What's the Big Deal About the Great High Priest?

Have you ever wondered about how the animals got on the Ark with Noah? We’re going way back here, but have you ever considered all of the animals that got onto the Ark? How’d they get on? Through the one door. This means that snakes had to slither up to enter it, eagles would have to swoop down to enter it, and elephants would have to possibly squeeze in to enter it. Every single animal that survived the flood entered through the same door that was opened and shut by God. There wasn’t another way inside the vessel - there was one open door. In our world people would say that “You need a fire exit” or “One door isn’t very tolerant or accepting of people who like to come in the back door” or “Wouldn’t it be better to have one entrance for the carnivores and another entrance for the vegetarians?” Yet, in God’s providence, we see that He made it so that there was only one door. The rain began, the flood waters rose, and God shut that one, single door to keep everyone inside safe. Do you think whenever that door was shut that the people inside began to complain that there weren’t other doors? Nope. They were grateful that God had provided a single door that led them to salvation.

In our world of confusion, chaos, sin, and evil, God has provided a single door. His door is big enough to accommodate millions of humans of all sorts of shapes and sizes. His door is sturdy enough to keep us safe and secure inside. His door is accessible enough that people can still enter it today. What is the door that God has provided for us to survive the coming flood of His judgment against sin? That door is Jesus Christ. There is one way that we can be saved and that is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. See, today God is holding up 2 hands. With one hand, God is welcoming us onto His Ark of salvation and pleading with us to trust in Christ as Lord… with the other hand, God is holding back the flood of His wrath against sin. Today, as the preacher of Hebrews shared, we are commanded to respond and not harden our hearts

Hebrews 4:7 CSB

7 he again specifies a certain day—today. He specified this speaking through David after such a long time: Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.

Why is there this command to act today? Because one day, God will throw both hands down and it will be too late to enter through His door. Today, if you have not trusted in Christ as Lord, if you have not asked Jesus to forgive you of your sins, friend today can be that day of salvation as you are declared forgiven and raised from death to life by the power of Jesus Christ, not because of how awesome or incredible you are, but because of how gracious and merciful Jesus is!

If you have already trusted in Christ as Lord and Savior, today you will be encouraged by God’s Word as the preacher of Hebrews will tell us in Hebrews 4:14-16 that we have a mediator in God’s courtroom. We have a door to get onto His Ark of Salvation… that good news is found exclusively in Jesus Christ! He is your great high priest. He is your redeemer. He is your Savior. He knows what you’re going through and He promises to walk through the suffering that you face in this life and never leave your side. Let’s study one of the most hopeful passages in all of Scripture

Hebrews 4:14–16 CSB

14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens—Jesus the Son of God—let us hold fast to our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin. 16 Therefore, let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need.

What a passage and what a reminder that we serve a Sovereign Savior who Sacrificed Himself in our place and can sympathize with us in our suffering. Wherever you’re at today in your spiritual walk, whatever you’ve done, and however you feel, today look to God’s Word and be reminded of the power of Jesus Christ and the hope that He alone can provide for His followers. Let’s pray and ask Him to guide us as we unpack His Word.

Our High Priest is Superior (14)

Hebrews 3:7-4:13 has primarily been negative in nature as the preacher of Hebrews has addressed the danger of unbelief. If you harden your heart, if you don’t repent, if you reject Jesus Christ then you will be judged because of your disobedience. Here in verse 14, though, we see an incredible turn to the positive aspect of belief. If the negative (unbelief) is extremely bad, the positive (genuine belief) is extremely good! Why is there hope through belief in Jesus Christ? What exactly does Jesus do for us? The short answer is that He died for our sins on the cross, but whenever He died for us on the cross, Jesus did something remarkable. His sacrifice was unlike any other sacrifice that has ever been made. He sacrificed Himself as the spotless lamb in the place of sinners like you and me. Hebrews talks a lot about Old Testament sacrifices and priests and that can be a little bit dated for us in 2023. In short, the high priest would go back to a small room called the holy of holies on the day of atonement and make a sacrifice on behalf of the sins of God’s people. This was unique to the high priest, the other priests couldn’t do this and would die if they tried. In Hebrews, Jesus is called our great high priest. What makes Jesus different than the priests in the Old Testament?

