This is on me, I'm muted up here. Hebrews chapter 7. When you hear commentators and theologians talk about the book of Hebrews, they always get this highfalutin sound to their voice, and they'll make statements that sound, of course, impressive when they first say it, but it's not really as impressive as what it sounds. They'll say something like this always about the book of Hebrews. They'll say in their scholarly voice, now, the book of Hebrews, I'm on, the book of Hebrews is a fascinating book. That's why they'll tell you about the book of Hebrews every single time, when in reality, as far as I understand, all 66, are fascinating books. Hebrews isn't any more fascinating than any other book of the Word of God. It's no more inspired, no more inerrant than the rest of the Word of God. All 66 books are inspired in the Word of God. And so, the book of Hebrews is not anything more than the book of Leviticus. Now, having said that, let me say this for the record. Now, the book of Hebrews is a fascinating book. As you get to the book of Hebrews, what you find is it's a book of comparisons. And the Lord uses different comparisons to describe the attributes and the characteristics of Jesus Christ to us. And certain parts of his ministry and certain parts of his life are described to us through the comparisons in the book of Hebrews. For instance, He's compared first to the angels, and the Bible concludes every time there's one of those comparisons, the Bible concludes that he's better than the angels. Then he's compared to Moses, and the Bible says he has a better testament than Moses. Then he's compared to Aaron, and he's better than Aaron. As you go through, he's also then compared to Melchizedek, the priest of Salem, knowing that he's a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. And then the Bible concludes, of course, that he's better than Melchizedek. But finally, as you get to chapter 6 and chapter 7, you'll find Jesus being compared to the high priest in general of the nation of Israel. Now, each one of those comparisons teach us something about the Lord, and this one is no different. The high priest, once a year, went into that place called the Holy of Holies, and he offered up a sacrifice for the entire nation of Israel. And if his sacrifice was offered the way it was supposed to be offered, And if the sacrifice was as spotless as it was supposed to be, then when he walked out of that room, the sins of an entire nation had been forgiven for the previous year. Please understand, and you see the comparison between the high priest and Jesus, don't you? Jesus, our great high priest, offered up a sacrifice, but it wasn't just for one nation. It was for the sins of the whole world, and it wasn't just for the previous year. It was for the previous year and all the years previous and all the years to come, the last sacrifice that God would ever need was Jesus dying on an old rugged cross. So even this comparison between Jesus and the high priest of the nation of Israel teaches us something about him. But the conclusion, of course, is that he's better than the high priest of the nation of Israel. Now, years ago, there was a man named Vance Havner. Every preacher that I know has at least one book by Vance Havner in their library. We may not have agreed with everything that Vance Havner said and did, but we certainly did like to hear some of the things that Vance Havner had to say and some of the things that he wrote. One time he finished preaching at a giant Bible conference, and he was elderly at the time, and a young preacher came up to him. And the young preacher said to him, he said, Brother Havner, he said, every time I hear you preach, I hear a powerful message. He said, I'm a preacher and I'd like to preach powerful messages like you preach. He said, what is the secret to powerful preaching? And Brother Havner looked at him and simply said this. He said, the secret to powerful preaching is this. He said, you just take your text. and you run to Jesus. That's how you have a powerful message. And tonight, we're going to take our text and run straight to Jesus. We're going to look at Hebrews chapter 7. At the end of this comparison between Jesus and the high priest of the nation of Israel, the Bible is going to give us a summary paragraph, if you will. a concluding paragraph that wraps everything up in a nice, neat bow here at the end of Hebrews chapter 7. Let's look at our text. Hebrews chapter 7, we're going to be reading and begin reading in the verse, the 22nd verse and read down through the rest of the chapter. Hebrews chapter 7, verse 22, the Bible says this, By so much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament. And they truly were many priests because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death. Watch what it says in verse 24, but This man, because he continueth ever, hath an unchangeable priesthood, wherefore he also, I'm sorry, he hath an unchangeable priesthood, wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. For such a high priest became us, who was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens. who needed not daily as those high priests to offer up sacrifice first for his own sins and then for the people's. For this he did once when he offered up himself. For the law maketh men high priests which have infirmity, but the word of the oath which was since the law maketh the son who is consecrated forevermore. I want to preach a message tonight entitled simply this, The Unchangeable High Priest. The Unchangeable High Priest. Let's have a word of prayer before we begin. Father, we thank you for this evening. Lord, we thank you for our time together in your house. Father, I thank you for all of those that are here tonight. Father, help us. to pay close attention to the preaching of the Word of God. Father, may you remove distractions from the room tonight as we preach this message. And Father, may we examine ourselves, not just in the light of the scriptures that we read tonight, but in the light of the perfection of the Son of God. Father, I pray that you'll help lost people tonight to see that there's a Savior that'll save them if they just ask, and save people to see that there's a judgment to come, that Father, we're not supposed to be better than everybody else. We're supposed to be as holy as you are. Father, have your will in your way, in Jesus' name, amen. I want you to notice the Bible begins by laying down this foundation that there were truly many priests who were not suffered to continue by reason of death. It's important to understand that every high priest, and the Bible names several of them in the Word of God, although most of them served in anonymity. There are several of them mentioned. Some are good high priests. We find a man by the name of Hilkiah in 2 Chronicles chapter 34 and 2 Kings chapter 22, the one who found the book of the law of the Lord, the one who was instrumental in this great revival that takes place in the nation of Judah, the grandfather of Jeremiah, the great, great grandfather of Ezra. This high priest was a good high priest. We, of course, see Aaron. The first high priest, another good high priest serving the Lord, faithful to the Lord. On the other side we have some bad high priests found, especially in the New Testament when you read about men like Caiaphas and Annas, men who were making profit off of the office of being a high priest, men who were