Let's pray. Lord, this subject is meat for the mature. The writer of Hebrews wanted to address this issue. He wanted to write about it because it was so good. but the recipients of his letter were dull of hearing. God, I pray that you would give us the ability to understand this great and glorious topic of the priesthood of Jesus Christ. Lord, I pray tonight that you would exalt your Son. I pray that through me you would bless your name and you would bless your people by showing them Christ. God, do all of these things for your glory, for our good. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. I want to begin our time tonight unpacking a big, big concept. And then I want to work out that concept by looking at a specific example, the priesthood of Christ. And then I want to discuss how the high priestly ministry of Christ applies to us. So here's the big concept. Jesus Christ is at the heart of Old Testament revelation. Jesus Christ is at the heart of Old Testament revelation. Every Old Testament book is preparing God's people for the coming of God's Messiah. Every promise, every feature and facet of the law, every blessing and every curse, every judgment brought about by disobedience, every juncture of Jewish history were signposts pointing to Christ and to His cross. They're signposts pointing us to Jesus Christ. Old covenant worship, the Passover, the temple and the tabernacle before it, the Temple Furniture, the Holy of Holies, the Priesthood, which we're going to discuss tonight, the Sacrifices, the Day of Atonement, the Hold of the Old Covenant, were signposts directing men beyond the shadows to the glorious reality of the Son of God, come to earth, crucified, raised to life, ascended to the Father's right hand, returning and reigning over every adversary. with men, and women, and children, ransomed from every tribe, and language, and people, and nation. That's the storyline of the Old Testament. That's what it's all about. It's all about Christ. It's all pointing us to Christ. When you read your Old Testament, when you read the Old Testament Scriptures, you've got to have this concept in your head. And when you're reading books like Genesis, and Exodus, and Leviticus, and Numbers, and Deuteronomy, All the way to the end of the Old Testament Scriptures, you have got to be thinking, this is about Christ. This is about Christ. This is about Christ. I'm supposed to see Christ. This is all preparation for His coming and His death. If you fail to see the Old Testament Scriptures as a series of signposts leading to Christ and finding ultimate fulfillment in Christ, the Old Testament canon is closed to you. You're never going to get it. You will never understand it. The Old Testament only makes sense in light of Jesus Christ. We've all been studying Genesis in our EMMs, right? If you fail to see Christ in Genesis, Genesis is a closed book. If you fail to see it as a series of signposts pointing you to Christ and finding ultimate fulfillment in Christ, you're going to miss the message of the book. Every time we're in Genesis, every chapter, it's Christ, Christ, Christ. You need to see God's promise in Genesis 3. True Satan, I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He shall bruise your head, crush your head, and you shall bruise his heel. Elaborated on in God's promise to Abraham. In your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. finally and completely fulfilled in Christ, who is the offspring of Abraham, who is the Lamb of God, slain for sinners, fulfilled in Revelation 7, 9-10. After this, I looked, and behold the great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne, before the Lamb, clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb. That is the fulfillment of God's promise to Abraham. In you, in your offspring, will all the nations of the earth be blessed. You have got to see Genesis that way or it is going to be closed to you. You're never, ever, ever going to teach Genesis to your kids rightly if you don't get this concept. You're never going to discuss it with lost persons rightly when they ask tough questions about Genesis 3 and 7 and 18 and 22. If you don't see it finally, ultimately fulfilled in Christ, you're going to miss the point. This is real relevant stuff. This is how Christians are supposed to understand and profit from the Old Testament. And, let me just say this, this is how Christians are supposed to understand and profit from the New Testament. For example, John 1.29 only makes sense in light of the book of Leviticus. When John the Baptist sees Christ coming, he says, Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. If you don't understand, if you don't have some sort of background, if you don't have some sort of context, if you don't have this idea in your head about the Old Testament sacrificial system that God put in place so that sinners could fellowship with the Holy God, they could draw near to Him, they could approach Him, then you are never ever going to get it. It's not even making sense to you. I mean, lambs slain for sin? What does that mean? I mean, you know, what does that mean? It doesn't mean anything to people unless they understand the Old Testament, unless they understand the Old Covenant. And just so you don't think that I'm making this stuff up, let's look at a couple scriptures. Turn to Romans chapter 3. And I'll be brief here. I will try very, very hard to just read the text. I think it's pretty much self-explanatory. And I will try to bite my tongue so I don't comment on it too much because we've got a lot to get through. So, Romans chapter 3, verse 21. He says, But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law. What? Although the law and the prophets bear witness to it. What are the law and the prophets all about? They're all about righteousness coming through