Now turn with me to the book
of Hebrews chapter seven. The last few messages we've been
considering one of the most prominent and yet frankly strangest persons
in the Bible, a man named Melchizedek. And it's really a Kind of difficult
to understand the prominence of Melchizedek because there's
so little written in the Bible concerning this man who was a
priest of the Most High God. That's what it says in Matthew
7 and verse 1. There's only a few things said
in Genesis chapter 14 concerning Melchizedek meeting Abraham,
Abraham paying tithes to Melchizedek, and then in Psalm 110, and then
here in Hebrews, there's much said about him in chapters five
and six and seven. But Melchizedek, I'm not going
to go into all of that again. If you missed those messages,
you can get copies of them. But Melchizedek was a type, a
picture of the Lord Jesus Christ in his high priesthood. That's
what Melchizedek is for. He was a man whom we don't have
any knowledge of his pedigree, don't have any knowledge of his
beginning or his end. He came into Abraham's life,
and that was before the Levitical priesthood, the priesthood of
Aaron and Levi in the Old Covenant. And the priesthood of Aaron was
also a type of Christ, but Melchizedek was a better type of Christ.
But today, what I want us to focus on is what the Bible calls
the power of an endless life. That's in verse 16. And what
it's talking about there is the person and work of the Lord Jesus
Christ. And the point that's being made
here is this, Christ and his priesthood, his high priesthood,
you remember what a high priest is for, a high priest represents
God to the people and the people to God and there's so much in
the typology, the symbolizing facts of the priesthood of Aaron,
even the clothes that he wore, the breastplate that had 12 names
on the breastplate, the 12 tribes of Israel, and two amulets, one
on each shoulder, six names here, six names, the 12 tribes of Israel.
That's who he represented. And he went in to the Holy of
Holies, if you've heard of that term, the Holy of Holies, where
the Ark of the Covenant was, where the mercy seat was, and
he brought the blood of a lamb off of the altar of burnt offering. sprinkled that blood over the
mercy seat for the people. That was a symbol of what we
just got through singing. That was a type. There's power
in the blood, not the blood of bulls and goats, not the blood
of a physical lamb, but in Christ, the blood of Christ. What does
the blood of Christ mean? Well, it means his death. When
you take the Lord's Supper, the cup that we drink, that's his
blood. His body was his sacrifice, human sacrifice on the altar
of his deity. God and man in one person, the
wine is his blood, his death. He had to die for the sins of
his people. And that's what the high priesthood
represents. And out of his death comes life. And that's why here in verse
16, he talks about Christ and his priesthood and his sacrifice
being the power of an endless life. And one of the reasons
I had Brother Robert read that Psalm 9 is I remember when I
was reading through the Psalms again one time and I would go
through and I would mark in red all of those positive things
in Psalm 9. In Psalm 9, you have the positive
things that belong to a believer. the child of God, and then you
have the negative things that belong to those who are in their
sins, who do not know Christ. And I went through and underlined
all the positive things, and it just dawned on me, everything
that's said there positively about the salvation of God's
people, of attaining salvation, maintaining, he'll maintain my
cause, things like that, that's all due to the high priesthood
of Christ, the power of an endless life. And the Lord Jesus Christ
is the one and the only eternal high priest of his people. He's
it. He's everything. There's one
God, one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.
Don't look to anybody else. Don't look to any human being
to be your high priest or your priest. Christ is the high priest
of his people. and to look anywhere to anyone
else's blasphemy. Now mark that down. The eternal
high priest of the Lord Jesus Christ, as he is the advocate
and the mediator of his people, all that the father gave to him
before the foundation of the world, all for whom he died,
all who are brought to faith in Christ by the power of the
Spirit, and all of these, for whom he died and was buried and
arose again the third day, he's ascended unto the right hand
of the Father, ever living to make intercession for him. He's
performing the duties of a high priest even now. And that's what
maintains our cause. That's why we can't be lost.
Because of what he did on Calvary and his preservation of his people. Yeah, once saved, always saved,
if the Lord saved you. If you claim once saved, always
saved, and you think you're the one who made the difference,
you're not even saved to begin with. So understand that. But the high priesthood of Christ
is one of the most vital, most glorious and comforting truths
of the gospel and of the whole Bible. Right now, right now,
The Lord Jesus Christ has each one of his sheep on his heart,
pleading our cause. You know what happens when we
plead our own cause? We mess up. I've done that a
lot, plead my own cause. Why me, Lord? Why do I deserve
this kind of treatment? Why do I have to put up with
this junk? I mess up. That's nothing but self-love.
