We will read now Hebrews 5:1010Called of God an high priest after the order of Melchisedec. (Hebrews 5:10); and from there until the close of Hebrews 6 we may observe that the apostle turns aside to a parenthetic warning. He is full of that style; and our style with one another is full of it. Such little breaks and interruptions in a discourse are always grateful to us.
In the first ten verses of Hebrews 5 a most weighty matter is introduced to our thoughts. In the first verse we get a general abstract thought of priesthood. It is that thing which serves men in their relationships to God. Then the character of service is presented to us — "That He may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins "; that is, that He may conduct both eucharistic services and penetential or expiatory services before God. He stands to conduct our interest with God in whatever form. He is “taken from among men" that He may have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way. He is not taken from among angels, therefore we read in Timothy, “the man Christ Jesus." God in ordaining a Priest for us has chosen One who can have compassion. We find at the close of Hebrews 7 that the Lord Jesus was separate from infirmity. But the priest here was one who by reason of infirmity could sympathize. The Lord Jesus had to learn how to sympathize, as well as to learn obedience by the things which He suffered.
Under the Old Testament scriptures two persons are distinctly set in the office of the priesthood — Aaron in Leviticus 8 and 9, and Phinehas in Numbers 25. The difference between them was this Aaron was simply called into the priesthood; Phinehas acquired a title to it.
When we come to the Lord Jesus we find that both these, Aaron and Phinehas, are seen in Him He was “called of God, as was Aaron." Aaron was a mere called priest. The priesthood of Numbers 25 stands in contrast with Aaron’s. Phinehas was not called, as was Aaron, but he acquired his title. How did he do this? He made an atonement for Israel in the day of their great breach, touching the daughters of Baal-Peor and enabled the Lord to look with satisfaction again at His erring camp. Phinehas stood forward to avenge the quarrel of righteousness and to make atonement for the sin of the people. “And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Phinehas... hath turned My wrath away from the children of Israel... Wherefore say, Behold I give unto him My covenant of peace... even the covenant of an everlasting priesthood." Nothing can be finer than this. You could not have a more magnificent light in which to read the Christ of God than in that act of Phinehas. Aaron was never in this way entitled to a covenant of peace. So you have these two Old Testament lights in which to read the priesthood of the Lord Jesus. He was the true Aaron and the true Phinehas. Both these are brought out here. The blessed Lord Jesus was called into office, as was Aaron; but He was in office because He made an atonement. This earth was like the outside place of the temple, where the brazen altar was. The Lord Jesus is now seated in the sanctuary of the heavens, which God has pitched, and not man, because He has passed by the brazen altar on earth. He has passed it by and has satisfied it. Nothing can be simpler, and yet nothing can be more mysteriously grand. How did God bear witness to the satisfaction of the brazen altar? By rending the veil. Then it is an easy thing to pass in. If God has rent the veil am I to let it be rent for nothing? If it be now rent I have as much right to go inside as the Israelites of old were bound to keep outside. By satisfying the altar He has passed by the rent veil into the sanctuary in the heavens. All that is brought out here. He glorified not Himself to be made a High Priest.
Why is it a matter of honor to be made a high priest? You will tell me that nothing can dignify the Son of God; and I grant it. But let me ask you, Do not men know what it is to have acquired honor as well as hereditary honors? The son of a nobleman goes to battle and may he not acquire honors as well as his hereditary family dignities? And tell me, which will he value the most? Those which he has acquired. He himself is more honored by them. His hereditary dignities are his, and no thanks to him; but his acquired honors are more specially his own.
Divine things are illustrated by human things. Who can add anything to Him who is God over all, blessed forever? But the Son has been in the battle and acquired honors “that would never have been His if He had not taken up the cause of sinners; and dear and precious honors they are to Him! That word “called" is very sweet in the original. God "saluted," "greeted" Him when He seated Him in the sanctuary, as He greeted Him when He seated Him on the throne — "Sit thou at My right hand." The Epistle to the Hebrews shows, in the opened heavens, a throne as well as a sanctuary.
In verses 7, 8 and 9 we find some very weighty truths connected with ourselves. “Who in the days of His flesh” (let us mark that with holy reverence), “when He had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from death." The scene of that conflict was eminently marked in Gethsemane. What was the transaction there? He properly shrank from undergoing the judgment of God against sin. “And was heard for His piety." He was heard because death, the wages of sin, had no claim on Him. His claim to deliverance was allowed. Instead of the judgment of God being sent to wither His flesh, an angel was sent to strengthen Him
Yet He suffered death. He might have claimed His own personal exemption from it, yet He went through it. He learned obedience to His commission by traveling from Gethsemane to Calvary, and He now presents Himself to the eye of every sinner on earth as the Author of eternal salvation.
We see the Lord in Gethsemane pleading, as I may express it, His title against death. His title is owned; yet, though death has no claim on Him personally, He says, “Thy will be done." He might have gone from Gethsemane to heaven; but He went the rather from Gethsemane to Calvary; and so, being made perfect there, He became the Author of eternal salvation to all who receive Him. Then, when the altar was satisfied, the sanctuary received Him, and there He is.
In creation God planted a man in the garden in innocence; in redemption God has planted a Man in heaven, in glory. There is a glory that excelleth. The glory in redemption leaves the glory that was once in creation as a nothing.
Now we have got down to verse 10. Observe that the language of verse 10 is taken up in verse 20 of Hebrews 6, and the argument there has not advanced beyond this verse 10. Supposing, then, I were to take you to Hebrews 1, 2 and 3 of 1 Corinthians, you would find the apostle there hindered in his teaching. “You are carnal; I cannot teach you with the rich treasures I have stored up for the church." It is so here; only there the evil that hindered was moral; here it is doctrinal.
It was very difficult for the Hebrew to detach himself from the things in which he had been educated. He was “unskillful in the Word of righteousness." The legal mind is apt to take up righteousness as Moses did, as a thing demanded from us. God takes it up as a thing that He will give us. And in the next chapter, finding this hindrance among them, he sounds an alarm, as in the opening of Hebrews 2 he sounded an exhortation. A carnal mind and a legal mind are two great villains. They are both little foxes that spoil the vintage of God.
“Now," says the apostle, "you must leave these things. I must put you down to another volume, and that volume is perfection." “For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened," and so forth. That is, “It is not within my reach to do it." We must leave it to God whether they be brought back or not. It is just between themselves and God. It is a terrible thing, having known Christ, to go back to ordinances; but I have no warrant to say that it will not be forgiven in the person of many who have thus been ensnared but have come back.