| CHAPTER 7
Verses 1-3: Melchizedek: king and priest (Genesis
14: 18-20).
The writer spoke about Melchizedek before in 5:10.
We will not repeat what we said about Melchizedek and Abraham when we
looked at that verse. However, notice that Melchizedek was both King and
also Priest. When the Jews had kings, from the time of Saul and David
onwards, one man was king and someone else was the High Priest. Usually,
it is not good for one man to have too much power.
Jesus is different. He is King, Priest and Prophet
too. But He can be trusted. It is because God is 'Most High' (verse 1)
and is so high above us that we need a priest. We need help so that we
can come to Him.
In verse 3, the writer uses an argument from what
Scripture does not say. He did this once before (1:5). This is the argument
'from silence'. It is a kind of argument that we should never use. People
will not accept it. We know that the Jews did accept this line of thinking
among themselves. Here in verse 3, it is useful. Melchizedek had no recorded
mother or father. The Old Testament usually tells us the names of fathers.
Beside this, from the time of Moses onwards, a man had to show that he
belonged to the family of Aaron if he was to become a priest. No one asked
the question whether he was a good man or not.
Verses 4-10: Melchizedek is greater than the
Jewish priests are
We may find these verses more difficult to understand
than most of this letter. The writer says three main things here.
1. Melchizedek was a greater man than Abraham
was. The person who has less honour always receives a 'blessing' from
the person who has more honour. The person who is less important always
gives a tenth part of what he has to the person who is more important.
Abraham already had the promises that God had given him. You would think
that he wanted nothing more. Melchizedek gives him a 'blessing'. (verse
6) To 'bless' someone is to tell them that God will make them really
rich with the things that matter. This may well not be money! Jesus
says that the poor are blessed (Luke 6:20). He means rich in God's love,
and in hope and in joy, in peace and in doing what is right. (See Romans
14:17.) Just as Melchizedek 'blessed' Abraham, so we should 'bless'
one another. Most of all we should 'bless' our own children.
2. The other thing that he says is that Melchizedek
is much greater than the Jewish priests are. Among the Jews, the tribe
of Levi took a tenth part of what the other Jews had. Levi had not yet
been born: but Abraham gave a tenth part to Melchizedek. Levi came from
the family of Abraham, so it was as though Levi gave instead of taking.
In any case none of them was a great man of God like Abraham. So in
the rest of the chapter the writer will work out what it means when
we say 'Jesus is a greater priest than either Melchizedek or the Jewish
High Priests'.
3. Then in verse 4 we read that Abraham gave
to Melchizedek one tenth part of the things that the had taken back
from the kings when he beat them in battle. He was not told to do this.
But in verse 5, the priests have to go to the other Jews and collect
from them a tenth part of what they have.
Verses 11-22: Jesus is like Melchizedek
God is perfect. So He wants what is perfect. We
are sinners. We are not perfect yet. We shall be perfect in glory! (See
12:23.) But God has now provided a perfect way for sinners to come to
Him.
These verses tell us in what ways Jesus is like
Melchizedek. There are seven things for us to notice in these verses.
1. In verse 11, the writer says that God promised
to give a different priest to us. He was to be different from the Jewish
High Priests. When God said: 'You are a priest forever after the order
of Melchizedek' He said it about someone. The question is: Who? So there
must be a change from the Jewish High Priests. What God gave to the
Jews in the time of Moses was not all that He had to give to men. It
was not even the best that He could give to us.
2. In verses 12 and 13 he says that God gave
the Law and the priests together to the Jews. If there is to be a change
of priest, then there must be a change in the part of the Law that says
how a man becomes a priest. The Jewish priests all came from the tribe
of Levi, but Jesus came from the tribe of Judah. This is just one way
in which He is different. Jesus rose like a plant from a seed or like
the sun at the beginning of a new day from the tribe of Judah. ‘Moses’
in verse 14 means the ‘Law’, because God gave His Law through Moses.
3. In verses 15-21, the writer says that Jesus
has become our Priest because He has the power which comes from a life
which cannot be destroyed. (verse 16). This is one of the greatest things
in the Letter to the Hebrews.