basically available to the highest bidder to say whatever was needed to be said to make the most money. We had good high priests and we had bad high priests, but there's two truths about every high priest. Number one, they were all sinners. It's just that simple. The Bible does not say, for all have sinned except the high priest and come short of the glory of God. It says, for all have sinned. It doesn't say, by the way, for all have sinned except the priest and come short of the glory of God, or all have sinned except the pope, or the imam, or the cleric, or the rabbi, or the evangelist, or the pastor. All means all. It's just that simple. There's never been a human being that's born of men that drew breath on planet Earth that was not a sinner. It's just that simple. because every one of them was a sinner. They all had a second thing in common. They were not suffered to continue by reason of death. Their high priestly tenure came to an end for the same reason, all of them. Their high priestly tenure came to end when they died. And because you're a sinner tonight, understand this, you're going to die. You're already sitting there, a corpse in your seat. As Romans chapter 5 and verse 12 says, therefore as by one man sin entered the world and death by sin. so that death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned, from the teenager sitting over here to the most elderly person in the auditorium. If you don't have Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, you're a walking, talking, breathing corpse sitting in the auditorium. That's what you are, and you've earned it because the wages, the payment of sin is death. You ever notice that death is the payment for sin, but eternal life is free? But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Every high priest had their tenure come to an end by reason of death, and they all died because they were all sinners. But then it gets to verse 24, talking about Jesus now, no longer talking about old high priests from history. It says this, but... this man. Notice what it says. First, it says about him, because he continueth ever. I want you to notice the first thing about Jesus, number one, is that I have an undying high priest tonight. You know, if I weren't a Bible-believing Christian, if I believed that there was no heaven, if I believed there was no hell, If I believed that all religions were just fantasies, that there was no truth even in the Word of God, if I believed all of that I would probably still be a Bible-believing Christian. You say, Brother Harper, that doesn't make any sense. Why would you be a Bible-believing Christian if you believed all religion was fake? Because we're the only ones on the planet that don't worship a dead man. Think about that for just a moment. Every year, the Buddhists make a trip to the birthplace of a man by the name of Siddhartha Gautama, the great Buddha, and they pray there, and they put money in the coffers there, and they pray over the dead, rotting corpse. of a man that's been dead since 350 BC, and they ask him to help them make their way to heaven, make their way to eternal life, make their way to transcendental meditation. It doesn't make any sense to me how someone could trust a dead man to give you eternal life. If he couldn't conquer death on his own, how's he going to help you conquer it? Every year the Muslims make a trip to Mecca and they pray over the grave of a man by the name of Muhammad, the prophet of Allah, and they ask Muhammad to help bring them into Heaven. They ask Muhammad to help bring them into eternal life, and it's so so difficult to understand how they would ask a rotting corpse to help them live forever. It never has added up to me, and it never will add up to me. But I'm here to tell you, if you've been there, you've seen it. But by the way, I believed it long before I ever laid my eyes on it. If you go to the grave where our Savior was buried you'll not find a body there. You'll find the stone still rolled away. You'll find that there's not a dead person there because he's a living person. As the angel said, why seek ye the living among the dead? I just heard a preacher say this the other day, that he laid him for three days and three nights in a borrowed tomb. He said, notice he's the only one that could ever borrow a tomb. The rest of us are going to keep ours a whole lot longer than that, aren't we? He's the only one that ever borrowed a tomb because he wasn't going to need it for very long. The simple fact is I don't serve a dead Savior tonight. I serve a living Savior. He's in the world today. I know that He is living, whatever men may say. I see His hand of mercy. I hear His voice of cheer. And just the time I need Him, He's always near because He lives. He lives. Christ Jesus lives today. That's why He's called the first and the last. That's why he's called the Alpha and the Omega. That's why he's called the Beginning and the Ending. That's why he's called the Last Adam. That's why he's called the He that liveth. That's why he's called the Resurrection and the Life, because he continueth ever. I don't have a dead Savior. I have a living Savior. Notice number one, I have an undying high priest tonight. Because he's an undying high priest, he has something else. Therefore, because he continued with effort, have an unchangeable priesthood. Number two, I have an unchangeable high priest. Now let me point something out to you. It's not just semantics, it's not just linguistics. It does not say in this verse that he is an unchanging high priest. It says he's unchangeable. Now the Bible is filled with verses that say he is unchanging. With him there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. Malachi chapter 3 and verse 6, I am the Lord, I change not. Hebrews chapter 13 tells us that he's Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and forever. Remember what the Lord said to Joshua as Moses was dead? He said, Moses, my servant is dead. And then he told Joshua, as I was. With Moses. So will I be with thee. Do you know nobody else but God can make that promise? As I was, I will be. Only the unchanging God can make that promise. Now he certainly is unchanging, but that is not what this verse says. This verse doesn't say he's unchanging. It says he's unchangeable. There's a difference. Over the years, I've been saved for about 47 years, I believe it is now, and I've heard just about every major preacher that's preached in fundamentalism for that period of time, and I've heard a whole bunch of them hold their Bible over their head and say something like this, well, I believe this book. I believe it from cover to cover. I believe its convictions, its practices, its precepts, and its principles. And then they would say something like this, and I'm not changing. And everybody would start shouting and saying amen. And then over the next 20, 30 years, we watched them change. See, they said they were unchanging, but they were changeable. Something changed them. It's not that they woke up one morning and said that they wanted to change. They were just changeable. Jesus not only is unchanging, he's unchangeable. You know what that means? That means you can't change him even if you want to. The lost world wants to change him, don't they? The lost world wants to talk about him like this. Well, you know, he was a good man, but he certainly wasn't the son of God. Can I tell you something? If Jesus were not the son of