Hebrews chapter 7 is the explanation
of Genesis chapter 14, at least the first, those few verses between
verses 18 and 20 of Genesis 14. Hebrews chapter 7 explains it
for us and leaves us spellbound at the grace of God and His wisdom,
such long patience, When I have a secret, I can't keep it. But
God kept His secret from the beginning of the world and revealed
it to us in these last days. That's amazing, isn't it? You
think sometimes those people who win the lottery, wow, how
could that be? The chances of winning the lottery
is like one in over a couple of billion people. But here we
are. The Lord has given us something
far better than the lottery. He's revealed His eternal purpose
of grace in Christ to us. And that's what we're going to
look at today in Hebrews chapter 7. Let me turn to there. We're going to ask the Lord to
be with us to explain His word to our hearts. Let's pray. Our gracious Heavenly Father,
we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior and our High
Priest. He came, He was appointed by
you, and He came and He did your will and saved us from our sins.
Help us, dear Lord, to find our all in Him. and to give you glory
according to what you deserve. Help us in the weakness, even
the sinfulness of ourselves. Take away our sins and strengthen
us by your spirit to understand and believe you and so honor
you for what you've done and who you are. In Jesus' name we
pray, amen. Ouch. Let me find my notes. Hebrews chapter
seven. When we read through this, and
I'm going to do that in sections, we're going to see the man Melchizedek
referenced here. Melchizedek was the one we read
about in Genesis 14. Remember what it said there,
he was the priest of the Most High God. the priest of the Most
High God. And he met Abraham after Abraham
was returning from the slaughter of the kings. Those kings that
overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and the other two cities and
their kings. And after Abraham and his 318
men miraculously gained the victory by God's purpose, Melchizedek
met Abraham and blessed him. Abraham then gave Melchizedek
tithes. He gave him a tenth part of all
that he took in the spoils of that war. And there's great significance
in that. We'll get to that, perhaps, next
week. But this week I want to look at this man named Melchizedek. Melchizedek. It reads here in
chapter 7, verse 1. For this Melchizedek, King of
Salem, priest of the Most High God. See how it picks up from
Genesis 14 here? Who met Abraham returning from
the slaughter of the kings and blessed him. To whom also Abraham
gave a tenth part of all. First, this man Melchizedek being
by interpretation King of Righteousness and after that King of Salem,
which is King of Peace. Now, with great efficiency of
words, the Lord explains to us Melchizedek. It's amazing how
compactly God explains His Word from the Old Testament. And powerfully,
like a lawyer making his case before the court, He closes every
argument to make his case. And the case is this, that we
have such a high priest. The Lord Jesus Christ is that
High Priest. That's the message of Hebrews.
And He's the High Priest of that New Covenant, not the Old Covenant,
which the priests in the Old Testament were priests over. That Old Covenant was a covenant
of works, but this is the High Priest of the New Covenant. And
this High Priest, it says here, was after the order of Melchizedek. That means He was like Melchizedek
in the way that God showed Melchizedek in the Old Testament. Now, God
uses every detail. Melchizedek's name means King
of Righteousness. And therefore, the Lord Jesus
is the King of Righteousness. And Melchizedek was also a king
in a place called Salem, which later became Jerusalem. Salem, Jerusalem. Salem means
peace. And so, Melchizedek was King
of Peace. King of Righteousness, King of
Peace. Psalm 85 10 says, Mercy and truth
are met together. Righteousness and peace have
kissed each other. This is our Lord Jesus Christ.
He's the one who fulfills this word. He's the king of righteousness. And we're going to see the significance
of that here in a moment. The Lord Jesus Christ. The main
point of this entire chapter and the book of Hebrews is that
we have such a high priest who is set on the right hand of the
throne of the majesty in the heavens. He's not a minister
of a sanctuary on earth, he's a minister of the true sanctuary
in heaven. He doesn't go about ministering
in physical, material, carnal things on earth, but he ministers
in spiritual things in heaven. And He's not like the Old Testament
high priests who were men, who died, whose lives ended because
they were sinners and had to be replaced in succession, priest
after priest. But He ever lives. And He ever
lives to make intercession for us. What is a high priest? Have you ever wondered about
that question? And why is a high priest important to us? Why is
it so significant to us to have a high priest? Well, a high priest
is a man. A man God has chosen and called
to serve God. To serve God. A lot of times
we think that God's purpose is all about us. Well, it has to
do with God's elect. There's no doubt about that.
