CHRIST’S OFFICES
Westminster
Shorter Catechism 23.
Quest. What
offices doth Christ execute as our Redeemer?
Ans. Christ, as our Redeemer, executeth the offices of a Prophet, of a Priest, and of a King, both in His estate of humiliation and exaltation.
Introduction
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And
likewise, Ephesians 4:24 says that the Christian has “put on the new man which
was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.” Adam was
also created according to God in true righteousness and holiness. Therefore,
Adam’s righteousness and holiness must also, like his knowledge, have been
damaged. However, the point to be made is that Adam, i.e., mankind, according
to Scripture, was created with true knowledge, holiness, and righteousness. It
was from this high and exalted position that mankind in Adam fell into a
threefold state of misery, i.e., ignorance, guilt, and bondage.
At the Fall mankind’s knowledge became ignorance. Our holiness
turned into guilt. And our true righteousness was exchanged
for bondage.
Now,
Adam, before the Fall, had perfectly executed the offices of prophet, priest,
and king. As prophet he knew truth, which has to do with God’s Word
(John 17:17). Therefore, being a prophet has to do with having true knowledge
of God’s will among other things. But Adam sinned and became an ignorant and
false or pseudo-prophet.
Also,
before the Fall, Adam was set apart by God to serve God in everything he did.
To be set apart by God to serve God has to do with holiness. Therefore, Adam
was a priest. But Adam by the same transgression of the Fall became a guilty or
false or pseudo-priest. And, before the Fall, Adam was to rule over God’s
creation. He was to rule in accordance with God’s Law as it applied in the
Covenant of Works. Therefore, Adam was king. This kingship had to do with
righteousness, i.e., ruling in accordance with God’s will.
But in
the same sin, the Fall, which was the breaking of the Covenant of Works, Adam
entered into bondage. Instead of ruling as king, he himself and mankind in him
and with him, became ruled by sin; which sinful disposition is bondage, i.e.,
bondage to sin. Adam was created to serve God by ruling creation according to
true knowledge.
What we’re looking at is how God went about fixing all these problems that were brought about by the Fall, which has to do with Christ’s work in salvation.
Prophet,
Priest, & King
Christ
our Redeemer is Prophet, Priest, and King. And why wouldn’t He be? After all,
He is the Second Adam. In other words, Jesus Christ as the express image
of God is the new Adam. He is the new Man who has put on knowledge, true
righteousness and holiness. We’ll look at this a bit more up ahead. But for now,
take note that Jesus’ offices of Prophet, Priest, and King have to do with His
role as our Redeemer. In other words, His offices are in relation to redemption
– our redemption. Therefore, Jesus is our Prophet, our Priest,
and our King.
And
notice that the Catechism isn’t saying that His offices ended with His death on
the cross. No! He continues even now to be our Prophet, our Priest,
and our King in Glory. For, He bears these three offices in His
exaltation. This means that Jesus in Heaven is still our Mediator. For, His
offices of Prophet, Priest, and King have to do with His Mediatory role. They
have to do with Christ as the Godman.
As
Prophet He’s God’s “spokesman” to us, and also our “spokesman” to God in
Heaven. As Priest He is able to intercede in Heaven for us and to minister for
God to us. And as King He rules His people (including creation) from on High
and does so in the wisdom and knowledge of God. As Prophet He removes our
ignorance by giving us, by His Spirit working with His Word, true knowledge of
the Triune God as revealed in His Gospel. As Priest He removes our guilt by
paying for our sins. This He does by having His Spirit set us apart to
serve God, thus making us holy. And as King He has the power by His Spirit to
free us from our bondage to sin which is unrighteousness.
In short,
our Prophet, Priest, and King has taken these three offices with Him into
Heaven. Therefore, these offices are the highest offices in all creation!
However,
the Catechism speaks of Christ as having these offices in the state of His humiliation.
