If you want to turn your Bibles
over to Hebrews chapter 5, Hebrews chapter 5, if you're
using the Pew Bible, you'll find it on page 1305, Hebrews chapter
5. Let's begin reading in verse
1. Hebrews chapter 5 and verse 1,
page 1305. For every high priest taken from
among men is ordained, is set aside, is appointed for men in
things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices
for sins, who can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that
are out of the way, for that he himself also is compassed
with infirmity. And by reason thereof he ought
as for the people, so also for himself to offer for sins. And
no man takes this honor unto himself, but he that is called
of God, as was Aaron. So also Christ glorified not
himself to be made an high priest, but he that said unto him, Thou
art my son, today have I begotten thee. And he said also in another
place, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek,
who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers
and supplication with strong crying and tears unto him that
was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared,
though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which
he suffered. And being made perfect, he became
the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him,
called of God and a high priest after the order of Melchizedek." The Apostle has a unique way,
I mentioned this the other night in this study, that the Apostle
has a unique way of writing. He mentions a subject, and just
almost in passing, and then later on he comes back to that subject
and he enlarges upon it he expounds upon that subject more fully
and this is what he does uh... several times already he's did
this in the book of hebrews that we've been studying in chapter
two in verse seventeen for instance he mentions christ as our high
priest first time he mentions christ as a high priest and then
he goes on to chapter three and he gets off of this subject altogether
on another subject. Now, those who say the Apostle
Paul wrote this is one of the reasons they say he writes just
like Paul. He gets sidetracked, as it were.
He got sidetracked on rest, entering into his rest, and now here in
chapter 4 and verse 14, he comes back to Christ, our High Priest. And we looked at some things
last time about Christ, our High Priest, and I just want to review
just for a second because it ties in with our lesson today. He's taught us several things
about Christ, our High Priest. There in chapter 4 and verse
14, you'll see that He's the Son of God. Who is He? Who is
our High Priest? In verse 14 it says He's the
Son of God. Jesus, the Son of God. He first
mentions this again in chapter 1 in verse 2 where He says, God
has spoken to us by His Son. And then He goes on later and
He talks about the two natures of God's Son. He talks about
His divine nature and His human nature. In chapter 1 in verse
8 He says, And to the Son He saith, Thy throne, O God, is
for ever and ever. Remember we studied that verse?
Unto the Son, he saith, thy throne, O God. Who is the Son? He's God,
isn't He? He's God. He's the second person
of the Sacred Trinity. And then He goes on and attributes
the whole creation to Him. Thou in the beginning hath laid
the foundations of the world, and the heavens are the work
of your hands. Who made the heavens and the earth? The Son of God.
Who is God? Who is God? And then in chapter
2 and verse 14 he goes to tell us his human nature. Look how
he says it again in verse 14 of chapter 2. For as much then
as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself
likewise took part of the same. He didn't take the nature of
angels. He took the seed of Abraham. He took our flesh and our bones,
our humanity. sin accepted. So who is our High
Priest? He's the Son of God in these
two natures, the divine nature and in our human nature. That's
who our High Priest is. That's who He is. Then He goes
on and says what He's done. What's He done? We know who He
is. He's the Son of God. What's He
done? Look again in chapter 2 and verse 17. Wherefore, in all things it behooved
him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a
merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God,
to make reconciliations for the sins of the people." What did
he do? He made an atonement for sin
and reconciled us to God. What was it that stood between
us and God? Sin. Sin. So he removed the sin,
thus reconciling us to God. What did he do? That's what he
did. He rendered powerless the devil and his work. Look what
he said in chapter 2 verse 14. For as much as the children are
partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself took part of
the same, that through death he might destroy him who had
the power of death, that is, the devil. Brother Wayne dealt
with that not long ago. He rendered powerless the devil
and his work. And he says there in that same
verse that he removed the bondage of the fear of death. We don't
have to fear death anymore. Man, I used to live in the fear
of death. You ever fear death? Man, I tell you, that's a king
of terrors, isn't it? You face death, buddy, and you
know that's it. That's it for this life. and
you're going into your long home. And how people face death without
a saving interest in the Savior who tasted death and defeated
death and delivered us from the bondage of that fear. So who
is He? He's the Son of God in His two
natures. What has He done? He's reconciled us to God. He's
made an atonement. And where is He now? Well, we
looked at that, didn't we? We looked at that there in chapter
4 and verse 14. seeing then that we have a great
high priest that is passed unto the heavens. Where is he now? He's passed through the stars,
through the outer space, and he's went where no man has ever
gone. No man has ever gone where he went. We can go so far out,
can't we? And that's it. We can't even
send machines out to the breadth of this universe. But he went
through all of that, entered into heaven itself, and sat down
on the right hand of God. Where is our priest now? He's
on the right hand of God. And you know something? He still maintains and retains
the sympathy with his poor, afflicted people that he had for them when
he was here. His sufferings didn't make him
bitter. His sufferings didn't make him hard. and His exalted
position didn't make Him aloof. He can still be approached into
today. He still has a tender heart. He was touched when He
dwelt among us upon this earth. Show us one time where anybody
ever came to Him with a true need and He turned them away.
