Is Jesus Your High Priest?
Good Morning Friends,
Today we have a scripture that is often used in preparation for Easter more so than Christmas and yet it is appropriate for this time of year for it give us hope. It is about the reason Jesus came to be with us and serves as the Great High Priest because he was the Son of God and would conquer death as a sacrificial lamb at atonement for our sins. Within the religion of the Jews, there was no more exalted position that could be held among men than that of the high priest. In the days of the New Testament, the office of high priest held significant power. He was the head of the Sanhedrin, the supreme court of Israel. But the most important task of the high priest took place on the Day of Atonement. It was on this day that the high priest would enter into the innermost part of the temple and make a sacrifice for the sins of the nation. So, Is Jesus Your High Priest?
Scripture: Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Hebrews 4:14-16 (NRSV)
This “King Melchizedek of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham as he was returning from defeating the kings and blessed him”; and to him Abraham apportioned “one-tenth of everything.” His name, in the first place, means “king of righteousness”; next he is also king of Salem, that is, “king of peace.” Without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God, he remains a priest forever. It is even more obvious when another priest arises, resembling Melchizedek, one who has become a priest, not through a legal requirement concerning physical descent, but through the power of an indestructible life. For it is attested of him, “You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.”
Hebrews 7:1-3, 15-17
Who has believed what we have heard? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by others; a man of suffering and acquainted with infirmity; and as one from whom others hide their faces he was despised, and we held him of no account. Surely, he has borne our infirmity and carried our diseases; yet we accounted him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
Isaiah 53:1-6 (NRSV)
Message: Sometimes I picture this scene in my mind. As the first rays of the morning sun break across the Mount of Olives, a priest standing on the Pinnacle of the Temple sounds the trumpet. This is the signal that the morning sacrifices are about to begin. Animals are sacrificed on the massive altar that stands before the Temple. In the presence of thousands of witnesses, the high priest slaughters these animals with a ceremonial knife. The court runs red with the blood of the slain animals. A portion of the blood is poured into a cup. At the appointed time, the high priest takes the cup and enters into the Temple. Passing through the outer doors, he finds himself in the Holy Place. To his left is a golden lampstand, casting its soft light through the room. To his right stands the table of shewbread. Before him is the altar of incense, its coals still warm from the morning offerings. Beyond the altar of incense is the great double veil. Normally no man is permitted to pass beyond the veil. But on this day, the high priest passes through the veil to enter into the Holy of Holies. Dominating this room is a single item. It is the Ark of the Covenant. It is a wooden chest overlaid with gold. It has a lid of pure gold. This lid is known as the Mercy Seat. On each end of the Mercy Seat is the golden figure of an angel, bowed inward and facing the center of the Mercy Seat. This Mercy Seat represents the throne of God. Here in the dim light of the Holy of Holies, the high priest sprinkled blood onto the Mercy Seat. In this way the High Priest provided an atonement for the sins of the people. But in Jesus we have something even better… the love of God… the example of a man who was tempted but did not sin. You see, Jesus Christ taught us how to love like no man has ever loved…to be tempted and face the temptation. He was full of compassion. He continuously extended grace when others were casting guilt. No one was hopeless. Every life mattered. He loved the prostitute as much as he loved the preacher. He said, “The Son of Man has come to seek and to save those who were lost.” And that is what he did. He sought out the lonely and the hurting, the destitute, the forgotten ones, the guilty, the hopeless, the rejects of society. And his love transformed them. Everywhere he went, Jesus changed lives. And everything good in our lives is because of Jesus. But his methods were unorthodox. People kept trying to squeeze him into a mold, and he was unwilling. He had obvious power. He could heal the sick, the deaf, the blind, the crippled, the diseased – it seemed his power was limitless. He performed miracles – he calmed a storm, turned water into wine, cast out demons – even raised the dead. But then he would confuse everyone after these awesome displays of power by saying things like, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” He claimed to be the Messiah, but about the time you’d expect him to put on a crown and take the throne, he’d pick up a towel and a bowl and wash his disciple’s feet. Listen, if there were an alternative way to God, Jesus would not have done what he did. If salvation could come any other way, you wouldn’t have seen Jesus dying on the cross. People want to invent their own methods of salvation. But if you’re planning on going to God’s heaven, then you’d better play by God’s rules. You know what God said, “There is no other name, under heaven, whereby you must be saved.” Thankfully in Jesus we have a High Priest with the authority to forgive us.
And So, do not make the same mistakes of departing from the living God, as did many before us. Realize that Jesus is the Great wounded warrior and realize that Jesus is still living as our High Priest and came to forgive us. Our faithful, sympathetic High Priest, even though gone from this earth, is still with us. We do not give up because He is physically gone. Jesus is even more effective where He is at, because He can now intercede for all and minister to all through the Holy Spirit. Jesus didn’t have to be a sinner to understand what it is like to live as a sinner in a fallen world. He tasted the horror of sin when on the cross, He was separated from His Father’s fellowship and bore the brunt of the curse of sin. In that “He tasted death” He tasted the wages of sin like no other could taste it. C.S. Lewis stated this in his book “Mere Christianity”: “A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. This is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. After all, you find out the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of the wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later. That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness. They have lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means — the only complete realist.”
Pray we go boldly to the throne of Grace. Pray we hold firmly to our faith. Pray we understand that the Law was a foreshadowing of what Christ would be and do. Pray we see Jesus woven throughout the entire scriptures. Pray we do not ignore, avoid and reason our way around a relationship with God. Pray we remember Jesus as the key to our relationship with the Father. Pray we honor Jesus out of love. Pray that we take time to draw closer to our Creator who knows our needs before we do. Pray we pause to remember Jesus as both priest and king and the maker of a better covenant. hold fast your confession by drawing near to Jesus with confidence. Praywe realize that the ceremonial laws were nailed to the cross with Jesus but that we might want to follow some of them in remembrance of Jesus.
Blessings,
John Lawson
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