One Mediator

Test the Teaching · Article 1 of 9 · 2026-11-01 · Key passages: 1 Timothy 2:1–6; John 14:6; Hebrews 10:19–22. Quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB); please check each one in your own Bible.

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Do I need someone between me and God? Many readers were taught that they do. Some were taught to ask Mary and the saints in heaven to pray for them, because their prayers carry a weight ours do not. Some were taught that God deals with mankind through one organization and the small group of men who lead it, so that a right relationship with God depends on recognizing that channel. Some were taught that Jesus himself is mediator only for a small class of believers, and that everyone else reaches God indirectly, through them.

This series tests teachings by the text. Here the text is not hard to find. Paul wrote to Timothy about prayer in the assembly, and in the middle of that instruction he set down, in one sentence, how many mediators there are and who he is. This article reads that sentence in its context, then reads what Jesus and the letter to the Hebrews say about coming to God. Where the teaching we test is stated in its holders' own words, we quote them. Where Scripture is silent, we will say so and stop.

Passages: 1 Timothy 2:1–6.

Read These First

• 1 Timothy 2:1–8: one God and one mediator.
• John 14:1–7: no one comes to the Father except through Jesus.
• Hebrews 4:14–16: draw near with boldness to the throne of grace.
• Hebrews 7:23–25: he always lives to intercede for them.
• Hebrews 10:19–22: boldness to enter, by his blood.
• Romans 8:31–34: Christ Jesus intercedes at God's right hand.

One God and One Mediator

What the text says. Paul begins with prayer. He exhorts “that petitions, prayers, intercessions, and givings of thanks be made for all men” (1 Timothy 2:1), “for kings and all who are in high places” (1 Timothy 2:2). This is “good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and come to full knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:3–4). Then he gives the ground of it all:

For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, the testimony at the proper time,

— 1 Timothy 2:5–6

A mediator is one who stands between two sides and brings them together. Notice the reach of Paul's own words in this one paragraph: prayer is made “for all men” (1 Timothy 2:1); God “desires all people to be saved” (1 Timothy 2:4); the ransom is “for all” (1 Timothy 2:6). The parties between whom the mediator stands are named in the verse itself: “between God and men” (1 Timothy 2:5). Passages: 1 Timothy 2:7–8.

What we conclude. Paul puts the two things side by side in one passage, and our conclusion is that he means two different things by them. Intercession is prayer offered to God for others, and Paul commands it of every believer (1 Timothy 2:1). Mediation is the standing between God and men that reconciles them, and Paul names one who does it: the man Christ Jesus, whose qualification is the ransom he gave (1 Timothy 2:6). The first is shared by the whole church. The second belongs to the one who paid it.

No One Comes to the Father Except Through Him

What the text says. Thomas asked Jesus, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going. How can we know the way?” (John 14:5). Jesus answered:

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through me.

— John 14:6

The letter to the Hebrews tells believers what that open way means for them:

Having therefore, brothers, boldness to enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by the way which he dedicated for us, a new and living way, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh, and having a great priest over God’s house, let’s draw near with a true heart in fullness of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and having our body washed with pure water,

— Hebrews 10:19–22

The command is addressed to the readers themselves: “let’s draw near” (Hebrews 10:22). The same letter commands the same approach at the throne: “Let’s therefore draw near with boldness to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace for help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:16). Under the law, one man entered the holy place once a year (Hebrews 9:7). In Christ, the way stands open to every believer. Passages: Hebrews 6:19–20; 9:24.

What we conclude. Our conclusion is that the access Hebrews commands is the believer's own. The letter does not tell its readers to come to God through a priest, through the departed, or through a body of men. It tells them to draw near themselves, with boldness, because the one mediator has opened the way with his own blood (Hebrews 10:19). A way that must be walked through another is not the way this letter describes.