How is Jesus a Superior High Priest?

His Lineage is Foreign (Hebrews 7:11 not of Aaron)

All of the priests in the Old Testament were descendants of the Aaron, Moses’ brother. They were called Levites and their job was to help lead the people of Israel in worshipping God faithfully. In order to be a high priest, you had to be from the line of Aaron… but Jesus isn’t. His lineage is foreign from the rest of the high priests and his line goes back even earlier to a person named Melchizedek as we’ll get into next week!

Hebrews 7:11 CSB

11 Now if perfection came through the Levitical priesthood (for on the basis of it the people received the law), what further need was there for another priest to appear, said to be according to the order of Melchizedek and not according to the order of Aaron?

This makes Jesus a superior high priest

His Priesthood is Forever (Hebrews 6:20 not dependent on another replacement)

The other high priests served in their role for several years but eventually they would pass away and another priest would take their place and continue the work that had been done by their ancestors for hundreds of years. Jesus, though, is the King of Kings whose rule knows no end. This means that just as His Kingdom will know no end, His priesthood knows no end.

Hebrews 6:20 CSB

20 Jesus has entered there on our behalf as a forerunner, because he has become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

This is good news for us because He’s going to continue to be our mediator even after we pass away. He is our representative in heaven before the Father and He’ll intercede for His people forever. If you’re a Christian, you’d better be thankful today that Jesus’ priesthood is forever.

His Sacrifice is Final (Hebrews 10:12 not offered again)

Finally we look at Jesus as a priest in terms of the sacrifice He offered. In the Old Testament we see the high priests offering a sacrifice first for their own sin and then another sacrifice on behalf of the sins of the people. They had to do this each and every year because everyone kept on sinning and the sacrifice they offered could only cover that sin, it couldn’t forgive it. This was exhausting! Enter Jesus

Hebrews 10:12 CSB

12 But this man, after offering one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God.

How could this be true? Because Jesus was the sinless sacrifice. It was a one stop shot. Jesus didn’t sacrifice an animal like a bull or goat, Jesus sacrificed Himself in our place. He is a superior high priest because there is no longer an offering needed to forgive our sins - it’s already been done!

The response to the superiority of Jesus Christ in verse 14 is that we are called to hold fast to our confession. What is a confession? A confession is a statement of admission. Many people will confess to a crime and offer a statement of their guilt. We also see a confession in a Christian sense as people will have a statement of belief on a specific thing and this offers clarity on what the person believes. Because of what our Great High Priest has done, the preacher of Hebrews says that we must hold fast to our confession. What confession do we have and what must we confess to? For one, we must confess the truth of the Gospel that Jesus Christ is Lord and Savior

Romans 10:9 CSB

9 If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

This is a confession. This is what Christians have been doing for 2000 years and this is what we are commanded to do today and it is all because of what Jesus has done first for us. These can be easy words to say, but they can be incredibly difficult to live out. How do we know this to be true? Think about what happened to Peter whenever Jesus was arrested before His crucifixion. This was the same guy who just chopped a Roman soldiers ear off - he was really bold whenever he was next to Jesus and around his friends - but what happens a few hours later? This guy is denying even knowing Jesus in the first place.

