The Greatest High Priest
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| "My Soul Is Sorrowful Unto Death" by James Tissot |
Every high priest chosen from among men is
appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and
sacrifices for sins. He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he
himself is beset with weakness. Because of this he is obligated to offer
sacrifice for his own sins just as he does for those of the people. And no one
takes this honor for himself, but only when called by God, just as Aaron was.
So also
Christ did not exalt Himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by Him
who said to Him,
“You are My Son,
today
I have begotten You”;
as He says also in another place,
“You are a priest forever,
after
the order of Melchizedek.”
In the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up
prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to Him who was able to
save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverence. Although He was
a son, He learned obedience through what He suffered. And being made perfect, He
became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey Him, being designated by
God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek (Hebrews 5:1–10).
Grace to you and peace
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!
From the CPH bulletin cover,
we read this summary of the theme of our service for this Fifth Sunday in Lent:
In humility, Jesus has
been exalted as our High Priest. He intercedes for us with the Father as the
one who can sympathize with our weakness, though He Himself is without sin (see
Hebrews 4:15). We have confidence that our prayers are heard because He is both
our perfect High Priest forever and the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Jesus
is the Greatest High Priest.
Before we consider the authority
and the work of Jesus as the Great High Priest and what that means for you and
me, we need to look at the authority and work of the high priest in the old covenant.
In the old covenant, every
high priest was “chosen from men” and “appointed “to act on behalf of men” to
deal with “the things for God.” The high priest was appointed by God “to offer
gifts and sacrifices,” which included all the public offerings presented each
day for God’s people (Hebrews 7:27) and each year on the Day of Atonement
(Hebrews 10:1-3) “for sins” (Hebrews 5:1).
In one respect, Israel’s
old covenant high priest was well-suited to make offerings for sins because he
himself was “beset with weakness,” the weakness of sin and its debilitating
effect on sinners (Hebrews 7:27-28). His own sin put him in the same place as
all other people since he was tempted just as they were. Because he himself had
sinned, he was in no position to condemn those who were “ignorant and wayward.”
He could deal with them as lost, like everyone who had lost their way on earth.
Yet, as God’s representative, he could also “deal gently” with them. He could
feel for them and suffer with them without either coldly distancing himself from
their plight or identifying with them so closely that he excused their sin to
minimize his own guilt.
Needing to deal with
his own guilt first so that he could minister to the people with a good conscience,
the high priest was obliged to make an offering for himself on “account of sins”
(Hebrews 5:3). While this was first done at his ordination (Exodus 29:10; Leviticus
8:14-17), it was also repeated each year on the Day of Atonement (Leviticus
16:6, 11-14). Having been cleansed of his own sins, he could then make
offerings for the people's sins.
A weak sinner himself rather
than a strong spiritual hero, the high priest could not under any circumstances
claim this high position before God and the people as an “honor” for himself
that he rightly deserved. But he received the honor only as a weak man who,
like Aaron, had been “called by God.” That divine call authorized him to do what
he could otherwise not do by his own authority, virtue and power: to offer
sacrifices to God on behalf of sin.
Like the high priests at
the old covenant temple, Jesus did not claim the office of High Priest for
Himself in His own right. Instead, God Himself glorified Him by placing Jesus
in that office, which happened at His exaltation (Psalm 110:1; Hebrews 1:3, 13;
8:1-2; 10:12).
Yet despite that
similarity, Jesus also differs from all previous high priests in five respects.
First, unlike all other
priests, Jesus is without sin (Hebrews 4:15).
Second, unlike them, Jesus
is not a son of Aaron but the Son of God.
Third, unlike them, Jesus
was not appointed by another man but by God Himself as God’s anointed Priest.
Fourth, Jesus did not
become High Priest by the enactment of God’s Law in the rite of ordination but by
God’s decree. Just as God had spoken the words from Psalm 2:7 that acknowledged
Him as His Son, God says the words from Psalm 110:4 that make Him High Priest.
Fifth, God’s decree,
announced prophetically in Psalm 110:4 and fulfilled at His exaltation, does
not make Him a temporal priest like Aaron and his successors but “a Priest forever,
after the order of Melchizedek.”
The appointment of
Jesus as High Priest was a process that began with God’s acknowledgment of Jesus
as His Son and was completed at Jesus’ enthronement with God. Since He was acknowledged
as God’s Son at His conception (Luke 1:35; cf. Matthew 1:20-23), the preparation
for His vocation as High Priest covered His whole earthly life. And since He
was acknowledged as God’s Son at His Baptism (Matthew 3:17; Mark 1:11; Luke
3:22; John 1:34), His whole earthly ministry prepared Him for His priesthood.
The reference to what Jesus did “in the days of His flesh” indicates Jesus’ entire
earthly life as His training for that eternal vocation.
The
use of the divine oracles from Psalm 2:7: “You are My Son, today I have begotten
You” and Psalm 110:4: “You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek”
are not to be just taken as prophetic announcements that have now been
fulfilled, but, as words spoken directly by God to His Son, part of His eternal
conversation with Him. They allow us to listen in on that conversation and hear
God addressing His Son with words that make Him an eternal Priest and acknowledging
Him as such.
In
Hebrews 5:7-8, we see the Son’s preparation for the office of High Priest. Even
though He was God’s eternal Son before His incarnation, He had to experience
the full extent of human weakness to be a truly sympathetic High Priest. So,
like the Israelite priests, Jesus experienced human weakness and suffering to
prepare Him to present offerings to God on behalf of the people.