Christ. They were preparing God's people for that. Turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 1. Read with me verse 20, this is great stuff. For all the promises of God find their yes in Him. Every promise in the Old Testament finds their yes in Christ. Finally fulfilled in Christ. That's Old Testament Scriptures. Signposts directing us to Christ. Shadows pointing to a greater and more glorious reality Turn to the book of Luke, chapter 24. I won't take time to read the entire passage. Most of you are familiar with it. Jesus, recently raised from the grave, is on the road to Emmaus with two of his disciples. And they're kind of like, they're worried that maybe he wasn't the Christ. Maybe this wasn't God's Messiah. Maybe this isn't the one we've been waiting for. And Christ, talks with them, and He teaches them, and He explains to them, and proves to them that He was the Messiah, and that He should suffer. Look with me, beginning in verse 25. And He said to them, O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into His glory? And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, He interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning Himself. When Christ wanted to prove to someone that He was God's Messiah, you know where He went? He went to Moses, and all the prophets, and all the scriptures, the Old Testament scriptures. That's where he went to prove to people that he was God's Messiah. You can also read Matthew 5.17. All of the law is fulfilled in Christ. But specifically, dealing with our topic tonight, turning to the book of Hebrews, this same Teaching will be repeated in chapters 9 and 10, but look at chapter 8. Read with me verse 4. Talking about the high priestly ministry of Christ. The fleeing of shadows being replaced with a glorious reality. He says now, if he were here on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are priests who offer gifts according to the law. Those priests, their ministry, the covenant under which they operated, was a copy and shadow of the heavenly things. That's what the Old Testament is. It's shadows. And they're giving evidence to a more glorious, more grand, more exciting and wonderful reality fulfilled in the Son of God. That's what the entire Old Testament is all about. So, let me work that out by looking specifically at the high priestly ministry of Jesus Christ and by looking specifically at the Old Testament priesthood. So, as I was thinking through what I could say about the Old Testament priesthood that would point us to Christ, there's lots of stuff I could say. There's one thing I really, really want to say, and that's what I'm going to spend all my time on, but I do want to just mention a couple other things in passing that are so good that you can study out on your own. You could kind of break it up into two categories, at least I broke it up into two categories. Maybe it's the best way, maybe it's not, but it may be helpful. So I was thinking, you know, you could talk about the qualifications for the priest, and then you could talk about their functions. Those are the kinds of things that you could look at, and you could see Christ in. So, let me just make a couple comments about qualifications. Have you ever, like, wondered why the priest you know, had these restrictions like he couldn't have any contact with dead bodies he had restrictions for like who he could marry he had restrictions about his appearance he had restrictions or there were qualifications and they were basically saying the priest had to be without physical defects have you like ever wondered why? what's that about? what's the point? This is the point. The priest had to be holy. He had to be holy. You cannot approach a holy God in your sin and all of these things were kind of giving an appearance of outward holiness. The reason he couldn't have physical defect, I think, is because of its association with sin, its association with the curse. That's why he had to wear linen garments, so he wouldn't sweat. Sweat was part of the curse. And so, he had to be holy, or at least at that time, in that dispensation, have an appearance of holiness. Outwardly holy. Ceremonially holy. That was the point. And all of that is pointing to Christ's holiness. You go to Hebrews chapter 7 and it's describing our High Priest and it says He's holy, He's harmless, He's undefiled, He's separate from sinners. He's perfect. He's perfect. And He's able to go into the presence of a holy God because He Himself is holy and minister on our behalf as our High Priest. I mean, doesn't that ever just boggle your mind when you consider the holiness of Christ? Holy in thought. Holy in action. You know, everything He did pleased His Father. And I think about that, and I am so unlike that. I'm so unholy. And Christ is so perfect in His holiness. Nothing lacking. and he goes right into the very presence of God to minister as our high priest. Just another, a couple more, I'll give you a couple more, I was going to cut it down to one, but I'll give you a couple more, and this will be the last two. One of the priest's duties was to burn incense on the altar continually, continually. It was prefiguring the Unceasing intercessory ministry of Christ on our behalf, always before the Father. Ever living to make intercession for us. That's what it was. Prefiguring. Christ interceding for us. Pleading His blood for us. Praying for us. All the time. And we are... I mean, we stay saved if you want to put it in that terminology, because Christ keeps on praying for us, never ceasing to make intercession for us, never ceasing to advocate our cause, never ceasing to plead His blood poured out for us. That's what He's doing. So, yes, it is a once-and-done kind of thing, but it's not quite a once-and-done kind of thing. Because Christ keeps on keeping us saved through