Satan is a master deceiver. He is a master deceiver. He's been in the business for
a long, long time, and he's good at it. Thinking about preaching
this morning, I got to thinking late last night, and I woke this
morning thinking the same thing. How craftily the fiend of hell
has developed religion throughout the ages by which to dupe men
by imitating the faith of God's elect. I can't think of any system
of religion that doesn't involve a priest, an altar, and a sacrifice
of some kind. A priest, an altar, and a sacrifice. Sometimes the priests are like
those of Rome, or like those of the Church of England, dressed
up in garb like men in drag, and look a little sissified,
but real fancy and rich. And sometimes the priests are
like the folks you find in the mountains in China, just have
a little something wrapped around them, and look very poor and
act very poor. But most all religions, all that
I can think of, including voodoo, I have a priest, a sacrifice,
and an altar. There's a reason for that. No
one can come to God. No one can be accepted of God.
No one can be saved by God except by a priest, a sacrifice, and
an altar. But the altar has got to be an
altar of God's making. He said, if you come near me,
don't come on an altar you built, come on an altar of earth. Don't
climb steps, lest your nakedness be exposed by you doing something. Don't climb the steps. I recall
the first time I preached out in Hucumba, California, where
the Bob Harmon was pastor. And on the way out, he told me
he was going to be preaching before me and wanted me to critique
the message. And I thought, hmm, how do I
get out of this? I said, Bob, I'd rather not do
that. He said, I want you to. And he got up and preached. He
preached on steps of salvation. And from the first breath to
the last, it was works. And I would have had to do something
if I spoke after him to repudiate everything he said, whether he
had asked me to or not. And so I got up behind him and
repudiated every word he spoke as damning heresy, work salvation. I had no idea what the repercussions
would be, but God was pleased to save him. God does things a little different
than we think he might a lot of times. But you can't come
to God by steps. You can't come to God on an altar
you make. You can't come to God at an altar
in a Baptist church or at an altar in a Catholic church. You
can't come to God at a material altar. You've got to come to
God at that altar which is in heaven, Jesus Christ the Lord. He is our altar. The physical
altar of the temple and the tabernacle were but types of him who is
our true altar, Jesus Christ the Lord. If you would come to
God, you must come to God bringing a sacrifice, but not just any
sacrifice. Only one sacrifice will do. You
have to come to God bringing the sacrifice that God provides. That's his own dear son, nothing
else. If you bring anything to God
except Christ and hope to find acceptance with him, pardon for
sin, forgiveness and righteousness and eternal life by anything
except the doing and dying of the Son of God, you'll go to
hell. Can I be more specific, more
clear? If you come to God bringing your
feelings, your religion, the religion of your mother and daddy,
your doctrinal creed, the purity of your life, your prayer life,
your scripture reading life, your spiritual life, bring anything
in addition to Christ, and you don't bring Christ at all, you'll
go to hell. You see, you can't lean altogether
on Christ and lean on something else. You've got to trust his
dear son, the Lamb of God, who alone by his blood takes away
the sin of his people wherever they're found in all the world.
And if we would come to God by his altar, by his sacrifice,
we must come to God through one mediator, one priest. Not many priests, not many mediators. I know that it's become very
popular these days, and I'm speaking as plainly as I possibly can
about papacy, the foolishness of Roman Catholicism, the blasphemy,
the idolatry, the damning character of it, along with all other forms
of work religion. But it's become popular these
days to embrace papacy and call it Christianity and call it faith
in Christ. It is demonic, it is hellish,
it is idolatrous. You come to God only by Christ,
not by Mary, not by the Pope, not by some priest dressed up
in a costume that looks funny. You come to God only by Jesus
Christ, who is our high priest, our great high priest, the only
one there is. Let's look at his greatness in
Leviticus chapter 21. My subject this morning is the
greatness of our great high priest. I like subjects that are bigger
than I am and I won't come close to scratching the surface, but
it's a great subject. The greatness of our great high
priest, the Lord Jesus Christ is our great high priest. He is the one and only mediator
between God and men. And this man, Christ Jesus, is
the one and only mediator, high priest, by whom sinners come
to God. Look at what the scriptures teach
us here concerning him. I'll call your attention to four
things in verses 10 through 24. We'll look at them one at a time. First, we see something of the
greatness of our great high priest, the Lord Jesus, in his consecration
to God as our priest. Verses 10, 11, and 12. Our great
high priest, the Son of God, the God-man, our mediator, sanctified
himself. That is, he consecrated himself
entirely to the will and glory of God for the saving of our
souls. You don't need to turn there,
just listen to what he said. In John chapter 17, he said,
sanctify them through thy truth. Thy word is truth. As thou has
sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into
the world. Why did the triune God send Christ
into the world? For the saving of his people
to the glory of his name. Why has Christ sent you and me
into the world? For the saving of his people