The picture here is of
the Son as a student, an apprentice, and God as His teacher and wise Mentor. The
period of His apprenticeship, His human training for the priesthood, was “the
days of His flesh,” His human life on earth from His conception to His death.
His preparation for His vocation as High Priest involved a life of obedience to
God. He was educated in practical piety marked by “right reverence” for God (Hebrews
5:7).
That lesson in obedient
piety had two sides: a passive and an active side. The passive side was His “obedience”
in suffering. Jesus suffered all kinds of abuse, culminating in His trial and crucifixion.
He endured the penalty for sinners and the effects of their sins on their
victims. Even more than that, He suffered under the threat of “death” that lay
so heavy on all humanity.
Here, as in the Old
Testament and particularly the Psalms, “death” is not envisioned just as an
event that occurs at the end of human life but as a dark power that blights the
whole of human life, a tyrant that terrifies and enslaves humanity (Hebrews
2:15). This enemy is closely allied with the devil and his life-threatening
cronies (Hebrews 2:14).
The human experience of
suffering from the threat of death all too often leads to disobedience and
rebellion against God. The suffering of Jesus, however, trained Him in faithful
obedience to God. Thus, Jesus was “tempted in every way” as we are but “without
sin” (Hebrews 4:15).
Jesus’ passive
obedience in suffering death was matched by His active obedience in prayer.
Since only God was “able to save Him out of death” (Hebrews 5:7), He, as a man,
learned to pray for His deliverance from death and for all those who would be delivered
from it through Him (Hebrews 7:25). His whole life was a life of prayer,
something that was mostly hidden even from the eyes and ears of His disciples
but was manifest to them privately in the Garden of Gethsemane and publicly to
the world as He hung on the cross.
By claiming that Jesus “offered
prayers and supplications” to God throughout His human life, the teacher
surprisingly describes His praying as a sacrificial act by which He offered
Himself to God. He pictures Christ’s whole earthly ministry as prayerful, priestly
service. The terms used for His praying, “prayers and supplications, with loud
cries and tears,” covers all kinds of human needs, from the necessities of life
to refuge from enemies, from help in trouble to relief from deep distress. They
also cover all kinds of praying, from spoken petitions to full-bodied
supplication, from vehement cries to heartbroken tears.
The use of the language
from the psalms of lament implies that Jesus learned obedience in prayer by
making the Psalter His prayer book. As the perfect student of God’s Word and the
perfect man of prayer, Jesus was exemplary in His piety. He learned right
reverence for God in suffering. God, therefore, “heard” His prayer (Hebrews
5:7) and accepted it by raising Him from the dead (Hebrews 13:20).
By offering prayers to
God in His suffering and being “heard” by God (Hebrews 5:7), Jesus “learned
obedience through what He suffered” (Hebrews 5:8). This does not refer just to
His passion and death on the cross (Hebrews 2:9); it includes all the evil that
He suffered in His life on earth (Hebrews 12:3). His suffering was part of His
training, His preparation for the high priesthood. Jesus’ lesson in passive
obedience and the practice of active obedience prepared Him well for His
priestly office, which now revolves around His intercession for the salvation
of all people (Hebrews 7:25).
God raised Jesus from
the dead and enthroned Him as High Priest, bringing Jesus to the goal of His earthly
journey. The Son, sent from God as His envoy, comes back to God as the High
Priest of humanity.
The completion of Jesus’
journey reverses the situation in Hebrews 5:7-8. The obedience that He had
learned on earth He now requires of His disciples; the deliverance from death
that He had sought from God He now grants to those who follow Him; the
perfection that He had gained by His obedience He now offers to those who obey
Him.
By His deliverance from
the realm of death, Jesus “became the source of eternal salvation” for all His
disciples (Hebrews 5:9). The “eternal salvation” that God had promised to the
Israelites in Isaiah 45:17 is available not just to them but to “all who obey”
Jesus. That Jesus is “the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him "
(Hebrews 5:9) is a startling claim since the accent in the Scriptures is
usually on obedience to God and His Word. As High Priest, Jesus now speaks the Word
of eternal salvation to His disciples (cf. Hebrew 2:3; 12:25); they come near
to God through Him as their High Priest (Hebrews 7:25). What’s more, God
Himself put this stamp of approval on Jesus’ priestly work of mediation. God
designated Jesus a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.
Jesus’ perfect obedience
makes Him the perfect mediator between God and man. His entire person, with
both His divine and human natures, is involved in our salvation, His divinity
in making perfect satisfaction for the sins of the world and His humanity in
mediating between God and us. By His whole life of perfect obedience, He undoes
the ravages of original sin on our whole lifetime.
His perfect obedience
as both God and man is reckoned to us as our righteousness before God when we
trust in Him. So, through Him and His perfect obedience, we receive pardon and
reconciliation, adoption as God’s children and eternal salvation; through Him,
we share in God’s
righteousness and holiness.
Jesus
is the greatest High Priest. He prays for you—intercedes for you—even there in
the Garden before He sacrifices Himself on the cross for you. And He sacrifices
Himself on the cross so that He might rise and intercede for you before His
Father forever. He is the author, the source of your salvation because He has
completed it on the cross.
For Jesus’ sake, you
are God’s child.
For Jesus’ sake, God
wills only good for you.
For Jesus’ sake, God
hears your prayers and promises to answer them.
For Jesus’ sake, you
are forgiven for all your sins
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
Unless otherwise
indicated, all Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, English Standard
Version, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good
News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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