Christ alone, glory to God alone

One mediator

The last lesson showed that salvation is a gift of grace received by faith. But what does faith take hold of? Not an idea or a feeling, but a person. Every gift of grace comes wrapped in one name.

For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all

1 Timothy 2:5-6

The word is mesitēs (μεσίτης), a go-between who stands between two estranged parties and brings them together. Matthew Henry puts it simply: "Sin had made a quarrel between us and God; Jesus Christ is the Mediator who makes peace" Matthew Henry. The Heidelberg Catechism asks what kind of mediator we need, and answers: one who is truly human and perfectly righteous, and yet stronger than every creature, that is, one who is also truly God; and that mediator is our Lord Jesus Christ Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 15–18. Only one who belongs to both sides can join them.

So Peter could say, "Salvation exists in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12), and Jesus himself, "No one comes to the Father except through Me" (John 14:6). Augustine explains that the Word, who is truth and life with the Father, became the way by taking our nature, and then urges: "Walk by the Man, and you will arrive at God" Augustine. What this means for neighbours of other faiths is taken up in Is Jesus the only way?

The Westminster Confession teaches that God, in his eternal purpose, chose and ordained his only Son "to be the Mediator between God and man, the Prophet, Priest, and King, the Head and Saviour of His Church" Westminster Confession 8.1. The Heidelberg Catechism likewise confesses him our chief Prophet and Teacher, our only High Priest, who by the one sacrifice of his body has redeemed us, and our eternal King Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 31. The three offices are the subject of a lesson in the Christian Doctrine course; here we look at what Christ's priesthood means for ‘Christ alone’.

Once for all

Day after day every priest stands to minister and to offer again and again the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this Priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, He sat down at the right hand of God. … because by a single offering He has made perfect for all time those who are being sanctified.

Hebrews 10:11-14

Just before this, Hebrews says we have been sanctified "through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all" (Hebrews 10:10). ‘Once for all’ is ephapax (ἐφάπαξ): one time, enough for ever. The old priests stood, because their work was never done; Christ sat down, because his was finished, as he said on the cross: "It is finished" (John 19:30). And he still "always lives to intercede for them" (Hebrews 7:25). Matthew Henry marks the difference: "Under the new, one Sacrifice is enough to procure for all nations and ages, spiritual pardon" Matthew Henry.

The Heidelberg Catechism draws the conclusion. He is called Jesus, Saviour, because he saves us from our sins, and because salvation is not to be sought or found in anyone else (Q. 29). Those who seek their salvation and welfare from saints, from themselves or anywhere else may boast of him in words, but in deeds they deny the only Saviour. For one of two things must be true: "either Jesus is not a complete Saviour", or those who receive him by true faith must find in him all things necessary to their salvation (Q. 30) Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 29–30. This is not a threat but an invitation. Everything is already in Christ; there is nothing we need to add.

Catholic and Orthodox Christians also confess Christ as the one mediator and his sacrifice as offered once for all. The differences lie in three places, and each tradition should be heard in its own terms. Both churches ask Mary and the saints to pray for them. They do not seek salvation from the saints, they explain, but ask their prayers much as we ask fellow believers to pray, since those who have died in Christ are alive in him; this does not replace Christ's mediation. The Catholic Church teaches that Mary's role as mother depends wholly on Christ's mediation and takes nothing from it Catechism of the Catholic Church, and the Orthodox honour her as Theotokos, the one who gave birth to God. And the Catholic Church teaches that the Mass is one and the same sacrifice as the cross: the same Christ is offered, now without the shedding of blood, and only the manner of offering differs Council of Trent, Decree on the Sacrifice of the Mass, while the Orthodox likewise speak of the Eucharist as a holy offering in which the church shares in Christ's one sacrifice.

The Reformed honour Mary as the one all generations call blessed (Luke 1:48). But with the Westminster Confession they offer worship and prayer to the triune God alone, "not to angels, saints, or any other creature", and "nor in the mediation of any other but of Christ alone" Westminster Confession 21.2. They receive the Lord's Supper as a remembrance and seal of the one sacrifice, the subject of The Supper: Christ's spiritual presence.

Glory to God alone

The last sola is where the others meet. If salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, then no room is left for our boasting: "Let him who boasts boast in the Lord" (1 Corinthians 1:31). Paul ends his long reflection on God's saving purposes with praise:

For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever! Amen.

Romans 11:36

Matthew Henry: "if all are of Him, and through Him, all should be to Him, and for Him" Matthew Henry. The psalmist prays, "Not to us, O LORD, not to us, but to Your name be the glory" (Psalm 115:1). Ephesians 1 sings of salvation with a refrain that comes three times: we were chosen "to the praise of His glorious grace" (Ephesians 1:6), we who hoped in Christ were to be "for the praise of His glory" (Ephesians 1:12), and the Spirit is the pledge of our inheritance "to the praise of His glory" (Ephesians 1:14). Many readers hear in these verses the work of the Father, the Son and the Spirit in turn.

God's glory does not compete with our joy. The Westminster Shorter Catechism begins: "Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him for ever" Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q. 1, a question explored in Man's chief end. Nor is that glory confined to church. "Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God" (1 Corinthians 10:31), and Matthew Henry calls this "the great end of all religion" Matthew Henry. Johann Sebastian Bach often wrote ‘S.D.G.’, Soli Deo Gloria, at the end of his scores.

The Reformers used each of these phrases in their own ways, but gathering them as ‘the five solas’ is a much later summary, which became common in the twentieth century. It is still a faithful one. Scripture shows us Christ; grace gives us Christ; faith receives Christ; and all of it is to the glory of God.

Practice