“...And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous;” 1John 2:1
At this time of the year our attention is often riveted on Jesus, God incarnate as a babe in the manger. We rightly sing carols about this miraculous event which lauds and extols the name and person of Jesus Christ, God’s only begotten Son.
But over the next few weeks I want to take your minds to other aspects of why Jesus was born. He was born to become our advocate, our attorney.
As we know an advocate is one who comes to another’s aid to plead their cause before a court or a judge. The one charged of a crime is totally dependent on his or her ‘brief’ or advocate. The advocate speaks on their client’s behalf in order to have their conviction removed or the penalty for the crime reduced.
Jesus was not only born to die, He was born to be our advocate.
Don Fortner in his book The Sinners Advocate says this Of Jesus; “He is a lawyer to plead our cause in court. The judge with whom our Advocate pleads is His Father and ours. A crime is urged against us, deserving the sentence of death. Now it is the place of our Advocate to plead for His clients. Behold, Jesus Christ, the sinner's Advocate, as He pleads our cause in heaven.” [Grace quotes]
Of course we understand that the charge held against us is our sin and unrighteousness of which we all are guilty. Our advocate does not and cannot plead our innocence, nor does he plead leniency owing to any special circumstance. Such was our hopeless case before God.
This is what he does. He pleads before God His own righteousness that has been imputed to us; that now covers us. Therefore sin and unrighteousness cannot be held against us. Jesus our Saviour was born to become our advocate!