God, he is the absolute opposite of a good man. If he's not the son of God, he is a liar, he is a braggart, he is a boaster, and he is a deceiver. If he's not the son of God, he's deceived more men than Muhammad and Buddha added together. If he's not the son of God, then he's a braggart. How big a braggart does it take to stand up and say to a crowd, I and my father are what? How big a bragger does it take to say to a crowd, I am the door. By me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved. Go in and out and find pasture. I am the way, the truth, and the life. I am the living water. I am the resurrection and the life. Listen how many times he bragged on himself. If he's not the son of God, he's a pretty big bragger. He's a pretty big deceiver. See, they like to say that because it soothes their conscience a little bit. They cannot actually admit that when they say that Jesus wasn't the Son of God, what they're really saying is that Jesus was a big old liar is all he really was. Remember what he said to that blind man in John chapter 9? He walked up to him and he said, Dost thou believe on the Son of God? And he said, Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him? And Jesus saith, Thou hast both seen him. Think about this. He hadn't seen very many people. He'd only had his eyesight for a few hours. Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee. Either Jesus is the Son of God, or he's a liar, and a braggart, and a deceiver. You can't have it both ways. He's the Son of God because you know what? He's unchangeable. You can say anything you want about Him. It won't change who He is. It won't change what He is. It won't change anything about Him because He's not just unchanging. He's unchangeable. Notice, by the way, Christians can't change Him either. We're constantly trying to change him. Over the years, I've spoken at a whole lot of pastor's fellowships. It was very often that I would get up to preach at a pastor's fellowship, and I'd be the first preacher, and then some old preacher would preach after me. And almost always, they were not just old, they were decrepit old. I mean, they were rickety old. They were limping and walking up with walkers and canes and all that kind of stuff. You know, the last three pastor's fellowships I've preached in, I've been the second preacher? I don't know what that says about me, but I'm pretty sure I don't like it. But a lot of those old guys would say something like this, and I'm not criticizing them. I know what they're trying to get across. They'll say this, I remember the good old days when God used to answer prayer. I remember the good old days when God used to send revival. I remember the good old days when God used to save sinners. Listen, anything he could do in the good old days, he can still do right now. He's not the God of just Billy Sunday. He's the God of right now. He didn't lose his power to send revival when D.O. Moody died. He still has it. He didn't lose his power to do miracles when the New Testament ended. If he wanted to, he could stick his finger in the Red Sea and part the water right now. He could keep you safe in a fiery furnace or in a den of lions right now. He's not lost one single ounce of his power because he's not just unchanging. He's unchangeable. Let's stop talking about him in past tense and start talking about him in present tense. Amen. Notice I have an undying high priest. I have an unchangeable high priest. Notice number three, please. I have an undefeatable high priest. Verse 25, wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost. Save to the uttermost. What does that word mean? Well, you can look it up in Bible dictionaries and original language helps and the expositors dictionary of New Testament words says it means completely and thoroughly. Vines says it means thoroughly and perfectly. Matthew Henry in his commentary says it means in all times, in all cases, and in all junctures. Say, Brother Harper, which one of those does it mean? It means all of those put together. He saved us perfectly. He saved us completely. He saved us thoroughly. He saved us in all times and in all cases and in all junctures. He didn't just start us on the path of salvation. One moment you were lost, the next moment you were saved. One moment you're on your way to hell, the next moment you're on your way to heaven. It's not a 12-step process. It's not something you work yourself through. It's something that God does in an instant, in a moment you go from being lost to saved that quickly. And when he saves, he doesn't just save you for a little while. He doesn't just save you in hopes that you can hold on. We're saved by the lion of the tribe of Judah. We're saved by the one whose name every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. We're saved by the one that is the King of kings and the Lord of lords and the blessed and only potentate. That's who saved us. And the fact is, we're not just saved for a little while. We're saved by the undefeatable high priest. in my home because I'm an evangelist, so I don't have a church, so I don't have an office in a church. So I've always, since we started in evangelism, had a room in my house that was my office. Now one thing that I hate, and probably if you're a man, how many men in this room, you have an office in your house? Raise your hand, hold it in the air. You've got an office in your house. One thing you probably hate is when your wife goes into your office. Not when she comes in to talk to you. Not when she comes in to spend a little bit of time and just chit-chat about things or even ask questions about family finances or things like that. What we hate is when they come in and move stuff. Absolutely, it's miserable because, now please understand ladies, I don't want all the ladies to get mad at me. I'm not saying that we men are right and you women are wrong. I'm just saying we think about things differently. Years ago, my father-in-law had a secretary. He was pastoring at Maranatha Baptist Church in Sissonville, West Virginia, and he had a secretary. And so he went to the filing cabinet and he was looking for a letter that he'd written to an evangelist about an upcoming revival that was scheduled. So he went to the filing cabinet, he looked in the file that began the last name of the evangelist, but there was no letter in the filing cabinet under the first letter of the last name. There was no letter in the filing cabinet under the first letter of the first name. He looked under the letter E for evangelist, but there was no letter there. He looked under the letter R for revival, but there was no letter there. Finally, he went to the secretary, he said, listen, I can't find that letter I wrote to evangelist so-and-so about her upcoming revival. Where is it? She said, well, it's under L for letter. I told that story at Hampton Baptist Church in Sharon Baptist Church in Hampton, North Carolina. And this whole section where the teenager is sitting, the whole section was cracking up through the whole story because in the middle of that section was the church secretary. And for the first two years that she was there, she filed every letter under C for correspondence. Now, again, in case you think I'm picking on ladies, let me explain what we men do. I'll be on the phone and someone is giving me a ten-digit number that is the most important number on the planet. It rivals the importance of the nuclear launch