Intercession

“And he stood between the dead and the living, and the plague was stopped.” – Numbers 16:36

This is an incredible picture if ever there was one: Aaron, clad in the robes of the high priest, holding the censer with holy fire and incense (see Exodus 30), running into defilement and death, through over fourteen thousand corpses, to stand at the live front of the contagion. Standing between the living and the dead. Surely Aaron prefigures Christ: he loves his own people though they rejected and spoke out against him. He leaves a place of safety for uncleanliness and exposure to possible death. Even Moses could not go: only Aaron, the appointed high priest, could act out the very essence of what his office entailed, literally interposing himself between the deserved death of his people and the wrath of a holy God. 

Christ acted as our high priest through his incarnation and atoning death: but he also continues to intercede for us. “Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us” (Romans 8:34). “Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). He intercedes for us as our advocate (1 John 2), and also through his prayers for us (Luke 22:32, John 17).

“I’ll pray for you” has become over-spoken to the point of meaninglessness—a while ago, I decided never to say those words unless immediately followed by said prayer, lest I forget—but this notion is not a platitude for Jesus. He exists perpetually to make intercession for us. His work for us did not stop at the cross. He prays for us. And not only Jesus, but the Holy Spirit: “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (Romans 8:26). You would think if we didn’t know what to pray for, the Spirit would help by, well, telling us what to pray for—but he intercedes for us instead. He himself speaks for us.

I tend to think, and I’m constantly told, that I can speak for myself most of the time, but the truth is, I am beset by the plague of my pride and my sin. I don’t just need coaching; I need someone to speak for me. And that is what God does. I consider how encouraged I feel when I know or feel or hear someone praying for me, or acting on my behalf. I think, what does it mean to me that Jesus is advocating for me in the heavenly realms, right there before God? That the Spirit himself groans in intercession for me? That all of this happens now? How could I not feel deeply and undeservedly loved? I think of Aaron, who despite being around 100 years old is not walking, but running, into the plague. How could I not desire in Christ-like-ness to intercede for others with the same sense of fervency and love?