Whenever persecution arises, there can be a temptation to stop doing the right thing and holding fast to Jesus Christ. This was a temptation for this church 2000 years ago and it’s still a temptation for us today. These Jewish Christians were tempted to go back to Judaism. To go back to the sacrificial system that they were raised in. They were tempted to give into temptation just as their ancestors gave into temptation and failed to do what God commanded them to do and we’re no different. Students, you are tempted to not stand on God’s Word each day and to fit in with the rest of the world and live out your own truth rather than live for the Creator of Truth. Parents, we are tempted each day to hold fast to the confession of parenthood which states that we exist to satisfy the desires of our children and restructure our lives around them instead of instilling in them the truth that we order our entire lives around God’s Word and glorifying Him is our number one goal as members of our families. Instead of giving into these temptations, we remember what Jesus has done. He is God’s own Son. He came to this earth and lived a perfect life and died for our sins on the cross and rose 3 days later and ascended back to heaven. He is superior! He is sinless! He is our Savior! Therefore, we trust in His work and we stand on His Word - even when the rest of the world disagrees with us or says that we’re crazy. Our faith is in Christ, our Great High Priest! But what exactly does this superior high priest do for us when life knocks us down? How can God know what it’s like to suffer like we do? Let’s look to verse 15 as we see that, second,

Our High Priest is Sympathetic (15)

Hebrews 4:15 is such an encouraging and humbling verse as it demonstrates that Jesus Christ cares about His children and knows what we’re struggling with. How do we know this? Look at this verse with me. We see a double negative here, “We do not have a high priest who is unable to...” Any English fans here? What does a double negative do? Maybe English isn’t your cup of tea because you’re a Math person. Think of it this way, what is the product whenever you multiply two negative numbers? Two negatives equal a positive! In English sometimes we use a double negative to emphasize the positive. Whenever you had a crush on someone in high school and a friend would call you on it, you might say, “Well, I don’t not think she’s cute.” What are you saying? You’re saying she’s cute without saying she’s cute! This is what we have in this verse. You could look at Hebrews 4:15 in this way, “For we DO have a high priest who CAN sympathize with us in our weakness BECAUSE He was tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin.” This is an incredibly important verse… but we can really wrestle with it, can’t we?

Take the most powerful king in human history. Do you really think that he knows what it was like to suffer like a common citizen of his country? Take someone in our world who is extremely wealthy and powerful, do you think that they genuinely can sympathize with you and me with our troubles and situations? Of course not! This is how we can feel about Jesus at times. We know that He is holy and He is in heaven and He’s the Son of God and He’s sinless and perfect and it can be so easy to assume that Jesus doesn’t understand what we’re going through in life. But this isn’t true! The same Jesus who passed through the heavens and paid the price for our sins and it seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven is the same Jesus who draws near and dear to His people because He sympathizes with us in our weaknesses. What would Jesus know about temptation and weakness? He actually knows quite a bit about these things.

See, Jesus as King of Kings didn’t stay in heaven… He came to the earth and we read in places like Isaiah 53 that He knew suffering quite well

Isaiah 53:3 CSB

3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering who knew what sickness was. He was like someone people turned away from; he was despised, and we didn’t value him.

Jesus was rejected and suffered. Why did this happen? Have you ever asked that question? If Jesus was the Son of God, which the Bible says that He was, why would He come to the earth, live a perfect life, and die on the cross? The reason why is because this was God’s plan. Whenever Adam and Eve sinned against God, God provided a way for humans to be restored to Him and that way was Jesus Christ. God’s plan from the beginning of time was for His Son to be born, live a perfect life, and die for sinners like you and me. This required Jesus to not only come and humble himself, but also to submit Himself to suffering and temptation because he truly was also fully-man. Think of some of the temptation that Jesus faced. Look with me in Matthew 4:1