You won't find it. The man was full of leprosy.
Did He turn him away? No. The woman with an issue of
blood, did He turn her away? The mother who had the daughter
vexed with devils, did He turn her away? He didn't, did He?
He didn't. He has sympathy. He's sympathetic. He's tender of heart. He's meek
and lowly of heart. And though He's so exalted in
heaven today, He's still touched with the feelings of our infirmities. And that's why Paul encouraged
us here to come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain
mercy. We have won who is in the presence
of God, who invites us to come to Him to obtain His mercy and
find grace to help us in the time of need. So that brings
us to our text. He goes on here now in chapter
5 and He enlarges further on the priestly office of the Lord
Jesus Christ. And He is going to tell us here
some of the qualifications of the high priest. The high priest
of the Jewish economy had to have certain qualifications.
And he's going to tell them here what that is. Why is that important? You know, we study these things,
Wayne and I talked about this the other night. We study a book
like this and it's written to the Jewish believers, first of
all. We profit so much from it. But
it's written to the Jewish believers. And sometimes when I'm up here
teaching, I can almost see on your face, I have no idea what
you're talking about. I have no idea what this is so important.
Why are we even studying this book that was written to the
Jews? We're not Jews. We know very little about what
it was to be a Jew living in this day and how important the
priesthood was to them. The high priest was a central
part of their life. So much of what they did centered
around this person of the high priest. And boy, here they got
themselves in trouble. They professed Jesus Christ to
be the Savior, to be the Messiah, to be the High Priest now, and
they got themselves in trouble with their nation. They needed
some information as to why they should trust Jesus Christ, why
they should let go of the Jewish economy, turn their backs upon
it, and trust Jesus Christ alone as their High Priest. They needed
some information. That's what this letter here
is about. They had three offices. If you
were a Jew, your nation had three offices. They anointed these
men in these three offices. One was a king. You know how
important our president is to us. Whether you like him or not,
he's important to this nation, isn't he? Our system, our political
system is set up around him. They had kings back then. They
anointed their king as their king, their leader. They had
prophets. They anointed their prophets.
And then they had priests. Well, they'd already lost their
king. They'd already lost their prophet. They hadn't had a king
in hundreds of years. Hadn't had a prophet in hundreds
of years. They weren't about to let go of their priest. They
had a high priest and they weren't about to let go of him. So somebody
was going to have to convince these Jews that Jesus Christ
is now replaced their high priest. And when you forsake Judaism
and you come to Christ, you don't lose a thing, but you're a great
gainer. You're a great gainer. And that's
what this book of Hebrews is about. And that's what chapter
5 is especially about, the qualification for a priest. These Jews knew
the consequences of professing Jesus Christ as their High Priest. They'd suffer for it. They'd
suffer for it. The first thing that they suffered
was excommunication. Boy, that was serious. That was
serious. You not only lost your Jewish
friends, you lost many of your privileges, and something else
you lost. according to the Jewish doctors
and Pharisees and scribes, you lost all hope of being saved.
