Christ as High Priest

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Q. H. How can Hebrews 2:1717Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. (Hebrews 2:17), be reconciled with Hebrews 8:44For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law: (Hebrews 8:4)? The latter Scripture seems to imply that ascension seems to have been a necessary preliminary to the Lord’s entering upon the office of High Priest; yet the former speaks of His making reconciliation for the sins of the people.
What is meant by reconciling sins? Is not John 17 in character the High Priest’s prayer?
A. To me a very blessed aspect of the Epistle to the Hebrews is that it is the complement, in a certain sense, of that to the Romans. The latter sets the believer “in Christ” before God in divine righteousness, recognizing an unchanged evil nature, a carnal mind; but also a new nature, the spiritual mind (Rom. 8:1-111There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 5For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 6For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 7Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 8So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 9But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 10And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. (Romans 8:1‑11)). The former shows us the divine provision of grace to maintain us there by the priesthood of Christ. This is alluded to in Romans 5:1010For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. (Romans 5:10); reconciled by His death, we shall be saved by His life, that is, His priestly intercession on high. So in Romans 8:3434Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. (Romans 8:34), “Who also maketh intercession for us.” Then in Hebrews 7:2626For such an high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens; (Hebrews 7:26), we read (as putting both thoughts together), “He ever liveth to make intercession for them.”
But all this supposes Him to stand in the capacity of High Priest, between a reconciled people and God; and to this Hebrews 8:44For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law: (Hebrews 8:4) refers. He exercised no true priestly service then, until He ascended to glory.
But still there was something which He did as a priest before He went on high. Just as the High Priest on the great day of atonement of old was making good the claims of God,1 and putting the sins of the people on the head of the scapegoat, while after all he was not in his normal place as between a reconciled people and God, so the Lord Jesus, ere He entered on the normal exercise of His priesthood, as a priest He did the work of the cross; both actively as offering Himself, and passively as the victim offered, in making atonement for the sins of the people. This is what is referred to in Hebrews 2:1717Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. (Hebrews 2:17), where the word is incorrectly translated “reconciliation.” There is no meaning in reconciling sins; there would be in reconciling people. It should be “to make propitiation (ἱλάσκεσθαι) for the sins of the people.”
John 17 is wrongly taken as an intercessional or priestly prayer. Now, the Lord is there as Son, not priest or advocate, and He is occupied in putting His disciples into His own place on earth before the Father and before the world, with an- allusion in the end to their place in the Father’s house by and by. He looks to the Father to keep them where He had kept them while with them.
Priesthood is for mercy and grace for help in time of need, to a feeble people who have to cry to God, in a place of danger and liability to fall and start aside from Christ.
 
1. It is helpful to remember that Aaron was not dressed in the regular High Priest’s garments on the day of atonement. It was an extraordinary work.