You do know that, don't you? Self-righteousness. But when
he pleads my cause, as was said in Psalm 9, and God judges, he
judges in righteousness, and where do I stand in comparison? Well, I stand firm and assured
in the righteousness of my high priest, the righteousness of
Christ imputed to me. That's how I stand before God.
Isn't that comforting? Isn't that encouraging? Somebody
says, well then I can just go out and sin as much as I want
to. If you ever get, if the Holy Spirit ever gets a hold of your
heart and settles you on that issue, you'll be more inspired
to obey God and fight sin than you ever were. And now you'll
be able to do it in a godly way. You won't be like a legalist
just trying to get yourself out of punishment, you won't be like
a mercenary just trying to earn your way into God's favor, earn
your way into God's favor. You'll be a son or a daughter
of God's grace and mercy. Well, in the last few verses
of the last message, what we see here is that Melchizedek
was greater than Abraham. How do you know that? Well, Abraham
paid tithes to Melchizedek. But also what we see is that
Christ is better than both. He's certainly better than Abraham
because he's Abraham's savior. He's Abraham's righteousness. He's Abraham's high priest. But
also with every sinner saved by grace. the earthly priesthood of Aaron
and his descendants all the way down. You know, the old covenant
that was instituted on Mount Sinai, and it lasted up until
the time of Christ, when Christ said it's finished and the veil
was written to in the temple. That spanned about 1500 years. Well, all during that 1500 year
period, God instituted the earthly human priesthood again the high
priesthood to typify Christ, the blood of sacrifices, the
blood of animals, certain animals who typified Christ, the Lamb
of God, he instituted that as a symbol, as a way of worship
so that his people were commanded to look beyond those things to
something better because those earthly things, the earthly blood
of animals, the earthly priesthood, could not accomplish salvation
eternally, could not accomplish eternal life, and could not accomplish
what he calls perfection. Now look at verse 11. He says,
if therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood,
for under it the people received the law, that Levitical priesthood,
that's the priesthood of Levi, who was a descendant of Aaron,
And you know the tribe that was the priestly tribe, you got a
whole book in the Bible about them, book of Leviticus. And that tribe, they were the
priest of the people. You had the high priest who was
a direct descendant of Aaron, then the other Levites who attended
the temple and the tabernacle and the temple. If they could
achieve perfection, the perfection that I need, I'm a sinner, I
need perfection. You're sinners, you need perfection.
Now if those things could have provided the perfection that
those people needed, what further, look at verse 11, what further
need was there that another, another of a different kind,
another priest should rise after the order of Melchizedek and
not be called after the order of Aaron? Now he's already maintained
that Christ was called after the order of Melchizedek, which
you don't know anything about Melchizedek's pedigree. See,
in order to be a priest under the old covenant, you had to
be able to prove that you were a descendant of Aaron and Levi. Somebody said it's kind of like
bird dogs, you had to have papers, that kind of thing. But that's
why if you were from the tribe of Judah, You could not, you
had no right under God's law and the old covenant to be a
priest. If you were from the tribe of Benjamin, no matter
how, you might've been a model of society, but you still could
not be a priest. You know, there's a great story
about that. You remember a king named Uzziah? Now Uzziah was from the kingly
tribe of Judah. And one day he got so full of
himself because of his success, and he was a successful king
to start off with. He got so full of himself that
he took it upon himself to enter into the temple where only the
priests could go and burn incense. And you know what happened? God
struck him with leprosy. You get out of here. You don't
have any right to be here. Oh, he's a great king. Doesn't
matter, he's not from the right tribe. He's not appointed of
God. That was for Levi and his descendant. Remember Isaiah spoke of that.
He said, in the year that King Uzziah died, he died a leper.
He said, I saw the Lord high and lifted up. Here's what Isaiah
was saying. He said, when Uzziah died, I
saw what kind of perfection God required. And you know what Isaiah
said? He said, then said I, woe is me. I am undone. I don't have that kind of perfection
in me. Well, if the Levitical priesthood
and the blood of animals could have done that, why did Christ
have to come? You see, this is the thing about
salvation by man's works. If you could attain perfection
by your works, you don't need Christ. If you imagine yourself
that you've attained some sort or some degree or some part of
perfection by your works, you're denying Christ. In fact, you're
saying he came in vain for nothing. Paul wrote about that in Galatians
2. He said, if righteousness come by the law, perfection come
by the law, then Christ died in vain. He died for nothing.