He Always Lives to Intercede

What the text says. Paul asks, “Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, yes rather, who was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.” (Romans 8:34). Hebrews says of this same Jesus: “he is also able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, seeing that he lives forever to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). Notice the pairing in that verse: believers draw near to God through him, and his intercession is the reason the way holds — “he lives forever” (Hebrews 7:25), where the priests of the old order were “hindered from continuing by death” (Hebrews 7:23). John writes to believers who sin: “If anyone sins, we have a Counselor with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. And he is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the whole world.” (1 John 2:1–2). The advocate's standing rests on his sacrifice. Jesus also tells his disciples that their access is not reluctant on the Father's side: “In that day you will ask in my name; and I don’t say to you that I will pray to the Father for you, for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me, and have believed that I came from God.” (John 16:26–27). Passages: Hebrews 9:24; Romans 8:26–27.

What we conclude. Our conclusion is that the intercession Scripture places at God's right hand is Christ's, and that it is enough. The same chapter says that “the Spirit himself makes intercession for us with groanings which can’t be uttered” (Romans 8:26) — God's own Spirit, helping our weakness from within our praying; he is not a departed creature to be asked, and he gives no ransom. Believers are told to pray for one another here (James 5:16), and they are told who intercedes for them there (Romans 8:34). Scripture gives no instruction to ask anyone who has died to intercede for us; what it says about the dead is taken up in the objection below, and the silence itself is stated plainly under Questions Answered.

Leaders Serve the Flock; They Do Not Stand Between

What the text says. Hebrews commands real honor for leaders: “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they watch on behalf of your souls, as those who will give account, that they may do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be unprofitable for you.” (Hebrews 13:17). A few verses earlier the same letter says which leaders these are: “Remember your leaders, men who spoke to you the word of God, and considering the results of their conduct, imitate their faith.” (Hebrews 13:7). The mark of the leader is the word of God he spoke. Jesus guarded the same ground among his disciples: “But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi’, for one is your teacher, the Christ, and all of you are brothers.” (Matthew 23:8). “Neither be called masters, for one is your master, the Christ.” (Matthew 23:10). Passages: 1 Thessalonians 5:12–13; 1 Peter 5:1–4.

What we conclude. Our conclusion is that leaders have real authority — to teach, shepherd and correct by the Scriptures — and that their authority is bounded by the word they speak. Where a leader's teaching is Scripture's, it carries Scripture's weight. Where it goes beyond what is written, it does not bind (1 Corinthians 4:6; see Questions Answered, Teaching handed down outside Scripture). This article is written by people who thank God for their teachers. It tests only the claim that a leader, or a body of leaders, stands between the believer and God.

The Teaching We Differ From

The teaching this article tests is that someone stands between the believer and God: another besides the man Christ Jesus through whom the believer must come, ask, or be recognized. It is held in two forms, and we take them in turn.

The first form: the intercession of Mary and the saints. The Catholic Church teaches it in these words. Of Mary: “Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 969). She “is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 969). Of the saints in heaven: “They do not cease to intercede with the Father for us, as they proffer the merits which they acquired on earth through the one mediator between God and men, Christ Jesus…” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 956).

We share much with those who hold this form. The same Catechism guards its own teaching with words we gladly repeat: Mary's function “in no way obscures or diminishes this unique mediation of Christ” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 970), and “No creature could ever be counted along with the Incarnate Word and Redeemer” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 970). We confess that guard with them. We also share the practice underneath the teaching: believers are to pray for one another, earnestly (James 5:16).

Their answer to the one mediator is in the same paragraph, and we state it as they do: the mediation of Mary and the saints is not a rival set beside Christ's but a sharing in it — “the unique mediation of the Redeemer does not exclude but rather gives rise to a manifold cooperation which is but a sharing in this one source” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 970), as Christ's priesthood itself “is shared in various ways both by his ministers and the faithful” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 970).

We answer from the text both sides open. Scripture does share Christ's priesthood with his people: they are “a royal priesthood” (1 Peter 2:9). And it shares intercession among the living: “pray for one another” (James 5:16). What it never shares is the mediation itself, because it defines the mediator by the price he paid: he “gave himself as a ransom for all” (1 Timothy 2:6). The cooperation the Catechism describes is a cooperation Scripture does not describe: it nowhere directs the prayers of the living to the departed, and nowhere shows the departed hearing them.