Matthew 4:1 CSB

1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

In His humanity, Jesus Christ was tempted. What was He tempted by in Matthew 4? Wealth. Power. Comfort. He was tempted in Matthew 26 to avoid suffering and fail to drink from the cup of God’s wrath against sin. Why would Jesus be tempted by these things? Yes, He was God, but yes, He too was a man. Jesus had sleepless nights and back pain. He experienced rejection and abandonment. He cried and He was hungry too. What’s the big deal about our great high priest? He knows His children and He knows what His children are going through. Maybe you say that He doesn’t know what it’s like to be tempted by things like social media, pornography, sexual trends, and peer pressure. Maybe you think that Jesus doesn’t know what it’s like to be tempted to cheat or take the easy way out. He does. Sure, our temptations are different but here’s the difference. You and I give into our temptation. Think of holding your breath. Some of us can hold our breath a long time and others are gasping for air after about 15 seconds. How do you get relief whenever you hold your breath? Stop holding your breath and breathe in! The longer you hold your breath, the stronger the urge to breathe becomes. This is how it works in our lives as humans in relation to our sin. We are following God’s plan for our lives but then the temptation to sin grows because we have a fallen nature and the only thing that will satisfy that nature is to live in sin… so we gasp for air and we give into temptation… but this was not so with Jesus! He never gave in. Every time He was tempted to sin, He never gasped for air… He kept on holding His breath through the trial. This happened throughout His life on earth and He never once gave in. He was tempted just like us, but He remained faithful to the end.

Spurgeon once put it like this, “A Jesus who never wept could never wipe away my tears.” The promise of Revelation 21:4 is that our tears will be wiped away and death and pain will be no more. How do we have that hope? Because Jesus Christ wept. He suffered. He died in our place. If you have ever suffered deeply with something in life, I trust that Hebrews 4:15 has been an encouragement to you. Several years ago there was a time in my life where I wasn’t able to sleep at all - like at all. From panic to depression to confusion, there were months where I felt like I was in this unescapable pit of my own creation. Not everyone has been through that, but I trust that some of you have! Some of you might even be there today to some capacity. You’re here and you’re searching for a lifeline of hope to get you out of the pit. Maybe you know the Bible stories. You know the right answers. You have a relationship with Christ. You’ve trusted in Him as Lord. All of those things are true and you still find yourself in a dark spot and maybe you feel like a failure because you believe that you should be able to get rid of those feelings if you only had more faith and that you yourself are the problem. Look with me at this incredible verse. If you are a Christian, you have a great high priest who not only made you, but He knows you. He not only has saved you, but He is saving you and make you more like Him each day. He was tempted too. He suffered too. But you can trust in Him because He never once sinned.

Jesus is not a sinner - He is the Savior of sinners!

If you have trusted in Christ as Lord and Savior, it’s not as though your temptation goes away. It’s not as though life is smooth sailing and easy going… it’s not as though all of your problems cease magically. But, once you are adopted into God’s forever family, you have an unshakeable hope and foundation in Christ because whenever the Father see’s you - He doesn’t see the darkness of sin and death, He see’s the blood of His Son. This is all because we have a great high priest who sympathizes with us in our weaknesses and 3rd, He promises to sustain us through the trials of this life and to lead us to our Father.

Our High Priest is our Sustainer (16)

Because we serve a Savior who was tempted, and never gave in, we can rejoice that and know that He will help us in our temptation today and sustain us each step of the way. We like to make things harder on ourselves than they usually have to be. How do we know this to be true? We have instruction manuals that come with our furniture, appliances, and toys and we only use them if we run into problems instead of using them to avoid the problem in the first place. We make things harder than they need to be. Have you ever had a disagreement with another person and there’s a conflict and you want to resolve it but you automatically assume the worst about the other person in your mind? You play through the conversation only to feel hopeless because you get yourself to believe that the other person either hates you or thinks that what you did was awful. We assume the worst instead of simply having a conversation. We make life hard for ourselves. Jesus takes away that temptation as our great high priest. Look at what Jesus does for us in verse 16. Because of Jesus, we are able to approach the throne of God as we sang about earlier this morning.

When can you and I draw near and approach God’s throne? In the Greek, this is a present tense verb. We could read verse 16 like this, “Because of what Jesus has done and because of His work as our high priest, let us constantly approach the throne of grace.” If Jesus has saved you from your sins and given you a new heart, you have the ability to draw near to God through Him today and receive help in your time of need. You don’t have to wait until next Sunday morning. You don’t have to wait until you finally solve the problem yourself. You don’t have to wait until you figure something out. You can come to God today and receive mercy and grace and help and it’s all because of Jesus. This means that Jesus is not only our high priest and Savior, but He is our sustainer as well.