If we could do it, if we could attain it, if we could make it,
if we could reach it in any way, in any degree, then Christ didn't
have to come. Why was there a need for another
priest to come after another order, an eternal order? Well,
look at verse 12. He says, for the priesthood being
changed, there's made a necessity of a change also of the law.
That law couldn't save a sinner. Couldn't do it. All the law can
do for a sinner is to condemn that sinner based upon his sins
or based upon his works. Salvation is not by works. For those who are of the law
are under the curse, the Bible says. Because why? Because cursed
is everyone that continues not in all things which are written
in the book of the law to do them. Perfection. That word perfection,
it means finishing. It means bringing it to completion.
It means accomplishment. Finishing what? Completing what? Accomplishing what? Well, I'll
give it to you in one short verse. I could give it to you in many,
many verses. Romans 10, four, it says, for
Christ is the end or the finishing or the completion or the perfection
of the law for righteousness to everyone that believe. Now, the earthly priesthood could
not do that. Levi couldn't do it, the blood of animals couldn't
do it, Moses couldn't do it, you can't do it, I can't do it. It's the accomplishment of righteousness
by the blood of Christ, which brings the forgiveness of sins,
which brings forth an everlasting righteousness of infinite value,
which is the power of an endless life. Isn't that what we want,
an endless life? Somebody said in a movie one
time, said, do you want to live forever? Well, I'll tell you,
I got news for you. Everybody wants to live forever. Now, you
might be going through a hard time, and you might say, well,
I don't want to live forever. Y'all, you do. You may not want
to live forever in misery. You may not want to live forever
in this body that's getting old. But you want to live forever
because God has put that in every person. Do you know that? Ecclesiastes
3. He set the world in our hearts.
That's eternity. That's what that means. Now you
may resign yourself, say, well, I'm not going to live forever.
You may be like the atheist. There's a French atheist who
was so popular in his existential philosophy, and he maintained
throughout his life, there's no God. This life is it. Eat, drink, and be merry. Tomorrow
you die. And he died in utter misery. clinging to this life. You know why? Because he wanted
to live forever. That's human beings by nature.
Well, where am I going to find the power of an endless life? You only find it in perfection.
I'll never forget one time I was eating lunch with a man. He said,
well, what does God require? And I said, God requires perfection.
He said, well, nobody can do that. And I said, you're right.
That's why salvation is by grace through Christ and not by our
works. What kind of perfection do I
need? Well, Christ died, was buried,
and arose from the dead. He's now seated at the right
hand of God, which is the right hand of power. And he's seated
there, as we read in John 17, to give eternal life to as many
as the Father has given him. The Bible says the gospel is
the power of God unto salvation. It's the power of Christ. It's
the power of the righteousness of God. It says in Romans 5.21,
that as sin hath reigned unto death, why do we die? It's because
of sin, the wages of sin is death. And he says, and as sin hath
reigned unto death, even so might grace reign. How does grace reign? Through righteousness. That's
this perfection. Unto what? Eternal life by Jesus
Christ our Lord, the power of God. Eternal life, the power
of an endless life. It's the power to, the power
of an endless life is the power to put away sins. You can't do
that. We can't do that. The blood of
bulls and goats can't do that. Aaron, the first high priest,
he couldn't do it. Everyone who followed in his
footsteps down through the ages couldn't do it. There's no man
today, I don't care what kind of a funny collar they wear,
they can't do it. They can't do it. But the Bible
says, this person, the Lord Jesus Christ, this priest after the
order of Melchizedek, after he had offered, think about this.
This is Hebrews chapter 10, in verse 12. This person, this man,
Jesus Christ, the God-man. Now listen to this. After he
had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, how many sacrifices
for sin did Levi and the priest that followed him offer? You
couldn't count them. How much blood was shed on Jewish
altars? I was talking to a rabbi in Louisville,
Kentucky one time. And I asked him, I said, why
aren't you all sacrificing animals? Why aren't you sacrificing spotless
lambs, bullocks, all of that? Because you don't believe Christ
has come. And he told me, he said, well,
because the temple is not built and we're not in obedience. I
said, well, do you know that they did sacrifice animals on
altars before the temple was built? Before the tabernacles,
didn't Abraham sacrifice? Didn't Isaac and Jacob sacrifice? They sure did. There's nothing
in the Bible that says you've got to have a built temple before
you can build an altar and sacrifice. That was God's way of worship.
