There's a line in that song that
is absolutely one of my favorite lines in any hymn. It makes me long for it every
time I hear it, every time I sing it. Adam's likeness, now a face,
stand thine image in its place. What a day that'll be when Adam's
likeness is not in us anymore. Oh, wouldn't that be wonderful? All right, let's open our Bibles
again to Hebrews chapter 7. I titled the message this morning,
Who is Melchizedek? Melchizedek is a very mysterious
figure in the Word of God. I happen to firmly believe that
Melchizedek is a pre-incarnate appearance of our Lord Jesus
Christ, just like the angel who appeared to Manoah and his wife,
the captain of the Lord's host that appeared to Joshua. Now,
I wouldn't split with anybody over that, but I just don't see
how any of these descriptions of Melchizedek can apply to any
mere man, the king of righteousness and the king of peace, the prince
of the Most High God. I'll show you what I mean. Look
and hold your place there. Look back at Genesis chapter
14. In Genesis 14, this is the only place in Scripture where
this man Melchizedek appears. a few other times, but the only
time he appears in scripture is in Genesis chapter 14. And
the scene here is Lot and all of Sodom had been taken captive
by a bunch of heathen kings and Abraham heard about it. Abraham
took 318 men and he went out and divided his 318 men and he
completely slaughtered. those kings and their armies,
recovered all the people and all their belongings, didn't
lose anything. It's what's called the slaughter of the kings. And
right after that slaughter of the kings is when Melchizedek
appears to Abraham, and then we never hear of him again. In
verse 18 of Genesis 14, and Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought forth
bread and wine. And he was the priest of the
most high God, and he blessed him. and said, Blessed be Abram
of the Most High God, possessor of heaven and earth, and blessed
be the Most High God, which hath delivered thine enemies into
thy hand. And he, Abraham, gave him tithes of all." Now, there's
several reasons why I believe Melchizedek is a pre-incarnate
appearance of Christ. Number one, Melchizedek is the
king and the priest. No man ever held both offices
of king and priest. You remember King Uzziah. He
tried to go in and offer incense before the Lord and God struck
him with leprosy and killed him. He tried to come before God without
a high priest. The king was trying to do the
job of a priest and God killed him for it. No man could be king
and priest. Number two, the lesser is always
blessed of the greater. Now Abraham is a great man in
the Old Testament and given to us as the example of faith, but
Melchizedek blessed Abraham. Not the other way around. Melchizedek
is greater than Abraham. Number three, Abraham gave ties
to Melchizedek. Isn't that odd? 400 years before
the law was given, Abraham gave tithes to Melchizedek. Tithes
are given to the Lord. And then lastly, Melchizedek
brought forth bread and wine. Now what's a priest doing not
bringing blood sacrifice? This priest brought bread and
wine. He brought those elements which represent the Lord's table,
the elements we still use to observe the Lord's table. Those
elements which picture the sacrifice of Christ. Now the blood was
there. The blood in the veins of Melchizedek. At least that's the way I see
it. Like I said, I wouldn't split with anybody over it. Because
the important question really isn't who is this man Melchizedek?
The important question is who is the Lord Jesus Christ? And
Melchizedek shows us something of Christ. Teaches us how believers
are blessed in Christ our great high priest. Now back in our
text in Hebrews 7, at the very end of chapter 6, we read that
Jesus is made a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. So what is this order, this being
made like a priest like Melchizedek? What does Melchizedek teach us
about Christ our Savior? Let me give you five or six things
I think would be a blessing. Number one, Melchizedek teaches
us The Lord Jesus Christ is the king priest. Verse one of Hebrews
seven says, for this Melchizedek, king of Salem and priest of the
most high God who met Abraham returning from the slaughter
of the kings and blessed him. Now, like I said a minute ago,
no man in Israel could ever be both king and priest. There are
three offices in Israel, prophet, priest, and king. A man could
be a king and a prophet like David was, Solomon was, A man
could be a prophet and a priest like Samuel was, but no one was
ever both king and priest, only the Lord Jesus Christ. He is
the king priest. Now, why is that significant?
Why make such a big deal about that? Well, because think of
those two offices put together. The king, he rules. The king rules sovereignly. I don't think Americans understand
that. I mean, it is our constitutional right to question our leaders,
isn't it? But you better not question the
king. His word is law, absolute law. There's no questioning his
power. There's no questioning his decision. His will is always
done. Christ is king. of kings. He's king over every earthly
king. He's lord over every earthly lord. He has all power. He has absolute sovereign authority
and there's no questioning his power. There's no questioning
his decisions. Nebuchadnezzar learned that.
