By Danny Rush
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Hebrews 5
As you know, Hebrews, being a New
Testament book, was written after the life, crucifixion, and resurrection of
Jesus Christ. What we’re getting here in this first section of chapter 5 should
be to us a great joy in realizing that we don’t have the required works to get
to atonement that people did in the Old Testament. Our great high priest, Jesus
Christ, fulfilled the law and has made the final atoning sacrifice by which we
are given salvation. Through Jesus, we have a direct relationship with our
heavenly Father.
The writer of Hebrews starts chapter 5
in verse 1 by saying “For every high priest taken from among men is appointed
on behalf of men in things pertaining to God, in order to offer both gifts and
sacrifices for sins;”. There’s an important distinction being made here in that
this high priest is a MAN, an EARTHLY being. Contrast this with what we covered
last week in our study of chapter
4 in that “WE have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens,
Jesus the Son of God”. That’s chapter
4 verse 14.
Also of note is that an earthly high
priest is TAKEN from among men and APPOINTED on behalf of men in things
pertaining to God. The position of high priest wasn’t one that just any man could
hold. He had to be of the line of Aaron, or, TAKEN from the line of Aaron, as
it was ORDAINED by God, or, APPOINTED by God, and once in the position there
were strict guidelines to adhere to.
Just to mention a few…Leviticus
21:10-12 says, “The high priest, the one among his brothers who has had the
anointing oil poured on his head (remember just a few weeks back in Hebrews
1:9 when God says of Jesus, “You have loved righteousness and hated
lawlessness; therefore God, Your God, has anointed You with the oil of gladness
above Your companions.”) There’s some interesting writing by Charles Spurgeon from
way back in 1876 on this topic noting that the use of the term “anointed with oil”
is likened to the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on someone.
With that in mind, let’s start over
with these few verses from Leviticus, “The high priest, the one among his
brothers who has had the anointing oil poured on his head (was given the holy
spirit), and who has been ordained to wear the priestly garments, must not let
his hair become unkempt or tear his clothes. He must not enter a place where
there is a dead body. He must not make himself unclean, even for his father or
mother, nor leave the sanctuary of his God or desecrate it, because he has been
DEDICATED by the ANOINTING OIL (given the Holy Spirit) OF HIS GOD. I am the
LORD”, God says. Think of these cautions against defilement as being similar to
keeping your sacrificial lamb spotless and without defect.
A defective lamb would not be an acceptable
atonement, just as a defiled high priest would not be acceptable to come before
God. The penalty for doing so would be death. As you may know from Jewish
tradition, they would tie a rope to the high priest so that if he were struck down,
they could pull him out of that most holy part of the temple, the Holy of
Holies. Being that they themselves couldn’t enter or they’d be struck down
also.
Leviticus
21:16-17 goes on to say, “The LORD said to Moses, “Say to Aaron: ‘For the
generations to come none of your descendants who has a defect may come near to
offer the food of his God”.
So, let’s talk about the first high
priest…
God himself told Moses to appoint
Aaron (his brother) as the first high priest. This special role was to act as
mediator between the people and God. Once a year, the high priest entered the
Holy of Holies to offer gifts and sacrifices for sin. You see, this was where
the Ark of the Covenant was kept. And in the Ark of the Covenant was the inscribed
law, given to Moses directly from God the father. What better place to honor
God and make atonement for sin?
Entering the sanctuary, the high
priest took with him the blood of sacrificial lambs, to atone for the sins of
the people. This included himself as all MEN are fallible. For the ceremony, he
wore holy vestments that matched the materials that decorated the Holy of
Holies. I’ll let you look into Leviticus
16:1-34 for more description on this.
Although Scripture describes Aaron as
a holy man, he did have flaws. For example, he led the Israelites in
worshipping a golden calf instead of God. We see this in Exodus 32 when the Israelites,
feeling Moses was away for too long while he was up on the mountain talking
with God, asked Aaron to make them a new god. He took their golden jewelry and
made a golden calf for them. The golden calf was an idol that the people
worshiped instead of the one true God. This was just shortly after they all
entered into a covenant with God that they would keep His commandments, be his
people, "His holy representatives to the other nations of the earth”, and
He would be their God.
I bring this up because of verses 2-3
of Hebrews
5 which says of the earthly high priest, “he can deal gently with the
ignorant and misguided, since he himself also is beset with weakness; and
because of it he is obligated to offer sacrifices for sins, as for the people,
so also for himself.”
Aaron, had a moment of weakness in
succumbing to the wants of the people in making them an idol to worship. It was
moments of weakness such as this that disallowed him from being able to enter
the promised land. And along with Aaron, that whole generation of Gods own
people were disallowed from entering the promised land because of their disobedience
and unbelief. Hence the 40 years they wondered in the wilderness, giving time
for every one of that generation to perish, leaving their children to inherit
Gods promise, His rest. (11-day trip)
Man, on his own, is weak when faced
with temptation. This is no different even for a high priest. A human priest was
faced with all the same temptations and trials that any other man is faced with
and is therefore able to sympathize with human weaknesses. But this is exactly
why Jesus had to come as a man, to be tempted with all the things we’re tempted
with, to face all the trials we face. And to be an example for us, yes, but
even more than that, to be a GREAT HIGH PRIEST for us that we recognize can
fully sympathize with our weakness.
