Hebrews 7:14-24 For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda; of which tribe Moses spoke nothing concerning priesthood.… There is something very solemn in the thought that a man shall be lifted above his generation, moulded distinct from all his contemporaries, and thus stand out, not in respect of his own interest, but with a reference to some personage of a remote futurity — a pledge that he shall arise, a portraiture of his character and a specimen of his history. These instances are but few, and only appear in relation i o Him who was to come, and to the purposes of His mission. Prophet does not announce and foreshadow prophet. Christ only is thus predicted and prefigured. It is very important, in all these examinations, to hold fast as a first, principle that he correspondence which is supposed is not of the Messiah to any earlier personages, but of them to Him. He is the Prototype. Theirs only is the conformity. Like the morning planet that announces and catches the first light of the sun, these herald and reflect Him to whom they are so mysteriously bound. I. WE SEE IN THE OFFICE OF PRIESTHOOD AN IDEA AND A PRINCIPLE WHICH EXCLUSIVELY BEAR UPON THE INCARNATE MANIFESTATION AND REDEEMING WORK OF JESUS CHRIST. From the beginning, the function of offering sacrifice was known and practised. The individual might act it for himself. It soon became vicarious. It grew into a service and a dignity. It widely, if not universally, obtained. 1. It was religious. All adoration and piety were founded upon it. 2. It was representative. He who was invested with it was "ordained for men in things pertaining to God." But this was not all: he was rather appointed between heaven and the people than between the people and heaven. 3. It was divinely conferred. "No man taketh this honour unto himself; but he that is called of God." 4. It was imparted by solemn induction. The candidate must pass through many ceremonials the most solemn and impressive.It resolved itself into invariable duties. 1. To offer sacrifice. "Every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices." "Gifts" were oblations of a votive and eucharistic kind; "sacrifices" were the inflictions of death upon a victim, with confession of sin and hope of expiation. The flowers which grew just on the border of Eden might suffice for the one; the firstlings of the earliest folded flock were demanded for the other. The Messiah is the anti-type. "He has come a high priest of good things to come." His temple was His own Body. His altar was His own Divinity. His ephod was His own authority. Yet in abasement and economic subordination, "He glorified not Himself to be made a high priest." The blood of His sacrifice realises the twofold use of the emblem; it is the blood of sprinkling — toward the Divine throne for its honour and vindication, for its exercises of justice and mercy — toward the penitent sinner for his relief and hope, for his obedience of faith and love. 2. To present intercession. The priests, the ministers of the Lord, might weep between the porch and the altar; but our attention is turned to an advocacy more efficacious and direct. The high priest went alone into the holiest once every year. "We have such a High Priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens." His sacrifice is single and complete. It cannot be repeated. 'But it is continually presented. "He now appeareth in the presence of God for us." 3. To pronounce benediction. "The Lord separated the tribe of Levi to bless in His name." "Aaron lifted up his hand toward the people, and blessed them." The language is preserved (Numbers 6:23, &c.). It seems the outline of Christian formula. But it was not to be given until the sacrifice had bled and until the incense was kindled. The more painful and anxious ministrations were first to be accomplished. Our Lord, clothed in the days of His flesh with poverty and humiliation, seen in the form of a servant and the fashion of a man, having laid aside the ensigns of His glory, has now gone into heaven. His array on earth was for abasement, for sacrifice. "Many were astonished at Him." He is now within the veil, and the heaven has closed upon Him as the curtain hid the most holy place. His intercession there is the cause and source of all spiritual blessings. Perfect analogies we cannot expect in relations like these. The law was the "shadow," but not the "perfect image." In the priesthood of our Saviour there must be peculiarities which cannot be reflected nor transferred. (1) It is real. The title is not allusively conferred upon Him because it is common and known. Whatever is common and known in the title is only derived from His office. (2) It is roundest on His actual death. He was at the same time Victim and Priest. He was "made perfect," or consecrated to His work, "by sufferings."(3) It is strictly meritorious. There could be no congruity between the hecatomb and the effacement of human guilt. But in the death of Christ is a moral strength and right which the Scripture most emphatically describes. (4) It is most tender in its design. "For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin."(5) It is associated with all other necessary offices. His suretyship of the new covenant involves these relations. He is Priest, Prophet, and King. Melchisedec was a priest and a king, but not a prophet; Samuel was a prophet and a priest, but not a king; David was a king and a prophet, but not a priest. All these high trusts and duties unite in Him who is the Prophet raised up unto us, the High Priest of our profession, and the King set upon the holy hill of Zion. The eternal perpetuity of His priesthood, which the text affirms, must, as a fact, embrace certain consequences which may be readily defined. It is not the exaggeration or poetry of truth, but a simple statement of it. What does it involve? 1. The influence of the atonement and intercession of Jesus Christ is supposed in the one idea of mediation. Merit and moral power are its effects. To this we owe all that justifies and cleanses the soul. We must ascribe to the same source the blessing of eternal life. Such an office can never cease to operate. 2. The union of the Divine and human natures in the person of Immanuel, as necessary to His priesthood, cannot, if that priesthood be eternal, admit of termination. 