an eternal, unceasing, high priestly, intercessory prayer for us, prayerful ministry for us. And so, that is just flowing out of His sacrifice for our sins. but is an ongoing, eternal, keeping us in saving grace before God. I'm going to skip the second one. It was basically on the priest just teaching the people. You know, people would marvel, like, Christ, no one ever taught us like this! No one ever spoke like this! He would confound the Pharisees and the Sadducees with his wisdom! understanding of the scriptures and he would rebuke them for not understanding the scriptures for themselves. His argument for the resurrection in Matthew 22 is amazing. You've got to read that and get it because it's good. So, what was the main function of the priest? What was he doing? What was the main purpose for God instituting the priesthood? It was this. It was atonement. Atonement. It was a term coined by William Tyndale. He wanted to kind of have an English word that would kind of, you know, be like this term reconciliation in the Latin. And so, he came up with this word. He coined this word atonement. And basically what it means is at-one-ment. Two opposing parties. Two You know, parties that cannot get along, they're separated from each other, are joined together, they are made one. That's what that word means. Now turn to Leviticus. You can read with me if you want or try to follow. I'll try to reference all of the scriptures. that deal with atonement for you, so you can follow along if you want. It's kind of going to be an abbreviated reading, so we can get through all of the text. There's a lot. So, let's go. Leviticus chapter 4, beginning of verse 13. If the whole congregation of Israel sins unintentionally, what? Skip down to verse 20. The priests shall make atonement for them, and they shall be forgiven. Leviticus 4, verse 22, when a leader sins, skip down to verse 26, the priest shall make atonement for him for his sin and he shall be forgiven. Verse 27, if any one of the common people sins, the priest, verse 31, shall make atonement for him and he shall be forgiven. Verse 32, If he brings, this is the man who sins, if he brings a lamb as his offering for a sin offering, he shall bring a female without blemish. And what? And the priest, verse 35, shall make atonement for him for the sin which he has committed, and he shall be forgiven. Leviticus chapter 5, verse 1. If anyone sins, verse 6, the priest shall make atonement for him for his sin. Leviticus chapter 5 verse 7, but if he cannot afford a lamb, this is the person who sins, if he cannot afford a lamb, he shall bring to the Lord as his compensation for the sin that he has committed, two turtle doves or two pigeons. And what? Verse 10, the priest shall make atonement for him for the sin that he has committed and he shall be forgiven. Leviticus 5 verse 11, But if he cannot afford two turtle doves, same guy who sins, if he cannot afford two turtle doves or two pigeons, then he shall bring his offering for the sin that he has committed, a tenth of an ephah, a fine flower for his sin offering. And guess what the priest is going to do? The priest shall make atonement, verse 13, for him for the sin which he has committed, and he shall be forgiven. Verse 14. If anyone commits a breach of faith and sins, verse 16, the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering and he shall be forgiven. Chapter 5, verse 17. If anyone sins, verse 18, the priest shall make atonement for him. Some of you are probably wondering right now if he's going to go through the whole book. He's going to give us every reference to the priest making atonement. The answer is yes. Let me assure you of two things. Number one, I have a purpose in doing this. I want you to get a feel of the massive amount of text that is devoted to this specific function. If you read Leviticus, it mentions once, maybe twice. I can't remember exactly. A lot of the studying was done after midnight and things are getting a little hazy right now. There's like one or two times it talks about him teaching the people. I think it's only one, but it may be two. But there are so many texts that talk about atonement. There's tons. Because that was his chief function, because that was man's chief problem. He was a sinner. God was holy. He couldn't draw near to God because of his sin. He needed someone to make atonement for him. And that was what the priest did. Leviticus chapter 9, verse 7. Then Moses said to Aaron, I don't have anywhere to go, so I'm here. I don't have any plans after this, so I'm not really worried about how long it takes us to get through the message. Then Moses said to Aaron, Draw near to the altar, and offer your sin offering and your burnt offering, and make atonement for yourself and for the people, and bring the offering of the people, and make atonement for them as the Lord has commanded. Leviticus chapter 10, verse 16. Now, Moses is a little bit upset about how... Here we go. A little upset about how Aaron was handling a situation that had to deal with the death of his sons. So it says this, verse 16. Now Moses diligently inquired about the goat of the sin offering. Why have you not eaten the sin offering in the place of the sanctuary? Since it is a thing most holy and has been given to you that you may bear the iniquity of the congregation to make atonement for them before the Lord." Chapter 12, verses 6 through 8. And when the days of her purifying are completed, it's talking about the regulations and rules for cleanness. Be clean before God. Be holy. And when the days of her purifying are completed, she shall bring to the priest at the entrance of the tent of meeting a lamb. And he shall offer it before the Lord and make atonement for her. And the priest shall make atonement for her and she shall be clean. Leviticus chapter 14. Verse 18, And the rest of the oil that is in the priest's hand he shall put on the head of him who is to be cleansed. Then the priest shall make atonement for him before the Lord. Verse 19. To make atonement for him who is to be cleansed from his uncleanness. Verse 20. Thus the priest shall make atonement for him, and he shall be clean. Verse 52. Thus he shall cleanse the house. The priest cleansed the house. So he shall make atonement for the house, and it shall be clean. Viticus 15. 