Nebuchadnezzar thought he was king and he learned nobody can
ask God, what are you doing? Nobody can question him. His
will is always done. I mean, there's not even a blip.
There's not a slightest delay in His will being done. It's
always done. He does according to His will
everywhere, in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants
of the earth. And this King, Christ our great
King, is also the high priest. Now the priest in the Old Testament,
you think what their role was? It was to offer sacrifices for
sin, wasn't it? And they offered thousands, millions
of animal sacrifices, which pictured the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus
Christ, but they could never take away sin because they're
animal sacrifices. And the blood of an animal can't
pay for the sin of a man. So the sons of Aaron, they offered
these sacrifices, but you think they must have gone home often,
just felt powerless, don't you reckon? I mean, Because they
hadn't gotten off of those same sacrifices all over again. Tomorrow,
they had no power to put away the sin of the people. They couldn't
help the people at all. All they could do is be a picture
of Christ. If you just see what I'm doing,
look to Christ. But they didn't even have the
power to make them do that, did they? Aaron couldn't make them see
Christ and what He was doing. Oh, but Christ can. He can because
He has all power. His sacrifice puts away the sin
of the people. Because His blood is perfect
blood, sinless blood, which is able to atone for sin. Christ,
our priest, has the power of the King to make His people sinless. Here's something else that the
priest did in the Old Testament. He proclaimed the leper clean
or unclean. Remember the time the Lord healed
the leper, He said, now you go show the priest. You've got to
go to the priest, so the priest can pronounce you either clean
or unclean. Now the priest didn't have the
power to make the leper clean, did he? All he could do was judge
what was there. He could say, this is what's
here. You're either clean or you're not clean. You're either
a leper or you're not a leper. But Christ our high priest, he's
the king. He's got the power to make his
people clean. See, he proclaims his people
clean. Christ the high priest proclaims his people are clean
because he's got the power of the king to make them clean. He uses his omnipotent power
to make his people clean. He is the king priest. That's
what Melchizedek shows us. Second, Melchizedek teaches us
this, that Christ is the priest of the Most High God. See that? He says, thou art the priest
of the Most High God. Now, there's no doubt that Aaron
and his sons were priests of God, weren't they? But they dealt
with God through pictures and types and shadows. They never
dealt with God face-to-face. They couldn't even go into the
Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement without filling that
place with smoke first, lest the Shekinah glory of God would
kill them. They couldn't deal with God face-to-face. But in
order for the sin of God's elect, in order for the sins of spiritual
Israel to be put away, there's got to be a different priesthood
than National Israel had. There's got to be a priesthood
coming. who can actually put sin away. And that's the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's the priest of the most high
God. Christ deals directly with the
Father, face to face. Christ didn't go into a tabernacle
made with hands with typical animal blood. No, he went into
heaven itself with his own blood by which the writer tells us
he obtained eternal redemption for his people. The sacrifice
of Christ was so successful, it was so perfect that the Most
High God said, their sins and iniquities will I remember no
more. Whoever it is Christ offered that sacrifice for, the Most
High God says they're perfect. I don't remember their sins and
their iniquities because they're gone. There's nothing to remember.
Now this is the gospel we preach. I know that oftentimes it seems
too good to be true, doesn't it? But it's true. Christ has made His people holy
and perfect. There is full and free forgiveness
of sin in the Lord Jesus Christ. I wish somebody had come in here
this morning miserable. I wish you'd come in here this
morning so utterly miserable. The weight and the guilt and
the sin just Just utter misery. If so, I got good news for you.
There is full, free forgiveness of sin in the blood of Christ.
Come to Him and have it for free, without money, without price,
He said. Because our Savior is the priest of the Most High God.
He doesn't deal in pictures. He doesn't deal in pipe dreams.
He deals directly with the Most High God against whom we've sinned. and he has to sacrifice to put
it away. That's the only way sinners like
you and me can obtain forgiveness and redemption. It's through
Christ, our high priest, dealing directly with the most high God
for us. Thirdly, Melchizedek teaches
us this. All blessings are in Christ. He says there at the
end of verse one, while Abraham was returning from the slaughter
of the kings, Melchizedek blessed him. Now Abraham, like I said
a minute ago, is a great man, isn't he? He's the example to
the father of the faithful. He's the great example of faith.