But first and foremost, God's purpose has to do with God. And if we lose sight of that,
then we get completely untethered from the anchor of our souls.
God wanted a high priest. God is the one who designed,
He created this role or office of a high priest. And He made
it. And He's the one who found a
high priest. He chose and called a man to
serve in this way. A high priest is a man who serves
God for sinful men. He's a representative of all
of the people he stands before God to represent. And that's
a significant thing because as sinners we cannot come before
God. There was a king in the Old Testament
whose name was Uzziah. He tried to enter the holy place
by himself without a high priest. And he was immediately struck
with leprosy and later died because he came to God, or attempted
to come, without a high priest. Without a high priest, God will
not hear us. We cannot come to God. We cannot
be accepted by God. There's nothing we can do to
make ourselves acceptable. God won't hear us. We can't access
God. We can't even worship God without
a high priest. But the Lord has designed this
for us, a high priest. Now, a high priest is only necessary
because we, as people, are sinners. And so God has designed this.
But why would God be motivated to make a high priest for sinners?
Why would He do that? What is sin anyway? Well, sin
is breaking God's law. Sin is striking out against the
only good and right way, the way of the Lord. And if we break
God's law, then we are saying our way is better and more important
than God's way. Actually, we're saying more than
that. We're saying God, who rules, doesn't have a right to rule
as much as I do. I want to be in charge of my
own life. And here's an illustration for
you. Perhaps you were kind to somebody in your childhood. Maybe
as a child, even now, you think of that. You're nice to somebody
and you share all your toys. Or if you're an adult, you open
your toolbox and say, whatever I have, you're free to borrow
whatever I have. Just take it and use it as needed
because you show a kindness to this person. And then this one
you've shown kindness to, even though you trust them, they prove
themselves to be your enemy. Because what they do, when you're
not looking, is they take all your toys from you. They take
all your tools. And not only do they take them,
but they lie about you to others. They claim that you are bad,
but they're good. And then when their sin is uncovered,
when it's shown that they're liars and deceivers and thieves,
then they turn and they accuse you of being bad because you
were so good. They actually find fault with
your goodness. That's what we did. God created
us and gave us our life and everything. And He even upholds our lives
as sinners. He's given us all of this and
what have we done? We've said, I don't need God. I don't need to depend upon Him.
I don't call upon Him. I don't bring what is His back
to Him in order for it to be used to His honor. And so God
has to show us how truly bad we are. Jesus said, evil proceeds
from within our heart. It doesn't come to us from the
outside. It starts inside of us. But we
don't know that. We think we're good. Like the
thief and the liar in this little illustration, we think that we're
better than the other person. We deserve what's theirs. And
we think that we can make ourselves look better by finding fault
with them to others. By accusing them to others. And
so, God has to do something. And what does God do? He gives
us His law. And God's law gives us commandments
and those commandments, when they come to us, they find us
unable to keep them. Unwilling to do what God has
said. And so our sin that's inside of us becomes more evident. What
we are on the inside, which is guilty and evil, becomes apparent
on the outside to us. God already knows what's in us.
He searches our hearts. He understands what we think
even before we think it. But His Word divides between
the thoughts and intents of our heart and exposes us before Him.
It discovers that we're guilty and wicked. And that we're without
strength to change. Not only without strength, we're
unwilling to change. Romans chapter 8 verse 7 says
that the carnal mind, what we are naturally from birth, is
not subject to the law of God. We're at enmity with God. And
so that's what we are. God's law comes to us, it discovers
our guilt, it shuts us up under our guilt, helpless to make atonement
for our sins, helpless to honor God by keeping the law of God.
And then the law of God also does something else. It tells
us about an atonement, a sacrifice that a priest makes to God in
order to remove sin. But the law comes short because
in the law, the atonement that the high priest made in Leviticus
16, it never really took away any sins. And so the law first
shows us our guilt. It shows us our inward corruption.
It condemns us before God and leaves us under the sentence
of God's curse. And then it tells us about an
atonement by a high priest, but it doesn't provide the atonement.
And so it raises more issues than it solves. It only uncovers
the disease of our heart, the plague of our heart, and shows
us the only way we can be accepted before God is by a high priest
and a sacrifice, but it doesn't provide any strength to us to
obey God, any strength to repent. It doesn't provide a sin covering
someone to take away our sin. It only tells us about that.