codes that go around in the football with the president. And so I'm going to give that important number its proper perspective, its proper place of importance, and I'm going to take a corner of an envelope that's in my junk mail and I'm going to rip that off of there, and I'm going to write that number on that little ripped up piece of paper because it's so important. I've got to keep it on a little piece of trash. That's the way I'm going to keep it forever. Now, I'll know where that piece of paper is, but when my wife sees that piece of paper, obviously, she assumes incorrectly that it's trash. I mean, it looks like trash. It's shaped like trash. I ripped it off of a piece of trash, and all it is is random numbers, and so she'll throw it away. I can't tell you how many times I've gone to my office, I've looked for a piece of paper, looked for something for 25 minutes, 30 minutes, and finally I said, sweetheart, I can't find that piece of paper. It's the most important piece of paper in the whole wide world. Do you know where it is? And she'll say, well yeah, it's right here. And she'll pick it up in one second. But I would have never looked there in a million years. So one of the things I hate is when my wife tells me, oh, I organized some stuff in your office today. I was preaching at Greenbrier, off Greenbrier Street at Bethany Baptist Church in Charleston, West Virginia. The pastor there was Brother Rodney, and so I had gone to, I was giving my wife and my daughter the week off. Now, when I give them the week off when they travel with me, that means that they went to church Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night. They just didn't have to go with me Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. On any typical year, I'll preach over 400 times in the course of one year. So if I didn't give them some time off, they would just go absolutely crazy after a period of time. So I'd given them the night off. The church, we weren't doing a kid's club there. My wife typically does a kid's club meeting with the children every place we go. But this church, the average age of the church members was about 84. They had a deacon that was 75. They chose him because of his youth and vibrancy. So she didn't come that week and I drove up to our house and we live right there off the church there at Maranatha Baptist Church in our little double wide and as I pulled up I noticed that all the lights on the front part of the house were out. So I assumed that my wife and daughter must be in the dining room. As I parked in the driveway, there are three lights that you could see from the driveway on the back of the house. There was the light in the laundry room, there was the light that you could see in the dining room, and then you could see the light in my office from outside. If no lights were on at the front of the house, the only light that was on on the back of the house was the light in my office, which meant that my wife and my daughter were in my office. She was about four at the time. Now, the damage that my wife does in my office can usually be straightened out. The damage that my daughter would do in my office was something that could never be fixed. So I walked to the door of my office, and there they were. Not only were they in my office, they were sitting at my desk in my big old chair. I got a big old chair in my office. I always have a big old chair in my office. I looked at them. Now, you might see me when I'm preaching. I get real loud, and my face turns red all at once, and you get concerned and all that. I understand. But when I lose my temper, it turns red like in increments, like a thermometer. It just keeps working on up. And the more hair I lose, the farther up it goes. And my face started turning red in increments. Well my wife and I are each other's first date. That's how far we go back. And my wife knows me better than anybody on the planet. And she said this, she said, now before you get mad. She was so right, it was going to happen here in just a moment. And she started to tell me that just moments before I walked through the door, my daughter, who was four at the time, came to her and began to ask her about being saved. Now we had allowed Charity to be in Kids Club from the time she was three, and so at this time she could have easily, at four and a half, quoted Romans 323, Romans 623, Romans 5.8, 5.12, Romans 10.9, 10, and 13. She could have quoted all those verses. But instead of doing that, my wife sat her down and opened up the Bible, showed her every single verse, explained every single verse just to make sure. And just moments before I walked through the door, my daughter had trusted Christ as her personal Savior. In case you're wondering, I didn't get mad that they were in my office. My wife said, would you like to say something to Charity? I said, I would. I sat down in my chair and Charity climbed up in my lap and I used a little object lesson for her. I said, Charity, I want you to picture that the tip of this finger is you. Do you understand that? She nodded her head. I said, do you know what happened when you got saved? I said, Jesus took you and he put you in the palm of his hand like this and he wrapped his fingers around you like that. And I said, Charity, let me ask you a question. Is anybody stronger than Jesus? And she got this look on her face and she said, no daddy. I said, Charity, could anybody get you out of his hand? And she said, no daddy. I said, do you know what happened next? And her eyes got a little bit bigger. I said, his Heavenly Father, Almighty God, took his hand and brought it down from Heaven and wrapped it around the hand of Jesus Christ. I said, Charity, is anybody stronger than God? And she said, no, daddy. I said, Charity, could anybody get you out of his hand? And she said, no, daddy. You understand that's what happened the day you got saved? Jesus Christ put you in the palm of his hand. Almighty God wrapped his omnipotent hand around it. You had the omnipotent hand of Jesus Christ surrounded by the omnipotent hand of Almighty God. The moment you got saved he put you in a ball of two-fisted omnipotence. What did Jesus say? little finite hands. And with one of your hands, you pride open the fist of Almighty God from his grip. Now, and you have to keep that one hand holding God so that he cannot reacquire his grip. With your other hand from inside, you have to pry open the fingers of his son, Jesus Christ. Then you have to kick out the Holy Ghost who's dwelling within you by whom you're secured until the day of redemption. So all you have to do to lose your salvation, it's not sin. What you have to do to lose your salvation is to overpower God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. Now listen to me. If you could overcome God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, you didn't need to get saved in the first place. No, you can't walk away. No, you can't give it up. You're saved, not just for a little while. You're saved to the uttermost. Nothing can change that. Brother Harper, what if I get away from the Lord? Then you come back. You know that God uses permanent relationships to describe his relationship with us? He uses the father-son relationship to describe himself. You get away from your father, and you say something negative to your dad, and all that. You move out of your house. You move away from him. You have no fellowship with him for ten years. He's