Therefore, we cannot say that our great
high priest doesn’t really understand what we’re going through. He’s lived this
life. We can’t say he doesn’t know just how hard it is to live on this earth. He
lived here. We can’t say he doesn’t know how hard it is to get by on what
little we have. He lived a life of poverty. And we cannot say our punishments for
disobedience seem unfair when we’re not living by Him as we should. He took our
just punishment upon himself and DIED for our sins WHILE WE WERE STILL SINNERS.
JESUS IS OUR PERFECT HIGH PRIEST. He
is Gods own son and “a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek”. What
does this mean, a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek? Melchizedek, you
should remember, is the priest king that met Abraham and blessed him while he
was returning from his victory over four mighty kings armies using only a
relatively small group of choice men. This victory was in saving his nephew Lot
and all that were taken captive with him. Melchizedek’s name is literally
translated King of Righteousness.
He is thought to have lived a prefect
life and is an architype of Christ. Depending on how far you might want to go
in your research of Melchizedek, some will say he may have been and earlier
incarnation of Christ, citing that this meeting between Melchizedek and Abraham
is what Jesus was talking about in John
8:56 when Jesus says, “Your
father Abraham was overjoyed that he would see My day, and he saw it and
rejoiced”. I’ll leave it to you to investigate it. That rabbit hole gets
deep.
Regardless of who he was, or could
have been, there’s something key here that we need to recognize. Melchizedek
was NOT of the line of Aaron. In fact, he came generations before there was a
line of Aaron. His priesthood predated Aaron, and to add to that, he was the
King of Salem, later known as Jerusalem. By now, I imagine you are seeing as I
am that Melchizedek was at least a picture of what Christ was to be, a priest
and King.
So now for the perfect high priest…
We have a perfect high priest in
Christ that has not only lived as a man, and so can sympathize with our
weakness, but looking back at chapter
4 verse 14, “one who has passed through the heavens”.
Hebrews
5:7 goes on to say, “In the days
of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud
crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and
He was heard because of His piety.” Jesus was not only tempted
as we are, but He also suffered as we do. Even more to the point of surpassing
any suffering we may experience as he died to take away our sin. Through his
suffering, Jesus cried loudly, his cheeks likely wet with tears, and he offered
prayers and supplication. But who were His prayers for? Maybe for Himself to be
saved from His suffering? Well, yes, He was quite grieved knowing the pain and
sorrow He faced, but most often His prayers were for the people of that time,
and for all of us today.
What was one of Jesus’s last prayers
as he hung on the cross, suffering and dying so that we may have new life? He
prayed “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.” He could have
easily saved himself, being the son of God, but as verse 8 says “Although He
was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.” Jesus knew
full well what his time on this earth was for and why he was to endure his
suffering and learn obedience. Ultimately, it was for our salvation.
Would we, being human, and fickle as
we are, have faith to believe in Jesus as we do now if it weren’t for the life
we know Jesus to have lived, knowing now that he was fully man, and is fully
God? Maybe we can’t answer that given what we know now, but this is exactly
what the Hebrew people at the time of this writing were wrestling with. What
the writer is trying to convey to them here is that we DO have a great high
priest who HAS fulfilled everything they spent their lives learning. Jesus
fulfilled all their customs and ways of life that they were TRYING to live out,
albeit not with great success.
I love this verse 9, it says “And
having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of
eternal salvation.” JESUS, IS, the source of our eternal salvation. How do we
get to the father? How do we get to his rest like we talked about last week?
How do we get to OUR promised land, our inheritance? ONLY through Jesus. What
does Jesus say in John 14:6? “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one
comes to the Father but through Me.” JESUS is the source of our salvation.
We cannot live by following examples
of disobedience and unbelief. Over the last couple of weeks, the writer is
using this example of disobedience and unbelief by God's own chosen people to
make a point to the Hebrew people of his day and is valid for us today. Even
though the chosen people who witnessed God's plagues on Pharaoh, were saved from
Egypt, witnessed a guiding pillar of smoke by day and fire by night, witnessed
the parting of the Red Sea and the drowning of Pharaoh's army, witnessed food
and water seemingly appear from nowhere, they still chose to worship a golden
calf and God cursed them because of it.
Even in knowing this history very
well, some of the Hebrew people of this day are found to be in disobedience just
the same. For the many signs and wonders that Jesus performed, and the
prophecies he fulfilled, they couldn’t wrap their heads around him being the Messiah
they had been waiting for. They were having trouble letting go of their
traditions which told them that their works are what would qualify them to
enter God's rest. They didn’t believe that Jesus was the fulfillment of all
those things and that God’s grace, and having faith in Him is what would bring
them to salvation. As in Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved
through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a
result of works, so that no one may boast.”
We may not have personally witnessed
Jesus’s many miracles in our day, but we have this book of the past, which has
been proven true time and again, which still holds true for us today, and which
promises us the result of our salvation in the future. STAY in the word of God,
ENCOURAGE others to do the same, and BELIEVE that our PERFECT HIGH PRIEST
continues to offer salvation to all who believe.
Amen.
