The two parts of Christ’s priestly
work are atonement and intercession. . . . (b) Intercession: “if any
man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1
John 2:1); “wherefore he is able to save them to the uttermost, seeing he ever
lives to make intercession for them” (Heb. 7:25); “I pray for them which you
have given me; neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall
believe on me through their word” (John 17:9, 20).
The intercession of Christ is
intimately connected with his atoning work. Westminster
Confession 8.8, after saying that Christ “effectually applies and communicated
redemption to those for whom he has purchased it,” adds that “he makes intercession
for them” (cf. Westminster Larger Catechism Q. 44). This is in accordance with
the Scriptures. The Apostle John asserts that “if any man sin, we have an
advocate with the Father” (1 John 2:1-2) and adduces as the ground of his
success as an advocate two facts: that he is “Jesus Christ the righteous” and
is “the propitiation for our sins.” The Apostle Paul in Rom. 8:34 states that
Christ is ”at the right hand of God making intercession for us” and mentions as
the reason why he is fitted for this work the fact that he “died and is risen
again.” In Heb. 4:14-16 believers are encouraged to “come boldly unto the
throne of grace” because they “have a great high priest who is passed into the
heavens and is touched with the feeling of their infirmities.” Again, in 7:24-25
Christians are assured that because Christ has an “unchangeable priesthood, he
is able to save them.” In 9:7-12 the writer reminds the reader that the Jewish “high
priest went alone once every year into the second tabernacle, not without
blood, which he offered for himself and the errors of the people”; and then he
states that Christ, “a high priest of good things to come, by his own blood
entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.”
Still further proof of the close connection
of Christ’s intercessory work with his atoning work is found in that class of
texts which represent the gracious influence of the Holy Spirit as being procured
by Christ’s intercession. These teach that plenary
effusion of the Holy Spirit which is the characteristic of the Christian
economy is owning to the return of the mediator to the Father and his session
upon the mediatorial throne: “I indeed baptize with water; he shall baptize you
with the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 3:11); “Jesus spoke this of the Spirit, which they
that yet glorified” (John 7:39); “it is expedient for you that I go away; for
if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto y9ou; but if I depart I will
send him unto you” (16:7). In 14:16-26 and 15:26 Christ assures his disciples
that after he has left them and returned to the Father “where he was before,”
he “will pray the Father, and he will give them another Comforter, that he may
abide with them, even the Spirit of truth”; and furthermore that he will
himself “send the Comforter unto them from the Father.” . . . . The same
connection between Christ’s atonement and Christ’s intercession is noticed in
the epistles. Christ was “made a curse for us that we might receive the
promise of the Spirit through faith” (Gal. 3:13-14). The Holy Spirit is “shed
on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Titus 3:5-6). When Christ “ascended
up on high, he received gifts for men” (Eph. 4:8). The intercession of
Christ relates (a) to the application of his own atonement to the individual
and (b) to the bestowment of the Holy Spirit as enlightening and sanctifying
the believer (cf. Smith, Theology, 481-90). (William G. T. Shedd, Dogmatic
Theology: Complete and Unabridged, Volumes 1-3 [Reformed Retrieval, 2021], 602-3,
emphasis added)
Further Reading
Another Reformed Protestant Arguing that Christ’s Intercessory Work is Propitiatory