He's given to us as the example of faith without works. Justified
by faith, not by works. Now the Jews, they knew Abraham
was a great man, didn't they? How many times did they tell
our Lord, well don't you be talking to us like that. We've got Abraham
for our father. We're all set spiritually. Because we got Abraham
for our father. But oh, when Melchizedek came,
Abraham knew somebody greater came, didn't he? Look at verse
4. He's now considered how great
this man Melchizedek was, unto whom even the patriarch Abraham
gave a tenth of the spoils. Abraham knew Melchizedek was
greater. Look at verse 7. And without all contradiction,
you can't contradict this, the less is blessed of the better. The lesser is always blessed
of the greater, of the better. There's somebody better than
Abraham. Melchizedek, the Lord Jesus Christ. And every blessing
God has for a sinner is found in the Lord Jesus Christ. You
don't have to wonder where to go to find the blessings of God. God made it so simple. He put
them all in one person. The Lord Jesus Christ. Now I
want you to look back at Genesis chapter 14. Every blessing God
has for a sinner is in Christ because Christ purchased them
through His sacrifice. Let's read these verses again. Verse 18 of Genesis 14, And Melchizedek,
king of Salem, brought forth bread and wine, and he was the
priest of the Most High God, and he blessed him, and said,
Blessed be Abram of the Most High God, possessor of heaven
and earth. See, the blessing was tied to
the bread and the wine, wasn't it? The bread and the wine came
first. Those elements which pictured
the sacrifice of Christ came first. Then the blessing flowed
from that. Well, every blessing you and
I will ever receive from God is a direct result of the sacrifice
of Christ for our sin. You think of all the blessings
that God has given his people, too many to mention, I'll mention
just a few. The forgiveness of sin. Oh, what
a blessing that is. To have our sin forgiven. Well,
God forgives sin. Why? Because the blood of Christ
put it away. Because the blood of Christ paid
the sin debt in full for His people. Atonement, being brought
back, made one with God. Adam separated us. Christ brings
atonement, brings us back to God so that God accepts His people.
But why does God accept His people? in the blood of Christ that washed
them white as snow, enabled them to come into God's presence,
made them fit. It's the blood of Christ that
washes us from all of our sin, making us holy and righteous.
That's what makes us fit to come into God's presence. Then there's
peace with God. Oh, the blessing to have peace. How's it come? Through the blood
of the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. God accepts our worship. What a blessing to be able to
come and worship and have God accept it. Why does He do that? Through the blood. Through the
blood of Christ. Here's a blessing. In all of
our stumbling, in all of our bumbling, in all of our willful
sin, to know Christ sits at the right hand of the Father, interceding
for us. How does he do it? How is that
intercession always accepted? Because he pleads his blood to
pay for sin. See, every blessing we ever have
from God comes directly through the sacrifice, through the blood
of Christ. Look at Hebrews chapter 10. Here's a blessing. We can
come to God and be heard. Come by a new and living way.
How is it that we come? The blood of Christ. And if we
come through the blood of Christ, we come in full assurance of
faith. Hebrews 10 verse 19, having therefore
brethren boldness, boldness, confidence, liberty to enter
into the oldest by the blood of Jesus by new and living way,
which he has consecrated for us through the veil, that is
to say his flesh and having a high priest over the house of God,
let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith,
having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies
washed with pure water. Oh, we can come through the blood
of Christ boldly, with confidence, this new and living way. Not
through that old dead way. You know, Israel of old, they
always came to God full of fear and worry, didn't they? What
if God doesn't accept me? What if God doesn't accept the
sacrifice? On the day of atonement, the high priest had a garment,
had bells around the bottom of the hem of his garment. And when
he would move, those things would clank together and those are
the bells. And he'd go in there in the Holy
of Holies. Nobody would go in there with
him. Nobody would be in the tabernacle. But boy, you can bet they were
outside listening, weren't they? If they hear those bells ringing,
that priest is still alive. He's still moving. God's accepted
his sacrifice. But they kept listening, didn't
they? What if the bell stopped? If the sound stops, maybe the
high priest made a mistake. And God didn't accept his sacrifice.
And God didn't accept his sacrifice, and he killed the priest. Guess
who he's going to kill next? I'm mighty interested in those
bells, aren't you? Full of fear, is he going to accept the sacrifice? Those who believe in Christ.
If Christ is your high priest, you don't have that worry. Because
we know the Father accepts His sacrifice. We know the Father
will always accept us in Him. So we come before Him without
fear. Oh, what a blessing. And every
blessing, any spiritual blessing, you can think of comes right
from there, from the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, our
high priest. He's the high priest who offered
the sacrifice. He's the sacrifice that was offered.