And then the high priest himself, in the law, can't take away sin.
He is a sinner like us. And he dies. And so the sacrifices
are offered year after year. Every year they're offered. It
reminds us of our sin. And the fact that our sin is
still there as a barrier separates us from God. This is given to
us by God in order to expose what we truly are before God. And what do men do when God gives
His law? Well, they take God's law like
this little evil monster who was given all these things and
then lied against the one who was kind to him. They take God's
law and they say, no, no, no. God's law doesn't really mean
that. Let's reduce it to something I can actually keep so that before
men I actually look pretty good. And so they change the law. They
seek to change God's laws. We make new laws. We do away
with the old ones. And then we legalize perversity. We legalize immorality in our
country in so many ways. And this has been done throughout
history. Even though When men live with others, they serve
as a conscience against the other to correct their wrongs. What
we do is we force other people to take the low place and say,
no, what you're doing is actually right. And if you don't agree
that what I'm doing is right, then I'm going to say you're
worse than I am. And that's what we do, isn't
it? Because men want to actually look good before others. We really
don't care about God, first of all. We want to look good before
others. And so God has given us His law.
Now, that's the reason God has given a high priest to us. You
see, God is the one in this illustration who gave everything and He has
a right to demand from us an obedience to honor Him because
He's actually good. We're not. He has a right not
only to require us to honor Him by keeping His law, but He has
a right to demand that His law and justice be upheld. And God's
justice will be upheld. In Psalm 89.14 it says that the
throne is established in justice. and in mercy. God's law will
be honored. God's justice will be upheld. It will be satisfied. Nothing
will go unpunished of all that we've done against God. That's
the situation. God has a right to take vengeance,
doesn't He? He's God. He rules. No one is
going to overthrow His throne, even though we think to do so.
We want to do so, but no one can overthrow God. He's going
to be just. His law will be honored. God
will be glorified. So how does a high priest help
in this case? Why would God give a high priest?
We're sinners. We're guilty. We're condemned.
We hate God. We go about to un-God, God, to
remove God from His throne. We don't want God to be God.
We want to be God. And we make ourselves look good
in the eyes of others by trying to change God's law and make
us look better. Such perverse, perverse people. So wicked at heart and in our
minds and in our words and all that we do. Why would God then
have a high priest? Ah, here we see something about
God that we would never have imagined. It says in John 1,
verse 17, the law was given by Moses. But grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ. Now that's something we never
would have thought as sinners. Grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ. What does it mean? We know what
the law is. The law is an agreement between
God and men. If men keep the law, they live. If they don't, they're cursed.
That's what the law says. The law puts all the conditions
upon us for acceptance before God. The law demands justice
from God against us if we break it. And the law requires perfect
obedience, continuous obedience from us all the time. What then
is the grace and truth that came by Jesus Christ? Here it is. the truth of how God can be just
and His justice vindicated, the truth of how God can be holy
and His law honored, and yet the grace of God that would reach
out to those who offended Him, who took what was His and lied
against Him and hated Him, and He would find a way to remove
the offense they created in Him and also bring them back into
a condition of peace with himself, reconciling them, removing their
offense in him and their separation from him. The high priest was
given for that purpose. First, to honor God, and second,
to bring us near. The high priest does all that
God requires, fulfills all God's justice, and he also brings near
those God would save. That's what a high priest does.
He stands in the place between men and God as a mediator, offering
to God what satisfies God, what pleases God, and offering to
God for men, for their sins. Look at Hebrews chapter 5 verse
1. He says this, For 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. Every high priest is taken from
among men. The high priest has to be a man
so he can bear the burdens as a man to God. He can stand for
men to God and he has to be ordained. God has to anoint him and appoint
him to be our High Priest. And what he does, he does in
things pertaining to God that he may offer gifts and sacrifices
for sins. That's what a high priest does.
He stands to God for men, sinful men, and he answers God in the
full satisfaction of his justice. in honor of His law, and He does
it in order to take away the sins of God's people. In the
Old Testament, the high priest had a breastplate, and on that
breastplate were written the names of the children of Israel. All of their names were written
there. Not every person, but every tribe in Israel. Because
he went in and stood before God offering for those whose names
were written on that high priest's breastplate. And so the high
priest stands for sinful men before God in order to please
God, to honor God and save his people. That's what the high
priest does. Now look at Hebrews chapter 7.
