You ever sang that here before?
I've always loved that hymn, and I don't remember ever hearing
it sung. Robert Murray McShane wrote that,
and that was a blessing. Would you turn with me to Hebrews
chapter 5? I've entitled this message, The
Credentials of Christ, the credentials of Christ. A credential is something that
gives a basis for credit or confidence. When I found out I had the problem
with my esophagus about a little over three years ago, Paul Walmsley
and Paul Harries looked for a doctor that had the credentials to do
the surgery. As a matter of fact, when I first
talked to my, I can't remember what kind of doctor it was, whoever
looked at my esophagus, he said, you don't want to have it done
here. There's nobody really that has the experience, the credentials
for it. They found a doctor in Cleveland
who had the credentials and the expertise in that particular
field. And on that basis, I had that
man operate on me. I want somebody with some credentials
if they're going to be doing something with me. I want to
have a basis for confidence in that person. Now, perhaps the
biggest thing of the book of Hebrews is the priesthood of
the Lord Jesus Christ. Look in Hebrews chapter 2 verse 17. Wherefore in all things
it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren that he might
be a merciful and faithful high priest. Look in chapter 3 verse
1, Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling,
consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ
Jesus. Look in chapter 4 verse 14, Seeing
then we have a great high priest. that's passed into the heavens.
Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession, for
we have not in high priesthood which cannot be touched with
the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted
like as we are. Yet without seeing, let us therefore
come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy
and find grace to help in time of need. Now this subject just
keeps unfolding all the way to the end of the 10th chapter.
That is the main subject of the book of Hebrews, the priesthood
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And in Hebrews chapter 5, verses
1 through 10, we're given the credentials of this great high
priest. He gives us a reason for confidence. Now let me remind you what a
priest is. A priest is a man who represents
men to God. Because of God's holiness and
because of man's sinfulness, men cannot come to God without
a priest. You can't come on your own. God
is holy. I'm sinful. Someone must represent
me. Now this priest must have the
qualifications to be a priest that God can accept. If I was
a priest for you, what good would it do you? It wouldn't do you
any good at all. This priest must be a priest
that God can accept. There must be something about
him that will make God accept the people he represents because
he represents them. And that's what I need in a priest.
And there must be something about him that will make the people
he represents trust him to represent them. So this priest must have
something God can accept and he must have something that men
can trust. And may God be our teacher as
we consider the credentials of Christ to be our great high priest. I love that passage of scripture
we open the service with in Hebrews 7, 26, such a priest became us. Such a priest is exactly what
we need. I need. this great high priest. Now let's look in Hebrews chapter
5 and read verses 1 through 3. 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 sins, who
can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the
way for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity and
by reason thereof he ought as for the people so also for himself
to offer for sins. Now, here we see this priest that
has what God needs. He has gifts and sacrifices for
sins that God can accept, and he's also a priest who's compassionate
toward us, toward the ignorant and to them that are out of the
way. Now, he tells us in verse 1 what
the purpose of a priest is. He is ordained for men in things
pertaining to God. Now, what separates you and me
from God is sin. That's why I can't come into
His presence on my own. God's unapproachable. He's holy. He's other. He's not like me.
He can't accept me the way I am. The only way I can come into
His presence is with a priest that He can accept, and a priest
that will do something for me. Now, notice it says in verse
1, 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 sins. Now this priest must have gifts
that he can offer God that God can accept. He must have a sacrifice
for sin that God is satisfied with and this is what we have
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now what is the gift he offers?
We just heard about it in that song. He offers to the Father
his righteousness. His obedience, His law-keeping,
the obedience He rendered as the representative of His people.
He says to the Father, those for whom He represents, He says,
their sin became mine and my righteousness is theirs. And
He presents to the Father His perfect obedience. Now, I don't
have anything like that to present to the Father, not in and of
myself, but He presents to the Father. Here's the gift He gives
the Father. perfect obedience. He said, that sinner's sin became
mine. I paid for it. My righteousness
is theirs. And he presents to the Father
his obedience. And understand this, his obedience
is my obedience. His righteousness is my righteousness,
just as truly as my sin became his. He died. He died because
my sin became his. He was guilty. And just as truly
as his My sin became his, his righteousness becomes mine. And
that's what he presents to the Father. Now, I've got some confidence
in that. That's a mighty powerful credential,
isn't it? He presents to the Father his
own righteousness. That's the gift he presents.
