The High Priest
Today is April Fool’s Day. I toyed with the idea of making some sort of ludicrous statement and then proclaiming “April Fool’s!” but decided against that since I don’t want to ever mislead you, even in a time of jest. But as I was debating on how I would begin the sermon, I remembered the title of a summer camp I went to as a young teenager: “Fools for Christ’s sake.” Paul makes the statement in his first letter to the Corinthians chapter 4, verse 10 to remind them of his continual suffering for Christ in the world. Paul goes where Christ leads and denies himself those things of which they have much abundance, so much so that many think of him as a fool. Who is this Christ that anyone should want to be considered a fool for His sake? What power has He over men that they would count all things as loss simply to know Him and to worship Him?
Over the last few weeks we have referred to Christ by a few of His titles, “Son of God,” “Bread of Life,” and “Lamb of God.” A very common understanding within the church of Christ is that He is prophet, priest and king. Each of these offices is embodied by different characters in the Old Testament, many of these characters carry more than just one of these offices. Ezekiel was a priest and prophet. David offered up sacrifices and prophesied. Moses, performed all three duties to varying degrees. The prophet represents the voice of God to the people. The king is the ruler of God’s people, and the priest represents the voice of the people to God. These offices carry with them much weight and importance to the culture, heritage and religion of the Hebrews. Where the men of the Old Testament symbolize various imperfect types of these functions, Christ embodies them all perfectly. Over the next few weeks we will be exploring each of these offices and Christ’s fulfillment of each. Today, we begin by looking at Christ’s place as the ultimate priest, the True High Priest, the only priest capable of performing and offering the sacrifice of the Lamb of God.
In today’s epistle, Paul states that Jesus is our high priest. He took the blood of the holy sacrifice, Himself, and offered it unto His Father as an eternal atonement for our transgressions so that we might receive everlasting life. This priestly function is ancient, first mentioned in Genesis 14:18, where Melchizedek, the priest of the Most High God met Abram with bread and wine, blessed him in the name of the Lord and worshiped God. We see then that our first understanding of the office of the priest is to offer the blessing of the Lord and to lead the people in the worship of God. Isn’t it curious how the first priest offered up bread and wine for fellowship with Abram in honor of the Living God? We continue that tradition today in our worship at the Holy Altar, where we partake of that holy Sacrament wherein we ingest the Bread and Wine and participate in the sacrifice offered by Christ. We find that this offering and Christ’s priestliness is prophesied for us in Psalm 110 verse 4 where we are told the Lord’s Anointed will be a “priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.”
Later, we meet Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, he is said to be the priest of Midian, and assumed to be a priest of the Most High. The significance of Jethro is untold but can be found by interpreting his relationship to Moses. Most likely, Moses had very little to do with the Hebrew religion. He was the adopted son of Pharoah’s daughter -- probably only a few knew that he was not of kingly blood. He was raised by his mother who taught him about their past and told him about God, but I would assume that he was more comfortable with the Egyptian religions given that he was not a slave but royalty and required to believe in the gods of the pharoahs. Since he had no real religious education, apart from the information passed to him from his mother and sister, he would have been very handicapped to know the basics of the Law already given, but not written down by the Lord. That is where Jethro would come into play. Jethro offered shelter for the renegade from Egypt. He offered him a place to live, and eventually, he offered Moses his daughter’s hand in marriage. Moses lived with Jethro for many years and benefited from having a priest for a father-in-law. At the very least, Moses would have learned by example some of the religion which had been passed down through the generations concerning the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He had been with Jethro for several years before he received the revelation at the burning bush, before God spoke to him. We can only assume that Jethro must have tutored him in the ways of God. Jethro was a shepherd and a teacher to Moses, leading him in to respect the Lord and honor Him through hard work, honest living, and loving his neighbor as himself. Christ touches our lives when we are lost and running from sin. He provides a place of rest and comfort to stay and be made whole again. He provides for us a help-mate through His Holy Spirit. He gives us work to do, to build up His kingdom and share His love with our neighbors, and He teaches us through His Word and Sacraments about the Most High God.