For this Melchizedek, he's a high priest. King of Salem, priest
of the Most High God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter
of the kings and blessed him, to whom also Abraham gave a tenth
part of all, first being by interpretation King of Righteousness, and after
that also King of Salem, which is King of Peace. Here we see
The Lord Jesus is a priest. He's saying these things about
Melchizedek because He's saying that the Lord Jesus is the one
who fulfilled this representation of Christ in this
man Melchizedek before Christ came. He shows us who Christ
would be when He came. And first, He's the King of Righteousness. What is the King of Righteousness?
Well, the king is sovereign, isn't he? The king does what
pleases the king. The king does whatever he wants
to do. But he's a king of righteousness, so he gives righteousness sovereignly
to whom it pleases him. And whatever he does, he does
according to perfect righteousness. He loves righteousness. He hates
iniquity. God has entrusted everything
to him because he cannot do wrong. He is the king of righteousness.
In Romans chapter 5, verse 21, it says, Where sin once reigned
to death, Sin reigned like a king to death, producing death in
us. Now, grace reigns. Grace sits on the throne. How?
Through righteousness. And where was that righteousness
from? The Lord Jesus Christ. Romans 5, 21. Grace reigns through
righteousness by our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus said to
the rich young ruler, there's none good but one, that's God.
There's only one good. It's God. And he says in Romans
3.10, there's none righteous among men. There's none righteous.
No, not one. And yet, in Psalm 71.16, David
says, I will make mention of thy righteousness, even thine
only. So here, this man called King
of Righteousness. Who could be the King of Righteousness
but the Lord our Righteousness? Who could be given this title
that belongs only to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God,
as our High Priest, but the one who is our High Priest? And so
I believe that Melchizedek was actually the Lord Jesus Christ
before he came into the world. He showed up on the scene. Remember
when later on God came to Abraham by three men in Genesis 18, and
it says that the Lord spoke to Abraham. One of those men was
the Lord, and that Lord is the Lord Jesus Christ. No man has
seen God at any time. John 1.18, The only begotten
Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared
Him. We only know God in Christ. God has never spoken to man directly. He always speaks through His
Son because He's our mediator. And so when God appeared to Abraham
in Genesis 18, it's the Lord Jesus Christ. And then later
in the book of Joshua, Joshua chapter 5, The captain of the
Lord's host appeared to Joshua, and Joshua said, Are you for
us, or are you against us? He says, I'm the captain of the
Lord's host. And Joshua fell down and worshipped him, because
it was the Lord Jesus Christ. And then in Gideon, in Judges
chapter 6, Gideon was spoken to by the Lord Jesus Christ,
who sent him. He says, I will be with you.
You're going to win the battle because the Lord spoke to him,
and the Lord Jesus Christ was with him. And then later in Daniel
chapter 3, Nebuchadnezzar looked in the fiery furnace where Shadrach,
Meshach and Abednego were cast in and he expected to find them
dead. And here they were walking around and there was a fourth
man there. And Nebuchadnezzar looked in
and he said, Who is this? The form of the fourth is like
the Son of God. Well, how could he be like the
Son of God? Because he was the Son of God! Before he came into
the world, he appeared in the Old Testament on numerous occasions. And here, I believe, is who it's
being spoken of. because he's the king of righteousness
and the king of peace. Not only does he uphold God's
righteousness, but he makes peace. That's amazing. Who would think
that the one who had a right to take vengeance, who is God
over all, would actually come to his enemies and remove the
offense they caused in him in order to make friends with his
enemies? It was all his initiative. He
paid the full cost of it. He laid our sins on his own son. He delivered up his son to death.
This is our great God and Savior, grace and truth, how God could
be just, righteous, and yet the justifier of him which believeth
in Jesus, making peace with God, with himself. at full cost to
himself, of his own initiative, humbling himself, laying our
sins on his son, and his son, who is equal with God, taking
our nature, bearing our sins as his own, and paying for them,
bearing the guilt and shame and enduring the pain of it. in suffering
and mocking as one whose enemies had come against him, hateful
and reproachful men coming against the Lord Jesus Christ. And yet
all of that was to make atonement for our sins. This is the King
of Righteousness who made peace and therefore He is the King
of Peace. Colossians 1.20 says He is our
peace. He made peace by the blood of His cross. Who but Christ could make peace?
