them by his holy Spirit to will and to do the Father’s good pleasure—that they may lay down their lives in sacrifice, filling up that which is behind of the afflictions of Messiah. As soon as the last member of the church shall have died as a member of His body, the New (Law) Covenant with Israel will be sealed—sealed with the blood of the Testator; the death of THE Christ, Head and members.
Meantime the resurrection change of the church as the body of Christ will have brought the Testator as a whole to the plane of glory, honor and immortality. On this plane THE Christ, Jesus the Head, and the church, His mystic body, will be in antitype the great Prophet, the great Priest, the great King, the great Judge, the great Mediator between God and mankind in general. Then will come the time promised in the Scriptures when this Great One, this Glorified One, the Seed of Abraham on the spiritual plane, will begin the work of blessing all the families of the earth, under the conditions of the New (Law) Covenant, to be made with Israel first. (R4453)
“Hebrews 9:16 reads: "For where a Testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator." In the case of Moses the death of the Testator was represented by the slaying of the bullock AND the goat. In the case of the Anti typical Moses, the death of the Testator is shown in the sacrifice of our Lord AND the Church his Body. The ability of Christ to give a Testament or Covenant, or to make a Covenant, should also be seen. As the man Jesus he could not make this Covenant. Why? Because as a man--not spirit-begotten--he could merely have given his human life for mankind and then would have had nothing left for himself; or if he had retained his earthly life he could have established only an earthly Kingdom and never could have given eternal life to any one subsequently. He might have blessed them with wise laws and regulations and improved conditions over the present time, but never could have given them life and the perfections and blessings that he will be able to give under the New Covenant.”
HOW THE LORD BECAME A TESTATOR
“In order to be a Testator and give eternal life to the world, it was necessary that our Lord should carefully follow the Plan that God had arranged: First, by his own obedience he should demonstrate his loyalty to God and receive life on the divine plane as his reward; second, that then, by taking up his human life which he did not forfeit in anywise, he should have that human life and its rights to give to Israel and through them to all mankind. He is thus a Testator. He is thus one who bequeaths (or wills) something to others. He bequeaths it not while he is alive, as a gift, but he gives it as a Testator, as that with which he parts in death. So our Lord Jesus, as the Great Mediator of the New Covenant, will give to mankind the human rights and privileges to which he had a right by virtue of his perfect obedience to the Divine Law.
He invites us, NOT to share those rights with the world, NOT to come under his Mediatorial reign and be sharers in restitution privileges, but, according to the will of God, to do something else, viz., to join with him in becoming Testator, to lay down our lives and thus be sharers with him in the spirit of his great work, that we may also share with him in the actual features of that work during the Millennium.
In our next post we will see how the Church is joined to the Testator.
