July 12 Sermon: Our Great High Priest

As we look at Hebrews 4:14-5:10 consider these questions:

1. How does the author of Hebrews emphasize the significance of Jesus as the Great High Priest in relation to the sacrificial system and the eternal nature of His priesthood?

2. What does the author mean by stating that Jesus "learned obedience through what he suffered"? How does this concept contribute to the understanding of Jesus as the perfect high priest?

3. In what ways does the once-and-for-all sacrifice of Jesus challenge the traditional understanding of priesthood and sacrifices in the Old Testament? How does this impact the Christian's approach to faith and salvation?

Transcript:

There are several television shows that will help you to understand a job better. Everything from Undercover Boss to How to It’s Made gives you insight in to what it is really like on the ground doing some jobs that you’ve been curious about. Another show like this is Dirty Jobs. I think I’ve only ever watched one episode but it was insightful. If I remember correctly there was an episode about a unique dirty job that was less than 20 miles from my home at the time and there was some talk about our area being featured and so I tuned in. On South Bass Island in Lake Erie the host of Dirty Jobs, Mike Roe, took on the role of Snake Researcher. On my list of desired jobs snake researcher would probably be on the bottom of the list. To do this dirty job he had to clean out sea weed in the harbor and then feed the water snakes. He was supposed to catch them but in trying to do so they spent a lot of time chewing on him. I was rather fascinated by the whole thing. I only went to South Bass Island once and I can’t remember if it was before or after this episode of Dirty Jobs aired in 2006 but regardless. This was a job that was being done someplace not far from home and I would have known nothing about it without the investigation that went on through this program. You could go to South Bass Island, pull into the harbor, eat at a restaurant, drive a golf cart around the island, and even go to the top of the 350 foot tall Perry’s Victory monument and you would not have known anything about the work that was being done there.

‌As we think about our passage for this morning I am drawn to this idea in two ways. First, the passage calls Jesus our Great High Priest. Do we even think about Jesus in those terms? And along those same lines, do we even know what a priest does? We don’t live in the same world the Biblical authors did. We likely hear the word priest and probably have a more pastoral idea behind the title. The truth is that a priest is one who oversees and administers a sacrifice. Talk about a dirty job, right? As we continue our journey through the book of Hebrews this morning we are going to see that this idea of Jesus as our high priest and what that entails is vital to our understanding of the Christian faith.

‌As we dig into this great passage this morning we are going to use three points as our framework for breaking it down for us as we hope to understand it better and apply it to our lives.

‌The first important thing that we are going to see is that Jesus is able to sympathize with us because he took on human flesh. We have seen this before in the book of Hebrews. When we talk about Jesus we are not talking about a being out there someplace in the abstract. Jesus addresses our human needs not off somewhere in the mystical. Jesus addresses our need here on earth in our very own flesh and because of this we can confidently go before God and know that he will help us in our time of need.

‌Secondly, he is greater than any high priest. The high priests in the Old Testament were sinful humans and so they not only had to offer sacrifice for others but they also had to present gifts and sacrifices for themselves. Jesus offered himself as a perfect, once and for all sacrifice and that is so much better than any other sacrifice that has ever been given.

‌Finally, we will see that this office is eternal. Through his obedience, even in suffering, he is the eternal source of our salvation. This is good news for us. There is not a need for a continual sacrifice. Instead, the one sacrifice for our sins in Christ is sufficient for the forgiveness of all of our sins.

‌We start off today then with the conclusion to chapter four in verses 14 through 16.

‌Our first point today is that Jesus is able to sympathize with us and we start with the idea of the ascension front and center for us. Jesus, our great high priest has passed through the heavens. The idea being pointed out to us is that Jesus was raised from the dead and ascended to the right hand of the Father. This is an important idea because it means that there is something important going on. When we talk about the work of Jesus for us, it is essential that we understand the eternal nature of it. If Jesus was merely a teacher who was cut down in his prime and he stayed in the tomb then what in the world are we doing here today. There are plenty of things that we could be doing that would be a far better use of your time. But that isn’t the story of who Jesus is. He was crucified for our sins but death could not hold him and so he rose again from the dead. Now, he has ascended on high and he reigns. Very important plot point and it is the reason that the church has survived and thrived for nearly 2000 years. The faith that we believe and confess is rooted in the one who reigns on high.