What do we mean by Christ’s humiliation? Well, we simply mean that He had these
offices when He walked on earth. But when did He enter into these offices?
Well, we’d have to say that Jesus began His public ministry in earnest when He
was baptised. It was at His baptism that Jesus was anointed with the Holy
Spirit beyond measure. The New Testament Greek term “Christ” means “the
Anointed One”. The Old Testament Hebrew term “Messiah” means the same, i.e.,
“the Lord’s Anointed”. Therefore, Jesus was anointed by the Holy Spirit when He
was anointed with water at His baptism.
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In Psalm
23 David the king says, “You anoint my head with oil” (Psa. 23:5). The Lord
said to Elijah, “Also you shall anoint Jehu the son of Nimshias king over
Israel. And Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel Meholah you shall anoint as
prophet in your place” (1 Kings 19:16). The Lord said to Moses in Leviticus
30:30, “And you shall anoint Aaron and his sons, and consecrate them, that they
may minister to Me as priests.” So, whether you were the Lord’s prophet,
priest, or king you were to be anointed into the office. Jesus Christ was
anointed into the offices of Prophet, Priest, and King by the Holy Spirit at His
baptism by John.
Now, we
know that Jesus is Prophet because Acts 3:22 says, “For Moses truly said to the
fathers, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from
your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you. And
it shall be that every soul who will not hear that Prophet shall be utterly
destroyed from among the people.’”
Jesus is Priest because Hebrews 5:6 says of Him, “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.” And Jesus is King because Psalm 2:6 says, “Yet I have set My King on My holy hill of Zion.” Therefore, Jesus as the Lord’s Anointed (i.e., Christ NT Greek or Messiah OT Hebrew) is the abbreviated form of Prophet, Priest, and King. The anointing of the Old Testament prophets, priests, and kings pointed the way forward for Jesus and to Jesus.
Why Jesus
is Prophet, Priest, & King
We need
to ask the question: Why did Christ enter into these offices? And we answer
that He entered into these offices to secure our redemption from the misery of
sin. He became Prophet to remove from us our ignorance. He became Priest to
eradicate our guilt. And He became King to set us free from our bondage.
Put
another way, Christ as Prophet grants us true knowledge of God. As Priest, He
grants us holiness. And as King, He grants us righteousness. In a word, He
restores the (full) image of God to us by His offices. So, we see then, that
these three offices have a great bearing on us. They all have to do with our
redemption, and Christ redeems the whole man.
Man, as
fallen, sets himself up as prophet without the Lord’s anointing. For fallen man
in his ignorance invents his own laws. We see even in our own day man trying to
redefine marriage, for instance. God’s Law forbids same sex marriage, but
fallen man does not have true knowledge. Therefore, he will pass laws that
prove his ignorance. However, this ignorance is a willing ignorance. It is part
of his rebelliousness to God that he suppresses the truth of God in
unrighteousness and believes the lie (Rom. 1:25). This is to say that though
fallen man knows deep in his heart that there is something inherently wrong
with same-sex marriage, he tries so hard to remain in ignorance of the truth of
the matter!
Fallen
man sets himself apart as priest without the Lord’s anointing. Fallen man seeks
to provide his own salvation. He serves the State and man-centred Humanism
instead of the true and living God. And fallen man declares himself to be king
without the Lord’s anointing. He seeks to extend his godless kingdom by
secularising everything, (i.e., by removing all mention of God from all spheres
of society). He does this by enforcing his own laws, laws that he has invented
in his self-imposed ignorance.
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And on
account of His completed work on earth as Prophet, Priest, and King He has
renewed Christians as prophets, priests, and kings in principle. And because He
has been exalted in Heaven, He is able to begin to renew us also in practice.
He does this through the prophetic, which is through having the whole counsel
of God preached. He does it through the priestly, by having baptism and the
Lord’s Supper administered. And He does it through the kingly by having
righteous discipline administered among the flock.
