A dear friend asked me, "What is the difference between a surety and a guarantor?" Well, I knew about a surety, but wasn't quite certain about a guarantor. A guarantor, he said, cosigns a note, and when the person in debt has paid all they can and defaults on the loan, the guarantor is legally bound to pay the balance owed. A Surety, on the other hand, is one who assumes legal responsibility to pay when the indebted person has no ability to pay anything at all. Christ was not our Guarantor, He was our Surety. The Savior is referred to a being the "Surety of a better testament" (Hebrews 7:20). He did not agree to make up what His sinful people lacked, for we had no ability to make any contribution to the offended justice of God. In the covenant of grace He assumed full responsibility before God for the indebtedness of His chosen people; and in the fulness of time He came to completely remove the indebtedness by suffering the wrath of God in our stead. Do you see the wisdom of God in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ? "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; To declare, I say, at this time His righteousness: that He might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus" (Romans 3:24-26). He was not our Guarantor, He was our Surety, bless His holy Name!