And all of that typified what we believe if we know Christ. So this man, after he had offered
one sacrifice for sins forever, And listen to what he did. He
sat down on the right hand of God from henceforth expecting
to his enemies be made his footstool for by one offering he hath perfected
forever them that are sanctified. How am I going to achieve perfection? I can't achieve it. It's not
an achievement. You may have a Sunday school
pin on your lapel. That doesn't mean you've achieved
perfection. That's not a merit badge. How am I going to, I can't
achieve it. But this person, the God man,
the Lord Jesus Christ, by one offering, have perfected forever. Them that are sanctified, them
whom God set apart for salvation. The power of an endless life
is the power to give life to the dead. The Bible says in Romans
8 and verse 10, if Christ be in you, the body is dead because
of sin, that's this physical body, but the spirit is life
because of righteousness. It's the power to overcome the
world. Christ told his disciples, John 16, 33, these things have
I spoken unto you that in me you might have peace, in the
world you'll have tribulation, but be of good cheer. I've overcome
the world. He's overcome it. It's the power to overcome
the flesh. Can you overcome your flesh?
No. You see, when you think about
this thing, Somebody says, well, I'm just going to conquer the
flesh. I had a man write me the other day. He said that he's
totally crucified his flesh. And I said, well, you shouldn't
be writing me. You ought to be dead. You know, when Paul and his warfare
of the flesh and the spirit, you know what he come down to?
Romans 7, 24. Oh, wretched man that I am. Who shall deliver me from this
body of death? But Christ is overcoming. He
said in verse 25, I thank God through Jesus Christ, my Lord. Overcoming the devil. Turn to
Revelation 12, show you something. I hear these preachers and these
priests, they talk about fighting the devil. I'll never forget
one time they started a religious TV station up home and up in
Kentucky There was several preachers on there just acting foolishly,
making a fool out of themselves. And they had a big statue, a
big blown up doll that they called the devil. And they kept going
over and punching that and all that stuff. I said, son, you're
riding the devil's clutches. He's laughing his rear end off,
watching those guys make a fool of themselves. Well, can we overcome
the devil? No, but I know who can and did. Look at Revelation 12 and look
at verse nine. Now this is all symbolic language
describing Satan, the great dragon. The great dragon of Revelation
is Satan. He was cast out. That old serpent called the devil
and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world, He was cast out
into the earth and his angels were cast out with him. And I
heard, and how were they cast out? By the power of God in Christ.
And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, now has come salvation
and strength and the kingdom of our God and the power of his
Christ. For the accuser of our brethren
is cast down. That's what Satan is, he's the
accuser of the brethren. which accused them before our
God day and night. Now look at verse 11. And they
overcame him by fashioning a blow-up dog and beating him in the head.
No. They overcame him by calling in a priest to perform an exorcism.
No. They overcame him by going to
church and not missing a service. No. They overcame him, look at
it, by the blood of the Lamb. That's what it took. And by the
word of their testimony. Now, what is the word of our
testimony? Well, let me tell you about when I was saved. No,
no, no, no, no. The word of the testimony of
God's people can be summarized in several ways, but one of the
greatest ways is what Paul wrote in Galatians 6, 14. God forbid
that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's the word of my testimony
and your testimony if you're a believer. And they love not their lives
unto death. The power to overcome, think
about it. Well, what's this all saying? It says we need a substitute.
We need a sacrifice that can wash away all our sins completely. What washes away our sins? Nothing
but the blood of Jesus. We need a perfect righteousness,
one that cannot be contaminated and one that cannot be taken
away. We have the righteousness of God, the righteousness of
Christ in Peter. The ground upon which God justifies
his people, makes things right, accepts us, declares us forgiven
of all our sins, declares us righteous, is the merits of Christ
alone. And it's the righteousness of
God through Jesus Christ revealed in the gospel as the power of
God. That's the perfection. And if
the priesthood, if any human priesthood could have attained
that, then there'd been no need for Christ to come. Look at verse
12, for the priesthood being changed. There's made a necessity
of change also of the whole law. When the priesthood changed.