Remember when he was born, the angels sang, glory to God in
the highest and on earth, peace, goodwill toward men. Peace with
God. Peace with God. We have peace
with God because we're justified before God. That's where peace
comes. When we were yet enemies, when
we were enemies, God reconciled us. He made peace with us through
the death of His Son, Romans 5.10. And this is the way He
did it. He made Him sin for us, He who
knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God
in him. That's the way God can be at
peace with us. He honored his law. He satisfied
his justice. He brought everything from his
high priest that he required of us, which we failed to give
him. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. We fail to do the one thing we
were created to do, to honor God. And the Lord Himself brought
honor to Himself in our High Priest, the King of Righteousness,
the King of Peace. Look at verse 3 of Hebrews 7. Melchizedek was without father,
without mother, without descent. There's no record of his father,
there's no record of his mother, and there's no record of any
descendants that came from him. Why? Because the Son of God is
eternal. He has no beginning. He has no
end. It says in Psalm 90, Psalm 90 in verse 1, this is
a psalm that was written by Moses. Not many psalms. Maybe this is
the only one that was written by Moses. But in Psalm 90 it
says this in verse 1, Lord, thou hast been our dwelling
place in all generations. Listen carefully. Before the
mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the
earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou
Who is from everlasting to everlasting? God. But who is it here He's
speaking of? The Creator. The One who brought
forth the mountains and brought forth the earth. And how did
He do that? He did it in His Son. The Son
of God is everlasting. He's the eternal God. He's from
everlasting to everlasting. The Alpha and the Omega. The
beginning and the end. The Almighty. Who but God. has all knowledge to create this
world out of nothing. Who but God by His almighty power
can command all things out of nothing into existence and then
give life to all things? and uphold that life for his
own purpose. And not one purpose of God fail,
but the Lord Jesus Christ, who is almighty, eternal, all-wise,
sovereign God. That's who this is. So the high
priest had to be eternal. He had to be the Son of God.
And so in verse 4 of Hebrews 7, it says now, to us, it says,
Now consider how great this man was unto whom even the patriarch
Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils. How great! God wants us to know. Listen. You've understood the priesthood
in the Old Testament. You've understood the law. You've
been given the law all this time. When God gave the law through
Moses, the mountain, Mount Sinai, was dark. There was lightning. There was fire on the mountain.
Nothing could touch the mountain. Not even a beast had to be put
to death by stoning or a dart thrust through that beast. And
when the people heard the voice of words, and the sound of a
trumpet, the words that condemned them in their guilt, and the
trumpet that heralded forth their condemnation, you know what they
said? Don't want to hear God speak to us anymore. Don't speak
anymore to us these words. And God told Moses, they've said
that well. What they've said, they've said
well. They can't endure what was commanded because they're
sinners. And under that Old Testament covenant, That covenant that
required all obedience from them and required God's curse come
upon them. In that covenant there were priests.
But now He's going to show that the priest that God always had
for His people, from eternity to eternity, is going to be so
much greater. So He says, Now consider how
great this man was, to whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the
tenth of the spoils. So if Abraham paid tithes to
Melchizedek, that means Melchizedek is greater than Abraham. And if he's greater than Abraham,
he's greater than all of the Israelites, even the Levites,
the priests. Verse 5 And they verily that
are of the sons of Levi, those priests, who received the office
of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people
according to the law, that is of their brethren, though they
come out of the loins of Abraham. So those men who in the Old Testament
gave tithes to the priests, they showed that God had ordained
that office, and yet God says that the Levites, who received
tithes under the law, they actually were less than Abraham who paid
tithes to Melchizedek, which means that Melchizedek was greater
not only than Abraham, but them. In verse 6 it says, But he whose
descent is not counted from them, not from the Levites, he received
tithes of Abraham and blessed him that had the promises Abraham
was great because God made a covenant with Abraham and gave promises
to Abraham. But Melchizedek was greater because
he blessed Abraham. It says in verse 7, and without
all contradiction, the less is blessed of the better. Abraham
was the less and he was blessed by Melchizedek. And verse 8,
here men that die receive tithes. That would be those under the
law, the Levites, the sons of Aaron. They receive tithes and
they die. But here, I'm sorry, there in
Genesis 14, He receiveth them, from Abraham, of whom it is witnessed
that he liveth. Where is it witnessed that he
liveth? Well, a little bit later on when it says in verse 16, Verse 17, he says, "...he testifieth
thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek." So
it was testified that he liveth because he had no beginning of
days, no end of life, no descendants. His life never ended. It's not
recorded a beginning of his life or the end of his life. He was
a priest forever. And God said that Christ would
be priest forever. So it's testified that he liveth.