to the glory of his name. For this cause, I sanctify myself. Now Father, sanctify my people
for the saving of your people and the glory of your name. Listen
to what he says. and for their sakes I sanctify
myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth. We see this portrayed here in
Leviticus 21 verse 10. And he that is the high priest
among his brethren, upon whose head the anointing oil was poured,
and that is consecrated to put on the garments, shall not uncover
his head, nor rend his clothes, neither shall he go in to any
dead body, nor defile himself for his father or for his mother. Neither shall he go out of the
sanctuary, nor profane the sanctuary of his God, for the crown of
the anointing oil of his God is upon him. I am the Lord. The first time the words high
priest are used in the Bible are here in verse 10. Actually,
a better translation, a more accurate translation would be
the great priest or the great high priest. Our great high priest,
the Lord Jesus, is the one of whom Moses here speaks. In all
things, he is our example. even in the typology of this
chapter, the High Priest, the Lord Jesus, is imminent among
the people for his devotion to God. I call on you and I call
on myself. I call on God for grace for you
and me, that we may more and more concentrate ourselves to
God. that we may more and more devote
ourselves to Him, following the example of our Savior. The anointing
oil is upon Him. The word anointing oil might
be translated as suggested by some, the crown of the anointing
oil. Our great high priest is the
King, the King of glory. He is the king on his, the priest
on his throne. He is the royal priest. In the Old Testament scriptures,
some men were prophets and kings. Some men were priests. but none bore all the offices,
prophet, priest, and king, and none bore the office of priest
and king. Jesus Christ alone is the priest
on his throne. On his head is the holy anointing
crown, the crown of the anointing oil, it is written. right across
the front of his mitre. Holiness to the Lord. This is
the crown of our Savior. God has highly exalted Him because
He has accomplished the redemption of His people by the sacrifice
of Himself. He has fulfilled all righteousness. He has obeyed His Father's will.
And now the Father has given Him dominion over all flesh. power, authority, might, dominion
over everything that he should give eternal life to all that
the father gave him. Our all glorious Christ, that
consecrated one has put on the garments of the priesthood, the
garments of salvation. It is he who made them. It is he who wore them. And it
is He who puts them upon us. He made the garments of salvation,
righteousness and atonement. And He comes by His grace and
puts the garments of salvation on you who believe. Perfect righteousness,
perfect atonement, complete perfect righteousness, complete perfect
satisfaction. Our great Savior, Jehovah's righteous
servant, never rent his clothes or uncovered his head as one
in mourning and in sorrow. Hold your hands here and turn
to Isaiah 42, Isaiah 42. Here the prophet speaks of the
Lord Jesus as Jehovah's servant. And he who is Jehovah's priest
is Jehovah's servant. Isaiah 42 verse one. Behold my
servant whom I uphold, mine elect in whom my soul delighteth. I
put my spirit upon him. He shall bring forth judgment,
that is justice to the Gentiles. Judgment, justice, righteous
salvation. He shall not cry nor lift up
nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. He will not put
on sackcloth and ashes. He will not rend his garments
as one in mourning. A bruised reed shall he not break. And the smoking flap shall he
not quench. He shall bring forth judgment
unto truth, justice to truth. By mercy and truth iniquity is
purged. He shall not fail nor be discouraged
till he has set judgment in the earth and the aisles shall wait
for his law. He shall not fail nor be discouraged
until he has finished his work. And our Lord Jesus has finished
his work. Back here in Leviticus 21. The priest was required not to
touch a dead body and thus profane himself. Our Lord Jesus, while he walked
on this earth in perfect righteousness as a man, could never profane
himself. Satan found nothing in him that
was evil. He could not sin. He's holy,
harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners. And he came to
the dead, the widow of Nain's son, Jairus' daughter, Lazarus. But he never went to the grave
and never touched the dead. except to raise them up in life. And even when he was suffering
and dying as our high priest, he showed tenderness, concern,
and care, not for himself, but for his mother. In the midst
of his woes, the smitten shepherd took time out of his suffering
and sorrow to speak for the comfort of his mother, committing her
to the hands of John the disciple. And when he had done that, he
resumed his suffering. What he did for Mary in the midst
of his suffering, he sees his mother standing there. And he
said, woman, you go home with that man right there, he'll take
care of you. In his last hour, he took care of the needs of
one dear him. Would you turn to Psalm 69? Psalm
69. What he did for Mary as he hung
on the cross, he did for you and me. Look at verse four. Listen to the Savior. They that hate me without cause
are more than the hairs in mine head. They would destroy me,
being mine enemies wrongfully. Ere mighty, then I restored that
which I took not away. O God, thou knowest my foolishness,
and my sins are not hid from thee. Now watch this. Let not
them that wait on thee, O Lord God of hosts, be ashamed for
my sake. Let not those that seek thee
be confounded for my sake, O God of Israel. Because for thy sake
I bore in reproach, Shame hath covered my face. I've become
a stranger unto my brethren, and an alien to my mother's children.
