First, What doth the apostle mean here by ‘save’—‘He is able to save them.’
To ‘save’ may be taken two ways. In the general, I know it may be taken many ways, for there are many salvations that we enjoy; yea, that we never knew of, nor can know, until we come thither, where all secret things shall be seen, and where that which has been done in darkness shall be proclaimed upon the housetops. But I say there are two ways that this word may be taken—1. To save in a way of justification. 2. Or to save in a way of preservation. Now, Christ saves both these ways. But which of these, or whether both of them are intended in this place, of that I shall tell you my thoughts anon; meanwhile, I will show you,
1. What it is to be saved in the first sense, [namely, in a way of justification,] and also how that is brought to pass.
To be saved is to be delivered from guilt of sin that is by the law, as it is the ministration of death and condemnation; or, to be set free therefrom before God. This is to be saved; for he that is not set free therefrom, whatever he may think of himself, or whatever others may think concerning him, he is a condemned man. It saith not, he shall be, but, he is condemned already. (John 3:18) The reason is, for that he has deserved the sentence of the ministration of condemnation, which is the law. Yea, that law has already arraigned, accused, and condemned him before God, for that it hath found him guilty of sin. Now he that is set free from this, or, as the phrase is, ‘being made free from sin,’ (Rom 6:22); that is, from the imputation of guilt, there can, to him, be no condemnation, no condemnation to hell fire; but the person thus made free may properly be said to be saved. Wherefore, as sometimes it saith, we shall be saved, respecting saving in the second sense, or the utmost completing of salvation; so sometimes it saith, we are saved, as respecting our being already secured from guilt, and so from condemnation to hell for sin, and so set safe, and quit from the second death before God. (1 Cor 1:18, Eph 2:5)
Now, saving thus comes to us by what Christ did for us in this world, by what Christ did for us as suffering for us. I say, it comes to us thus; that is, it comes to us by grace through the redemption that is in Christ. And thus to be saved is called justification, justification to life, because one thus saved is, as I said, acquitted from guilt, and that everlasting damnation to which for sin he had made himself obnoxious by the law. (1 Cor 15:1-4, Rom 5:8-10)
Hence we are said to be saved by his death, justified by his blood, and reconciled to God by the death of his Son; all which must respect his offering of himself on the day he died, and not his improving of his so dying in a way of intercession, because in the same place the apostle reserveth a second, or an additional salvation, and applieth that to his intercession, ‘Much more then, being now,’ or already, ‘justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him’; that is, through what he will further do for us. ‘For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much more, being reconciled,’ that is, by his death, ‘we shall be saved by his life,’ his intercession, which he ever liveth to complete. (verse 9,10)
See here, we are said to be justified, reconciled already, and therefore we shall be saved, justified by his blood and death, and saved through him by his life.
2. Now the saving intended in the text is saving in this second sense; that is, a saving of us by preserving us, by delivering of us from all those hazards that we run betwixt our state of justification and our state of glorification. Yea, such a saving of us as we that are justified need to bring us into glory. Therefore,
When he saith he is able to save, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession, he addeth saving to saving; saving by his life to saving by his death; saving by his improving of his blood to saving by his spilling of his blood. He gave himself a ransom for us, and now improves that gift in the presence of God by way of intercession. For, as I have hinted already, the high priests under the law took the blood of the sacrifices that were offered for sin, and brought it within the veil, and there sprinkled it before and upon the mercy-seat, and by it made intercession for the people to an additional way of saving them; the sum of which Paul thus applies to Christ when he saith, ‘He can save, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession.’
That also in the Romans is clear to this purpose, ‘Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died.’ (Rom 8:31-39) That is, who is he that shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect to condemnation to hell, since Christ has taken away the curse by his death from before God? Then he adds, that there is nothing that shall yet happen to us, shall destroy us, since Christ also liveth to make intercession for us. ‘Who shall condemn? It is Christ that died; yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.’