still your dad. Nothing changes that bond. Nothing can alter it. You know what does change? After 10 years, you get in trouble and you want to pick up the phone and call dad and have him bail you out. You know what you have to say first? Dad, I sure am sorry about what I said 10 years ago. That's what changes, your relationship with him changes, not the fact that you're saved to the uttermost. I have an undying high priest. I have an unchangeable high priest. I have an undefeatable high priest. I have, number four, a universal high priest. Notice what it says, wherefore he's able to save them also to the uttermost, to save them to the uttermost that come, I'm sorry, let's read it again. Wherefore he's able also to save them to the uttermost that are really good, hardworking, moral people. Is that what it says? Warfare is able to save them the uttermost that live in the suburbs, that are a nuclear family, that have all the advantages of growing up in a wonderful home. That's not what it says at all, does it? The criteria is not what they're like. The criteria is that he's able to save anybody that comes unto God by him. The worst person from the worst background and the worst home life in the worst part of town can still be saved just by coming unto God by him. The only limitation, think about this statement, the only limitation to the gospel of Jesus Christ is us. We have this treasure in earthen vessels. The fact is he has entrusted us with the gospel and we pick and choose who we're going to talk to, don't we? Notice I said we, not you. Several years ago, I was preaching inside the city limits of Charlotte, North Carolina. I was preaching at Every Nation Baptist Church. It was a church plant at the time. It's a little bit bigger now. They were renting two storefronts in an old, dilapidated shopping mall, all right? And they had these two storefronts. On the other side of the mall, the only other things that were open was there was a Chinese restaurant and a Korean restaurant. So you could get Asian food or food for your soul. That's all you could get at the whole mall. Everything else was falling apart. The new owners were trying to fix it up a little bit so they could get some stores to come back in. And so there was construction material everywhere. Big equipment was in there and all that kind of stuff. I was preaching there the last Wednesday of August. And they could not have the air conditioners on. They weren't working at the time, and so it was kind of warm, and I'd worked up a sweat preaching. So I'd gone to the back, and the pastor is concluding the invitation. So everybody has their head bowed and their eyes closed, and I'm standing in the back. At that time, about a six-foot-two African-American fellow walked up to me. Now when he walked up to me, the young people will get this before the old people will. When he walked up to me, I noticed something significant about him. He had two teardrop tattoos under his eye. Do you know what gang culture says? Do you know when you get your first teardrop tattoo? When you've killed your first person. He had two teardrop tattoos under his eye. He looked at me and he said, Mr. Harper. And I said, yes, sir. He said, can I talk to you for just a minute? Now, I assumed, by the way that he asked that, that we were going to stand right there and talk for a little while, right there in the back of the auditorium. And I said, sure, I'd be happy to talk to you. He turned around and walked out. I had to follow him. He walked out into the dark shopping mall. He turned to the right away from the Chinese and the Korean restaurants and kept walking. I'm a type A personality. I like to be in the lead when I'm walking someplace, but he started before me and his legs were longer than mine, so he stayed in front of me. He kept walking and nobody in that auditorium knew where I was. So I have a guy that by his own tattoos has admitted that he's killed two people, leading me to the dark part of a mall. I have to tell you, I'll be honest with you, I was a little bit nervous. We just kept walking and walking and walking, and it got darker and darker, and we were farther and farther away from anybody who would even know where I was or who I was. Finally, we made a turn there. You know, you have those hallways that go to the outside, and the good news was the moonlight was coming through the glass doors at the end, and so there was a little bit of light there. But he stopped and he turned and he looked at me. And this is what he said, I'll never forget it. He said, Mr. Harper, he said, remember this was Wednesday night. He said, last Saturday I tried to kill myself. He said, I took six hits of ecstasy trying to end my life. He said, they called the ambulance. The ambulance got there on time. And as they were rushing me to the hospital, I yelled in the back of that ambulance and just said, God, save me. And he looked at me and he asked the question. He said, does that mean I'm going to heaven? And I said, no, sir. Asking God to help you in a time of crisis is not the same as trusting Christ as your personal Savior. I said, I can tell you how you could know for sure you're on your way to heaven. Would you like me to do that? And he said, yes, I would. And I stood there, and as I was quoting Romans 3, 23, I noticed when I got about two-thirds of the way through, he helped me finish the verse. I found out about him that he had a sainted old grandmother who'd been praying for him as he went off the wrong way and got involved into drugs and got involved in the gang culture. His grandmother had been praying for him every day and had witnessed to him hundreds of times. He just never listened. Finally, I looked at him and I said, would you like to trust Christ as your personal Savior? And he looked at me with big old tears streaming down right over top of those teardrop tattoos. And he said, yes, I would. I said, would you like me to help you pray? He said, no, I think I can handle it. He bowed his head right there and closed his eyes. And without saying this too piously, it's the most beautiful sinner's prayer I've ever heard in my entire life. Found out about a year and a half ago that not only is he still in church, but now he's in the choir. See, the simple fact is, let me be as honest and as transparent as I possibly can be. If I were walking through that dark mall by myself with no one around, and I saw a man much larger than me carrying around with him the visible testimony that he'd killed people, and I saw him walking towards me in that dark mall, I have to be honest, I probably wouldn't have stopped him and witnessed to him. I probably would have walked right on past him. But He'll save anybody that comes unto God by Him. It doesn't matter how bad your past is. It doesn't matter how bad your home life is. It doesn't matter what you've done in the past. He'll save anybody to the uttermost that comes unto God by Him. I have a universal high priest. I have an undying high priest. I have an unchangeable high priest. I have an undefeatable high priest. I have a universal high priest. Then we get to the part that the Christians love to sing about, love to talk about, but we don't love to put it into practice. We don't love to apply it. Look at the next verse, please, verse 26. For such an high priest became us. who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens. Five different ways in the same verse the Bible tells us that