He's the altar upon which it was offered. He's all. All right,
here's the fourth thing Melchizedek teaches us, that Christ, our
high priest, makes his people righteous. In our text, Hebrews
7, the writer says here, verse 2, 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. Christ our Savior is the King
of Righteousness. He is all righteousness. He rules
over all righteousness. He rules in righteousness. Christ the King sovereignly makes
His people righteous. All righteousness is in Him. It can't be found any place else. And Christ, our high priest,
is the king who lives and rules to ensure the righteousness of
his people. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
king of righteousness, the righteousness of his people. Christ is both
the cause and the giver of righteousness. Christ is the cause of righteousness. He earned it for his people by
obeying the law for And he's the giver of it. He gives it
to them freely because they have connection with him. They have
union with him. His people are righteous because Christ is their
representative. See, they did. God's elect did. Whatever it is, Christ did. He
obeyed the law. They did too. And Christ's people
are what Christ our representative is. We are righteous because
he's righteous. That's real. That's in reality
right now. Right now. Adam was our first
representative, wasn't he? We just sung about the first
Adam and the second Adam. Adam was our first representative.
Every one of us did what Adam did. Can you deny it? We've sinned
in Adam, didn't we? And every one of us are what
Adam is. We're sinners, aren't we? I mean,
that is all too real. We are what our representative
is. Well, in the exact same way,
the second Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ, made his people righteous.
God's elect did what Christ did. They obeyed the law when he did.
Just as surely as we broke the law when Adam did, we obeyed
the law when Christ did. So God's elect are what Christ
is. He's the king of righteousness. He's righteous. Did his people
are too. And you don't have to wait to
get it someday in glory. Right now. Right now, that new
man born of God is righteous. You who believe are as righteous
as you ever will be. Sit right here in those chairs.
You're as righteous as you ever will be. Just as surely as every
man and woman, boy and girl is a sinner in Adam, you're righteous
in Christ. He is the king of righteousness. And this king does not just rule
some little teeny tiny village. He's got a vast kingdom. And
that kingdom is full of people who've been made righteous in
him. That's what a king we have. What a high priest. Our high
priest is the king of righteousness. And if he's the king over it
and he'd given it to us, we can't lose it, can we? Right, here's
the fifth thing Melchizedek teaches us. Christ, our high priest,
gives his people peace. Melchizedek was the king of Salem,
which being interpreted is king of peace. Look at Isaiah chapter
32. See, these two things go together,
the king of righteousness and the king of peace. They have
to go together because wherever there is righteousness, there
must also be peace. Isaiah 32 verse 17. The work of righteousness, the
result, the work of righteousness shall be peace. and the effect
of righteousness, quietness and assurance forever. And my people
shall dwell in a peaceable habitation and in sure dwellings and in
quiet resting places." Oh, what a blessing it is to have peace. Isn't that wonderful to have
peace? There's no more conflict. There's
no more noise and tumult and screaming and yelling and war
and fighting. There's peace. Oh, where there's
righteousness, there is peace with Almighty God. With Almighty
God. Christ doesn't come to give peace
in the world. That's not possible. The world hates God. And they
hate you who believe Him. That's not the peace He gives.
The peace that Christ gives, His peace is much greater than
that. Well, you think, I think every president of my lifetime
has promised, I'm going to go over there in the Middle East
and have peace. I don't care how long any of us live, not
one of them is going to do it. Not one of them. It's impossible. I'll tell you something greater
than making peace over there in that Middle Eastern desert.
Peace with God. Christ did what looks impossible
to the sinner. He made peace with the Holy God
because He took the sin of His people away from them. and He
made them righteous. His sacrifice took away everything
that made God angry, so there's peace. The sacrifice of Christ
put God at peace, gave His people peace. And it's through the sacrifice,
and if you're still in Isaiah 32, look at verse 1. Isaiah tells
us that. Behold, a king shall reign in
righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment, and a man shall
be as a hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest,
as rivers of water in a dry place, has the shadows of a great rock
and a weary land." Now, what's this tempest and this wind and
these rivers of water? What's all this storm? What's
this talking about? He's talking about the storm of God's wrath.
The storm of God's wrath against sin, the sin of His people. Well,
Christ is the King of righteousness and He's the shelter from the
storm of God's wrath against the sin of His people. God's
elect run to Christ and they hide in Him and Christ is the
shelter. He bears all the wrath of God
that falls against the sin of his elect and shields them from
every drop of God's wrath. Not one bit of it falls upon
them. And when all that fury was poured out, God said, there's
no more wrath left in me. I poured it all out on my son.