Their verses are Revelation 5:8 and 8:3–4, read above under He Always Lives to Intercede, where the prayers of the saints are shown going up before God himself. Where Scripture speaks to the practice itself, our conclusion from its plain statements is that the dead know nothing (Ecclesiastes 9:5), and it gives no command, and no example, of asking the departed to pray for us. Our conclusion is that to ask another besides Christ to intercede with the Father for us is to seek a Counselor with the Father where Scripture names one: “we have a Counselor with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous” (1 John 2:1).

The second form: the appointed channel. Jehovah's Witnesses hold this form, and we state it in their own words. Their Bible dictionary, Insight on the Scriptures, teaches that Christ is mediator for those taken into the new covenant: “He mediates the new covenant between God and those taken into the new covenant, the congregation of spiritual Israel.” (Insight on the Scriptures 1). It gives their number: “The total number of those who are finally and permanently sealed is revealed in Revelation 7:4-8 as 144,000.” (Insight on the Scriptures 1). And it states the limit in one clause: his mediatorship “operates solely toward those in the new covenant” (Insight on the Scriptures 2). Their magazine, The Watchtower, names the channel on earth. The faithful and discreet slave “is made up of a small group of anointed brothers who are directly involved in preparing and dispensing spiritual food during Christ’s presence” (The Watchtower 10). And of that slave it says: “That faithful slave is the channel through which Jesus is feeding his true followers in this time of the end. It is vital that we recognize the faithful slave. Our spiritual health and our relationship with God depend on this channel.” (The Watchtower 2).

We share the starting point of those who hold this form: we take 1 Timothy 2:5 together, as the text both sides open. We share, too, the honor due to teachers (Hebrews 13:7), and we say plainly that many who hold this teaching preach Christ's ransom with zeal. And we share their own words for everyone outside the covenant: they “also pray to Jehovah God in the name of Christ, putting faith in the merit of his ransom sacrifice” (Insight on the Scriptures 3). “They, too, look to Jesus Christ as their great heavenly High Priest, through whom they can approach God and through whose ministration they can get forgiveness of sin.” (Insight on the Scriptures 3). We pray in Jesus' name, and we look to the same High Priest.

Their charter text is Jesus' parable, and we quote it in full:

“Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his lord has set over his household, to give them their food in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his lord finds doing so when he comes. Most certainly I tell you that he will set him over all that he has.

— Matthew 24:45–47

Read it where Jesus put it. It belongs to his call to readiness: “Watch therefore, for you don’t know in what hour your Lord comes.” (Matthew 24:42). It is spoken to servants about faithfulness, and it ends in warning, with the evil servant who beats his fellow servants (Matthew 24:48–51). Luke's telling begins with Peter's question — “Lord, are you telling this parable to us, or to everybody?” (Luke 12:41). Our conclusion is that Jesus answers with the steward's charge, laid on every servant: “To whomever much is given, of him will much be required” (Luke 12:48). Nothing in either telling names a year, a place, or a class of men; and nothing in the parable concerns mediation at all. Our conclusion is that the servant gives the household its food without standing between the household and its lord: the household's access to the lord is never made to wait on him.

The form's second argument is that mediator is a covenant word: Moses was the mediator of the law covenant for Israel alone, so Christ mediates the new covenant for its members alone. The text Paul wrote answers it in its own terms. He did not write of a mediator of the new covenant here; he wrote “one mediator between God and men” (1 Timothy 2:5) — and the paragraph around it says God “desires all people to be saved” (1 Timothy 2:4) and that the ransom was “for all” (1 Timothy 2:6). John says the same of the sacrifice itself: “not for ours only, but also for the whole world” (1 John 2:2). Our conclusion is that the breadth of the ransom fixes the breadth of the mediation.

A verse that rules out a teaching does not say that those who hold it are lost, and we do not say it either. Many who hold these teachings love the Lord Jesus and read their Bibles with care; some of us were taught by them, and one of us was inside the second form for fifteen years. We ask every reader to do with us what we ask throughout this series: open the text, read it in context, and keep what is true.