Our next example of the priesthood comes from Aaron, Moses’ brother. We find that Aaron was given the important task of coming before the Lord in the Holy of Holies. He was charged to come in to represent the people before God. He would sprinkle the blood of the sacrifice of atonement upon the Ark, where the presence of God dwelt -- where the glory of God was made manifest. The high priest had to be ritually purified before he was allowed to enter into the Holy of Holies. This area was off limits to everyone else because it was where God made contact with the earth. God had His seat in the Holy of Holies and if you were to come into his presence without being clean, you would surely die. The high priest then would go through different ceremonies and offer several personal sacrifices in order to be made clean to enter into the Presence of the Lord. He also wore special garments which were, according to God’s design, for beauty and glory. These garments also bestowed upon the high priest an imputed righteousness through their blessing so that he might be considered worthy to stand before the Lord. Also, when going into the Holy Place, he would bear upon him the special garments in which were embedded stones that bore the names of the Twelve Tribes of Israel so that the high priest would represent the entire nation and remember them before the Lord God. The priests would have many duties given them through the Law, mostly relating to offering sacrifices, ritual cleansings, and the circumcision. We know that Jesus offers us ritual cleansing and atonement through His blood. As we have discussed, He also provides for us all the new circumcision, our Baptism, wherein we are brought into the Body of Christ and made a new creation in Him.
As the high priest offers up the blood of a lamb, so through Jesus’ death, He offers up to God the ultimate sacrifice for our purification. His blood, the blood of the perfect Lamb, was shed before God and sprinkled upon the real Holy of Holies -- that is Christ Himself, God Incarnate. His special garments are those of righteousness and peace. He needs no reminder to pray for us before the Almighty. He needs no outer garments to be made perfect and shown righteous before God. For He is God and He knows us all by name. He beseeches the Father continually on our behalf. He seeks for us to come to Him, so that we might partake of that perfect atonement.
Further evidence of Christ’s priesthood is found in the Gospel today where Christ responds to the Pharisees who accuse Him of being a sinner and a devil. He strongly retorts that He preaches the Word of God and only those who are of God understand the words which He speaks. Christ seeks not His own glory, but that of God Almighty. The true priest seeks to give God the honor due Him as Lord of All. The priest must be blameless before God to come into His presence and offer the sacrifices of atonement. He states, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, if a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.” Christ is talking of spiritual death. Spiritual death is caused by sin which separates us from the Father. Christ tells those gathered around Him that if they will follow Him and heed His voice, they will be saved from the spiritual death -- eternal damnation: the wages of sin are death. Who can offer up the sacrifice to save the people from their sin? That office is reserved for the high priest. Jesus is placing Himself in the position of the true High Priest of God as John tells us and Paul confirms.
The Jews then asked Jesus if He was greater than Abraham and the prophets who had come before. And like the deft orator He always proved to be, Christ responded by saying that He would not honor Himself, but His Father honored Him. He continued by saying that He knew God and that Abraham rejoiced to see that the Christ had come. Who could know God except for those to whom He would reveal Himself? Among those living, the only ones who could even have the remotest chance of getting to see God were the high priest who would stand before God in the Holy of Holies and offer sacrifice to Him, the prophet, who was specially appointed by God -- and from which no one had heard for nearly 500 years, or a Davidic King who was anointed to be the titular representative of God on earth. Jesus was making a bold statement equating Himself in stature to either the high priest, a prophet or the king. Abraham wasn’t alive at that point and Jesus was only in his thirties, so physically it would seem impossible for Abraham to have seen the Messiah, but God provided the vision to Abraham of the seed of Abraham who would be the fulfillment of the promise of God -- He would be the High Priest that would offer the sacrifice of the Lord’s Chosen Lamb which would bring unto Abraham a countless number of children and would encompass all nations.
Christ fulfills the role of the priest for our lives. He is the perfect high priest, as He is the perfect sacrifice. When we are asked what power He might have that would make us want to worship Him, our response can be simple. He is the Lord’s Anointed. He is my High Priest of the Most High God. We have no concern for what the world may think of our “foolish” endeavor of seeking to honor Him because He is not of this world. He is our mediator that leads us to eternal life. He saves us from the death that is to come. He is the I AM, the Beginning and the End. He is our Savior and our God. He is our prophet, priest and king.