He presents to the Father his righteousness, and he's got a
sacrifice for sin. A sacrifice that the Father accepts. He has the only sacrifice that
satisfies God, a satisfaction. Now understand this about the
blood of Christ. When God, and this is a difficult thing to
think about and even talk about, but when God places a man in
hell, it's forever. It's never going
to stop. It's never going to be annihilated.
It goes on forever and ever and ever. Terrible thing to think
about, but it's true. It's true. Now why is that? Because
no man can ever offer satisfaction for sin. That's why. He's never
paid the debt. Sin is an infinite evil. Now
you and I, the problem with us is we don't much understand that.
I believe it, but I don't much understand it. But sin is an
infinite evil because it's against an infinite God. And it deserves
infinite satisfaction. And no man can provide that.
And that's why sin goes on forever. And the closest way I could come
to understanding this is to think about my daughter. My daughter,
oh how precious she is to me. Now somebody violently murdered
her and abused her. And then said, well, I'll give
you a million dollars to make satisfaction for that. Would
that satisfy me? No way. Well, what if I give
10 million? No way. There is no satisfaction for
that. Sin is such an infinite evil
and that's why hell lasts forever. There's never... It's so evil
that it... God can't be satisfied. But Christ Jesus... My... If God punishes me, it's going
to go on forever because I can't satisfy it. But there's such
difference between my death and the death of Christ. It's Christ
that died. The Son of God actually satisfied
the justice of God. His sin payment, God was pleased
with. I mean, God said, I'm satisfied.
I can ask for no more. Now that's quite a priest, isn't
it? To think of his priesthood, first
of all, he offers a perfect righteousness to his Father, and he offers
full satisfaction for sins. Now such a priest became us,
didn't he? Isn't that just what you need? That's what I need,
his priesthood, to do that for me. Now look in verse 2, not
only do we have his credentials towards God, we have his credentials
for men. Now, this high priest who has
this gift and sacrifice for sins that he can offer to the Father,
here's how he is toward us, who can have compassion on the ignorant
and on them that are out of the way, for that he himself also
is compassed with infirmity. Now, here are his credentials
toward men. He has compassion. Compassion. Men that are not
compassionate are never loved. The man who is unmerciful, unbending,
unforgiving, grudge-holding, and harsh will not have anybody
wanting to be around him, will he? I don't want to be around
somebody like that. I don't have anything to do with
him. I don't want that person to be my friend. What are they going to do for
me? They can't do anything for me. A priest who has no compassion
toward men cannot be a priest, can he? What good would he do? Would he help you any if he had
no compassion toward men? The priest that you and I need
must be a man of compassion for the ignorant. And this is how
this priest is described as one who has compassion toward the
ignorant. Now what is ignorance? It's want of knowledge, want
of understanding, and it's a great evil. It's a great evil. I mean, ignorance... Here's what Paul said about it
in Romans 10, verses 1-4. He said, Brethren, my heart's
desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be
saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal for God.
They're very religious, but not according to knowledge. For they
being, what? Ignorant of God's righteousness,
and going about to establish their own righteousness, have
not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. Ignorance is a great evil. Ignorant
of God. Ignorant of His true character.
Ignorant of self. Ignorant of the Gospel. Ignorance. What a great evil. And we're
all by nature ignorant. None of us know God. None of
us know how God saves sinners by nature. We're ignorant. Now,
if this great high priest could not have compassion towards people
like that, where would that leave us? We'd be in trouble, wouldn't
we? But thank God he's compassionate
toward the ignorant. And the next qualification he
gives is he is compassionate toward those who are out of the
way. You know what that out of the way means? It means those
who have gone astray. You ever gone astray? You ever
gone off in a direction that you knew was wrong and you just
deal with that direction? evil, knowing it, knowing it's
wrong, but you still keep going in that direction. You've gone
astray. You know, David said when he ended up, Psalm 119,
that glorious psalm, he ended up with this verse, I've gone
astray like a lost sheep, like a stupid, silly, lost sheep. Seek thy servant. Now, you know,
where would you be? Where would I be? If our great
high priest did not have compassion on that one who went astray,
thank God the shepherd goes after that sheep that has gone astray
and brings him back in. Now this is the kind of, this
is the only high priest we need, isn't it? This high priest who,
he has what God needs, perfect righteousness. an offering that
actually satisfies God and I can actually come into God's presence
and God be satisfied with me through the blood of Christ and
one who's compassionate towards the ignorant and on those who
go astray. He truly is the friend of sinners. Now let's read verses four through
six. Here's his next credential. First he's got what we need and
he's got what God needs. Verse four. And no man taketh
this honor unto himself, this honor of being a priest, but
he that is called of God, as was Aaron. So also Christ glorified
not himself to be made a high priest, but he that said unto
him, Thou art my son, today have I begotten thee. He said also
in another place, Thou art a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek. Now, here's the second credential
of our Lord Jesus Christ and his priesthood for his people.