Questions Answered

These questions touch this article. Each is answered from Scripture and labeled. The Statement of Faith, section 15, gives the same answers.

The authority of church leaders and teachers. Our conclusion: leaders have real authority to teach, shepherd and correct by the Scriptures. No leader, council or church may bind a believer to anything Scripture does not teach (Matthew 23:8; Mark 7:7).

Jesus said: “But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi’, for one is your teacher, the Christ, and all of you are brothers.” (Matthew 23:8).

Read the other way: Hebrews 13:17; Matthew 16:19; 18:18; Acts 15:28; 2 Thessalonians 2:15. Confidence: Solid. The leaders of Hebrews 13 are those “who spoke to you the word of God” (Hebrews 13:7), and the binding of Matthew 18 is spoken over a discipline case (Matthew 18:15–18). The one council that laid a burden was the apostles' own; it agreed with the words of the prophets (Acts 15:15) and laid “no greater burden” (Acts 15:28) than necessary. Leaders’ duties and their limits are both plain; applying them case by case is our step.

Teaching handed down outside Scripture. Our conclusion: what the apostles taught binds every believer, by word or by letter, and that teaching is now held in Scripture. No later teaching, however old, binds a believer unless Scripture teaches it (1 Corinthians 4:6).

Paul wrote: “Now these things, brothers, I have in a figure transferred to myself and Apollos for your sakes, that in us you might learn not to think beyond the things which are written, that none of you be puffed up against one another.” (1 Corinthians 4:6).

Read the other way: 2 Thessalonians 2:15; 2 Timothy 2:2; John 21:25. Confidence: Solid. Paul himself warns of a claim “by word or by letter as if from us” (2 Thessalonians 2:2) and gives his own hand as the sign (2 Thessalonians 3:17); what Timothy heard from him was heard “among many witnesses” (2 Timothy 2:2), and the same letter sends its readers to the Scriptures that equip “for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16–17). John says the many other things Jesus did are unwritten, and that what is written is written “that you may believe” (John 20:31; 21:25). The apostles’ authority is plain; that none of it binds outside Scripture is our step.

Whether salvation depends on these questions. Our conclusion: salvation depends on believing the good news about Jesus and remaining in his teaching. It does not depend on settling every question in this document (John 8:24).

Jesus said: “I said therefore to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am he, you will die in your sins.” (John 8:24).

Read the other way: John 8:24; 1 John 2:23; Galatians 1:9. Confidence: Solid. John names the belief he requires: “that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God” (John 20:31). John’s denial is denying that Jesus is the Christ (1 John 2:22), and his test of teaching is the confession that Jesus Christ came in the flesh (2 John 7, 9). Galatians 1:9 curses a rival good news, not an unsettled question; Romans 14:1 shows that not every question divides.

What Scripture does not say. Scripture does not say that anyone who has died hears the prayers of the living, or carries them to God. It does not say that any council, organization or group of men is God's channel to mankind, or that a believer's relationship with God depends on recognizing one. It does not say that Christ is mediator for one class of believers and reaches the rest only through them. Where Scripture is silent, we do not build.

“The secret things belong to Yahweh our God; but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.” (Deuteronomy 29:29).

Where We Stand

Scripture says

• There is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all (1 Timothy 2:5–6).
• No one comes to the Father except through Jesus (John 14:6).
• Believers are to draw near to God themselves, with boldness, through the new and living way he opened (Hebrews 10:19–22).
• We may draw near with boldness to the throne of grace (Hebrews 4:16).
• Christ Jesus makes intercession for us at the right hand of God (Romans 8:34), and he lives forever to make intercession for those who draw near to God through him (Hebrews 7:25).
• If anyone sins, we have a Counselor with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous (1 John 2:1).
• Believers are commanded to make intercessions for all people, and to pray for one another (1 Timothy 2:1; James 5:16).
• The leaders to be remembered are those who spoke the word of God, and one is our teacher, and all of us are brothers (Hebrews 13:7; Matthew 23:8).

