Monthly Archives: March 2015

Greater Than Levi

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GREATER THAN LEVI

Just think how great he was: Even the patriarch, Abraham gave him a tenth of the plunder! Now the law requires the descendants of Levi who become priests, to collect a tenth from the people – that is, from their fellow Israelites – even though they also are descended from Abraham. This man, however, did not trace his descent from Levi, yet he collected a tenth from Abraham and blessed him who had the promises. And without doubt the lesser is blessed by the greater (Heb. 7: 4-7).

Undoubtedly, the priesthood of Melchizedek is a higher office than the priesthood of Levi. Here’s the argument:

Levitical priests received tithes from the Israelites because they were the ordained priests of Israel, yet Abraham, who was the grandfather of Levi, gave a tenth of the spoils of war to Melchizedek. Instead of receiving tithes, Levi, in Abraham, was paying a tithe. That would make Melchizedek’s high priesthood of a higher order than Levi’s.

If Jesus’s high priesthood was in the order of Melchizedek and not Levi, of necessity that would make Him a superior high priest to Levi. That, coupled with the fact that He was no longer subject to death because He conquered death and rose from the dead, would make Him a high priest forever. He need never be replaced because He will never die again.

And, on top of that, He went through everything that human beings go through as part of this fallen world. He is able to support those who come to Him because He is always at the Father’s right hand, in the place of authority and power, to intervene on our behalf. He is, in every way, the high priest we need.

Those believers who were tempted to return to Judaism to avoid persecution ought, by now to have realised that to go back to their old religion would not only be a backward step but also cause them to forfeit all the benefits of being in union with Jesus. They would have to return to all their unfulfilled desires with no hope of ever experiencing the fulfilment of everything their religion promised. If they rejected Jesus as their promised Messiah, there would never be another to fulfil all the prophecies that pointed to Him.

In the one case, the tenth was collected by people who die, but in the other case, by Him who is declared to be living. One might even say that Levi, who collects the tenth, paid the tenth through Abraham, because when Melchizedek met Abraham, Levi was still in the body of his ancestor (Heb. 7: 8-10).

The writer rounded off his argument that Melchizedek’s high priesthood was superior to Levi’s by pointing out that Levi did not receive but paid a tithe to Melchizedek when he was still in the body of Abraham. Therefore, Melchizedek was greater than Levi.

But why this lengthy discussion? The high priest played a significant role in the lives of Jewish people. Their approach to and acceptance by God was centred in the high priest. Without his ministry and intervention, they had no hope of contact with God because he was the mediator – the go between. The Levitical priests offered sacrifices on their behalf so that they could have the assurance that their sins were forgiven and that they were acceptable to God. Without the Levitical priesthood and the high priest, they were cut off from God.

To have a high priest who would never need to be replaced because of death, and to have one who offered, not animal blood as a temporary measure to be repeated over and over again, but His own blood to remove sin once and for all, was far superior to what the Levitical priests could do. On top of that Jesus was both God and man. He represented man to God and God to man. He was the perfect high priest in every way, sinless and deathless.

We Gentiles, who did not live under the system of the Old Covenant, might find it difficult to appreciate what this meant to Jewish people. Why is there such a longing to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem? Is it not so that they can re-establish the sacrificial system? Temple and sacrifices go together. Because they have, in the main, rejected Jesus as their Messiah, they need the animal sacrifices for the forgiveness of sin. And yet, because they have rejected God’s Lamb, there is no forgiveness for them since the sacrificial system has been fulfilled and replaced by Jesus.

To reject Jesus is to reject the only way to the Father. He is the way and there is no other way.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

A Mystery Man

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A MYSTERY MAN

This Melchizedek was king of Salem and priest of God Most High. He met Abraham returning from the defeat of the kings and blessed him, and Abraham gave him a tenth of everything. First, the name “Melchizedek” means ‘king of righteousness”; then also, “king of Salem” means “king of peace.” Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, resembling the Son of God, he remains a priest forever (Heb. 7: 1-3).