Jesus Christ is perfect. The Bible is full of verses that tell us that he's perfect. Isaiah chapter 53 and verse 9, he hath made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death, because he hath done no violence, neither was any disease found in his mouth. Hebrews chapter 4 and verse 15, we have not in high priest which cannot be touched with the fillings of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we and yet without sin. Hebrews chapter 5 and verse 14, how much more shall the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot unto God. First Peter chapter 1 verses 18 and 19, for as much as you know that you're not redeemed with corruptible things such as silver and gold received by tradition from the vain conversations of your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 21. He has made him to be sin for us. Verse 20, made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, so that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. I'm here to tell you, he's not just a good high priest, he's an undefiled high priest. He's a perfect high priest. Now we love to sing, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. We love to read that passage that Isaiah saw those angels, saw the Lord high and lifted up and his train filled the temple. And the seraphims on either side are singing, holy, holy, holy is the Lord. We like to sing about it. We like to talk about it. What we don't like to do is put it into practice. Let me illustrate. Several years ago, when I first married into the Bartlett family, before I'd married into the Bartlett family, they used to have the Bartlett Family Tennis Tournament. They would go to Pipestem, West Virginia, and do this little family reunion thing, and they would play tennis. And my father-in-law always won the Bartlett Family Tennis Tournament. He was also the person that bought the trophies. So the year before I married into the family, the trophy for the Bartlett Family Tennis Tournament was about this big. On the front it says world champion of tennis, Bartlett family reunion, all this stuff on that little placard thing that goes on the front of it. But after before I'd married into the family, I'd played tennis with my father-in-law, my two brothers-in-law, my sister-in-law, and I beat them pretty soundly. I was a significantly better tennis player than any of them were. And so the year I married into the family, when we went to Pipestem, the trophy was about this big right here. And all it said on the front of it was the word tennis. That's all it said. That was all the room there was on that little tiny thing because my father-in-law knew I was going to win. He's not going to give me a big trophy. He's going to belittle me as much as possible. That's what father-in-laws do. You know the difference between outlaws and in-laws? Did I ask you that? You know the difference between outlaws and in-laws? Outlaws are wanted. I lost about 35 pounds one time a couple years ago. I put most of it back on, unfortunately, but I lost 35 pounds. And my father-in-law looked at me after I'd lost 35 pounds, and this is exactly what he said to me. He said, you know, I didn't realize how fat you really were until you lost some of that weight. Only a father-in-law can say that, that's all. That's what they're here on the earth to do, is to give you left-handed compliments, alright? So I got to be a relatively decent tennis player. I beat most of the people I played, but there was one guy, his name was David Van Horn. He's a pastor in West Virginia, in Charleston, West Virginia, at Lake Fork Baptist Church. And David Van Horn, no matter how good I got, could always beat me in tennis. So over the years, I'd stopped playing, David had stopped playing, and all that kind of stuff. And we'd gone to other pursuits like golf. You don't sweat as much when you play golf, you know. And so, I hadn't played tennis in a while. Well, David Van Horn went to the hospital, went to the doctor's office, and he was told he had non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. And they were going to lay out the treatment plan for him. And by the way, I know you're going to ask the question later. He is completely in remission now, so praise the Lord for that. But he asked the doctor, he said, well, while the chemo treatments are going on and the radiation and all that, is there something that I can do that would help? And the doctor looked at him and said, well, you need to lose some weight. And David asked the question that we would all ask, well, how much weight do I need to lose? And the doctor told him, you pretty much need to lose a whole person. Now, let me explain something to you in case you've missed this. When they measure your necessary weight loss in people instead of pounds, you're a fat person. And David decided one of the best ways to do that was to go and play tennis. So he called me up and he says, hey, Rich, I want to go play tennis. And I said, yes, I would love to play tennis with you. He said, Brother Harper, wait a minute. Would you take joy in beating an overweight cancer patient in tennis? Yes. I slept the night before dreaming about jumping over the net to shake hands with David. I had worked out my little victory dance that I was going to do after I beat him. It was all being played out in my mind, and I went out to start the set, the first set. I'm standing on one side of the tennis court with my racket in hand. He's standing on the other side, and please excuse a pop culture reference. He looks like Jabba the Hutt standing there. He can't move. He can't run. He's just staked out one place on the court. And that's all he can do. He beat me, six loves, six won. In West Virginia, we call that a whooping. To add insult to injury, I walked in the back door of my house, my wife was washing dishes. And she looked at me and she said, did you win? And you don't know this about me, but if I won, you don't have to ask. I will volunteer that information to you. I will go on ad nauseum about how great a tennis player I really am, how many serves and lobs and backhands and forehands. I will describe every volley. I'll go into every single point, point by point, and tell you just how wonderful I am. If I won, you don't have to ask me. If I didn't win, I don't want you to ask me. I said, no, I didn't win. And then she looked at me with this incredulous look on her face and she said, why? Now, here's the truth about me. You're not going to outlast me. It's just that simple. If we're playing ping pong, because I like to play ping pong, right? And we're playing the best of three and you win the first two, we're playing the best of five. Whether you signed up for it or not, if you win the next one, we're playing the best of seven and then the best of nine. And when we get to the best of 51 or best of 53 and you finally have to go home, I'm going to dance and say, well, I beat you. You forfeited. So if somebody beats me, it's not because they outlasted me, it's because they're better than me. No man wants to say, well that very overweight cancer patient is a better tennis player than I am. I decided I was never going to play tennis again. About a week later, my brother-in-law, Tim Britton, called me up. He said, hey, I've been playing tennis a little bit. I've taken it up. I kind of like it. Do you want to go and play with me? It took me a minute to think about it, but I went ahead and agreed and went