We conclude

• Our conclusion: mediation of access belongs to Christ alone. The intercession believers owe one another is commanded in the same passage that names one mediator, and it does not add a second (1 Timothy 2:1, 5).
• Our conclusion: no priesthood, no departed saint, and no organization stands between the believer and God (1 Timothy 2:5; Hebrews 10:19–22).
• Our conclusion: the faithful and wise servant of Matthew 24 is a charge to every servant's faithfulness, not the charter of a channel (Matthew 24:42–51; Luke 12:41–48).
• Our conclusion: leaders have real authority to teach, shepherd and correct, and it is bounded by Scripture (Hebrews 13:7, 17; 1 Corinthians 4:6).

Hope

The one mediator is not a barrier between you and God. He is the open way to him. Paul writes: “Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; through whom we also have our access by faith into this grace in which we stand.” (Romans 5:1–2). Access is not a favor granted to a class; it is what believers have, by faith, through Christ.

And the Father is not distant behind his Son. Jesus said of his disciples: “the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me, and have believed that I came from God.” (John 16:27). The invitation stands in the letter to the Hebrews, spoken to ordinary believers: “Let’s therefore draw near with boldness to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace for help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:16). If anyone sins, we do not go looking for another advocate: “we have a Counselor with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.” (1 John 2:1).

Living It Out

These are applications, offered as invitations.

• When you pray, you might come to the Father through Jesus in your own words, as Hebrews invites: draw near with a true heart (Hebrews 10:22).
• Ask a living believer to pray for you, and pray for them. That is the intercession Scripture commands and honors (James 5:16; 1 Timothy 2:1).
• If you were taught that you need a channel between you and God, consider reading 1 Timothy 2:1–6 and Hebrews 10:19–22 aloud, slowly, and asking who is named there.
• Thank God for your teachers, and test what they say by the text, as the Bereans did (Acts 17:11).
• Where you have confessed your sin to God, rest in his promise: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us the sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9).

Questions for Reflection

1. When you pray, to whom do you speak, and through whom do you come to God?
2. In 1 Timothy 2, what is to be made for all people, and who alone is named as mediator? (See One God and One Mediator.)
3. What does Hebrews tell believers themselves to do, and with what boldness? (See No One Comes to the Father Except Through Him.)
4. By what mark does Hebrews tell us to know the leaders we are to remember and imitate? (See Leaders Serve the Flock.)
5. How does Peter's question in Luke 12:41 bear on who the faithful servant is? (See The Teaching We Differ From.)
6. What does it mean for you that “the Father himself loves you” (John 16:27)? (See Hope.)

Check It Yourself

• The one mediator: 1 Timothy 2:1–8; John 14:1–7; 16:23–27.
• Draw near: Hebrews 4:14–16; 6:19–20; 7:23–25; 9:7, 24; 10:19–22; Romans 5:1–2; 8:26–27, 31–34; 1 John 1:9–2:2.
• Intercession, shared and single: James 5:16; Revelation 5:8; 8:3–4; 19:10; 22:8–9; Ecclesiastes 9:5.
• Leaders: Hebrews 13:7, 17; Matthew 23:8–10; Luke 10:16; 1 Thessalonians 5:12–13; 1 Peter 5:1–4.
• The teaching tested: Catechism of the Catholic Church 956; 969; 970; Matthew 24:42–51; Luke 12:41–48; Galatians 3:19–20.
• Answered: Statement of Faith, section 15; Matthew 23:8; 1 Corinthians 4:6; John 8:24; Deuteronomy 29:29.
• Hope: Romans 5:1–2; John 16:26–27; Hebrews 4:16; 1 John 2:1.

Next

Next in Test the Teaching: Jesus Is Not the Father, and Not One of the Angels. Is the Son the Father himself — or one of the angels?

Next article: Jesus Is Not the Father, and Not One of the Angels
Study guide: Study Guide: One Mediator
Series: All 9 articles in Test the Teaching

© 2026 Elvis Lucas, Open the Text. Original: https://openthetext.com/series/test-the-teaching/01-one-mediator/
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