Up to this point, the writer has mentioned Melchizedek several times but given no information about this man. This “mystery man” was to play a brief but important role in Abraham’s life, and would be a part of the prophetic fingerprint of the Messiah.

Melchizedek was a king-priest in the city of Salem, i.e. Jerusalem, an unusual office because, according to God’s instructions, no king was permitted to carry out the office or functions of a priest. On the few occasions in the history of God’s people, kings were judged for burning incense e.g. King Uzziah.

But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall. He was unfaithful to the Lord his God, and entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense. Azariah the priest with eighty other courageous priests of the Lord followed him in. They confronted the king and said, ‘It is not right for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord. That is for the priests, the descendants of Aaron, who have been consecrated to burn incense . . . (2 Chron. 26: 16-18a).

Why, then did God specifically designate Melchizedek to be the head of a unique order of king-priests especially since there is no biblical evidence that anyone else served as a king-priest in the order of Melchizedek except Jesus? Melchizedek was a type of Jesus for several reasons:

1. His name means “king of righteousness”. His name was a prophetic utterance of character – he was a righteous king, i.e. he walked in the ways of Yahweh, doing the right thing in his rule over his people. Jesus was a righteous man – without sin – and a righteous king.

Of the greatness of His government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this (Isa. 9: 7).

2. He was “king of Salem” i.e. king of peace. His reign also apparently was a reign of peace.

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on His shoulders. And He will be called . . . Prince of Peace (Isa. 9: 6).

3. There is no record of his parents or his genealogy. This does not mean that he was not human or that he had a supernatural birth. The writer used this lack of information as a type of Jesus whose human birth and genealogy although significant because He has to be a true representative of the people, did not mean that He only came into being at His human conception. He is both God and man, two natures in one person to represent God to man and man to God.

4. Melchizedek’s pedigree did not include a record of his birth or his death. Again he was a type of Jesus who existed with the Father before He came to earth and who returned to the Father after His resurrection. He lives forever as a high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

5. Unlike the Levitical priests who could not be kings, and the Davidic kings who could not be priests, Jesus is both king and priest. As our king He rules over His people with justice and righteousness, and a priest, He represents His people to God, presenting His own blood as an atoning sacrifice for sin to God.

Jesus is eminently qualified to be our high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

Anchored In Hope

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ANCHORED IN HOPE

God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where our forerunner, Jesus, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever in the order of Melchizedek (Heb. 6: 18-20).

When God makes a promise and seals it with an oath, we have the assurance that what He has promised is of great significance. His promises are all unbreakable, oath or no oath, because He is God and He cannot lie. However, the oath is for us, not for Him, to reassure us that He means every word He has spoken.

Our hope of receiving what He has promised is anchored to Jesus, who has taken His own sacrificial blood into the Most Holy Place in the heavenly realms as an atonement for our sin. His blood guarantees that God has forgiven and blotted out everything that was written against us. Our high priest is neither a weakling nor a sinner like the Levitical high priests and the blood He presents is not animal blood which cannot atone for sin.

To go back to the old religious system, which was only a picture of what Messiah had come to do, was as unthinkable and impossible as adults returning to infancy. Why would his readers want to throw away an unshakeable hope that their salvation was secure, to go back to rules and rituals that did not bring them the peace of sins forgiven – forever?

What does an anchor do? It secures a vessel to something immovable so that it will not drift off course and be dashed to pieces on the rocks during a storm. These Hebrew Christians were in the midst of a violent storm – such hatred from the authorities that their lives were in constant danger.

Their circumstances offered them no security. Where did their security lie? It lay in God’s promises – nothing that humans could do to them could separate them from God’s love. Whether they lived or died, their eternal destiny was sure because they had a high priest who spoke for them. This high priest did not enter an earthly sanctuary which was only a model of the heavenly sanctuary. He entered heaven itself to present His own blood to the Father.