For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up, and the reproaches
of them that reproach thee are fallen upon me. But in the midst
of that, he said, Lord, don't let my people be ashamed. Don't
let them be confounded for my sake. Don't let them be ashamed
for my sake. He that believeth on him shall
not be compounded. That's the tender care of our
Savior for us all. When he came here to redeem and
save his people, our Savior said, lo, I come to do thy will, O
God. And he never changed his mind.
He never turned aside from his work. He never went back. Jehovah's servant, our Savior,
chose never to go out free as the bondservant might, but rather
he voluntarily stood to his pledge. And as our great high priest,
our Savior never went out of the sanctuary. He never profaned
it by the introduction of personal concerns. He never felt anything and did anything and
experienced anything for personal gain, for personal concern. He ever felt the streams of the
anointing oil, the consecrating oil on his head. He came to save
others, himself he could not save. He saved not, but rather
hated and lost his own life for us. He stood entirely, entirely, in the entirety of his life,
from the time he came into Mary's womb to the time he ascended
back to the throne of God in heaven, he lived entirely for
us, for the glory of God. What a statement. He consecrated
himself. He separated himself to this
work. Oh, thanks be unto God for such
a great high priest. Now, here's a second thing that
will show you something of the greatness of our great high priest. We see it in the bride he chose. Look at verse 13, Leviticus 21. He shall not take a wife or he
shall take a wife in her virginity, a widow, or a divorced woman,
or profane, or an harlot, these shall he not take, but he shall
take a virgin of his own people to wife." The high priest in
Israel by law was only allowed to marry a virgin. Now, the law here does not equate
a divorced woman or a widow with one who is a harlot. But the
priest was not allowed to marry anyone except a virgin in Israel. Why is that? God's elect, the
Church of Christ, is espoused to him, our high priest, as a
chaste virgin. He calls his bride, my undefiled. And when we stand before him
at the throne of God, the Savior declares that we will stand before
him as chaste virgins and undefiled. Let me show you. Turn to Revelation
14. Revelation 14. And I looked, and lo, a lamb
stood on the mount Zion, and with him an hundred and forty
and four thousand. That's the totality of God's
elect, a specific number given for an indefinite number. Having
his father's name written on their foreheads. And I heard
a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice
of a great thunder. And I heard the voice of harps,
harpers harping with their harps. And they sung, as it were, a
new song before the throne, and before the four beasts and the
elders. And no man could learn that song,
but the 140 and 4,000, which were redeemed from the earth.
These are they which were not defiled with women, for they
are virgin. They were not defiled with women
for they're virgins. We often hear people say, and
I have said myself, justified, just as if I'd never sinned.
That's not right. That's not right. It's more than
that. To be justified before God means
I never sinned. He didn't just put away the memory
of our sins, He put away our sins. These are virgins. They are not defiled with women,
for they're virgins. These are they which follow the
Lamb with us wherever He goeth. These were the redeemed from
among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. and
their mouth was found no guile, for they are without fault before
the throne of God. The Lord Jesus is our great high
priest, our Melchizedek, our ever-living high priest, touched
with the feeling of our infirmities, who also makes intercession for
us, who is able to save to the uttermost all who come to God
by him. But even in his choice of a bride,
The Lord took care that God's priest set forth the picture
of Christ another priest. Our Savior's bride is without
spot, without wrinkle, undefiled. The choice one of her that bear
her. The daughter saw her and said,
she's blessed. Obviously, there's no greatness
in a man choosing to marry a virgin. Every man wants to do that. You
young ladies would be wise to learn that and bear it in mind.