There's peace. There's no more wrath. There's
no more wrath from God to be found for his people. There's
peace. He already poured it out in justice
upon his son. Christ made peace with God by
the blood of His cross. The blood of the cross of Christ
satisfied the Father so that He is at peace with His elect.
But here's the problem. You and I are born in sin. We're
born at war with God. And we are, aren't we? We're
born at war with God. Our carnal mind enmity against
God, it's not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can
it be. Well, then how can we? who are born the sworn enemy
of God. How can we be at peace with God? How is that possible? By the
exact same blood that put the Father at peace. The blood of
the cross of Christ. Let me show you that. 2 Corinthians
5 verse 20. Hearing of the sacrifice of Christ
makes God's people surrender. They surrender to God, they stack
their arms and they beg for mercy for Christ's sake. 2 Corinthians
5 verse 20. Now then, we are ambassadors
for Christ. As though God did beseech you
by us, we pray you in Christ dead, be ye reconciled to God. I pray you in Christ dead, I
encourage you in Christ dead, right where you sit, quit your
warfare and be reconciled to God. Now, why would enemies like
us ever be reconciled to God? Why would we quit our warfare
and be reconciled to God? It's the sacrifice of Christ.
For, here's why you do that, Paul says, for He, God the Father,
hath made Him, God the Son, sin for us, who knew no sin, that
we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. See, the blood
of Christ makes me not angry with God, too. The blood of Christ
applied to my heart gives me a new heart. Makes me not angry
with God. The same blood that made the
Father not angry is the blood that makes me at peace with God. When the blood of Christ is applied
to our hearts, the warfare's over. The war's over! There's
peace with God. And we also have peace of conscience. Can you think of anything more
miserable than a guilty conscience? I mean, it won't quit, will it?
I mean, you can't shut that guy up. A guilty conscience. Oh,
what we would give to have peace of conscience. Want me to tell
you where it's found? blood of Christ. His blood, once
we're cleansed in the blood of Christ, the conscience has got
nothing to scream about. Sin's gone. It's all been gone.
Our conscience is not going to tell us, well, you better get
busy now. You better get busy keeping the law. No, I'm not
going to tell you that because the law's already been kept in
Christ. Your conscience won't tell you that. You better get
to work. Wash away some of this sin now or you're not going to
be accepted. Your conscience is not going to tell you that because
Christ's blood already cleansed all of our sins. and we have
peace. We rest in God. Hebrews 9 verse
13. For the blood of bulls and of
goats and the ashes of an heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctified
to the purifying of the flesh, how much more? So the blood of
Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without
spot to God, Purge your conscience from dead works to serve the
living God. Your conscience is purged from
having to do those dead works, trying to keep the law and make
God happy with you, because Christ already did it. Your conscience
is at peace. Now, the believer still works.
Don't mistake this to think the believer is lazy, never works.
No, the believer works. Isn't that what Brother Mike
Walker told us Thursday night? Whatever it is God's put to your
hand to do today, do it with all your might. Do it with everything
you got. Do it out of love. Do it out of thanksgiving for
God, not because you're trying to earn something from Him. We
have peace, peace with God. Alright, here's the last thing
Melchizedek teaches us. He teaches us that salvation
in Christ cannot be lost because it's eternal. Verse 3 says, Melchizedek
is without father. without mother, without descent,
having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like
unto the Son of God, abideth the priest continually." Now
it says here, Melchizedek is without father. How's that a
picture of Christ? Who's the Son of God? Christ,
the Son of God has a father, doesn't he? The Father. But as
a man, the Lord Jesus had no father. Joseph was his foster
father. The Lord Jesus Christ had no
earthly father. He couldn't have an earthly father.
He couldn't be conceived by human seed. If that, if he was conceived
by human seed, he'd take part in Adam's sin and he'd be a sinner.
But he had, he didn't have an earthly father. He wasn't conceived
with earthly fleshly seed. So he had no sin nature. That's
what enabled him to be the righteousness of his people. What also says
Melchizedek had no mother. Well, how can that be our Lord
Jesus? He's got a mother, doesn't he? Mary. He was born of a woman.
Mary's his mother. Well, Mary is the mother of the
Lord Jesus. But as God, the Lord Jesus Christ has no mother. He's
eternal. The Son of God was never born.