And yet those men received tithes who died. And here, Abraham,
the greatest of all, gave tithes to Melchizedek, which means he
was greater than Abraham. And he lives, not like the priests
in the Old Testament who die. You see, God is trying to show
here, first of all, that Melchizedek is greater than Abraham. that
He's greater than all the priests of Aaron under the Levitical
law, and He brings a greater covenant as well. He serves God
by virtue of His endless life. And so we read this also. In verse 9, And as I may so say,
Levi also who receiveth tithes paid tithes in Abraham, for he
was yet in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him. Because
God made a covenant with Abraham and Levi had been born to Abraham,
therefore all of the covenant that God made with Abraham meant
that Levi was part of that covenant and Abraham acted as his head.
What Abraham did Levi was considered to have done in that covenant
and Abraham gave tithes to Melchizedek. Therefore, Levi also gave tithes
to Melchizedek. The same analogy is true for
us, God's elect. All that God did in the Lord
Jesus Christ for His people, all that Christ did, He did for
us and we did in Him. When God says in Revelation 13.8
that Christ is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,
how long ago then did God effectively, in His purpose, in His decrees,
how long ago did God slay His Son? Before the world was created. Before there was ever a man.
Before there was any sin in the world. And so, therefore, since
God ordained the blood of Christ for His people before the world
began, how long ago then was there a high priest to offer
that blood? To stand before God for His people? And how long ago did the Lord
Jesus Christ love the church and give Himself for the church? From eternity. God always had
and elect people. God always had them because He
chose them in Christ. He made Christ their high priest,
their mediator, their surety. And Christ, before time began,
in God's purpose, in the ordinance of God, the will of God, He offered
Himself to God. He agreed to that covenant. He
sacrificed Himself and God received His sacrifice. And therefore,
God received His people with Him. And so as Levi paid tithes
in the loins of Abraham, all that Christ did as our High Priest,
we did in Him. When He lived His life, when
He obeyed God's law, when He offered Himself to God for our
sins, it was our obedience, it was our death, and it was our
justification when God raised Him from the dead because we
were in Him. And so it's very significant.
Levi paid tithes in Abraham. And verse 11, it asks this question
now. Because the law is going to be
done away. The Old Testament is now being done away. And the
purpose of the book of Hebrews is to show that the new covenant
is now come. It's now revealed. And God is
making it known, and so He says, "...if therefore perfection were
by the Levitical priesthood, for under it the people received
the law, what further need was there that another priest should
rise after the order of Melchizedek and not be called after the order
of Aaron?" Why would God, in Psalm 110 verse 4, after the
law had been given for hundreds of years, why would God say,
the Lord swear and he will not repent. You, speaking to his
son, the Lord Jesus Christ, are a priest forever after the order
of Melchizedek. He reaches back to Melchizedek,
who was before the law, and he goes forward and says forever
Christ is going to be a high priest like him. Why would God
do that? Well, because the law made nothing
perfect. If the law of Moses made men
acceptable to God, God would never have had to say in Psalm
110.4, after the law, that He was going to have a high priest
after the order of Melchizedek. Because the law would be good
enough. But it was not good enough. It did nothing to take away sin.
And so verse 11 says, If perfection were by the Levitical priesthood,
for under it the people received the law, what further need was
there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchizedek
and not be called after the order of Aaron? For the priesthood
being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of
the law. Isn't that amazing? If the priesthood
changes, the law must change. What did the law do? Remember,
what was the law? It was a covenant. It was an
agreement God set. And He made it between Himself
and the people of Israel. He says, the man who doeth these
things shall live by them. But if you fail, at one point
you're cursed. Do this and live. Fail and die. That was the law. The law put
everything on us. And of course, only served to
expose our sinfulness. It served to expose God's holiness
in the sense of what He demanded and in His justice. But it left
us in the dark as to who God truly is in His character as
God. All we knew was the terror of
the Lord. And it couldn't persuade us.
We can't love a God who requires us to give to Him that He might
reward us. We can't love a God like that.