Salvation was of the Jews. If you were excommunicated from
that, there was no hope for you. They said you were a Gentile
without God, without hope in the world. The Jews alone had
the Holy Scriptures. That's true, isn't it? They alone
had the priesthood and the worship of God and the service of God.
The Gentiles lived in the light of nature. That's all they had.
And how they had abused that. Instead of looking at the creation
and saying, God made that? Who is this God? Can He be known? Can He be worshiped? They looked
at the stars in the heaven and began to worship. They looked
at the moon and began to worship it. Only the Jews had the Holy
Scriptures. Only the Jews had the promise
and the covenants. The Gentiles had nothing. So
if you was cast out from the Jews, man, where would you find
the truth at? You couldn't. You couldn't. The
most devastating thing that could happen to a Jew was to be cut
off from Israel. That's the most fearful words
I imagine you could hear if you were a Jew. You're cut off. You're
cut off. And you know, you read the Old
Testament, just sometimes get your concordance out and look
at all the different reasons They could cut you off under
the Jewish economy. Genesis 17 and verse 14, if you
refused circumcision, you were to be cut off from the people
of Israel. Exodus 12 and 15, if leaven was
found in your house during the Passover week, you were cut off. Can you imagine that? During
the Passover week they came and searched your house. If they
found a little leaven that you missed, you were cut off. That's
how strict this was. Exodus 31 and 14, whoever broke
the Jewish Sabbath was cut off from his people. That was the
least they could do for you. The worst was to stone you with
stones. Leviticus 7.20, if you eat of
a sacrifice when you were ceremonially unclean, you were to be cut off.
Numbers 9.13, if you refused to participate in the Feast of
the Passover, you were cut off. Leviticus 17 and 9, if you offered
a burnt offering and didn't bring it to the door of the tabernacle
of the congregation, you were cut off. If you touched the dead
body of a man or a woman, you were unclean. And if you didn't
perform that which made you ceremonial clean, you were cut off. You
were cut off. And the high priest is the one
that they went to for instructions in these things. He told them. He instructed them in the ways
of being accepted with God. And when you rejected their high
priest and said, there's another high priest. There's another
high priest that's my high priest. First thing they do is say, don't
you come back in this synagogue. Don't you come back in the temple.
You've got nothing to do. You'll be shunned and you'll
be without hope and without God in this world. That's what they
told you. That's how serious it was. That's why this book
is so important. Now look. Look over here in very
familiar Scripture. Look in John chapter 9. Old Hebrew
chapter 5 and look over in John chapter 9. You remember this
story. There's a man who was born blind
and the Lord Jesus gave him his sight. Somebody went and told the Pharisees
that the Lord had given him his sight, and they called this blind
man up and talked to him and said, Who healed you? He said,
Well, I don't know. He just told me to go wash, and I washed and
came to see him. And they questioned him for a
while, and finally he lost his patience with them, and finally
he said, If I tell you who he is, will you go worship him too?
You going to worship him? And they said, ìWell, you go
be His disciple, weíre Mosesí disciples.î But they called the
parents. You remember they called the
parents and said, ìIs this your son that was born blind and now
he sees?î And they made this statement. They said, ìWell,
thatís our son, but how he was made to see, we donít know.î
Why didnít they tell them the truth? Thereís one reason they
didnít tell them the truth. They were scared to death. Theyíd
be excommunicated. from the synagogue, from the
temple, and from the whole Jewish economy. And if you were excommunicated,
you were in trouble, bud. You were in trouble. Look at
what he said in John chapter 9. And look in verse 19. This is where the Pharisees asked
the parents. Ask them, saying, Is this your son, who you say
was born blind? How then doth he now see? His
parents answered them, and said, We know not. We know that this
is our son, and that he was born blind. But by what means he now
seeth, we know not. Or who hath opened his eyes,
we know not. He is of age, ask him. He shall
speak for himself. These words spake his parents,
because they feared the Jews, For the Jews had agreed already
that if any man did confess that he was Christ, he should be put
out of the synagogue. Therefore said his parents, Ask
him, he is of age, ask him." Spirit to death. And we got it
in the book of Hebrews, you can read chapter 10, you can read
chapter 13, that when these Jews professed Jesus Christ, When
they owned Him as their Savior and Lord and King and High Priest,
they came under severe persecution from the Jews. They had their
goods confiscated. They were mocked. They were made
a gage in stock. And Paul wrote to them and said
in chapter 13, he said, What you are going to have to do is
go unto Him that is without the cap. Jesus suffered without the
gate. So what you're going to have
to do is leave the temple, leave that priesthood, leave the economy
that you've lived under all your life and go to Christ and suffer
for Him outside the camp of that Jewish religion. So boy, when
the Apostle wrote here and gave some qualifications for the priesthood
and showed them that Christ met those qualifications, don't you
know it just thrilled their hearts? We want proof! We want knowledge!