The Son of God was given. A child was born, but the Son
was given. The Son of Man was born, but
not the Son of God. And what all this means is this.
is that Christ is the eternal Savior. Eternal both ways. Christ doesn't have a beginning
of days. Salvation doesn't either. Salvation's always been in Christ.
He doesn't have a beginning of days. Salvation doesn't have
a beginning of days. And Christ doesn't have an end
of days. Then neither does salvation. You see, it's eternal. There
never has been a time, even before creation, there's never been
a time that God's wrath has been upon His people because He always
saw His people in Christ, the Lamb slain from the foundation
of the world. Their salvation is eternal. Their righteousness
is eternal. Their acceptance is eternal.
But in our experience, there was a time we didn't know God. What's that song you sing? It
is finished. Well, the war is over, but I
didn't know it. I didn't know it then. I was still a rebel. There was a time in my experience
I was a rebel. I was lost. I was in darkness.
But God's elect cannot stay in that condition. It's impossible.
Christ has already justified it. God's loved them from eternity. They're not going to stay in
that darkness. They're not going to stay in that rebellion. They're
not going to stay dead. Nothing will stop God from giving
them life. from revealing Christ to them
and in them. See, this salvation is sure.
It will be sure in our experience because it's eternal. And if
there's one thing I love, it's a sure thing. I mean, it's a
sure thing. I stopped by with Jonathan yesterday.
He's a Michigan fan, bless his heart. And he had the Michigan
football game on. I mean, Michigan was just blowing
Nebraska clear out of the state. And they showed the stands and
a bunch of people left. And I said, you know one thing,
If I was there, I was a Michigan fan, I'd never leave a game like
that. Because I like a sure thing. I mean, I like a sure thing.
Now that's just a silly, insignificant thing. How much more does that
apply to my soul? Oh, I need a sure thing. I'm
a sinner. That's a sure thing. I need sure
forgiveness of sin. I need sure cleansing from sin.
I need sure salvation from sin. That's only found in the Lord
Jesus Christ. The only way I can have peace
for my heart and rest for my soul is by trusting Christ. See, salvation is eternal, so
it can never be lost. Our Savior lives eternally to
guarantee it. For the believer in Christ to
lose their salvation, God would have to cease to exist. That's
not going to happen. For a believer to lose their
salvation in Christ, Christ, His blood, would have to quit
being effectual. He'd have to quit interceding for you. He'd
have to quit loving you. Well, that's never going to happen.
So salvation in Christ is sure. It's eternal. I'm thankful. This salvation in Christ is eternal. Because Christ, our High Priest,
lives eternally to make good on the sacrifice that He offers.
His priesthood is unchangeable. It's unchangeable. More than
meaning that that's eternal, it means there's no reason for
it to ever change. It's perfect. Now Aaron's priesthood,
that had to change, didn't it? Something's got to change. These
sacrifices they're offering aren't putting sin away. Something's
got to change. But Christ's priesthood is unchangeable because it's
perfect and he makes his people Perfect. And He's given us all
this. This is what information He's
given us about Melchizedek. He's given to us so that we would
trust Christ the Savior. Now we know that Christ is eternal,
don't we? He's the one who spoke all of
creation into existence. Everything that was made, everything
that was created was made by Him for you. So Christ existed
before creation. Well then, I'm pretty sure He
existed before the law. If he existed before creation,
he had to exist before the law. Then that tells me salvation
was always by grace, never by the law. It was always in Christ,
never by us keeping the law. Now I also, Christ existed before
creation. He existed before the law was
given. I happen to believe that Christ was also physically on
this earth before the law was given in the person of Melchizedek
to teach us this point. was never meant to come by the
law, by Aaron and his priesthood. Salvation was always in Christ.
It was always by God's grace. It was always by faith, never
by the law. And God showed us that by sending
Melchizedek as a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ 400 years
before the law was given. So we would have all the more
reason to put our hope and our trust and our confidence in Christ. God, help us to do it. God, help
us to do it. Let's bow together in prayer. Our Father, how we thank you
for this clear declaration of Christ our King Priest. The salvation
is sure and certain in Him. Oh, how we thank you. This is
the Savior we need. This is the gospel Father, I
pray that you'd give every heart here this morning faith to believe
you. Let us leave here this morning believing in Christ our Savior,
having righteousness and peace, peace with thee, peace of conscience
in him. Father, bless your word. You
promised that your word would never return unto you void, that
it would always accomplish the purpose whereunto you sent it. And Father, we pray this morning
that your purpose in sending out your word is a purpose of
mercy and grace to your people.