WITH regard to the beautiful materials with which the breast-plate was made, we have, in the “gold, blue, purple, scarlet, and fine-twined linen,” the personal glories of the great High Priest typically set forth. So immediately did failure and sin come in after the introduction of the priesthood, that there is no reason to believe that these garments of glory and beauty were ever worn before the Lord. But we can, I trust, easily see how all will be made good, when the true Melchisedec sits as a Priest upon His throne, and all the twelve tribes are set in terrestrial glory in their proper lots in the land; and with what unspeakable glory all these typical blessednesses will shine forth in moral worth, and unfading excellence, in their true Messiah, when He reigns before His ancients gloriously.
We can, also, happily enter into and enjoy the precious lessons these types and shadows read to us as to the meaning of that blessed One having entered into heaven itself by His own blood, and now appearing before the face of God for us. And how touching to the feeblest believer to find that he is included amongst those who are thus so wondrously blessed! for it is for “all who come unto God by Him.” This surely every believer can say, even the weakest babe in the faith, that he comes unto God by Christ.
1. The first practical lesson for our hearts suggested by the contemplation of the glorious High Priest in heaven for us, is that He both demands and warrants our —
unwavering confidence.
Hence the apostle says, “Seeing then that we have a great High Priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession,” or let us hold fast the confession.
This does not say, “hold fast your faith,” or “hold on in faithfulness,” blessed and important as it is to continue both in faith and faithfulness; but seeing that Christ has so taken hold of us, that, whether we are thinking of Him or not, He is faithful — He changes not — that His merciful and unwearying heart is continually taken up with us, in presenting us always before the face of God — we cannot hesitate to confess Him as our life, righteousness, never-failing security and hope, spite of all the changes within and around in this chequered and sinful scene. Let us then “hold fast the confession.” It is His faithfulness, His grace, His abundant goodness, which is the ground of true confidence; and especially when we see that Jesus, our great High Priest, is presenting us in divine righteousness, in His own acceptance before God continually.
Dear Christian brethren, we do well thus to contemplate the moral perfections and excellences of our High Priest. When we grow cold and forgetful of Him, does He forget us? Never. Nothing can and nothing will ever cause Him for one moment to cease to bear us up before our God in the perfectness of His unchanging love, and in the almightiness of His everlasting strength. What an unspeakable basis of rest and confidence our God has given us in Christ Jesus!
“I change, He changes not:
My Christ can never die;
His love, not mine, the resting-place,
His truth, not mine, the tie.
I know He liveth now
At God’s right hand above;
I know the throne on which He sits,
I know His truth and love.”
2. The second point to notice in the function of our precious Priest in heaven is —
His sympathy.
For “we have not an High Priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities.” Observe it is not sins, but infirmities; for surely that holy One could have no sympathy with us in sin, nor could we wish Him to; besides, we know that He suffered for sins. But “infirmities” are short of sins and transgressions. He knows that often our spirits are willing, but the flesh is weak; that again and again we break down through natural weakness in our efforts to serve and glorify Him. We would praise Him with untiring voice, but soon grow weary. We are sometimes sleeping when we ought to be prang; and are overcome with fatigue in His blessed service, when our inner man would delight to go much farther. But Jesus knows all about us. “He knoweth our frame, He remembereth that we are but dust.” He understands our frailty and our feebleness; and His heart is touched with deep consideration for us.
He knows, too, what we are, not only as knowing all things, but as having lived here among men, and having as perfect man thorough personal acquaintance with every necessity of His people in this poor world. And He is certainly not less mindful of His own dear ones now than then. If the sorrowing hearts of Martha and Mary drew forth tears of sympathy from their loving Saviour when He knew that in a little while Lazarus would be again by their side in all the vigor of health and brotherly affection, though He has changed His place from earth to heaven, His heart cannot love less on that account. How sweet then to be able to look up to Him, when conscious of our own infirmities, and fully to count upon Him as a Friend that sticketh closer than a brother—
“Whose heart is filled with tenderness,
Whose very name is Love.”