15. And the priest shall make atonement for him before the Lord for his discharge. And the priest shall make atonement for her before the Lord for her unclean discharge. Leviticus chapter 19 verse 22 and the priests shall make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering before the Lord for his sin that he has committed, and he shall be forgiven for the sin that he has committed." The primary function of the Old Testament priesthood was this, to make atonement for the sins of the people so that they could draw near to God and the priesthood that was pictured, that was alluding to Christ finds its perfect fulfillment in Him. God has been rendered propitious indefinitely through the high priestly ministry of Christ by which He offered Himself a sacrifice and satisfied perfectly God's wrath against sinners and God's desire to manifest the immeasurable glory of His grace to creatures wholly undeserving of it. What the priesthood was meant to do or should have done was perfectly fulfilled in Christ. We'll get to this, but the problem was that it could never cleanse internally and eternally God's people from their sin. And so Christ came in the fullness of time and did just that. Turn to the book of Hebrews. So, primary function of the priests, make atonement for the people. Christ's primary function as our High Priest was to make atonement for the sins of the people. Hebrews chapter 2 verse 17 talking about Christ therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God Christ is a high priest in the service of God to what? To make propitiation for the sins of the people. To satisfy God's wrath against their sin. To utterly and completely exhaust it, so that there is no wrath left over for the people. To make perfect union between God and His people. Turn over just a few pages to Hebrews chapter 9. 9-11 through 10-14 is going to deal explicitly with Christ's high priestly ministry. And what it is getting at is this. Jesus is the reality that every temporary, imperfect, shadow-like high priest descended from Aaron was pointing to. And what Hebrews is saying is that The shadows are gone. The reality has come. Reformation has come. The good things alluded to in the Old Covenant have come when Christ came. When He appeared as our High Priest and secured for us an eternal redemption by offering Himself in sacrifice to make atonement for our sins. Look at verse 11. But when Christ appeared as a High Priest, He is a High Priest. I mean, it can't get any clearer than that. He's a High Priest. He's a High Priest. He's the fulfillment of all of these facets and features of the Law. He's a High Priest of the good things that have come Verse 13, for if the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer sanctify for the purification of the flesh, that's what we were talking about before when we were saying that it was just a outward, external, ceremonial cleanness. He says, if that was true, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit, Ki, Key concept. Offered himself without blemish to God. Like a high priest, Christ offered himself. He offered a sacrifice to God for the sins of the people. It says, he offered himself without blemish to God. How much more shall he purify your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? How much more will he clean you on the inside? How much more will He purify your conscience, your heart? No one in the Old Testament could say that they were clean, they had a clean conscience, no guilt before God. based on the sacrificial system that was in place. He's going to go on to say in chapter 10 that actually what was going on every year when the high priest was offering a sacrifice for sins, what he was doing was bringing up the remembrance of sins every year. You're still a sinner. You're still in your sins. But Christ offered Himself up once for all. One time. And cleansed us. from our sins, internally and eternally. And we are right with God forever because of the perfection of His satisfaction. That's how Hodge would put it. Because His high priestly ministry was so perfect and the sacrifice He offered was so perfect. It satisfied God's wrath against our sins. I would love to keep on working through this passage. Let's just look at these couple verses. Verse 23. It's going to say, again, that all of these things are copies of the heavenly things. God is in heaven, surveying the landscape of heaven, and He then institutes a system that mirrors or looks like is a shadow of what's going on in heaven that's what it's saying this wasn't an afterthought God had planned it this way all along they're copies of the heavenly things and then says verse 24 for Christ entered not into holy places made with hands He entered into the holy place, the true holy place, the real holy of holies, right into the very presence of God, what the tabernacle, the temple were pointing to, just like a high priest would, to appear in the presence of God on our behalf, to offer Himself, And it says, and I'm getting that from the fact that verse 25 says, nor was it to offer himself repeatedly. He went in to offer himself one time, but he went in to offer himself, to offer himself as a sacrifice, just like the high priest would go into the Holy of Holies, in the tabernacle, in the temple, and offer a sacrifice for sins. Chapter 10 is going to confirm the same thing. Let