He sustains not only us, but all things as Colossians 1:17 tells us

Colossians 1:17 CSB

17 He is before all things, and by him all things hold together.

Friends, this is good news! In your weakness, you can come to your Father’s throne and receive assistance. In your pit, you can come to your Father’s throne and receive comfort. In your isolation, you can come to your Father’s throne and receive love and compassion and hope unlike anything this world can offer you. How can we do this? It’s truly all because of Jesus Christ! It’s not because of us… We don’t even know what we need - but He knows exactly what we need before we know that we need it.

Whenever Lindsey and I were in high school, she worked at a local movie theater in Ozark and after we started dating, seeing a movie suddenly became the cheapest date because her ticket and concessions were all free! In high school and college, I can’t even begin to imagine how many movies we went and saw just because it was a free date. If you’ve ever gone to a movie theater and ordered a drink, have you watched the worker fill up your cup? Most movie theaters have a really cool drink dispenser where the machine automatically stops filling your cup whenever it starts to get full. The worker doesn’t have to press a button, the machine knows how much soda your cup needs and it stops at the exact right spot. This is what our God does. You and I can be absolutely running on empty with nothing in our cup… but because of what Jesus has done, we can come to our Father who will fill us from His Word with exactly what we need.

The same grace that saved you will continue to sustain you as a child of God. He is powerful and He is personal. He is Savior and He is Sustainer. He is tender and He is transcendent. He came, lived, died, and passed through the heavens and paid the price that we all owed. What is the big deal about this great high priest? Jesus does for you and me what we could never do for ourselves and what no one else could ever do for us. He sacrificed Himself in our place and He satisfied the wrath of God against sin. He is the door aboard the ark - have you entered by grace through faith in Christ today? If not, why not today? Don’t wait another minute to get things right with your Creator and Savior.

Application

Hold Fast to God’s Word

Because of Who Jesus is and What Jesus has done, we must first hold fast to God’s Word and stand on it without shame. Hebrews 4:12 is in view here. We live in a world that cannot stand God’s Word. This has been true for Christians for 2000 years. 2 Timothy 3:12 tells us this

2 Timothy 3:12 CSB

12 In fact, all who want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.

The preacher of Hebrews calls on us to hold fast to our confession in Jesus Christ. This will lead to problems in our lives because our world cannot stand this confession. Our world hates the idea of there being only 1 way to be saved and that’s through faith in Jesus Christ. Yet, this is what Scripture teaches. This is what we hold fast to today and each day. We stand on the solid rock of God’s Word!

Trust Alone in God’s Son

You and I live in a real world of real hurt and real pain. We don’t worship a sufferingless Savior who is immune to the struggles we face as humans. Jesus knows what it’s like to suffer and be tempted. He is our hope in the midst of our struggle. We can always trust in Him. As we stand on God’s Word and remember that there is only one way to be saved, we realize that we must respond to Jesus with faith. We are to trust in Him alone for salvation. Trust that He is Who He said that He was, trust in Him to save you and trust that He will provide for and sustain you!

Run Daily to God’s Throne

As you trust in what the Bible says about Jesus Christ and stand on God’s Word, you can have hope that you have a God who is always accessible. In the good days, you can run to God’s throne. In the bad days, you can run to God’s throne. When you feel alone, you can run to God’s throne. Not only can we run to God’s throne, but we are called to do so with boldness and confidence knowing that Jesus will give us exactly what we need.

Do you know this Great High Priest? Do you know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior? Not do you know about Jesus… but do you know Him? Has He changed you? Has He saved you? If so, friend, understand that He knows what you’re going through and He will hold you fast. If you don’t know this Jesus, look at what He has done. He made you. He has a purpose for you. He came and died for sinners just like you. Don’t put it off another day, trust in Jesus and turn to Him in faith, today.

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