Every man wants a chaste virgin for a wife. Any man in this building
who wanted otherwise, please raise your hand and I'll acknowledge
it. Every man wants to marry a chaste virgin. No man wants
to marry a defiled woman. You girls need to learn it. Your
mamas and daddies need to teach it and emphasize it. I know this
generation is a generation that looks upon chastity as mockery,
and looks upon virginity as a thing to laugh at, and looks upon fornication
and adultery and sodomy as a thing like sitting down and having
a drink together. We live in an apostate, godless generation. Don't let it influence your thinking.
Here's the greatness of our Savior. He loved a harlot. This is how
Ezekiel describes us. An imperish, whorish woman with
a whorish heart. That's what he got when he got
me. And he made that imperish, whorish
woman with a whorish heart, a chaste virgin. By nature, we are not
such. By nature, we are all like Hosea's
wife, Gomer. God commanded Hosea to go down
to the red light district and get him a wife. And Hosea went
down and got Gomer and he married her. and God gave them three
children. But though Gomer had married
Hosea, it was just a marriage of convenience for her. He never
took Gomer's whorish heart from her. And after a while, Gomer
went back to the red light district and spent everything in the arms
of another, sold herself to another. all the while Hosea providing
for her and caring for her. Finally, when Gomer was broken
and ugly and dirty and useless, Hosea went to where she was and
they found her on the auction block and they bought her for
an omer of barley and a half omer of barley for the silver of his sweat and
the gold of his blood. and it took her home. I can picture it. Jose went and got that worthless,
dirty slut. That's not too low to describe
you. That's not too low to talk about you. That's not too low
to talk about me. He went and got that dirty, worthless
slut and never did a man walk more honorably down the streets
with the bride than Hosea did with Coba. Now he's won her heart. Now, he says, I betroth you unto
me in righteousness and in faithfulness. You're mine and I'm yours. Oh, I'd like to have been a fly
on the wall in the parsonage that night, wouldn't you? He
brought me to the banqueting house And he spread his banner
over me. His banner over me was love. I'm sick of love. His left hand is under my head. And his right hand doth embrace
me. And so it is that our Savior
embraces us. He is God who hateth putting
away. And he's married himself. a whorish
woman, whom He made to be a chaste virgin by His obedience in death
in our stead. And now He embraces us in the
grip of grace that can never be broken, not by us and not
by another. Here's a third aspect of our
Savior's greatness as our high priest. Look at verse 15. Neither shall he profane his
seed among the people. Aaron was not to mix his seed
with the wicked, with the heathen, with the idolaters, with the
reprobate. Neither shall Christ. He shall
never profane one of his own by charging them with sin. He shall never profane you. Did
you hear that? He shall never profane you, you
who are his. He will never charge you with
sin, as he shall forever charge the wicked. Blessed is the man
unto whom the Lord will not impute sin. Oh, would to God I could convey
this to you like I wish. Would to God he would convey
it to me and seal it on my heart as I wish he would. Blessed is
Don Fortner to whom God will never for any reason at any time
impute any sin. He cannot. Merlehart, the holy
Lord God, cannot impute sin to you because Christ took it away. Christ took it away. Before ever
it was committed, he took it away. Plunged it into the depths
of the sea of divine forgetfulness. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. Who
is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather,
that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us. One last thing. We know that
all the work of our great high priest, the Lord Jesus, shall
effectually secure this blessed end, because our priest is exactly
the priest God required. Look at the perfections of our
Savior. Here is the greatness of our
high priest. He who is our great high priest
is the perfect priest, verse 16. And the Lord spake unto Moses
saying, now don't miss this, here the Lord speaks not to Aaron
personally, but to Moses, the lawgiver. And Moses, the lawgiver,
tells Aaron the priest, the kind of man the priest must be. Speak
to Aaron, verse 17, saying, whosoever he be of thy seed in their generations
that hath any blemish, let him not approach to offer the bread
of his God. For whatsoever man he be that
hath the blemish, he shall not approach A blind man, or a lame
man, or he that hath a flat nose, or anything superfluous, or a
man that is broken-footed, or broken-handed, or a crook-bite,
or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be a scurvy, or
scabbed, or hath his stones broken, no man that hath the blemish
of the seed of Aaron, the priest shall come nigh to offer the