We want instructions. Is Christ truly our High Priest? Tell us about Him. We've got
to know Him better. That's what this book is about. Look at it like this in chapter
5. What were the qualifications and the functions of a High Priest? And these two go together in
chapter 5 of Hebrews. Look at some qualifications.
Look in verse 1, Hebrews chapter 5, and look in verse 1. This
is so simple. Every high priest taken from
among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God,
that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sin." What
is the first qualification? He must be a man. He must be
a man, not an angel. He cannot be an angel. An angel
cannot do us any good. He must be a man, born of our
bones. flesh of our flesh. He must have
our spirit, the spirit of a man. He must have our human nature.
He must be a man. Exodus chapter 28 verse 1, it
said this about Aaron, the first high priest. The Lord said to
Moses, Take thou unto thee Aaron your brother, and his sons with
him from among the children of Israel, that he may minister
unto me and the priests also. You know God in heaven can't
do us any good. He can't do us any good. He has to be God in
our humanity. He has to come down and condescend
and become a man. He had to be a man taken from
among His brethren. And Jesus was taken from among
the Jews, wasn't He? Chosen from among them. Secondly,
we're told here that He had to be ordained or appointed or set
aside to that office. There was a public ceremony when
a priest, a high priest, was anointed to the office. They
had a public ceremony. They put this high priestly robe
on him right in front of everybody. They anointed him with oil. When
Moses anointed Aaron, he just kept pouring oil on him. It ran
down his beard and all the way on the skirts of his garment.
A public ceremony that they had. And he says here in verse 4,
look at verse 4 of chapter 5, And no man taketh this honor
unto himself, but he that is called of God. In other words, none of these
high priests put themselves in that office. You know, things
may have got bad and they didn't have a high priest. You just
didn't rise up and you say, I think I can do that. I think I can
handle that. You didn't do that, buddy. You didn't do that. Who
set a man in this office? God. God called him to it. Sometimes read Numbers chapter
16, where Cory, a man by the name of Cory, one of the sons
of Levi, he got some well-known men together, and he said, Let
us put ourselves in a priesthood. We can do this. We can be a high
priest. And they came to Moses and said,
You and Aaron take too much on you. We're just as good as you
fellows are. And Moses said, Well, I'll tell
you what we'll do. Tomorrow Aaron can get his censer and fill it
full of coals, put incense on it. And you get all of your men
together and you get your coals of your censers and put your
incense on it and you all stand here together and let's see who
God chooses as His operator. Remember the story? Well, the
next day they all come together bunch of rebels trying to put
themselves into the priesthood. And the earth opened up. And
these men began to scream and everything that appertained unto
them, the men, the wives, and the children, and the little
ones, all of them went down into the pit because they tried to
put themselves into the priesthood without God calling them. That
is how big an honor that it was. You had to be called of God to
do it. And fourthly, we're told here
in verse 2, he had to be a man of great character. He had to
be a compassionate man. Look what he says in verse 2.