me just read these passages. I don't even need to explain them. Chapter 10. start in verse 10, and by that will, God's will, that His Son should come and inaugurate a new covenant and under that covenant operate as priests and offer a sacrifice for sins and by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Christ was offering a sacrifice because he was a high priest. And it was to atone for sins, to take away sins. And every priest daily at his service offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering, He has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified." There are so many passages in the New Testament that are confirming this, and proving this, and elaborating on this. Christ is our High Priest. He offered His sacrifice for our sins. He atoned for them fully and completely forever. And we're right with God because of Him. John 17, 20-21, we will end our discussion of Jesus' high priestly ministry, or seeing how the Old Testament priesthood is alluding to His superior priesthood here, and we'll make some applications, and we'll be done. John 17, This is the high, priestly, intercessory prayer of Christ for His people. The end to which Jesus labored and prayed was this. Look at verse 20. I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word. He's praying for all of His people throughout all history, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us. That is taking two parties, opposing each other, at enmity with each other, and joining them together. That's what Christ prayed for, and that's what He accomplished on the cross. He brought sinners into a relationship with a holy God. That's astounding. That's amazing. So, So what? We just talked about a lot of things. So what? What's the point? Let me just start off with this. Go to this high priest. He will atone for your sins. If you are not looking to Christ for salvation from your sin, there is no hope for you. None! There's no hope for you. If you are not looking to Him to make atonement for your sins, to bring you into a relationship with God, you don't have a relationship with God. There's anyone in here who is not gone to that priest for atonement. You're not leaning on, resting on, embracing His sacrifice for your sin. The offering up of Himself for you. You are still in your sins. And you are still at enmity with God. And His wrath is against you. Go to Him. He will save you. It says in John chapter 6, there is no one. I will never cast out anyone who comes to me. Friends, you should marvel at and rejoice in this truth. What I mean is, what He accomplished for us as our High Priest is astounding. He made it possible for God to be just against sin and to deal with sin. and also justify people who are ungodly, people who are sinners, people who have rejected God, who have turned away from God, who hate God. Romans 3 says, there is none that seeks after God, there is no one who is righteous. And those kinds of people are able to be right with God because of Christ, because of what He did, because of His high priestly ministry, because He offered Himself up as a sacrifice for our sins and made atonement for them forever. And that should astound you. And you should rejoice in that. You should love that. Because you know you and you know that you don't deserve it. You don't deserve all of the blessings. You don't deserve all of the joys that are ours in Christ. All of the future joys and blessings that will be ours because of Him. We don't deserve it at all, but praise God. It's ours through Christ. It's ours through Christ. But don't just stop there. The whole point of the priesthood was making it possible for sinners to draw near to God. So, the admonition, Hebrews chapter 10, is draw near to God through Christ. He has made intimate, the most intimate kind of relationship possible with God for you. There is a reason that God describes His relationship to His people, or through marriage, as the relationship of a husband to a wife. There's a point to that, because that's the kind of relationship that is possible through Christ. The New Covenant that Christ inaugurated, that's what it's about. They will know God. They're going to know God. He's going to write His laws on their heart. He's going to write them on their mind. And they're going to know Him. And they will not need anyone to teach them. Because they're going to know Him. Intimately, like a husband knows his wife, like a wife knows her husband. That kind of personal, intimate relationship, that was not possible in the old covenant, is possible now, because of Christ. So draw near to Him. Pray. Pray. I mean... Like sometimes I just think like, why don't I pray enough? Why don't I pray more? Why don't I draw near to God through prayer more? I have access to His throne room. The way's been opened. Why don't I pray? This is the God of the universe. Great, glorious, amazing, wonderful, unlike anything or anyone you've ever known. And you get to talk to Him as much as you want. Why don't we pray more? Why don't we draw near more? I think about that and it's so convicting. So convicting. Because I don't... I take it for granted and I don't... I don't enjoy it like I should. I don't engage in it like I should. But Christ has made the way to God open. And so draw near to Him. And, admonition of Hebrews, don't turn away. Keep on believing in this Christ. Keep on looking to this High Priest. Don't turn away. Keep on doing what we're doing tonight. Keep on looking to Him. Keep on remembering Him. Let's pray. God, thank You so much that there is a High Priest who has made atonement for our sins and who has perfectly satisfied the demands of Your justice and allowed You to show grace and mercy and kindness to ungodly people like us. We praise You for Christ and for His ministry on our behalf. And it's in His name we pray. Amen.