offerings of the Lord made by fire. He hath a blemish. He shall not come nigh to offer
the bread of his God. The man that God will accept,
the man who can do business with God, the man who can bring a
sacrifice to God, The man who can intercede for God's elect,
for God's Israel, for God's people, the man who can obtain salvation
for sinners must be a perfect man. Perfect in all the details
of humanity. Jesus Christ is that man. Turn over there and look at it,
Hebrews chapter seven, Hebrews seven. Verse 25, he is able also to
save them to the uttermost that come to God by him, seeing he
ever liveth to make intercession for them. This is a priest who
is himself the sacrifice. And having sacrificed himself,
he now lives in heaven to make intercession for sinners who
come to God. For such an high priest became
us. That is to say, this is exactly the priest I need. who is holy,
harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and higher than
the heavens, who needeth not daily as those high priests to
offer up sacrifice, first for his own sin, and then for the
people's. Now watch this, for this he did
once when he offered up himself. For the law maketh men high priest,
which have infirmity, but the word of the oath which was since
the law maketh the Son who is consecrated forevermore. All
right, back to Leviticus 21. The high priest, we're told in
verse 21, and again in verse 22, was to offer up the bread
of God. The bread of God. Those words
are found Only seven times in scripture. They're found five
times right here in this 21st chapter of Leviticus. It's obvious
to me that our Lord Jesus referred to this chapter when he spoke
in John chapter 6 and said, I the bread which I give is my flesh,
which I give for the life of the world. The bread of God is
he that cometh down from heaven. The bread of God is that which
the priest put on the table of showbread every week. The bread
of God was the bread that the priest offered to God, his life. Our Savior said, Eternal life
is received by sinners by faith as you eat my flesh and drink
my blood. You got to eat this bread to
live, but the bread is first offered to God. The great high
priest, the Lord Jesus, sacrificed himself to God for us. And then God takes the bread
that the priest offered and he's now accepted, and he gives that
bread to the priest family. So that Abraham's sons, even
those who are flat-nosed and have crooked backs and are blind
or deaf or lame, even those who are not perfect, even those who
have their blemishes, feed on the bread. Hear me, children
of God. Hear me, you who do not know
my God. The bread of life is Jesus Christ
the Lord. He's the bread, the only bread
that satisfies God. He's the bread, the only bread
that satisfies God. I like bread. I know I'm diabetic. I'm not, it's not good for me.
I like bread. And if my wife gives me a meal
without bread, she's doing her best to be good to me, I know.
But I always ask for a bite of bread. If it's just a piece of
light bread with nothing on it, I'll want a bite of bread before
I get done eating. And I'm about always gonna have
it, sometimes. She plum forgets that she's not
supposed to give it to me. Yesterday, after breakfast, I'd
worked at the house. I was working home on Saturdays,
and she started rustling around in the kitchen, about time to
have something to eat for lunch. She fixed something she'd never
fixed before. I hadn't had it since I was a
little boy in the South. She fixed some cinnamon brown
sugar toast. You know what we had for lunch
yesterday? Nothing but bread. Nothing but bread. Cover that
bread up with butter, real butter, not that cast-off, but butter.
Cover it up with butter and then put brown sugar and cinnamon
on it and bake it. And have you a cup of coffee
or a glass of milk. I think we had both. And I had two and a
half pieces of that bread and I was completely satisfied. I didn't want anything else.
I didn't want any meat. I didn't want any gravy. I didn't
want any potatoes. I didn't even want any Brussels
sprouts or broccoli. Some of you will get that. I
didn't want any of that. I just wanted the bread. Christ, blood and righteous. Christ obedience unto death.
Christ our Savior. Mark, that's the only bread that
satisfies God. And that's the only bread that
will satisfy a sinner. The only bread that will satisfy
your soul. Eat this bread and you'll never
hunger again. Eat this bread. and you have
all that your soul can desire. Eat this bread today and tomorrow,
tonight and the next night. This bread is always at the altar
of God on the table of showbread. Always there for God. and always there for me. Always there for God and always
there for me. God give you grace now to come
to the great high priest on his throne. It's called the throne
of grace. Obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need,
eating this bread. What do you mean, pastor? Take
him by faith. feast upon Him. The bread of
life spread before you in His Word by God's almighty grace. Amen.