In His
church the prophetic office is seen in the preaching/teaching elder. The
priestly office is seen in the deacon. And the kingly office is seen in the
ruling elder. But all these church functions are subject to Christ who is the
exalted Prophet, Priest, and King. But the point is that it is still Christ who
is executing His offices while in Heaven through His church officers on earth.
So, we see then that He is actively transforming us into the true image and likeness of God. Or to say the same thing, we see that He is renewing us in His own image and likeness. Therefore, it would help us to grow if we realised what Jesus is doing to us. We must be diligent students of His Word so that we may attain true knowledge, so that we may learn what it means to be holy, and so that we may learn what it means to be truly righteous.
Practical
Out-workings of the Prophet, Priest, & King
So, what
then are the practical out-workings of all of this? Or to put that another way,
how does all of this apply to us Covenantally? Well, let’s put it like this: Adam
was to serve God by ruling creation according to true knowledge. That’s the
heart of the matter. Adam was to serve God as prophet by thinking,
speaking, and doing all things according to true knowledge to the glory of God
(1 Cor. 10:31), as priest by serving God and His people (Phil. 2:3-4),
and as king by ruling over creation wisely (Psa. 8:4-6; Heb. 2:6-8). When
we talk about the Covenant of Works this is what we mean. We mean that Adam was
to be Prophet, Priest, and King in God’s creation.
When the
LORD had Adam name the living creatures in Genesis 2:19 Adam was doing the work
of a prophet. When the LORD God took Adam and placed him in the Garden to tend
and keep it in Genesis 2:14, Adam was to do the work of priest. And, when the
LORD God told Adam in Genesis 1:28 to be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth
and subdue it, and to have dominion over the fish, birds, and every living
thing that moved on the earth, Adam was to do the work of king.
All of
this was to be done in obedience to God who had written His Moral Law in
positive terms on Adam’s heart when He created him (e.g., Rom. 2:15). So, we
see then that Adam, i.e., man, humanity, was to serve God by ruling creation
according to true knowledge. Man was to speak forth, as a prophet who subjected
himself to God’s Moral Law. He was to serve as a priest who subjected himself
to God’s Moral Law. He was to rule and have dominion as a king who subjected
himself to God’s Moral Law.
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So, we
see then that when Adam sinned, he sinned as Prophet, Priest, and King. Therefore,
if man was to be redeemed, His Redeemer would Himself need to be Prophet,
Priest, and King. But not only would He need to be Prophet, Priest, and King,
but He would actually need to fulfil the Covenant of Works made with man in the
beginning. And not only would He need to fulfil the Covenant of Works made with
man, He would also need to pay the penalty Adam incurred for breaking it!
So, we
see then that Jesus Christ had true knowledge of God while on earth. He
expounded God’s Law in the Sermon on the Mount, for example. And He applied it
to Himself and kept every jot and tittle of it perfectly. Therefore, He is the
True Prophet. And we see that Jesus Christ served God perfectly by loving the
multitudes, feeding and healing them. And He then went and offered up Himself
as a perfect sacrifice to God. Therefore, He is the True Priest – the Great
High Priest! And we see that He ruled wisely, for while on earth He was the
Servant King.
He taught His disciples true knowledge of God according to God’s Law. He is the True Prophet. He served God by serving His disciples according to God’s Law. He is the True Priest. And He ruled His disciples according to God’s Law. He always kept His disciples in check without lording it over them. Therefore, Jesus is the True King.
Christians
Prophets, Priests, & Kings in Christ
Now, what we need to grab hold of is that, yes, Christ did these things while on earth, by which we mean that did these things in His state of humiliation. But He also does these things right now from Heaven in His state of exaltation. How so? Well, He does it by getting you and me to keep God’s Law. In other words, we who have been redeemed by Him are now, by His Spirit working in and through us, keeping the Covenant of Works, which means that in Christ Jesus there is a sense in which we are prophets, we are priest, and we are kings.