out, and I beat Tim so badly. I beat him six loves, six love, which is worse than I had been beaten a week before. I walked in the back door. My wife said, did you win? I said, well, of course. I always win. See, I have really, really quick short-term memory loss when it comes to losses. And I described every point, every lob, every volley, went on and on about how great I was. That next Saturday, I'm sitting in the living room with my wife, and I said, you know what? I think I'd like to play tennis. Guess who I called? And I know what you're thinking. You say to yourself, well, Brother Harper, if you played more tennis with David Van Horn, you could become a better tennis player. I'm not interested in being a better tennis player. I just want to win. I'm never going to play on a circuit or anything like that. Why would I be concerned about how good a tennis player I am? I just want to walk in the back door and my wife says, did you win? I want to say, yes. I don't want to ever say no again. I called my brother-in-law Tim. I beat him every bit as bad as I had just a week before. I walked in the house all proud of myself because I had beaten Tim Britton. See, isn't that what we do in church though? Pastor preaches a message on reading your Bible, and you quickly scan the auditorium, and you find someone who you know reads less than you do. So you can walk out and say, well, I probably don't read my Bible as much as I should, but at least I read more than they do. You sit in the auditorium on a Wednesday night at a revival service and you look around and see the people that are missing. So you can pat yourself on the back for being more faithful than the ones that would be sitting in the empty seats. Isn't that what we do? Aren't we constantly comparing ourselves to the Tim Britton Christians in the room? When in reality, the only one we're supposed to compare ourselves to is him. He's holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens. You know why we don't like to compare ourselves to Him? Because it always leads to the same place. If you compare your sacrifice to His, you never walk away feeling good about your sacrifice. You compare your service to His, you don't walk away feeling good about your service. You compare your submission to His, you don't walk away feeling good about your submission. Whatever you compare to Jesus Christ, you find out that you come short of Him. And you know what that does? It leads us to a place of humility. And there is nothing more opposite of the human spirit than humility is. Nothing more hated by God than the pride that we carry is. Proverbs 6, 16, and 17, these six things doth the Lord hate, yea, seven are an abomination unto him. The first one listed is a proud look. You ever wonder why God hates pride so much? Because in eternity past, when Lucifer, the son of the morning, decided to invent sin, it had never existed before. He did not start with lying. He did not start with killing. He did not start with adultery. He started with pride. I will ascend above the stars of God. I will be like the Most High. And you know what we do as Christians after we've been saved for a while? And after we can look around the auditorium and say, you know what? I'm not perfect, but I'm better than those, and I'm better than those, and I'm better than those. After we start to do that, that just, we all of a sudden stop deciding that the altar is everywhere we need to go. Why would I have to come to the altar if I'm a better Christian than most of the people in the auditorium is what we think, isn't it? But you know, the opposite ought to be true. It's not the dregs of Christianity that were humble. It is David, the man after God's own heart, that said, I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. It's Isaiah, the prophet that King Uzziah relied on, that said, woe is me, for I am undone, for I'm a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. It's the great apostle Paul that said, I know that in me, that is in my flesh, there dwelleth no good thing. Oh, wretched man that I am. And the closer we get to the Lord, the closer we get to the light of His perfection, the more we should be humbled, not the less. Several times we've pulled up to a church and had to just get dressed in our trailer before we even hooked up the electricity and turned all the lights on. You ever get dressed in a dimly lit trailer? You look at yourself in the mirror? You look good. Now I'm standing there saying, well I don't know why I haven't worn this outfit before. This looks great. And as I walk up to the church and there's the lights out in front of the church and the reflection of the big glass doors that every church has, I realize I know why I don't wear this outfit. It doesn't match. There's egg on my tie. I'm wearing a blue sock and a black sock. I know exactly why I don't wear this outfit. It looks terrible because the closer you get to the light the more you see your imperfections. And the closer we get to the light of His perfection, the more we see our shortcomings. So the child of God who finds themselves never going to an altar, they're not comparing themselves to Jesus Christ. They're not comparing themselves to Him. You can walk out of a church service comparing yourself to everybody in this room and walk out patting yourself on the back. But if you truly compared yourself to the one that is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens, there's no pat putting on your own back, is there? That's the reason we like to sing about His holiness. We don't like to apply it. I have an undefiled high priest tonight. And last, then we'll be finished. I have an unselfish high priest." Notice what it says, "...who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own self and then for the people's. For this he did once," now watch the wording here, "...when he offered up himself." Here's the narrative that you hear constantly. You even hear it from pulpits of men that would say they believe like we believe. They describe the Garden of Eden and Adam and Eve and God walking in the cool of the day with Adam in the garden and God fellowshipping with mankind in sinless perfection. And they'll make it sound like this was God's plan, eh? That God intended for humanity never to sin and to always fellowship with Him in perfect harmony. Lucifer, the serpent, was more subtle than the beast in the field, convinces Eve by pointing out to her the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, and she eats the fruit and gives it to Adam, and he eats the fruit. And then once they've sinned, God has to go back to heaven. And he says, you know what? Plan A was an abysmal failure. Satan thwarted plan A. Now I got to come up with a plan B. I got to go through heaven and find someone willing to die for the sins of mankind. And Jesus said, well Lord, I'll go and die for mankind. And Jesus came to die on the cross as the most glorious plan B that has ever existed. That's an interesting story. Unfortunately, there's no truth to it whatsoever. Jesus dying on that cross was not plan B. It was always plan A. Revelation chapter 13 and verse 8 says, He is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. You know, the people that love you, you can almost pinpoint when someone started loving you. When your parents started loving you before you were even born. When they first found out they were pregnant, but especially when they first saw