What is the value of Christ’s life for our salvation (as distinct from His atoning death on the cross and resurrection from the grave)? Did it do more than provide us with the example we are to follow as Christians?
One of the critical issues from the outset, is that only a Mediator can do the work of mediation. Because we were alienated from God by sin, we needed someone who could come between God and ourselves and bring us back to Him. We needed a mediator who could represent us to God and represent God to us. There is only one person who has ever fulfilled that requirement: Jesus Christ…fully God and fully man.
Jesus Christ fulfilled three key offices: That of Prophet, Priest and King. While some aspects of Jesus Christ as Priest were fulfilled in his life (namely his prayer, intercession, and blessing of believers), the significant aspects of this role were fulfilled in his atoning sacrifice on the cross on our behalf. Similarly, while Christ was certainly referred to as a King during his life, the roles of King are fulfilled through the resurrection where he is now seated on the throne in heaven. However, his role as Prophet was fulfilled mostly in his life on earth.
Christ as Prophet revealed God the Father to us (Jn 14:9). Jesus also proclaimed the gospel of redemption to us and called the world to salvation. He was our teacher and our lawgiver, just like OT prophets, but Christ taught freedom from the Law and trust in him alone for righteousness. He fulfilled this role through words (Mt 7:28-29), deeds (Jn 10:25), and the example of his life (1 Pet 2:21-23).
However, Christ’s life was much more necessary than that of setting an example for us. Christ’s life was necessary for us in his active obedience. If Christ had only earned forgiveness of sins for us (through his priestly role), then we would not merit heaven. Our guilt would have been removed, but we wouldn’t have righteousness; our condition would have been no different than that of Adam and Eve before they had done anything good or anything bad and before they had passed a time of probation successfully. In order for Adam and Eve to have been established in righteousness forever, and to have their fellowship with God made sure forever, they would have had to obey God perfectly over some period of time. Whenever that time was completed, God would have looked on their obedience with delight and they would have lived with him forever. This obviously did not happen.
Therefore, Christ had to live a life of perfect obedience to God in order to earn righteousness for us. He had to obey the law perfectly his whole life in order to achieve the positive merits of obedience for us. Paul says that his goal is that he may be found in Christ, not having a righteousness of his own based on the law but that which is through faith in Christ (Phil 3:9). Paul knows that we don’t just need a moral neutrality, but rather a positive moral righteousness. Some say that Christ living a perfect life wasn’t necessary, that he only needed to die for our sins. On the contrary, Christ living a righteous life became our righteousness. It was imputed to us. We needed not only Christ’s sinlessness but his righteousness. If we only needed sinlessness, then Christ’s life was unnecessary and he could have died at an early age. We need a record of obedience as well as righteousness…both are only obtained by the work of Christ.
Christ fulfilled righteousness in his active obedience, but he also lived a life of passive obedience. He submitted himself to the works of the Law, the penalty of the Law and all limiting conditions of human existence while under the Law. Additionally, he submitted himself to temptation to overcome the desire for comfort, to submit himself to temptation to exercise divine power disobediently, and submitted himself to the temptation of idolatry. In all of these ways, he fulfilled the Law perfectly for us.
Christ’s life also fulfilled his role as Priest in that he took on the sufferings necessary to pay the penalty for our sins. Christ suffered his whole life not only in temptation and grief, but also in the pain of the cross: both the physical pain and death, but also the pain of bearing sin. Christ also felt the abandonment that sin and guilt cause, he had to do it all alone. Not only the abandonment but, Christ also solely bore the wrath of God. He did all of this voluntarily, innocently, and purposefully.
So Christ’s life did have a very necessary role in our salvation. He fully accomplished our righteousness in his active obedience and fully paid the penalty of our sins in bearing the wrath that was due us to the very end, exhausting God’s wrath on our behalf.