We Christians are in the process of naming and claiming all things, not for ourselves, as does fallen and unredeemed man. But like Adam in the Garden before the Fall we are naming and claiming all things for God. This is our role as prophets of the Lord in the world. And, like Adam before the Fall, we are also tending and keeping God’s creation by caring for others and our environment. We pray for, and we reach out to, the lost. And if we can ease each other’s physical suffering, we do. This is our role as priests of the Lord in the world. And like Adam before the Fall, we strive to look after the wildlife of God’s creation. We rule over and have dominion of the fish, birds, and every living thing. We should be seeking to protect their environment. But we should never do so at the expense of human beings made in the image and likeness of God. This is our role as kings of the Lord in the world. But we must do all these things only in accordance with God’s Law.
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Then
there are all the multiple spheres of human society. We must operate as
prophets, priest, and kings in politics, education, religion, family, etc.
Whatever sphere we operate in we must do so according to God’s Moral Law.
God’s
Moral Law is what holds society together. God’s Moral Law is the building
blocks of society, any society. God’s Law is the glue that binds society
together. All societies ought to love God with all its heart, soul, strength
and mind, and love its neighbouring society as itself. Whether you’re in the
various aspects of society such as politics, business, family, religion,
education etc., every aspect of societies needs to be brought under the
authority of God’s Law. In a word, the Pre-Fall Covenant of Works must be
re-established in God’s creation. Or to put it another way, Jesus Christ has
repaired and renewed the broken Covenant of Works.
Whereas Arminian theology holds that man saves himself by personal obedience to God (such as exercising his own faith, and thus causing God to save him!), i.e., that it is our own obedience that provides our own salvation, we Calvinists believe that it is Christ’s salvation that provides our obedience, which is to say that our salvation comes first, then comes our obedience. And the obedience that comes from our redemption by Christ is our keeping of God’s Law (or Covenant of Works as per the Cultural Mandate, Gen. 1:27-28, 9:1-7). In other words, the Covenant of Works is still in force. It was never revoked. If it was revoked, then why did Christ bother to keep it while on earth? And now that He is in Heaven, He continues to keep it through His redeemed prophets, priests, and kings, including you and me.
Conclusion
With
these things in mind, with the exaltation of Christ and His offices of
Prophet, Priest, and King in mind, pay careful attention to Isaiah 2:1-4, “The
word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. Now it
shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord’s house
shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above
the hills; and all nations shall flow to it. Many people shall come and say,
‘Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of
Jacob; He will teach us, and we shall walk in His paths.’ For out of Zion shall
go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge
between the nations, and rebuke many people; they shall beat their swords into
plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift of sword
against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.”
Have you
beat your sword into a plowshare yet? Have you beat your spear into a pruning
hook yet? Have you started to tend and keep God’s creation the way Adam was
supposed to in the beginning? Of course you have! For by the grace of the
Sovereign Lord you’re a prophet, priest, and king!
Surely,
you’re not still rebelling against God’s Law – the same law that is going forth
out of Zion? Surely, you’re not still battling against the Word of the LORD
from Jerusalem? Surely, you’re not doing any of these things. Why not? Because
you now have true knowledge! And the guilt of your sin has been removed
– you are now holy! And you are no longer in bondage to sin – you are now
righteous!
We have a
wonderful Redeemer! And He has given us, His Church, a wonderful commission – a
Great Commission. Think about the words of the Great Commission in terms of
what we’ve looked at and you might be surprised! In Matthew 28:18ff,
Jesus says, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go
therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of
the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all
things I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of
the age. Amen.”
We’ve
considered something of the Westminster Shorter Catechism 23 where it asks: What
offices doth Christ execute as our Redeemer? To which it answers,
Christ, as our Redeemer, executeth the offices of a Prophet, of a Priest, and
of a King, both in His estate of humiliation and exaltation.
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