that first ultrasound, boy, they loved you from that moment on. And as parents, that's when you started loving your kids. As soon as you found out, you were expecting. Your best friends, their love for you began when you started hanging out together and having shared experiences and shared moments of laughter, and you shared heartaches together, and they helped each other through those kinds of things. And you can trace back, you know, not when you first became friends, but you realized you really loved your best friend. Some of you, when you fell in love with your spouse, some of you, it was love at first sight. Others of you, you had to convince her for a while before she loved you. But do you know when it comes to God, He doesn't love you because of shared experiences. He doesn't love you because it was love at first sight. Jesus Christ is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. So before God said, let there be light, He already loved you. He was already willing to die for you. You didn't have to do anything good. You didn't have to do the right thing. You didn't have to come to so many church services. He has always loved you. He loved you before your great, great, great, great, great, great grandparents were born. He's always loved you. Now, listen to me carefully. No one has ever loved you like that. There are some sitting in this room, your parents don't even have a relationship with you, but God would. Some of you in this room, your marriage went on the rocks years ago. You walked away from someone. You stood in front of a congregation of people and promised to love them till death do you part, and yet it's gone. But not only has He loved you since eternity past, He will love you all the way into eternity future. No one's ever loved you like that. I have an unselfish high priest. who offered up himself. Now, here's what will blow your mind. He offered up himself as a sacrifice to the man who stands there and shakes his fist toward heaven and says he doesn't believe there's a God. He offered himself up as a sacrifice for the young person that doesn't even listen when they're hearing the truth of Jesus' love toward them. He offered himself up as a sacrifice to the one that takes his name in vain every single day. Because He doesn't just love you now. He's always loved you. And no one's ever loved you like that. If you're here today and you don't know Christ as your Savior, you understand this. He's always loved you. And he is the universal high priest that will save anybody that comes unto God by him. And because he's undying and unchangeable, he'll always be there to keep his promises sure and he'll never change his mind about saving you. And because he's undefeatable, he can always hold on to you and no one can pry you out of his grip. Lost person tonight, this unchangeable high priest will save you right now if you just ask him. you're a Christian tonight, it's time to stop comparing yourself to everybody else. It's time to stop coming to church looking for some way so that you can feel better about you before you leave. It's time to come to church and compare yourself to Jesus Christ and let Him change you and mold you because the goal in the Word of God is not to be the best Christian at Volusia County Baptist Church. The goal, according to the Word of God, is to be ye holy, even as I am holy. And by the way, Christian, we're never going to reach that goal. So let's let Him continue to mold us and change us and shape us and conform us into His image. And if we compare ourself to the undefiled high priest, it'll always end up in the same place with you in humility on your face before Him. Let's bow our heads and close our eyes, no one looking around. With every head bowed and every eye closed with no one looking around, Let me ask you a couple of questions tonight. How many would say, Brother Harper, tonight, I know I'm saved. I know for sure that if I died today, I'd go to heaven. I know as well as I know my own name that Jesus is my savior and heaven is my home. Would you slip your hand up, please, all over the auditorium if you could say that? Thank you. Put your hands down. Now, you're here tonight and you couldn't say that. Or you're here tonight and you peeked and saw other people raise their hands, so you raised yours. By the way, you can raise your hand a thousand times in a thousand invitations. It doesn't mean you're saved. And just because everybody on your row is going to heaven doesn't mean you are. If you're sitting here tonight and you couldn't say, I know that if I died today, I'd go to heaven. But let me ask you a question. It's just simple, isn't it? Wouldn't you like to know that? Of all the important things that you can know, Wouldn't knowing that your eternity is settled in heaven be about the most important thing you could know? How many would say tonight, Brother Harper, I couldn't raise my hand and say that I know for sure that I'm saved, but I would like to know I'm going to heaven. Nobody's looking but me. I already know who raised their hand and who didn't. I would like to know I'm going to heaven. Won't you slip your hand up right now. Just let me see it just above your shoulder. I'm not going to embarrass you. I'm not going to come and get you. I'm not going to single you out or anything like that. I just want you to be honest with me. I'm not sure if I died today I'd go to heaven, but I'd like to know that. Slip your hand up high enough for me to see it. Thank you. I see your hand. Now, if you raise your hand, I'm going to ask you to do one more thing for me, all right? Listen, how simple this is before you get mad at me. Would you just look at me? If you just raised your hand, would you just lift your eyes and look right at me? Right over here. I see you. Now, would you do me a favor? Would you do me a big favor now? Would you look around all back here? Turn around and look at everybody. You could stand up and look at everybody if you want to. All right? Is anybody staring at you? Does anybody know who I'm talking to in this room? Just me and you, right? We're the only people who know who raised their hand, right? Now, I could stand here and talk to you like this, couldn't I? But wouldn't we both get embarrassed after a little period of time? We start feeling self-conscious that all these other people are here and they're listening to our conversation. And they're all, I tell you what, they all start doing, they'd all start peaking after a few minutes. But here's the truth of it. Just keep looking at me. What I'd like to do, if it's all right with you, is come down off of this platform and just meet you there at the end. They're going to turn this microphone off when I come down there, okay? And then I want a lady to talk to you. And she'll take you out of this room. Nobody will know you left, but me and you and that lady, that's the only people that'll know. And she's going to show you what the Bible says. She's going to take you to another room. You won't be in front of everybody. Nobody's going to be staring at you or anything. All right, so I'm gonna come down off of this platform right now. I'm gonna meet you right there at the end of the aisle, and one lady personal worker's gonna meet me, and I'm gonna introduce you to her, and then she's gonna take you out of here, and she'll be nice to you, I promise. Not as nice as I am, but she'll be nice to you, okay? I'm coming down to get you right now.