The Continious Ministry Of Jesus Christ

THE CONTINIOUS MINISTRY OF JESUS CHRIST

“HE EVER LIVETH”

HEB. 7:19-25

In just a couple of weeks, we will celebrate one of Christianity’s most holy days, which is Easter. The Gospel, or good news, contains not only the message that Jesus died for us and paid our debt of sin to God, it also contains the message that Jesus is alive. 2 Timothy 2:8 Remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel: Now this morning, I am not going to preach directly on the resurrection of Jesus. I want to share on one of the results of it.

The Gospels record for us the three-fold earthly ministry of Jesus, preaching, teaching, and healing. The Gospels also tell of His concluding ministry on earth to bring salvation and deliverance to those who believe. Heb. 9:11 But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building; 12 Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. The Son of Man is come to seek and save those who are lost. However, we need to realize that just because Jesus has now arose, and is placed at the right hand of the Father, His ministry is not over. Jesus Christ is still very much involved in ministry. The writer of Hebrews tells us that "He ever liveth to make intercession...". Christ is alive as intercessor, He is alive as your intercessor. Now you may ask, what is an intercessor? According to the dictionary, an intercessor is someone who mediates between two contending parties, or a person who intercedes for another, one who pleads for mercy for another. You might think that you don’t need an intercessor, but you do. Thank God for salvation, thank God for victory, but we still live in this weak flesh that gives us problems and troubles. We struggle against the flesh, against Satanic powers and against sin. We are involved in a struggle and we will continue to be involved in this struggle until Jesus comes. There will be times that we will need strength, times that we will need help, and times we will need mercy, in order to continue to live for God. We need the Lord’s help to make it through this world. Remember “He ever liveth to make intercession”. This is part of His ministry as our High Priest. He will, always will be there to give you help when you need Him to be. We often overlook this portion of Christ’s ministry. We seldom think about how important this ministry of intercession is in our lives. Paul said in Rom. 15:30, Now I beseech you, brethren, for the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake, and for the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me; Paul is in effect saying, I beg you to pray for me, for we strive, or wrestle (Satanic forces) in prayer. If Paul, the man of God that he was, needed prayer, rest assured that you need it too. It is exciting as well as assuring to know that you are praying and making intercession for me. You will never know how much help your prayers have been for me. We are striving together in prayer. However, just think for one moment, Jesus Christ the Son of God is praying for you and making intercession for you as well. We are here on the earth, but Jesus is in the very presence of the Father. We have to strive in our prayers, but Jesus is right at the Father’s hand. He ever liveth to make intercession! There are three benefits we receive from the intercession ministry of Jesus that I want to share with you as to why this ministry is so important to us.

I. THERE IS THE ACCEPTANCE OF PROFOUND GRACE FROM THIS MINISTRY.

1. Jesus serves as our high priest before God. In the Old Testament, whenever someone wanted God to do something on their behalf, they would go to the high priest, offer a sacrifice, and have the high priest pray for them that God might hear.

2. There was a problem with this. The high priest was human just as the one seeking help was, and he was susceptible to sin just as anyone else was. We know that many of the priests failed God, many were greedy and did not really care for the people at all. When you went to the priest, how could you know that God would hear him, if he was in the same boat as you were. Many times the high priest would not be able to understand your need at all. He might be angry with you, he might not care anything at all for you.