Infinitely Superior High Priest

 

As we continue our study through the book of Hebrews, I center my remarks today around this text in chapter three and verse one: “Therefore holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priesat of our confession.” 

 

As we read the third chapter of this book, it’s important to remember the chapters and verses in the Bible were added between the 13th and the 16th centuries to help readers quickly find what they were looking for in Scripture.

 

So, when the writer used the word ‘therefore’ in this first verse of chapter three his readers would have immediately understood he was referring to what he’d written in chapter two. As a reminder to ourselves, let’s take a moment to look at that section:

 

“Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives. 16 For assuredly He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the descendant of Abraham. Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted. (Hebrews 2:14-18)

 

He continues in chapter three: “Therefore holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.” 

 

For the remainder of this message and into next week, I’d like us to consider Jesus as our Apostle and High Priest. As many of you know, the word ‘Apostle’ means to be sent by someone as a messenger. And so, the Lord Jesus tells us in John 3:17, “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” He says it again a few chapters later, (John 6:38) “For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.”

 

In other words, the Father sent His Son into the world with His inerrant and infallible message of eternal life – the message proclaimed to all who have ears to hear and hearts humble enough to receive that message.

 

But Jesus is not only the matchless Messenger from the Father. He is also our matchless High Priest – one who is infinitely higher than those under the Mosaic covenant. Infinitely higher because He alone is Almighty God in flesh, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, inextricably One with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

 

As our High Priest, Jesus always, continually, moment by moment intercedes for us to the Father. Listen to Hebrews 7:23-25 “The former priests [meaning those under the Mosaic covenant]  . . . were prevented by death from continuing, but Jesus, on the other hand, because He continues forever, holds His priesthood permanently. Therefore He is able also to save forever those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”

 

Now let’s take a moment to remind ourselves of the responsibilities placed on the Old Testament priests – including the High Priest. A partial list includes offering atoning sacrifices to God for the people’s sins (for example, see Leviticus 4:20, 26, 31). Another role of the priests was to intercede to God for the people (for example, Leviticus 9:22-24; Numbers 6:22-27). But a responsibility reserved only for the High Priest was to bring the blood of the sacrificial animal into the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement.

 

And as the infinitely superior High Priest, Jesus brought His own sacrificial blood into the Holy of Holies in heaven. I spoke at length during the last week or so about Jesus’ propitiatory/atoning sacrifice for us. As our High Priest, Jesus also makes intercession for us moment by moment, day after day, throughout our lives.

 

It is to the Lord’s role as our intercessor that I want to now turn our attention because His prayers to the Father are markedly and distinctively unlike the prayers of ANY human priest.

 

When Jesus our High Priest prays for us, He does so lovingly, individually, knowledgably, effectively, and specifically. To help us remember those significant adverbs, I’ve formed the acronym, ‘LIKES” from the first letter of each word.

 

First, the ‘L.” Jesus, at the right hand of the Father (see Romans 8:34; Acts 2:33) Lovingly prays for us. Scripture could not be clearer: God loves us – ALL of us. Believer and non-believer. He loves us despite our reciprocation – or lack of reciprocation – to His love. God loves us without requiring anything of the beloved. He loves us because, well, because He loves us.

 

God’s very nature is love: (1 John 4:16) “We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love.” And because He is love, He “causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. (Matthew 5:45)

 

Paul picks up the same theme in his appeal to the pagans in Lystra: (Acts 14:17) “[God] did not leave Himself without witness, in that He did good and gave you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.”

The unconditional nature of God’s love is clearly seen throughout the gospels and the epistles. Listen to the apostle Paul in his letter to the Christians at Rome: (5:6-8) “For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man, though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

It's important that we understand God always initiates love. It’s never a response to what we do or don’t do, to what we have done or haven’t done. That’s precisely what makes His love unconditional. St Paul merely touches the outer edges of that stunning truth when he writes: “Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? . . . For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35-39, selected verses)

 

Perhaps because God’s love for us is so altogether undeserved, we find it difficult to fully comprehend His ‘agape’ love because we don’t have that kind of love. And even if we did, we cannot sustain it because of our own sin nature.

 

But God fully sustains His love for us through every hour of every circumstance and failure and stumble we experience in life. And how then ought we to respond to that kind of love.

 

I know how I should respond. I should respond by wanting to love Him regardless of my circumstances or how I ‘feel’ at any given moment. We should love God because He first loved us. That’s why mature Christians don’t obey Him out of fear. We obey Him because we don’t want to hurt Him. And the more we love Him, the deeper our obedience will be to Him, and the humbler our honest repentance will be when we fail.

 

So, the first point – Jesus Lovingly prays for us because He loves us unconditionally, faithfully, passionately and compassionately. And now to the second point, “I”. He prays for us Individually.

 

In Christ’s eyes we are not a trivial ‘one’ among the six BILLION people on this planet. We are not an unimportant part of His Body, the Church. To the point: YOU are not a nameless face to your High Priest. He knows your name, your address, and even how many hairs you have on your head.

 

Look at your fingertips. Those spirals and loops are entirely unique to you. No one among those six billion people on this planet has precisely identical fingerprints. Your fingerprints are unique because YOU are unique.

