Office business

I have often been confused by John Wesley’s admonition that Methodists preach Christ in all his offices. I knew the words “prophet,” “priest,” and “king,” but I was not sure what Wesley meant or what he was getting at.

Then today reading an excerpt from Joel Green’s book about reading Scripture like Wesleyans, I was led to this note from Wesley’s Notes on the New Testament:

It may be farther observed, that the word Christ in Greek, and Messiah in Hebrew, signify anointed, and imply the prophetic, priestly, and royal characters, which were to meet in the Messiah. Among the Jews, anointing was the ceremony whereby prophets, priests, and kings were initiated into those offices. And if we look into ourselves, we shall find a want of Christ in all these respects. We are by nature at a distance from God, alienated from him, and incapable of a free access to him. Hence we want a mediator, an intercessor, in a word, a Christ, in his priestly office. This regards our state with respect to God. And with respect to ourselves, we find a total darkness, blindness, ignorance of God, and the things of God. Now here we want Christ in his prophetic office, to enlighten our minds, and teach us the whole will of God. We find also within us a strange misrule of appetites and passions. For these we want Christ in his royal character, to reign in our hearts, and subdue all things to himself.

The priest closes the distance between God and ourselves and grants us access to God. The prophet teaches us the things of God and brings light to the darkness. The king bends our rebellious will and wild heart to the yoke of God. Here is what Wesley means by these offices. I must say, I would not have come up with those same three office descriptions on my own.

What an interesting discussion we could have just around these three offices and how Wesley helps us in our understanding and where we want to argue with him.