Those of us who have believed and received this promise are anchored in hope to the mercy of God in the Holy of Holies in heaven. Jesus is not a Levitical high priest who will die and be replaced by another mortal man. He is a high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

The writer had tried several times to introduce his readers to Jesus’s high priesthood in the order of Melchizedek but he was aware of their immaturity and inability to understand the “meat” of the word. This time he plunged on because he wanted them to understand how Jesus fulfilled the entire system of Judaism, so that they were no longer bound by its rules and rituals. There was no more need for animal sacrifices and all the rigmarole that went with them. These were a reminder of the instructions and teachings – torah – of Yahweh which were intended to show them, in practical ways, how to fulfil the greatest commandment both to love God and to love their neighbour, and how to make atonement when they failed to love.

Unfortunately, what was intended to be a provision for sin had become an excuse to sin. Sacrifices and rituals became a way out for them so that they could go on sinning with impunity. Instead of teaching them the heinousness and infectiousness of sin, they became hardened to sin’s seriousness because their sacrifices were always a way out, so they thought.

When God laid all the judgment for sin on His own Son, and then raised His from the dead as proof that sin’s debt had finally been paid, He showed us just what sins does to human beings. He ordained Jesus to be the eternal and never-to-die-again high priest who is at the Father’s right hand making intercession for us, presenting His blood so that we might be forgiven and so that we might turn away from sin and live according to His word.

Can we have an anchor and a hope more secure than that? Absolutely not!

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

An Unbreakable Promise

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AN UNBREAKABLE PROMISE 

When God made His promise to Abraham, since there was no one greater for Him to swear by, He swore by Himself, saying, ‘I will surely bless you and give you many descendants.’ And so, after waiting patiently, Abraham received what was promised. People swear by someone greater than themselves, and the oath confirms what is said and puts an end to all argument. Because God wanted to make the unchanging nature of His purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised, He confirmed it with an oath (Heb. 6: 13-17).

We need to back up a bit to get the gist of what this writer was saying. His readers were suffering persecution at the hands of both Jews and Romans because of their allegiance to Jesus. To the Jews, Jesus was a blasphemer who had been executed by the Romans for treason because the charge of blasphemy was not on their list of crimes. To the Romans, Jesus’s claim to be the Son of God and Lord put Him at odds with Caesar. His followers, therefore, were to be exterminated.

To avoid persecution, they were tempted to go back to Judaism since the Roman government still tolerated the Jewish religion. The writer’s persuasive argument was that Jesus was greater than everything they held dear in Judaism because He was the fulfilment of the types and shadows of their religion. To go back would be to forfeit all the blessings and promises Jesus fulfilled.

God’s promises are backed by His unchangeable nature and are therefore unbreakable. Although Abraham was an old man and his wife both barren and beyond childbearing, God promised that he would be the father of a great nation and have many descendants. Abraham looked beyond the circumstances to the promise of God which had to be fulfilled or God was a liar.

Abraham received what God promised after many years of waiting because he believed God. What was his secret? Faith and patience! If God said it, He would do it, no matter how long it took to keep His promise. It was not about trustworthiness but about timing. God is always painting on a bigger canvas and writing a bigger story than we can see or understand. What He was doing in Abraham’s life had to fit in with every other circumstance around him.

God’s promise to Abraham was so crucial to His salvation plan that He confirmed it with an oath – not because His word was untrustworthy but because He wanted Abraham to know how important this promise was. In the natural it seemed an impossibility for him and Sarah to conceive a child. Abraham’s faith had to rise above human possibilities to take hold of the divine promise and to fix his faith on God’s word and not on his reason.

Intervening years were not an issue to God. The deadness of Abraham and Sarah’s reproductive organs were not a problem. God’s power to intervene overshadowed these natural obstacles. Abraham’s confidence in the trustworthiness of God’s promise was the crux of the matter. Was he prepared to take God at His word and see it through to fulfilment no matter what?