Who can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are
out of the way. He had to be a good man. He had
to be a decent man. He had to be a man who was genuinely
compassionate to other people. He couldn't be a man that was
self-righteous and legalist, that looked down his nose at
the unfortunate, at the fallen, at the ignorant. He had to look
upon those who came to him with compassion. That was the qualification. Did Jesus Christ have these qualifications? Did He have all of these qualifications?
Well, we've done seen that he was a man. He was a real man,
wasn't he? He was born of our bone. He was
flesh of our flesh. And he was chosen out from among
his brethren. Acts chapter 7 verse 37, here's
what Stephen quoted Moses said, A prophet shall the Lord your
God raise unto you of your brethren. Him shall you hear. He wasn't an angel. He was man, 100% man and 100%
God. He was the God-man, but He was
a man. It took a man, didn't it? A real
man, not God in heaven, not a spirit, but a real man in our humanity. Christ was that man. There's
a man in heaven today. There's a real man in heaven
today. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, has taken to Himself
our humanity and has become our high priest, a real man in heaven
today. He was ordained. He was set aside. He was appointed. You had to
be appointed. And you know something? There
was an open ceremony when Jesus Christ began His ministry. There
was an open ceremony. Remember when He was baptized?
And the heavens opened and a dove came down upon his head. Remember
that? And you remember what the Bible
says that dove was? That was the Holy Spirit in the
form of a dove. There was a voice from heaven
saying, ìThis is my beloved son.î So God anointed him with the
Holy Ghost and with power openly. He did that openly. And he went
about doing good. And Christ never took this honor
to Himself, did He? He never took this honor to Himself.
God chose Him and God put Him in this office. He was chosen
of God, the Bible says, and precious. I came not of Myself, He said,
but the Father sent Me. All that Jesus Christ did and
all that He said was verification that He didn't come on His own.
God sent him. God called him. Listen to this. Never a man spake like this man.
Never a man spake. What did they mean? Well, when
you go up to a man's grave that's been dead for four days and he's
stinking, and you say, Lazarus, come forth, never a man spake
like that. When you stand on the front of
a ship and say to the raging winds and sea, be still, and
it obeys you, never a man spake like that. Why could he speak with such
authority, such power? God called him. God sent him. God was with him. All that he
said and all that he did, all his miracles, was evidence that
God had called him to be our priest. Even one of the Pharisees
themselves says, no man can do these miracles that you're doing
except God be with him. God called him to it. The Old
Testament prophecies concerning Christ and the works that He
did on this earth in the days of His flesh confirmed that God
had put Him into this office. The Jews denied it. The Pharisees
and scribes denied it. But their own Old Testament proved
it everywhere. I just read to you this verse
6 where it said, ìYouíre a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.î
You know where thatís located at? In the Jewish writings. Thatís in the Old Testament Psalms
chapter 110 and verse 4. God swore unto him. And all of
the old Jewish commentary said that that pertained to the Messiah. Youíre a priest forever, I swear.
Who called Jesus Christ to be a priest? I love Zechariah chapter 6 and
verse 12. Listen to this. If you don't
read much in Zechariah, that's just the good old gospel. Listen
to what he says in chapter 6 verse 12, speaking of Christ. Behold
the man whose name is the branch. He shall grow up out of his place
and shall build the temple of the Lord. Upon this rock I will
build my church. And he shall bear the glory and
sit and rule upon his throne, and he shall be a priest upon
His throne. Who is that? That's the one that
God called to be a priest. Boy, can't you just hear those
Jews rejoicing in their hearts, those believing Jews when they
got this letter? I read that! I read that! Yes,
God called Him! Bless God! God called Jesus to
be a priest. He's my high priest because God
called Him to it. Just as He called Aaron, now
He's called His son. Jesus of Nazareth was a man of
excellent character and He was meek and lowly in His heart.
He was full of compassion, wasn't He? That was a qualification
for a high priest. He had to have compassion. Is
Jesus a compassionate Savior? I found Him to be so, haven't
you? Some people just want to set Him forth as mean and hard. I found Him to be a very compassionate
Savior, myself. Just what I need. And sometimes
you read the Gospels and look at the places where it said he
was moved with compassion. He had compassion on the people.