There are things which we wanted to do when we were not quite so old
as we are now. We know that we shall never be able to do them. Life
is too short. So we set ourselves to do something else. We decide to
do less. Death may come and stop us from doing that too. Other people
will not love and care for the things that we loved and cared for when
we die. Other people will not try to finish the work which we only started.
(See Psalm 146:3,4.) How different it would be if we knew that our life
would not be cut short by death! But Jesus has an 'endless life'. He
will never have to give up His purposes. He will never have to stop
what He is doing.
If we had 'an endless life', we would be able
to face all sorts of dangers. We would have no fear. But this does not
help us to understand what these words are saying about Jesus. It is
more help to remember that we would not say something could not be destroyed
until it had been tested. So we could not say that Jesus has a life
which cannot be destroyed unless it had been tested. It had to be tested
to the limit. It was tested when Jesus died on the cross. It was tested
by death, by the devil and by the load of our sins. But Jesus rose again:
He has 'a life that cannot be destroyed'. [7.1].
4. Now in verses 17-19, the writer says that
the old Law, which said: 'Priests must come from the tribe of Levi'
is set aside. It had done all it could to help the Jews. Now God has
given to us 'a better hope'. The only thing that the Jews could hope
for was the coming of the promised Messiah. This had now happened. Now
we can come close to God. All of us now are priests if we trust in Jesus.
We really come to God, not just to a 'Most Holy Place' in a Tent made
for worship. The Law of Moses did not make anything perfect. God always
looks for something perfect. It is not that we are yet to become perfect.
It is God's way of dealing with sinners that will now be perfect. (See
verse 11).
5. In verses 20-22, the writer talks about part
of Psalm 110:4. He had not yet said anything about this part of the
Psalm. This is: - 'The Lord has sworn and will not change His mind'.
God has sworn that Jesus will be a High Priest. When God swears, this
is greater than when He gives laws about priests. So Jesus is a greater
priest than the Jewish priests are.
6. Then the Psalm says: - 'God will not change
His mind'. Eli was one of the Jewish priests. God made promises to him
(1 Sam 2:30). But Eli's sons sinned so much that God did not allow them
to live (1 Sam 4:17,18). Jesus will never give God any reason to 'change
his mind'. Jesus is 'the King of Righteousness'! He always does what
is right.
7. Verse 22 tells us that because God has sworn
Jesus will be our High Priest, God has also made Jesus the 'surety'
or 'guarantor' of a 'Covenant' or 'Testament' which is better than the
'Old Testament'. We must understand what the writer means by a 'Covenant'
or 'Testament' or we shall not be able to understand Chapter 8. We also
have to explain what 'Surety' or 'guarantor' means. Please remember
that although the words may not be easy, what they mean may well be
something that you know about quite well.
(a) First then, a 'Covenant' is an Agreement
between two or more people. The 'Old Testament' was the Covenant between
God and the Jewish people. God told the people that He would be their
God. He told them also that they would be His own people. He gave
them His Law. He promised that if they obeyed the Law, He would do
them good. If they did not obey the Law, He would punish them. It
was a Covenant, which depended on what they did.
(b) Second, a 'Testament' is a 'Will'. A man
has the right to say what is to happen when he dies. His 'Will' says
who is to receive his money and all the things that he owns. In Old
Testament times a man was told to 'put his house in order' when he
was dying (Isaiah 38:1). That meant that he gave spoken orders as
to what was to happen when he died. We make a written 'Last Will and
Testament' which sets out our wishes. But nothing happens until we
die.
God's 'New Testament' is the Good News. It
is the promise that all our sins will be forgiven when we put our
trust in Jesus. It is the promise that God will give us his Holy Spirit,
who will make us new men and women when we believe. It is the promise
of life and glory for ever. Jesus had to die so that God's 'Will',
the New Testament, would come into force.
