I Have Finished The Work

Everything our Lord Jesus Christ did as a man He did according to the will of God and for the glory of God. Throughout His ministry our Saviour constantly ascribed glory to God for all things; the miracles He performed, the doctrines He preached and for the mission of salvation and reconciliation upon which He was embarked. The Saviour was always obedient to His Father’s will and from a child was aware to be about His Father’s business. 

A heavy burden

Christ’s great work as the God-Man was to fulfil the terms of the covenant of grace; satisfy the righteous demands of the holy Lord God and accomplish restoration for His people from the effects of Adam’s sin. This was ‘the work’ that was given Him to do. To accomplish this He must be the Lamb of God without spot or blemish, a worthy and able sacrifice for sin. No other man or angel could accomplish this role, therefore it was given to Christ alone to secure the redemption and salvation of God’s elect people. 

Called to serve

The Saviour did not take the role to Himself but was called and appointed to it in the divine Council of peace. In His covenant duties and mediatorial office Jesus was a willing servant of God. He delighted to do His Father’s will. As very God and perfect Man He knew all things that should come upon Him and the abuse He must suffer. Though He knew what price must be paid for sin and what agony must be endured, He did not flinch from the role of Mediator. He finished His work. 

A worthy sacrifice

In this High Priestly prayer our Lord affirms His successful completion of all His Father’s will together with every duty and obligation of His mediatorial role. In His human nature, in His own body, our Saviour fulfilled all righteousness, satisfied every divine requirement of God and obtained complete atonement for His church. He was a worthy sacrifice. He glorified His Father supremely in His death by carrying away the sin of God’s elect in accordance with the divine will.

A successful Saviour

Now, on the eve of His crucifixion, the Saviour claims His rightful glory for accomplishing His task. He says, ‘I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do’. By His sacrifice and death Christ defeated death and set at liberty all death’s captives for whom He suffered. He destroyed Satan’s realm and purchased salvation by His own precious blood. He delivered His Bride and Body, the Church. He pleased His Father, satisfied justice and honoured God’s grace.

The Victor’s Prize

Upon this basis the Lord Jesus claims His crown of office and all the rights of God’s covenant promise. The work finished, Christ looks to the consequences as agreed upon in the divine councils and under the Covenant settlements of grace and peace. The glory sought by our Saviour was originally given to Christ as the God-Man Mediator when He stood forth as Surety for His people and assumed responsibility for our deliverance, even before the world began. It was His own glory before He ‘made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men’. 

The settlement of grace

The ‘settlement of grace’ was the joy set before the Lord Jesus Christ in eternity and for which our beloved Saviour ‘endured the cross, despising the shame’ in order to bring many sons to glory. His duties accomplished, His victory complete, it is Christ’s glory to be ‘set down at the right hand of the throne of God’, reigning forever as the mighty King in His Kingdom, the everlasting Father over His own house, and Head of His body the church. 

Glorious with the Father

The glory the Lord sought was not only from the Father but with the Father, glorify me ‘with thine own self’, as the Lord explains it. This does not mean Christ sought the Father’s glory. He always possessed the divine glory as the eternal Son, co-equal with the Father and the Holy Ghost. The glory requested is uniquely the glory of the God-Man upon completion of His work. He ‘sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they’.

The job done

This request of the Lord Jesus confirmed to His disciples, and to us, that nothing can be added to the work given to Christ and finished by Him. Nothing can enhance His work or withstand the efficacy and power of His blood. His sacrifice cannot be frustrated. It has already accomplished and secured all the covenant promises of grace. In His High Priestly prayer, in the presence of His disciples, the Lord speaks of His work as finished and complete because the time was come to finish it and He was sure of its accomplishment and success. 

Amen.