Everywhere he just had compassion. A man with leprosy came to him
full of leprosy. You didn't dare look at that
man. You shunned somebody like that. That was a deadly disease. And this man approached Jesus
and his nose had rotted off. He had a fever that would cook
an apple in five minutes if he held it in his hand. His ears
had rotted off, no hair on his head, not only a bald head, his
scalp was showing. He was in a miserable, dying
state. And he come and fell down before
Jesus of Nazareth, and he says, If you will, you can make me
clean. And you know what the Bible says
in Mark 1? Jesus had compassion on him. And he just didn't say,
Be thou clean. He reached forth his hand and
touched him and said, I will be thou clean. And immediately
he was clean. Compassion. I wouldn't have done
that. That would have scared me to
death if that man had come to me. I'd have ran. I'll be honest.
I'd have ran. He went off into the, when he spoke to the stormy
sea and stilled it, he went off to the other side. And this man
with all these legions of devils come running to him. He was naked
and feces on his legs. He stink, matted hair. He was a miserable, devil-filled
man. And the Lord cast the devils
out of him, clothed him, put him in his right mind. And he
said, Lord, I want to be with you. Let me go with you. I'm
afraid not to be with you. What did the Lord tell him? Go
home to your friends and tell them what great things the Lord
has done for you and has had compassion on you. He's just the high priest we
need, isn't He? For us ignorant people, that's
out of the way. He can be touched. He's just
the priest that we need. I tell you, if I was a Jew, I
wouldn't care anything about leaving the priesthood and losing
my Jewish friends, being put out of the synagogue and losing
all those privileges. I wouldn't care a thing about
leaving that and being told about a priest who didn't love me,
didn't care about me, wasn't concerned with what I was suffering.
That wouldn't appeal to me, would it to you? But he's not that
kind of priest. He's one who can be touched.
He's a compassionate priest. Now quickly, what were the functions
of the high priest? We find that here in verse 1
also of chapter 5. Was Jesus qualified to fulfill
the functions of the high priest? Look what he says in verse 1
again. Every high priest taken from among men is ordained for
men in thanks pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts
and sacrifices for sin. What he is saying here, he is
appointed for men. The high priest was appointed
for men in things pertaining to God." In other words, he had
to represent man before God. Now, you try that. How would
you represent men before God? How would you represent sinners? Let's be honest about it. How would you represent sinners
before a holy, God! Out of where would you do that? You had to be smart if you was
a priest. You had to know man. You had to know his need. You
had to know where he was. And you had to know God. You
had to know what man needed. You had to know what God required.
You had to meet man's need and fulfill God's obligation, God's
requirement. You had to be a smart man, didn't
you? A man come to you and he'd sin, you had to know what sacrifice
to offer. You had to know who to offer
it to and how to offer it. Does Jesus Christ qualify to
be a high priest? Does He know us? Does He know
our needs? I tell you, He is more qualified
to be our priest than any of those Jewish high priests. He
knows us much better than they did. He knows us perfectly. The Bible says that He needed
not that any man testify of Him, for He knew what was in man. We just read to you last week,
413, neither is there any creature that is not made manifest in
His sight. For all things are naked and
open in the eyes of Him with whom we have to do." He knows
us, doesn't He, Wayne? He knows our motive. He knows
our feelings. He knows our hearts. He knows us perfectly. Nothing
is hid from His sight. David said, Lord, You know my
down settings. You know my uprisings. You understand
my faults aforeall. You can pass my path, my lying
down, you're acquainted with all my ways. There's not a word
in my mouth, but you know it all together. You know me perfectly. I can't say anything, I can't
think anything, I can't go anywhere that you don't know. He knows
us, doesn't He? He knows us perfectly. And I'll
tell you something else, He knows God perfectly. He knows the heart
of God. He knows the purpose of God,
the will of God, the commandments of God, the requirements of God. He knows how to represent both
parties. He knows how. He is a perfect
high priest. And the reason He knows all of
this, you see, is because He's the Son of God. He's the Son
of God. That's why He's such a wonderful
high priest. He knows us. He knows what we're feeling because
He's been here and suffered it already. He knows God because
He's with His Father. No man knows the Father but the
Son. I know the Father. I don't know
Him like He knows Him. I don't know Him like He knows
Him. But He can represent me to the
Father. He knows how. He knows how. Back then, you had more access
to the president. He had a serious problem, but
he couldn't get into the president. Every time he went to the White
House, everybody else was in there talking. They said, well,
you can't right now. Come back later. And he went over to the
side of the house and just sat down, thought he'd try later.
