he consideration of
this fact would have saved the world from much vain speculation.

When Paul argues the importance of a mediator, it is not on the ground
that the Son loves us more than the Father, but on the ground that He
knows us by experience. "For we have not a high priest that can not be
touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but one that hath been in
all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us, therefore,
draw near with boldness unto the throne of grace." The fact that our
high priest, or intercessor, was "tempted in all points, like as we
are," is the reason why we may approach a throne of grace with
boldness. This boldness is simply a profound confidence based upon the
humanity of our mediator.

When we approach a throne of grace, conscious of sin and imperfection,
how little can we trust ourselves. We realize that we come empty-handed
before God. With the poet, each can sing:

"Nothing in my hands I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling."

We can plead no merit of our own. We have no legal claim on the
store-house of God's boundless mercy and love. But we remember that we
have a Friend; that this Friend has suffered the same trials and
temptations; that He knows by bitter experience just how we feel; that
He deeply sympathizes with us, and that He loves us with a devotion and
faithfulness beyond human experience or expression. Remembering this,
how can we feel otherwise than confident that an already loving Father
will hear our petitions in harmony with His will, and bless us as His
believing children? The efficacy of prayer, therefore, grows out of the
mediatorship of Jesus, and the confidence in prayer grows out of our
appreciation of the mediator and of His work. Hence a light
appreciation of the mediatorial work of Jesus leads to a prayerless
life.

Jesus Himself taught that there is no way of approach to the Father
except through Him. "I am the way, the truth and the life; no man
cometh unto the Father but by me." No man can approach God _in his own
name_. God does not look upon men in their own personality. He looks
upon them only _through their mediator_; and what He sees to commend,
is seen and commended only through, and on account of, their mediator.
In other words, God sees the mediator only, not them. Hence the man
that does not accept the mediator cuts himself off from God. He rejects
the only way of approach to God. He prevents God's considering his
case; for G