He is God's appointed priest. He is the one his father appointed
for this. Who made him priest? God did. Who sent him to be this priest?
God did. Who gave him? God did. Who smote him? God did. Now nobody can just up and decide
to be a priest. I think I'm going to be a priest.
Look what happened to the men in the Old Testament when they
tried to usurp the priest's office. I think of the sons of Korah.
They said to Aaron and Moses, the Levites, the people from
the tribe of Levi, this isn't fair. I mean, we're just as holy
as you are. We can offer up incense to God.
And you remember what happened? God opened up the ground and
sent them to hell right then, because they tried to usurp the
office of a priest. Remember, Christ is the only
priest, and these men represent the Lord Jesus Christ. What about
King Saul? He's waiting for Samuel, the
priest, to come. And Samuel doesn't come. He says,
well, I'll just go ahead and offer up this sacrifice myself without
the priest. And he lost his kingdom over that. What about Uzziah,
the great king? When his heart was lifted up,
he came into the temple to offer up a sacrifice and to offer up
incense. And 80 priests stopped him and said, this appertained
not to be Uzziah. Get out of here. He said, no,
I'm going to do it. He lit the incense and leprosy started covering
him. And he went out and died a leper.
You see, no man can take this honor to himself. Only that one
who's called by God to be priest. Now I don't believe that there's
anything more corrupt than a sinful man calling himself a priest
and thinking that he can represent somebody else to God. Listen to men's confessions of
sin as though they could do anything about it. The only man who could
be a priest is the man God appoints. Nobody else. Any time a man takes
this title to himself, I'm a priest, and acts like you can confess
your sins to him and tell him things, all you do is make, that
would have to be the most corrupt person in the world, and all
you do is make him more corrupt. That is utterly unacceptable. There's only one great high priest,
the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one that God has appointed
his son. He said to the son in verse 6
of Hebrews chapter 5, he said also in another place thou art
a priest forever. God made him this priest after
the order of Melchizedek. Now Melchizedek is a very mysterious
figure. I have no doubt that he's the
Lord Jesus Christ himself. I'm just sure of that. He's mentioned
in Genesis chapter 14 and Psalm 110 And his priesthood is a different
priesthood than the Levitical priesthood. It's not the same
priesthood. Look in verses 10 and 11 of Hebrews
chapter 5, he speaks of Christ being called of God and high
priest after the order of Melchizedek, of whom we have many things to
say. And hard to be uttered seeing
that you're dull of hearing. And he goes on to say some things
to them after that. And he's not going to pick up
this subject of Melchizedek to the end of chapter 6 and end
of chapter 7. Because there were some things that they were balking
at and having trouble with. The first principles of the oracles
of God. And it caused them to be dull of hearing. And you know
when I read that passage of Scripture, that just scared me. I don't
want to be dull of hearing. I want to be quick to hear the
Word of God. I want to be able to discern. to know the difference. And these people had got to the
place where they'd become dull of hearing and they couldn't
tell the difference between truth and error, light and darkness.