And here this little boy was out in the yard playing. And
they started talking and asked each other their name. This was
Abraham Lincoln's son. Abraham Lincoln's little boy
out playing outside the White House. And the fella told him
this problem, said, I've been trying to see President Lincoln
for several days now, and I can't get to see him. He said, oh,
I can get you in. So he got him and tucked him
in the back door, brought him in the back door, said, Daddy,
there's a man here needing to talk to you. And he did. That's the high priest. That's the high priest. You can't
represent yourself to God, but He can. He can take you right
to the Father. He knows how to do that, doesn't He? He had to offer gifts and
sacrifices to God. That's what we're told here in
verse 1. The priest offered gifts. He offered gifts of thanksgiving.
You'd take the firstfruits of your crops, they'd offer them.
firstborn of some of the animals, and then offer them. Hebrews
chapter 13 verse 15 says we offer the sacrifice of praise to God
continually, the fruit of our lips giving thanks unto His name.
Can you imagine the Lord Jesus offering gifts to His Father?
The gifts of thanksgiving, the gifts of praise, We don't think
very much about that sometimes, do we? We think, well, we've
got a few extra dollars. We need to give it to the Lord.
Give it to the Lord. We've got a little time. We need
to give it to the Lord. Do you know one of the best sacrifices
you can offer to Him? Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving. Praising Him. That's a gift,
isn't it? Could you imagine when the Lord
Jesus stood one day and lifted up His arms toward heaven to
His Father? and said, Father, I thank Thee.
Father, Lord of heaven and earth, I thank You that You have hid
these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them unto
me. Oh, that was like sweet incense
going up to heaven. Father, I thank Thee. When He
thanked the Father for the food that they had. When He sang unto
Him His praises. That was gifts. Gifts. out of
his own heart through his own mouth to the Father. He's well
qualified to offer gifts, isn't he? And look here, sacrifices
for sin. That's what he had to be. He
says here in verse 3, look in verse 3 and I'll quit with this.
And by reason though, he says in verse 2, who can have compassion
on the ignorant, on them that are out of the way? For he himself
is compassionate with the infirmities. and by reason thereof this high
priest ought as for himself also for the as for the people also
for himself to offer for sins the high priest his duty was
to offer not only gifts but sacrifices for sin but boy there's three
things here in this verse three that christ is far superior to
these high priests under the Law. He did not need to offer
for Himself. Did He? Notice how Paul made
that so clear? They had infirmities, so they
first had to offer a sacrifice for themselves. And he was not
talking about the sinless infirmities of just getting hungry and getting
weak. He was talking about sinful infirmities. Aaron was a man
that was fallen just like us. And before he went in and offered
the sacrifice on the Day of Atonement, He had to first offer a sacrifice
for himself. Jesus never did that. He never had to offer for himself
because he had no sin. He had no sin. His offering was far superior
to theirs. What did they offer? They offered
the blood of bulls and goats, ashes of a heifer, things like
that, animals and the blood sacrifices. What did He offer? He offered
Himself. He offered His own blood. And
the third way He is superior to them, their sacrifices that
they offered had to be offered over and over and over again. How many times did He give Himself
to God as a sacrifice? One time. Why didn't He offer
Himself again? Why is it uttered ridiculous
and blasphemous when the Catholic take the bread on the communion
day and say they've turned it into the literal body of Jesus
Christ. Why is that wrong? Why is it
blasphemy when they say He suffers as much in their bread now as
He did upon the cross? Why is that wrong? He don't need to suffer again. That sacrifice put away sin forever. And now in Him there is no sin. He put it away by the sacrifice
of Himself. So these Jewish believers, they
come here and they read chapter 5 and they say, Oh, my soul,
He's well fit to be my high priest. He meets all the quantification
much better than the high priest that I was going to. He looked