‌In our lives we have many ideas that we hold to. Some stronger than others. I believe that if someone were to come to us with some information that disproves something we would be open minded but the truth of the matter is that we hold to these things pretty strongly right. We are going to be resistant to things if it doesn’t match up with how we see the world. This is even more true if it is something that we know to be absolutely true and it is connected with an authority. We hold strongly to these things because this gives us a deep conviction. We might be able to be persuaded on why something relatively insignificant isn’t worth holding to but when something really matters and we feel strongly about it, those become the hills that we are willing to die on. Those convictions are what really root and ground us and make us who we are.

‌And so the author of Hebrews wants us to root our lives and the way we understand the world in Jesus. He has not only died and rose again but he has passed through the heavens. This makes him the absolute authority. Remember, the book of Hebrews is written to people who are thinking about stepping away from the faith and returning to their Jewish, ritual roots. Instead of doing that they are encouraged to hold fast to the confession they have in Jesus. He has risen and is ascended. If that happened, and it did, then why in the world would we trust anyone else. Why would we go back to something else? So, hold fast they are told. Stick to the truth of the gospel. The Christian life is like a sailboat. You need the truth of the rudder to sail straight and that rudder is the truth of scripture that shows us who Jesus is and what he did. The Holy Spirit comes along and is the wind that fills our sails. It builds up our faith and pushes along but we need that strong rudder that is the truth of who Jesus is.

‌And the author of Hebrews continues to build on why they should trust in Jesus and why he should be the reason they hold fast to their confession. He isn’t a high priest who doesn’t understand the perils of the little guy. Again, Jesus is not a mystical, out there somewhere savior. He is the savior who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses. And so notice the progressions used by the author here. Jesus is exalted and he passed through the heavens but it isn’t just in that space that he has shown us his love. He is able to sympathize in our weaknesses because he was here. He was tempted in every way as we are, yet didn’t succumb to temptation.

‌And this truth leads to a very practical application. We can go to the throne of grace with confidence because we have a God who is rich in mercy. Not only does he understand our struggles but he endured them on our behalf. If God, in Christ endured all that for his people, then he most assuredly hears our prayers. What Jesus did for us was so that we would have access to God and we are going to see this as we move on to the next section of our passage today and see that Jesus is greater than any high priest.

‌As I said before it is important that we understand what a priest is. They oversee a sacrifice. It was a bloody job. The sacrifices were the means by which people could go before God. Our sinfulness kept us from a holy God. Remember back to the garden. The punishment for sin was death but God, in his great mercy, allows the death of an animal to cover the punishment for sin, but that was temporary. If you’ve ever read the book of Leviticus you see this on full display. The sacrificial system was to show the need that the people had to be made right with God. But, not every person was a priest. You didn’t just go out and sacrifice an animal on your own after you sinned. That wasn’t how it worked. The high priest had a specific job to do and as we see here in verse 1 of chapter 5 the high priest was appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God. They were the ones who offered gifts and sacrifices for the sins of the people.

‌But we see here that there is a problem with this arrangement. Yes, the high priest can understand those who are wayward or are ignorant of their sin because he is weak and a sinner too but therein lies the problem. He needs to offer a sacrifice for himself because he hasn’t loved the Lord his God will all his heart, mind, soul, and strength and hasn’t loved his neighbor as himself. He needs the blood to be spilled for him too.

‌You see the problem here. You see that we need someone greater if this problem is ever going to be solved once and for all. We need more than just a high priest. We need a great high priest who is like us but doesn’t need to have his sins forgiven. We need one who is like us in every way but without sin. You see the flow of the argument here. We need Jesus to be our great high priest but wait, there is a problem. Jesus isn’t a Levite. According to the law the priests are Levites but we know from all the prophecies of the Messiah and from what the New Testament shows us in the genealogies of Jesus that he is from the family of Judah. So how could he be what we need?

‌This is why the passage says no one takes up this honor himself. The author of Hebrews is letting us know that God appointed Jesus to this office. When it says Christ did not exalt himself to be made high priest it means that this wasn’t a usurping of the office of high priest but it was the intent of almighty God.

‌So, once again we get quotations from the Old Testament. We see that Jesus is the Son of God and we see another quote from the Psalms but this one is new for us. You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. I’m not going to dig too deep into Melchizedek and not because it’s hard to say. We will see more of Melchizedek in the coming weeks in Hebrews and then we will meet Melchizedek when we return to the book of Genesis in a month or two to look at the life of Abraham.