We can only fear Him because we know we deserve to be punished
and He threatens us with it. But when the Lord gives us, when
He says that the law had to change under the priesthood because
it made nothing perfect, He's pointing to a new law. And what
is that law? It's the law that God is going
to write on the hearts of His people. What is the law God writes
on the hearts of His people? What is that law? It's the rod
of His strength. The gospel of His Son. The Gospel
of Christ is written on our hearts. It's the power of God to salvation. I determine not to know anything
among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. The Lord Jesus
Christ fulfilled the law. He fulfilled all the Old Testament
law. And He did the will of God in offering Himself in making
atonement for our sins. He did everything that God required.
And so that law is not needed. Because the law is done in Christ. God is satisfied. God is honored
by the obedience of Christ. He's the only one who could do
it. There's none good but God. No man is good but the King of
Righteousness. And that's why the law had to
change. God couldn't be honored by that old law. He couldn't
be. Because we were sinners and sinners
can't honor God. But Christ is not a sinner, and
He did honor Him. Now, in verse 13 it says, "...he
of whom these things are spoken pertains to another tribe." Not
only did He show that the Lord Jesus had to be a priest after
Melchizedek because of His endless life, because they died as sinners,
and because God swore to Him, but also now He says, The law didn't talk about a high
priest out of the tribe of Judah. It says in verse 14, "...it is
evident that our Lord sprang out of Judah, of which tribe
Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood." The Lord Jesus'
priesthood was not given out of the law of Moses. Moses had
nothing to do with Christ's priesthood. He didn't initiate it. It wasn't out of Aaron. He was
a priest of a different kind, a different covenant. The Old
Covenant is not the covenant of grace. The Old Covenant is
a covenant we cannot come to God by. The New Covenant is the
only way we can be saved. Our only hope of salvation is
our High Priest. And so he goes on and on. And I'm going to cut this short
a little bit now for sake of time, but I want you to see verse
19. He says, "...for the law made nothing perfect." The law
made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope
did, by the which we draw nigh unto God. Now, the book of Hebrews
uses that word perfect over and over. If you read it in chapter
6, it talks about perfection. Chapter 7, it talks about perfection.
The law couldn't do it. We must go on to perfection.
But in Hebrews 10.14, it says, By one offering he, Christ, hath
perfected forever them that are sanctified. Now the Lord Jesus
Christ did what the law could not do. The law made nothing
perfect, but Christ did. And how did he do it? By his
one offering. You see, the high priest is our
only hope before God. But the high priest is not a
high priest for all men. Because if you ever have a high
priest, know this, if you ever have a high priest, then all
that God thinks of the high priest is what He thinks of you. What
He accepts from the high priest, He accepts for you. And if God
accepts the sacrifice, then He accepts you for whom it was offered. But if you don't have a high
priest, you have no hope. then how can I know that Christ
is my High Priest? Hebrews 7.25 says, He is able
to save them to the uttermost who come to God by Him. So the question is, has God given
us, has he given us a sense of our hopelessness and helplessness
under the law? And has he shown us from scripture,
has he persuaded us that the gospel of Christ is our only
hope and that Christ is all of our answer before God? Has He
persuaded us? And have we, with glad reception,
embraced Christ? He is my all. And we come to
God by Him, by His blood, and say, Lord, receive me only for
Christ's sake. And in receiving Christ, Receive
me with him. Is that what God has done for
us? Then we come to God by Him and He, our Lord Jesus Christ,
is able and He will, without fail, save us to the uttermost. And He did it by offering Himself
to God. Now, This is given to us so that
we might know and have ultimate confidence that there's no possibility
of failure. That the New Covenant actually
saves God's people, honors God and saves them from their sins.
So that we would come to God and worship God and give Him
our all for Christ's sake. Let's pray. Lord Jesus, we pray
that you would stand for us, that you would intercede for
us, bring us to yourself, reveal your Father's heart to us in
the grace and truth by which you humbled yourself, reconciled
us to God, removed our sin from us, put Your own robe of righteousness
upon us, so that we might be accepted by God Himself without
sin, justified in all of His justice, blessed with all that
God gave to Christ. We pray, Lord, that we would
be given this great grace and we might be enabled by your spirit
to worship you as those who've been saved from the worst sins,
saved to the highest place, the depths of despair to the highest
heaven in the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you for this salvation.
Lord, we pray you wouldn't leave one here without giving them
this understanding, this heart that comes by your spirit to
know and believe the Lord Jesus Christ. In his name we pray,
amen.