 

But that’s not all we can say to illustrate your individuality before your Creator. I’ve shared this before, and I do it again for emphasis: When your father and mother came together to produce you, your mother had ovulated typically only one ovum with its own unique DNA coding. Meanwhile, your father ejaculated into your mother an average of one quarter BILLION sperm cells – each of billion sperm also had their own unique DNA coding.

 

Think a while about the miracle that is YOU. As the Psalmist tells us: (Psalm 139:13) “For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb.” It is a biological truth that only ONE of your father’s quarter of a billion sperm cells fertilized your mother’s one ovum. That means, God personally directed your conception and your formation in your mother’s womb. God chose the one unique sperm from your father with its own unique DNA to fertilize your mother’s one ovum with its own unique DNA to create YOU.

 

So, I say it again, when our High Priest prays for you, He prays for the ‘unique’ you. He prays for the one out of six billion ‘you.’

 

Some might wonder how it’s possible for Jesus to know every unique person among the six billion people on this planet. That’s easy: Because our High Priest is God the Son, coequal, coexistent, and coeternal with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

 

Lovingly, individually – and our ‘K’ word – our High Priest Jesus prays for us knowledgeably. What that means is our High Priest – unlike any human priest can ever pray – our High Priest prays with the comprehensive and limitless knowledge of who we are and WHY we are as we are. Such knowledge is only possible to God.

 

When our High Priest prays for us, He prays with infallible knowledge of the full range of experiences in our pasts and our current days. He has perfect knowledge of our motives, our relationships with others. He knows everything that makes us who we are, why we think as we do, and why we do whatever it is we do – or don’t do. He knows every thought that crosses our minds even before we ourselves know them. You might remember what the Psalmist wrote: “O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You understand my thought from afar. You scrutinize my path and my lying down, and are intimately acquainted with all my ways. Even before there is a word on my tongue, behold, O Lord, You know it all. (Psalm 139:1-4)

 

And because He loves each one of us with such complete and infallible knowledge, and He loves us without conditions attached, and because He is God, we can fully trust that Jesus’ prayers for us are fully Effective – the ‘E’ word in our acronym. His prayers are abundantly effectual, and utterly powerful.

 

I suppose we might have difficulty to one degree or another in understanding the full implication of the promise –that Jesus’ prayers for us are entirely efficacious and powerful. We might have difficulty because we cannot fully understand the breadth and length and height and depth of the value and the power of our own prayers. I believe a big part of that deficient understanding of the efficacy and power of our own prayers is because we  so often don’t see the results of our prayers.

 

We pray for healing, but healing doesn’t occur. We pray for finances, and little changes. We pray for the salvation of others – even for family – and decades later, we’re still praying. And so, we might start wondering what’s the use of praying?

 

But mature Christians know that just because we don’t see answers to our prayers doesn’t mean God hasn’t heard our prayers, or that He has said, “No.” Scripture assures the Christian: (John 5:14-15) “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.”

 

And who can ever pray according to the will of the Father better than the Son of God, our High Priest? Who in all history could know perfectly the will of God except for the Son of God? That’s why we can be utterly confident that when our High Priest Jesus prays for us, His prayers will always and without room for doubt be answered in accordance with His prayers for us.

                                                                          

You and I often forget that God plays the proverbial ‘long game.’ He’s in no rush – so to speak – to get things done. CS Lewis understood that troubling point – troubling to us who often have little patience even to wait for the red light to turn green. Listen to what he wrote in ‘Mere Christianity’ – “God is not hurried along in the Time-stream of this universe any more than an author is hurried along in the imaginary time of his own novel. He has infinite attention to spare for each one of us.”

 

Impatience, and being able to pray fully in accordance with the Father’s will are some barriers to being at peace with God’s decisions about our prayers. But when Jesus our High Priest prays, He always prays in accordance with the will of the Father because He has the mind of the Father.

 

Finally, the ‘S’ word in our LIKES acronym. When our High Priest prays, He prays Specifically for us. What I mean by that is, our High Priest prays for our specific needs as He alone can know.

 

Listen, we don’t know with complete understanding even our OWN needs. So the apostle writes to the Christians at Rome: (Romans 8:26-27) “The Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”

 

And since we cannot completely know our own needs, how can we possibly know the complete needs of others? That’s why it ought to be of great encouragement to know our High Priest – who loves us so much that He came from heaven to earth to die for us – that Jesus prays for our specific needs, even as our needs might change moment by moment.

 

Jesus is the matchless Apostle sent into the world by the Father with the eternal message of salvation through repentance through Christ. Jesus is also our matchless High Priest, infinitely higher than those under the Mosaic covenant. Infinitely higher because He is Almighty God in flesh, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, inextricably One with the Father and the Holy Spirit.

 

As our High Priest, Jesus continually, moment by moment intercedes for us to the Father. He prays for us lovingly, individually, knowledgeably, effectively, and specifically. Oh, Holy Spirit, please plant this truth deep in our souls, that we may bear increasing fruit for Your kingdom.

 

So then, we focused attention today on HOW He prays. Next time we’ll examine WHAT He prays.