‌In a nut shell, Melchizedek is a priest who comes out of nowhere in the book of Genesis. He shows up and is never heard from again. He is mentioned in the Psalms and here in Hebrews but otherwise we don’t know much about him. He is a priest that Abraham meets and gives a tithe to. Why it is important to what Hebrews is saying is because if he met Abraham it is before there were any Levites for there to be a priestly line from. You can’t have Levites without Levi.

‌The point is that there are priests who are appointed by God apart from being in the line of Levi. Melchizedek was a priest and he came out of nowhere and he continued to be a priest after he left the presence of Abraham. The author of Hebrews is saying that this is how Jesus is a priest. He is of a greater order of priests.

‌And we see as we conclude the passage and move to our final point that he is greater because he endured suffering. Ultimately he is greater because the sacrifice was himself.

‌We are going to see that all that Jesus has done for us is to provide his people with a salvation that is eternal and once and for all.

‌Once again we are reminded that this happened through suffering. Jesus was able to experience pain and suffering just as you and I do. He offered prayers and supplication just like we do. He cried out to God and shed tears just like we do. The suffering of Jesus was real. His death was not some sort of drama and just for show. It was very real. He was concerned about going to the cross just like you or I would be. His prayers were heard but he still had to endure the pain and suffering of the cross.

‌Now, there is one part of this idea of the suffering of Jesus that kind of sounds confusing here. He learned obedience through what he suffered. What does that mean? Well, even though we have read that Jesus was without sin it doesn’t mean that his life was easy. His struggle against temptation was real and yet Jesus stood in the face of temptation to abandon the plan of salvation and died for us.

‌The obedience of Jesus for you was not just in the temptation in the wilderness. It wasn’t the restraint he showed when dealing with those who would falsely accuse him. It was his entire life all the way to the point of willingly suffering and dying for your sin and unbelief.

‌And we read here that because Jesus was our perfect high priest he became the source of eternal salvation for those who obey him. We need to understand the significance of this. We get the idea of our salvation being once and for all but for the audience this book was written to it was profound. They were used to the idea of needing to offer continual sacrifices. They knew that they needed the blood of an animal to be shed regularly because their sin was great. Now, in the Lord Jesus Christ they had an opportunity to have something that they could trust in that would cover their sin forever. And again we can understand the plea being made to these people. Why would you leave the once and for all sacrifice of the Son of God for your sins? Why would you trust that the endless blood from lambs and goats can cover your sins when God the Son made a once and for all sacrifice for you?

‌Why would you rely on a high priest who needs a sacrifice for himself when you have a priest after the order of Melchizedek who is greater than anything you can imagine? The plea to these people is to remain faithful to the one who can really save you. Don’t leave him. Trust in him. He will not fail. He is your eternal source of salvation.

‌And while this is a message to some first century Hebrews who are having a crisis of faith it still applies to us today. As we saw previously in the book of Hebrews, the word of God is living and active and so it applies to all times and all people.

‌As we think back on this passage today we are going to consider one specific application for us this week. It is particularly important for us to remember as we return to the Lord’s table this morning. It has been a time of fasting for us. We have not celebrated the Lord’s Supper since May. As we remember what Christ has done for us today we remember that his work on our behalf was a once and for all sacrifice. We do not come to the table and believe that we are re-sacrificing Jesus every time. We trust in the once and for all nature of the work of Jesus on our behalf. We look to the suffering of Jesus and we are reminded that what he endured was for us.

‌We come to the table today not believing that what we eat and drink today is somehow saving us but that it is a means of grace by which God is at work in us to make us holy and conform us to the image of Christ.

‌And so, our application and challenge today is to remember this truth. What this means for us is a focus on the sufficiency of Christ. Is Jesus enough? Are we putting all of our trust in him alone? Do we really believe that what he has done for us is going to save us?

‌It is easy for us to say yes. But when it comes to the way we live our lives do we really mean it or are we constantly trying to add something to our faith? The state of our fallen hearts is to slip back into a belief that somehow I need to do more or to think that I somehow haven’t done enough. It is important that we reject this thinking.

‌And so the challenge for us is to daily put aside ourselves and instead take up our cross and follow Jesus. The reason we should do that is spelled out for us so clearly in this passage. He has done everything for us. Why would we turn to anything else? He has risen for us and passed through the heavens for us. Why would we think anything that we would do is better than that?

‌And so as we take these elements today may we remember the sufficiency of what Jesus has done for us and may that be what we rest in each and every day. In the face of hardship, the work of Jesus is sufficient. In the face of turmoil, the work of Jesus is sufficient. He is our great high priest and he is the source of our eternal salvation. May that be the truth that motivates you and gives you comfort each and every day.