(c) There is a verse, Isaiah 63:8, which may
help us to see what is meant by a 'Surety'. There it is as though
we can hear Jesus. He speaks to His Father like this: 'Surely these
Christians who trust Me as their Saviour, they are My people. They
know how much I love them. They know how I suffered when I died for
them. They know what great things I will do for them. So they will
be true to me. They may sin, but if they do, they will come to Me
and tell Me how sorry they are. They will feel shame because they
have failed me. But I will still be their Saviour'. When we are tempted
to sin, this is a thought that should help us.
Sometimes, a man who cannot pay back a debt will
find a 'Surety'. You might owe some money to a man who did not like you
or trust you very much. He says to you: 'I must have that money from you
by the end of next month. There will be trouble for you if you do not
let me have it'. But you have a friend who has plenty of money and the
man to whom you owe the money trusts him. He knows about your problem.
He says to the man who does not like you: - 'If you do not get your money
back by the end of next month, then I will pay it to you myself'. He has
made himself your 'Surety'. And I hope you would try extra hard to pay
the money back so that your 'Surety' does not have to pay. Our Lord Jesus
Christ is our Surety. We were in debt to God, because we had sinned. We
had nothing that we could pay to God. So Jesus paid all our debts to God.
So we should try extra hard not to sin.
Verses 23-28: Jesus is far better than the Jewish
priests are
These verses tell us about seven ways in which
Jesus is far better than the Jewish High Priests.
1. In verse 23, the writer tells us that the
Jewish High Priests all died. Jewish writers said that there were 83
of them. Aaron was the first. Numbers 20:25-29 tell us of his death.
The line of priests came to an end in A.D.70 when the Romans destroyed
Jerusalem and the Temple. The people might sometimes have said: - '
When the old priest was alive, we felt that our prayers did go to God.
Since he died it is not the same. This new priest is not so good'. There
is only one Jesus! He is our priest for ever.
2. In verse 24 we learn that as priest, Jesus
will never pass His work on to any one else. The Jewish priests had
to pass their work on to someone else. [7.2]. Death stopped the Jewish
priests from staying in office. Death was the means by which Jesus became
our High Priest for ever.
3. In verse 25, we remember that the Jewish priests
could not save sinners. Jesus can. He always lives, so He can always
save lost sinners. Jesus saves us from everything that might hurt us
or keep us out of God's glory. He saves us in this life and we shall
enjoy life with God for ever. Jesus 'intercedes' for us: He asks God
to do us good. This is not because God does not want to do us good.
(See John 16: 26,27.) But God wishes us to ask for what we want, because
He is our Father. And it is good to know that Jesus is always there,
because we know that we are sinners. But for the death of Jesus, God
would just send us away. In 2:18 we learned that Jesus was to help us.
Then in 4: 15 we learned that He was able to feel what we feel. Now
we see that He is able to save.
4. Then in verse 26, the writer says that although
God gave the Jews their line of priests, they were not quite what people
needed. This verse tells us what Jesus is like. He has lived among men
and He has been tempted, but He is holy. Sin has not made Him dirty
in any way. He is separated from sinners, but only so that He is better
able to help us. He is 'high above the heavens' with God, but this is
so that He can bring us from this world to God and to glory.
5. In verse 27, we can see that the High Priest
had many other priests who worked for him. He had one day in the year
when he himself had to kill animals as offerings for sin. Every day,
however, the other priests were busy doing it for him. Those priests
were sinners, so they had to make one lot of offerings for their own
sins and then another lot for the people who felt they had sinned. Jesus
had no sin, but He died for us once for all time. There is no need for
Jesus to die again. His death is enough for us all. It is enough for
God. We cannot add anything to it. It is wrong to try to add anything
to it.
6. This is the first time that the writer has
said that when Jesus died, He made Himself an offering to God because
of our need to be set free from our sins.
7. So Jesus is different from all others who
have given offerings to God before He did. They offered animals. He
offered Himself.
In verse 28, the writer finishes off this part
of what he has said about Jesus as our High Priest. For the third time
(see 2:10 and 5:9) he says that Jesus has been 'made perfect'. In the
next chapter he will move on to speak of the Old 'Covenant' and its worship,
and the New 'Testament'. |