They were dull of hearing. Now, Christ Jesus is a priest
not after the Levites, but after the order of Melchizedek. This
is a special priesthood and we're going to get more into that in
the weeks to come. But his credential for being
priest is that God appointed him to be a priest. You come
by any other man and God will say I reject him and I reject
you too. There's only one priest who can bring us into the presence
of God and that is the Lord Jesus Christ, God's appointed priest. Now thirdly, his credentials
are seen in him performing the actual functions of a priest
in the days of his flesh. Look in verses 7 and 8. Who in the days of his flesh
talking about the Lord Jesus Christ when he walked upon this
earth for 33 years, who in the days of his flesh, when he had
offered up prayers and supplications with strong cryings and tears
unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard
in that he feared, though he were a son, yet learned he obedience
by the things which he suffered. How often has a man been appointed
to an office and failed to discharge his responsibilities? You see,
it's one thing to be appointed to an office, and it's another
thing to faithfully perform the responsibilities
you've been charged with. You look at failure in faithfulness,
what it's done to our country right now. You look at the CEOs
and the financial people who have just let everything go to
pot as far as our economy goes. These are men who were appointed
to offices and they failed. How many politicians have been
appointed to an office and they have not faithfully discharged
their responsibilities? They don't do us any good at
all, do they? No, yes, I want to be the one God's appointed,
but I also have to see this man who faithfully does everything
the Father appoints him to do. Now, as I said, it's one thing
to be appointed to the office. It's another thing to faithfully
discharge the office. And, oh, to think of our Lord
in the days of His flesh. Look at verse 7 again. Who in
the days of His flesh when he offered up prayers and supplications
with strong crimes and tears unto him that was able to save
him from death. And this is talking about his
prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. He was heard in that he feared,
though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which
he suffered. Turn with me to Luke chapter
22 for a moment. Though he were a son, though
he were the son of God, though he's the eternal son of God,
yet learned he obedience. I wish I could talk about that
the way it ought to be talked about. I mean, the best I could
do with that is read it and say, there it is. There it is. Yet
learned he obedience through the things which he suffered.
Now look here in Luke chapter 22, beginning in verse 41. And he was withdrawn from them
about a stone's cast, and kneeled down and prayed, saying, Father,
if Thou be willing, remove this cup from me. Now, as a man, and
I don't understand this, I believe it, but I don't understand it,
I don't understand how the Son of God could be terrified by
anything, but as a man in the flesh, The Son of God was terrified
at the thought of being made sin. And there's no way you and
I can understand that or enter into it. But he was terrified
at the thought of being made the filth and offscoring of all
things. That's what was going to happen
to him. And he prayed, if it be possible, if there's any other
way, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me But you know
what? It wasn't possible. Not for God
to be glorified. Not for His people to be saved. He had to do that. That's why
I said, nevertheless, not my will but Thine be done. And the
scripture says here, let's go on reading Luke 22. He said in verse 42, Father,
if thou be willing, remove this cup from me, nevertheless not
my will, but thine be done. And there appeared an angel unto
him from heaven, strengthening him, and being in agony, he prayed
more earnestly. And his sweat was as it were
great drops of blood falling down to the ground. What agony
he was in. And this is what that reference
to the strong crimes and tears. And here's the point. He became
obedient unto death. He truly said, though he slay
me, yet will I trust him. He became obedient unto death. Now that's how much his obedience
was. He became obedient to death. He faithfully discharged his
office as a priest. Don't you admire his obedience? I admire his obedience and I
want to, that's the obedience I want to have. Now, I know his
obedience is my obedience before God, but I want to be an obedient
child, don't you? I want to obey him. The best
thing you can say about somebody is they obey their master. They
obey their Lord. He faithfully discharged his
office in the days of his flesh. Now, let's go back to our text
in Hebrews chapter 5. So here's three credentials. We've got one more after this,
but here's the first. He's got what God needs. He's
got what I need. That's a good credential. God
appointed him to be a priest. That's a good credential. And
he faithfully discharged his office as a priest. That's a
good credential. Now look here in Hebrews chapter
5, verse 8, oh no, verse 9, I'm
sorry. And being made perfect, he became
the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him,
called of God and high priest after the order of Melchizedek. Now, that word, being made perfect,
is the same word that's translated in John chapter 19, 30, finished. finished. This high priest finished
whatever the father gave him to do. Nothing was left undone. When it says it is finished,
when our Lord said it is finished, that meant the salvation of all
the elect was what? Finished. I mean, story over. Ended. Completed. Now that's the kind of priest
I need, the one who finishes the work. I am saved. Being made a high priest, he
finished the work of salvation for everybody he died for. It's
completed and he is now the author of eternal salvation. And here's
another thing that I can't, I believe this, obviously I can't understand
it, He wasn't a complete savior until he died. Because the work
was not finished until he actually died, was buried, was raised
from the dead. But what he did in time finished
this salvation and he became the author of eternal salvation. I love this phrase, eternal salvation. He became the author of eternal
salvation. And once again, here's one of
those things that being creatures of time, It sure is hard for
us to grasp anything to do with eternity. But you know, eternity
does not have a starting point. It doesn't start and then go
on forever. No, eternity is, it goes forever
this way, that way, there's no starting point. And he became
the author of eternal salvation to all who obey him, for all
who believe the gospel. That's what that obedience is
talking about. He became the author of eternal salvation for
all them that obey him. Now, eternal salvation. Does
that mean I've always been saved? And there was a time when I was
unconverted. There was a time when I had no love for Jesus
Christ. There was a time when I didn't believe the gospel.