3. Whatever be the honours and rewards of His priesthood, they shall be eternal. His robe of light shall not decay. His tiara shall not dim. We may look deeper into this truth. There shall be a manifestation of principles, arising out of His incarnate and mediatorial work, which can only gather strength and clearness through all duration. He will be glorified in their exhibition and influence. There has also been brought by Him to His heavenly kingdom a countless multitude of redeemed sinners of our race. These were once enemies; all of them were alienated from the favour and the service of God. By His priesthood He has reconciled them to both. They have access to the Divine presence and sympathy with the Divine will. They stand forth before Him. He shall see His seed. They have become a holy nation — a royal priesthood, priests of God and of Christ. They offer themselves a living sacrifice. They offer to God the sacrifice of praise continually, II. WE PROCEED TO CONSIDER THAT PARTICULAR RIFLE OR ARRANGEMENT IN WHICH THE HIGH-PRIESTHOOD OF CHRIST IS CONSTITUTED AND DECLARED. It is necessary to collect, if we would form a proper and consistent judgment, whatever is recorded of Melchisedec, from his first appearance in sacred history, until he is made in far later inspired Scripture the subject of allusion and illustration. 1. It seems probable, though we would lay upon it no undue stress, that the fragmentary history of Melchisedec was not destitute of design. A sort of ambiguity belongs to it, not inherent in it as a whole, but because it is so singularly told. The curtain arises, there passes before us the suddenly apparelled actor; but ere we can discern his intent, it drops. The stranger crosses our path, hut as we would require his anxious errand, he disappears. The star shoots along the firmament, and all again is dark. Advantage seems taken of this sudden emergence, this undeveloped character, to give greater depth of resemblance to that Prototype whom it respects. "Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after My name?" "No one knoweth who the Son is." "As the Father knoweth Me, even so know I the Father." "He hath a name written, that no one knoweth but He Himself." 2. "The order" of this priesthood was doubtless primaeval. There is no disproof from chronology that Melchisedec might be Shem, "the father of all the children of Eber." He lived five hundred years after the flood. We know that in him is the direct genealogy of Christ. But this is unimportant to our argument. It was assimilated to patriarchal service. It was that religion. Long before the Levitical ritual was given, the same "pattern" prevailed. The Aaronic rule was defective, a temporary relief, a mere substitute: Christ shall not be "called of God a high priest" in subjection to it. The Melchisedaican class was unchanging, germinant, comprehensive, initial; it is according to its perfect idea of pontificate that Christ shall be installed. 3. The resemblance is much promoted when we observe in type and counterpart the union of the regal and sacerdotal dignities. Censer and sceptre are in his hand; crown and mitre are on his head. Be passes from temple to palace, from palace to temple; from throne to altar, from altar to throne. His personal name and puissant style are significant. He is king of righteousness and king of peace. His capital, notwithstanding a thousand revolutions, still endures. He was not "the mighty hunter before the Lord," the bloody tyrant, the desolating scourge; his reign was that of blameless justice and of benignant concord. The king is not lost in the priest. It is a sanctified alliance. Now our Lord is a priest for ever after this order. 4. The priesthood of Salem knew no separating demarcation. It regarded man with perfect impartiality. The high, altar of Calvary is covered wit, the "propitiation for the sins of the whole world." The breast-plate of our High Priest is inscribed with all peoples. There is henceforth no middle wall of partition. Rival distinctions of speech, climate, and complexion are abolished, Nor is this anomalous. It is but a reverting to principles older than Judaism. 5. This order of priesthood involves an entireness and self-independence. It is pronounced by the historian that "he was the priest of the most high God." The inspired commentator dilates upon this ministry in words confessedly remarkable: "Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days nor end of life: he abideth a priest continually," or uninterruptedly. We may premise from language so strong as this, that his office was immediately conferred, and that it could not possibly be alienated. 6. The oath which confirms the Saviour's "order" is calculated to give it the deepest impression. "The Lord hath sworn, and will not repent." Bow much of interest must be contained in this order of priesthood! How should it awaken our study! The Lord doth not lift up His hand to heaven and swear by Himself, but for that which is great and dread and glorious! He will not afford this sanction to any dispensation and its priesthood which is temporary, national, interstitial; but seizing the purest Conception of atonement which earth could afford — the least diverted, admixed, corrupted by any taint of earth — the truest idea, the simplest abstract, the surest pledge of priesthood — as when God pitched the awful tent at the east of Eden and wrought for the guilty, naked fugitives garments from their sacrifices — honouring all this in the person and vocation of His servant Melchisedec — "the Lord said unto my Lord — the Lord sware and will not repent — Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec!" 7. Nor is another descriptive feature of this early priesthood to be depreciated. That strangeness which surrounds it simply arises from the broken and incomplete character of the narrative. It is not in any sense even the biographic sketch. It is but a segment, a single section, without reference to the extremes of human being. Nothing is guessed. That bare and abrupt account is made the basis of every reasoning. All we have to do with him is contained in that account. There consists all his typic importance. Not a single extraneous point is pressed. And this is not without its lesson. The everlasting priesthood of our Lord Jesus Christ is wholly a revelation. Any idea that illustrates it, in cypher and image, is wisdom from above. 8. The symbols which this royal priest brought forth in meeting Abraham are not to be overlooked. They were the signs of oblation. The bread was for a perpetual offering in the ancient temple, and the wine was a libation poured continually upon the ancient altar. And when we hear that Christ is after this "order," is it vain imagination to think of Him "who took bread and brake it, who took the cup and gave it"? Was it but accident that bread and wine were before Him? Were they not Paschal relics? Is their appropriation arbitrary? Is it not conformable to sacrificial law? Did not these aliments always signify the flesh and blood of sacrifice? And in our Christian feast, that feast on sacrifice, we behold them dedicate to one commemoration — Christ's offered, though sinless, humanity! (R. W. Hamilton, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda; of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood. |
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