We have not then an High Priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but who is—
“Touched with a sympathy within,
And knows our feeble frame,”
now in the presence of God for us—
“And, though ascended, feels afresh
What every member bears.”
3. Our High Priest is also our—
Succourer in temptation.
“In that He Himself hath suffered, being tempted, He is able to succor them that are tempted” (Heb. 2:18). His watchful eye never taken off us, His heart ever caring for us, and thus being objects of His care and activity, there is not an advance of Satan toward us that escapes His vigilance, not a snare laid, not a fiery dart hurled, not a wile projected against the feeblest of His saints, but all is open and manifest to His all-seeing eye; and, blessed be His name, He is able to succor us. He has known terrible temptation Himself. The foul breath of the adversary must have been exquisite suffering to His holy heart; and it is true that He did suffer thus, for “He was in all points tempted like as we are,” sin excepted.
He is then able to defeat Satan, to strengthen us to resist him, to keep us from being carried away by him, to preserve our feet from being entangled in the meshes of his net, to uphold us lest we fall, to deliver us from his wiles, to strengthen our faith to quench his fiery darts, and to enable us to stand fast in Christ, to stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, to be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. How comforting, then, is the thought that there is a perfect One in the glory who resisted Satan in temptation, and through death rendered him null who had the power of death, that is, the devil, who triumphed over him in resurrection from among the dead, and who assures us that “He is able to succor them that are tempted.”
4. Our Lord in glory as our great High Priest is deeply—
concerned about our need.
He is constantly saving us from ten thousand difficulties and perplexities which cross our path. In this we see He saves to the uttermost or right on to the end. Having saved our souls, saved us from the wrath to come, He saves us day by day from the things of men, and Satan, and the world, which sometimes threaten to swallow us up. For this, too, He is ever living to intercede for us. His intercession, then, as our High Priest is not about our sins, but about our need. We are therefore enjoined to “come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16).
Oh how precious is the fact that Jesus, having saved us from the wrath to come by the blood of the cross, is now pleading in heaven for us about our present need! As the Captain of our salvation, He is leading us on our way, and, unlike other captains, has actually gone before His soldiers to break down every impediment for them, and now as our great High Priest ever intercedes for us with God. He never forsakes, never forgets us, never slumbers nor sleeps, but is ever active on our behalf, ever merciful and faithful, ever living to make intercession for them that come unto God by Him. He will thus carry us through every difficulty thrown in our way by men and Satan, and bring us off more than conquerors through Him that loved us.
Oh the blessedness of having such a great High Priest to sustain our hearts in happy holy liberty in God’s presence! One, too, who can sympathize with us as to our infirmities, succor us in temptation, and daily save us through His ever-living and all-prevailing intercession. How unspeakably precious to be able to look up, and to see that no weakness nor failure on our part — no, not even eternity itself — can erase the graving of our names from His heart! And when we would be easily cast down with humbling views of our weakness, forgetfulness, and shortcomings, oh! the unutterable blessedness of looking up and seeing that infinitely loving, faithful heart ever engaged about us, and ever presenting us before the face of God in all the virtue and fragrance of an everlasting anointed High Priest.
And if the precious ointment, with its exquisite perfume, when poured upon the head of Aaron, ran down to the skirts of his garments, surely the precious savor of Christ must, by the Holy Ghost, rest upon every member of His body. It was the same precious anointing oil which was poured upon the sons of Aaron as upon Aaron himself; and so the same Holy Ghost that Jesus received of the Father has also been given to and has anointed those who are through grace brought into everlasting relationship with Him. But this leads us to the consideration of God’s present priests on earth, which will occupy us on another occasion if the Lord will.
Meanwhile, let us not forget, that because the veil is rent and Jesus is gone into heaven with His own blood, that there we are now, and there is our sanctuary. Because of the blood, and because our High Priest is there, we have liberty to enter into the holiest at all times, and abide there and worship.
As we sometimes sing—
“ ‘Tis finished! here our souls can rest,
His work can never fail;
By Him, our Sacrifice and Priest,
We pass within the veil.
“Within the holiest of all,
Cleansed by His precious blood,
Before the throne we prostrate fall,
And worship Thee, O God.”