Abraham had to walk a long road of learning to trust God before he was willing to stake everything on God’s promise. He left his homeland on God’s instruction, a God he did not know, and went to a land he did not know because God had told him to go. He settled among strangers, sometimes hostile to him, as a nomad, because God said so. He had no idea what God was doing with him but he trusted Him anyway.

God gave him a son when his heart was ready to receive the child and to raise him to believe in God. He even went to the point of sacrificing his son because God told him to do it. So confident had Abraham become in the promises of God that he was in perfect harmony with Him no matter what He told him to do.

It was this kind of faith that God needed and that He honoured in a man who was tried and tested. The way was open for Him to keep His word because His promise, backed by His oath was Abraham’s anchor.

Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, ‘So shall your offspring be.’ Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead – since he was about a hundred years old – and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had the power to do what He had promised. That is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.” (Rom. 4: 18-22).

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

Fruitfulness Is The Test

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FRUITFULNESS IS THE TEST

Land that drinks in the rain often falling on it and that produces a crop useful for those for whom it is farmed, receives the blessing of God. But land that produces thorns and thistles is worthless and in danger of being cursed. In the end it will be burned.

Even though we speak like this, dear friends, we are convinced of better things in your case – the things that have to do with salvation. God is not unjust; He will not forget your work and the love you have shown Him as you have helped His people and continue to help Him (Heb. 6: 7-10).

To the Hebrew people, intellectual assent to a doctrine was of no value if it did not issue in action. If one’s beliefs did not produce the fruit of faith. Faith was as barren as a piece of land that bore thorns and thistles instead of a crop that was valuable to the farmer. Rain falling on unproductive land was a waste and the land deserved the curse of God on it.

People who once trusted Jesus for salvation and then turned their back on Him, going back to their unrighteous ways, was as useless as a field of weeds. Like the weeds, they were destined for the fire.

What is the writer saying? A person who does not produce the fruit of salvation is like a piece of land that receives the blessing of God’s rain and then grows only thorns and thistles. What is the fruit of salvation? A life given to God to serve Him by loving and serving His people. Just as the fruit on a tree reveals the nature of the tree, so the fruit of a life reveals the nature of that life.

The writer has warned his readers that it is dangerous to go back to the old way because it would lead them to sterility and death. On the other hand, however, the fruit that they bore showed him that they had not abandoned their faith. They were showing their love to God by supporting and helping God’s people. This was surely the evidence that they were still rooted in Jesus and had not gone back in the old life of selfish pursuits.

‘Keep going,’ he urged them. ‘Don’t give up on your faith. God will not forget the way you have lovingly served Him by your kindness to His people. This is the fruit of your faith in Jesus, showing that you have His nature in you.’

We want each of you to show this same diligence to the very end, so that what you hope for may be fully realised. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised (Heb. 6: 11-12).

These readers has made a good start, indicating by their fruitful lives, that they were on the way of the Lord. ‘But,’ said the writer, ‘it’s not only about a good start. It’s about a good finish.’ The secret of the way of the Lord is to keep going until you reach your destination. When they turned from their own way and returned to the Lord, they began a journey that would take them to God. He had promised them an inheritance as His sons and daughters – His very own nature which He had given to Adam before he fell into sin. Trouble and persecution should never cause them to want to go back, as the Israelites had done.

God’s salvation plan was to restore His nature in man so that His human family would once again enjoy oneness with Him. The journey back to Him demands both faith and patience because we have an enemy without and an enemy within. How do we overcome so that we can be replicas of Jesus, God’s Son who is the model of perfect sonship?

His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness. Through these He has given us His very great and precious promises so that, through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires (2 Peter 1: 3-4).

God has promised us His power to overcome our enemies, the devil who deceives us and our old nature that pulls us towards selfishness and greed. He enables us to submit to Him as our Lord. As we yield our lives to Him, His Spirit gives us the power to say no to ourselves and yes to God.

How do we know that we are being transformed into the image of Jesus? Not that we have an elaborated superstructure of right doctrines but that we are kind to those in need. When we are rooted into Jesus, His life in us through our union with Him will produce the fruit of right living to His glory.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.