And I would hardly call myself saved at that time. As far as
what I could understand, I was under the wrath of God. I was
scared to death of going to hell. I was afraid of going to hell. That was my experience. If somebody
would have said to me at that time, well, you're saved. No,
I'm not. No, I'm not. If I die, I'll go to hell. That's
what will happen to me. So in my experience, no, I've
not always been saved. But yet we read of eternal salvation,
a salvation that never had a beginning and a salvation that never has
an ending. Behold, I've loved you with an
everlasting love. Therefore, with loving kindness,
I've drawn thee. Now, in my experience, no, I've
not always been saved. But there's never been a time
when I wasn't united to the Lord Jesus Christ. If you're in a boat, a canoe
or something, going down a river, and you come up on a fork in
the river, it goes two different ways. Let's say there's an island
in that river. Now that's one river flowing,
not two rivers, one river flowing. Then all of a sudden you hit
that fork, and it seems like there's two rivers, doesn't it?
But there's not two rivers. It's only one river. It's going
to get back into one river. But when you choose one way or
the other, you can't see the river on the other side, can
you? You can't see it. But it's still there. And it's
still the same river. And you're going down this river.
Then you hit that island. All of a sudden you can't see
the other side. That's what I call time. Time. I can't see my union with Christ. I believe it. I can't see it.
It's over there, but I can't see it. But it's still the same
river, and then it's going to come back and be one river that
when I die, I'm going to experience my union with Christ once again. This union never had a beginning.
That means I have always had existence and personality before
God. And remember, God doesn't see
things in time, yesterday, today, and tomorrow. It's eternal. And
he became the author of eternal salvation. Now, I'm in this thing
called time right now. And I can't, whether that illustration
works, I don't know, because that's a, how can you illustrate
something so far above us and so glorious? But I have always
been united to the Lord Jesus Christ. And I've hit this thing of time,
what I'm going through right now, I'm in the flesh. And I
can't feel me being one with Him. But when I die, just like
that river connects again after that island's over, still it's
still one river at all times. I'm always united to the Lord
Jesus Christ. And He became the author. Here's
what is so That eternal salvation was accomplished in time when
our Lord died on the cross and He became perfect. He became
complete. He completed salvation for everybody
He represented as their high priest. And this is how secure
my salvation is. It already is. I'm already in
heaven. If Christ is already in heaven,
I'm already in heaven. I'm right there with Him. I'm
united to Him and I can't be separated from Him. He became
the author of eternal salvation to all them that obey Him. Being called of God a high priest
after the order of Melchizedek. Now these are some mighty powerful
credentials for our great high priest. He's got everything God
needs and everything we need. He has the gifts and the sacrifices
to offer God and he has compassion towards poor, stupid, ignorant,
astraying sheep like me. He's the one God appointed to
be priest. He's no man appointed priest. He's God's appointed
priest. God sent him. And he faithfully discharged
everything the Father gave him to do, and he completed salvation. Such a high priest became us. And when our Lord said from the
cross, Father, forgive them, their ignorance, They're astray. They know not what they do. You
know what? Everybody he prayed for, the Father forgave. There wasn't anybody he prayed
for that the Father didn't forgive. What a glorious, great, high
Christ. Let's pray together.