upon Annas now, the high priest, with contempt. Well, that rascal,
he don't have any compassion for me. He'd put me out of the
synagogue in a minute. Oh, but this Son of God, He loved
me and He gave Himself for me. And He ever lives on God's right
hand to plead and maintain my cause. And when I go to the Father,
He represents me there. He pleads and maintains my cause
before God. He's just the high priest I need. Isn't that what you think about
Him? He's a perfect Savior, is He not? Everything that we need,
we find in Him. That's why we don't get hung
up on this other stuff. We don't need it. Just give me
Jesus. That's all. Give me Jesus, the
dear and blessed Son of God. He'll suffice, will He not? Oh,
Father, gracious Father, oh, thank You for this faithful and
merciful High Priest that You've sent into this world that took
our humanity to Himself. through suffering became a perfect
high priest. Experience what it was to mature
and experience what it was to endure temptations. Experience
what it was to suffer and die and taste death. And oh, Father
in heaven, we bless you for sending Him. We bless you for accepting
Him. We bless you for exalting Him.
They are at your right hand. And we come before you, we come
and address you as our Father through Him who is merciful and
faithful. Through Him as once and for all
settle this same question. Now we don't have to be concerned.
We don't have to live in torment and fear of death because you've
tasted it. You've taken away that which
caused the division and the enmity. Oh, blessed Father in heaven,
Thank you for sending such a great one to us, such a Savior. And
He's just the one we need. He's the one that gives us hope
in a life that's better than the one we have now. A sure hope. A steadfast hope. Because He's
entered there into your presence in our glorified humanity, never
to have to suffer again. We thank you for this congregation.
We thank you for those who have come here to worship you tonight.
We pray for Ken's grandson, Jason, that you would be pitiful to
that young man. And Lord, if it would please
you to use his sickness to teach him his frailty and his awful
need of a Savior to save him. I pray for Missy, Ken's daughter,
that you would be gracious to her in her afflictions and her
sufferings and teach her, Lord, the same. Teach her her needs. Oh, how we long for others to
see their need of a Savior, that they may flee from the wrath
to come and lay hold upon Him, the only way of salvation. Please
bless our conference in the next weekend. Bless Brother Fortner's,
the preachers there. Lord, be gracious and visit your
gospel. Bless Paul and Mike as they come
here to preach for us. I pray, Lord, that You would
give them the message that would honor Your great name and would
edify Your people. We ask these things in Jesus,
our Lord's name. Amen. You guys want to get together
one day next week to clean somewhere you all wore out? You think we
need to get together and clean the place up? You want to do
that? I got a guy coming that's going
to He's going to power wash the church. He's going to power wash
the building around, so he's going to do that for us. I thought
it might be a good day just to come and sit down and work and
just clean everything up. I know we've got a little painting
to do in the bathroom. You all want to set aside a time
to do that? What day would be the best? Some evening? Some
morning? What would be the best? We've
got Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. The preachers are coming in Thursday,
so I've got to be at the house Thursday. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday? Whatever, is that all right?
What time? If you can't make it, that's
fine. Monday's a holiday? Monday's my birthday. Monday's
my birthday. That's a holiday. The 4th or
7th? I was wondering why they set
that aside. My birthday? I was beginning to think, man,
I'm somebody. Labor Day. Labor Day. That's a good day.
Labor Day. I was born on Labor Day. What day? I don't care to come on my Tuesday.
What time? Five o'clock in the morning? Go ahead. What's a good time? Some of you
guys work like dogs already. So, you know, I appreciate you
just being willing to come back one more day. What's a good time
for you? He's got eating on his mind. What time? Just give me a time.
I don't care what time it is. 10 o'clock? 10 o'clock, okay. 10 o'clock, okay. Okay, anything
before we go? Did you bring your Can you still
want that organ? If a wife says she wants a