Now what's he talking about? He's talking about when that
earthly priesthood was ended. And when was it ended? when Christ
came to fulfill all righteousness for his people, to fulfill all
perfection. And he said it himself in John
19.30, hanging on that cross, he said, it is finished. And remember, God, he tore that
veil in two from top to bottom. showing that the way of salvation,
the way of access to God was made clear now for God's people,
the blood of Jesus Christ, which washes away all my sins. Look
at verse 13, for he of whom these things are spoken pertaineth
to another tribe of which no man gave attendance to the altar.
Christ in his humanity was from the tribe of Judah. He was a
descendant of David, made of the seed of David according to
the flesh. He was not from the tribe of Levi in his humanity.
Now he was both God and man in one person. He's God and man
in one person, but his humanity came from the tribe of Judah. Verse 14, it says, for it's evident
that the Lord sprang out of Judah, of which tribe Moses spoke nothing
concerning priesthood. That old covenant priesthood
was not for anybody from the tribe of Judah. Verse 15, and
it is yet far more evident for that after the similitude of
Melchizedek, there riseth another priest. Christ came from another
order, which Melchizedek, even in his earthly priesthood, symbolized
an eternal order. And that's what Christ fulfilled.
Melchizedek himself was not the fulfillment of that, but Christ
is. And he says in verse 16, who is made not after the law
of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless
life. Christ's priesthood did not come
by the law of that old covenant, that carnal commandment. And
the reason it's called carnal, because it had to do with physical
things, fleshly things. Sometimes carnality means sinful,
but sometimes it just, and flesh sometimes means, but sometimes
it just means physical. And that's what is, in other
words, Christ, his priesthood had nothing to do with that physical
covenant made with those physical people, which was temporary and
it had a beginning and it had an end. And so, The priesthood
of Christ was not after the law of a carnal commandment, but
after the power of an endless life. He came into this world
to save his own. He walked this earth, he kept
the law perfectly, he suffered, he bled, he died, he was buried,
but what happened? Did he stay dead? No, he was
raised from the dead. Why? Because sin demanded his
death. Our sins imputed to him. Righteousness,
which he established through his death, demanded life. The
grave couldn't hold him. He conquered death, the grave,
and hell. That's what he did. And when he did all that, it
all changed. Christ, the law couldn't give
us life, it could only bring death, so the introduction of
Christ and his priesthood abolished that Levitical priesthood and
thus the whole Mosaic economy. We're under the new covenant
now. And it's the power of an endless
life that describes the priesthood of the Lord Jesus Christ opposed
to the law of the carnal commandment which can only bring death. And
let me conclude with this, that power of an endless life is the
power to preserve us and bring us to glory. Look at verse 17, he says, for
he testified thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek,
for there is verily a disannulling of the commandment going before,
that was the Levitical priesthood, that was gone, for the weakness
and unprofitableness thereof, it could not achieve perfection,
it could not achieve righteousness, it could not give life, for the
law made nothing perfect, The law made nothing right. The law
could show us our need of salvation, but it couldn't save us. The
law could show us the perfection that God requires, but it couldn't
work it and provide it. It made nothing perfect, but
the bringing in of a better hope did. Who's the better hope? That's Christ. My hope is built
on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not
trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. On
Christ the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand.
But look at this now. A better hope did, by the which
we draw nigh unto God. You know, in several places in
the old covenant, in the prophets, the nation Israel, as they had
misused and abused that old covenant law and turned it into a legal,
self-righteous system of work salvation. They're described
as coming to the temple or coming to the altar with their hands
lifted, singing praises and in prayers. And in both Isaiah and
Jeremiah, they're represented as getting farther and farther
away from the true and living God, even in their religion. And I'm afraid that's the case
with many people today. They go to church, they hear
a message, they're entertained or whatever, but the gospel of
God's salvation by his grace in Christ is either on the sideline,
not preached at all, or denied. And they think they're drawing
nearer to God. but they're getting farther and farther away even
in their religion. Isn't that sad? But through the
power of an endless life, because of the perfection that Christ
alone as the representative, the substitute, the surety, the
high priest, the mediator of his people accomplished, we who
trust him and look to him as the author and finisher of our
faith, we truly draw nigh unto God. And God accepts us, he accepts
our praises, he accepts our prayers, our worship, not because of our
goodness, not because of even our sincerity. Yes, we should
be sincere, but that's not why God accepts us. That's not why
we draw nigh unto God, because of our sincerity. We draw nigh
unto God because of the blood of the Lamb. The crucified one,
what can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.