“Ina Kent,” asks— What is the character of Christ’s priesthood now; Aaronic or Melchisedec?
Is Aaronic priesthood, intercessory? and Melchizedec, blessing If so, can Christ assume the latter order of priesthood until the millennium?
When did Christ assume His priesthood? Was it not after His ascension? (Heb. 8:4.)
A:—1. As a rule, Aaronic priesthood is characterized by atonement and intercession; that of Melchisedec by power and blessing. He is “the high priest of our profession,” as Christians: He will be in result “priest of the Most High God”—God’s millennial name.
The order of His priesthood is (as ever) that of Melchisedec —its exercise at present after the pattern or character of Aaron, i.e., intercessional. He was “called” to the priesthood by the word of Him that said unto Him, “Thou art my Son, today have I begotten thee.” (Heb. 5:5.) This has reference to His being the Son of God, as born of a woman, and born in time on earth. Compare Psa. 2:7, and Luke 1:35. This is distinct, from His being God’s eternal Son.
He is installed in His priesthood after the order of Melchisedec, as having gone on high when he had been rejected on earth, had died and risen, and had ascended to heaven. Compare Heb. 5:6, and Psa. 110:4.
He was perfected for His ‘priesthood (especially for its present exercise), “in the days of his flesh,” through strong crying and tears, and His pathway of sorrow and suffering, and then He went on high. Heb. 5:7-9; Mark 14:33-40; Luke 22:40-53.
Having gone through all this, He was “saluted of God a High priest after the order of Melchisedec,” (Heb. 5:10), when. He ascended into the heavens. There and then He first practically exercised His priesthood. (See query 3.) When He comes forth again He will exercise it after its true order, as Melchisedec.
There was an action done on the cross by Him as priest before He took His seat on high. It is noticed in Heb. 2:17. But strictly speaking it was not a priestly act, though it was the act of a priest. I allude to His making propitiation for the sins of the people. In scripture you will find that priesthood m its true character follows the work of redemption. As sinners the people needed a sacrifice, but as saints they need a priest. The High Priest standing confessing the sins of the people, was not, in this act, in his normal place as standing between a reconciled people and God. Christ was both priest and sacrifice to make propitiation for the sins of the people; but having done this as a priest He enters on the exercise of His priesthood, standing between a people who have been reconciled to God, and a God who has reconciled them to Himself.
Then follows an immense heavenly interval, characterized by the presence of the Holy Ghost dwelling on earth, before Christ comes forth to minister joy and strength and blessing as Melchisedec, in the age to come. Here then, is where Christianity comes in. In the epistle to the Hebrews, He is only known as gone in, never has come out: though here is a promise that He will. This stamps the primary application of the epistle to. Christians in the most characteristic manner. For, as Christians, we have to do with a Priest who is gone in to the holiest; Israel has to do with a priest who has come out
No doubt, His priesthood in the holiest now sustains His people Israel as a separate people on earth, till the morning of their history arrives. They are apparently lost to man’s eyes, but the true Priest orders a light for this people “before the Lord continually,” “from the evening unto the morning” of their history: the twelve loaves on the pure table in their two rows, with the frankincense put on them, in type shows how He maintains them in a perpetual memorial before the Lord. (See Lev, 24:1-9.)
The typical exercise of the Melchisedec priesthood is seen in Gen. 14:18-20. Abram returns from the slaughter of Chedorlaomer and the confederate Kings in Shaveh, and Melchisedec comes forth in connection with the name of the “Most High,” God’s millennial name—then, in millennial day, “possessor,” manifestly, “of heaven and earth.” He deals strength and joy (bread and wine) to the victorious Hebrew—blesses him, and blesses the God of Abram who had delivered him from his foes.
Thus, in the opening of the age to come, when the great confederate battle of the kings of the earth is fought, and the seed of Abraham delivered from their foes, Christ appears, introducing joy and strength, and as Priest of the Most. High God—then manifestly possessor of heaven and earth—the one now the abode of evil spirits, and the other the scene of man’s evil and Satan’s lie. He sits as a Priest on His throne (Zech. 6:13), the link between the then cleansed heavens, and the renewed earth, and Jehovah will “hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth, and the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil, and they shall hear Jezreel “ (the seed of God), “and I will sow her unto me in the earth—i.e., the restored and delivered people, which He never yet has done (Hos. 2:21-23). A stream of full blessing then flows from God in that day through Melchisedec.
Thus this priesthood is all blessing, after He has come forth, at a future day. This answers much of query 2.
At present we only know Him as gone in to the heavens, ever living (there) to make intercession for those that come unto God by Him (Heb. 7:25). His order of priesthood never changes. His exercise of it is certainly not after its true order but the activities of intercession constantly exercised to reconcile the condition of a poor, failing, feeble people on earth whom He has redeemed, with the perfection of the place of glory in. which He has set them on high.
Ready on the one side to give loose rein to all that is in our hearts, in a scene of corruption suited to its evil; capable on the other hand of enjoying God in all His holiness in the light of heaven; the priesthood of Christ supports our weakness in the divine desires, and all that God has caused to spring up in our hearts, and sustains us against the encroachments of the flesh and the world-ministering to us the grace we need here below, which He learned in His own path; because He has seen to the righteousness we did need on high before God; and thus we find from our God (not as it is translated “help in time of need” but,) “opportune succor” (εὔκαιρον βοἡθειαν) to prevent failure, and falling by the way. To pick us up when we have fallen, might be, indeed, “help in time of need”; but to minister “opportune succor”, supposes that we have discovered our constant need of it, and that we are in the place of danger and liability to fail. Thus prevention is better than cure. His present intercessional priesthood is active to sustain us before God by the way.
Advocacy and washing of our feet come in as actions which flow from priesthood, while not themselves strictly so.