Jesus, Our Eternal High Priest (Hebrews 5:1-14)

Jesus, Our Eternal High Priest

 

Hebrews 5:1-14

 

Indeed, our view of history has an enormous influence on our thoughts. What has made us arrive at the current situation? What is the force that drives the world to keep rolling in a certain direction? What will come up at the end of this evolution? Without answers to these questions, our life is nothing but a log drifting on the waves. Of course, we Christians have our view of history that we gained from the Bible, and this is not just "a Christian view of history" but is "the History." And, simply saying, it is the history of redemption, which was initiated by God when he called the fallen man Adam, “Where are you?” (Genesis 3:9) This is the only question and the greatest issue of God that keeps the history rolling forward. When I immigrated to New Zealand, my daughters Maria and Esther were at the age of four and two, respectively. In that country, they spent six years, most of their early childhood, and then we moved back to Korea and stayed there two years before coming to America. While living in Korea, Maria and Esther were almost foreigners, having to learn the Korean language and culture from the beginning. one day, Maria had a school assignment, which was visiting an ancient palace in Seoul and surveying old buildings and structures. on a sunny spring day, I took the two girls to the palace, and I helped Maria to do her homework. on that beautiful day that couldn’t be any better, the old palace was crowded with many visitors. And all of a sudden, I realized that Esther was missing. I couldn’t see her anywhere my vision reached. I totally panicked. My brain just blanked out. All of my nerves were extremely strained with one question, “Where is Esther?” I forgot why I had come to the place. I forgot the joy of the sunny day. Even I forgot I was with Maria. My head was fully occupied with just one question, “Where is Esther?” Later, recalling how I felt at the moment, I could appreciate vaguely how desperate God might have been when he was looking for Adam, crying “Where are you?” And this is what I believe how our history began.

 

Today we are going to think about Jesus as the Eternal High Priest and about the sacrifice that Jesus offered to God as the High Priest. We may think ‘priest’ and ‘sacrifice’ are merely Old Testaments concepts. But they are not! Especially considering that the entire human history is the history of redemption and this is God’s only business from the beginning and to the end, the terms ‘priest’ and ‘sacrifice’ cannot be foreign words at all. They have never been ‘antique.’ Probably they sound ‘out-of-date’ because we have the Eternal High Priest and he already offered a perfect sacrifice ‘once for all’ (Hebrews 10:10), making it necessary no longer. For us, nevertheless, ‘priest’ and ‘sacrifice’ are very critical on-going concepts that are interwoven with our everyday lives. For example, St. Paul says to the saints in Rome, “I urge you brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is our spiritual act of worship” (Romans 12:1).  Apostle John also praises God, “(Jesus Christ) has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father – to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen” (Revelation 1:6). These verses tell us that, like Jesus is the High Priest who offered his body as a sacrifice pleasing to God, we were also called as God’s priests to offer our bodies as living sacrifices. In fact, the terms ‘priest’ and ‘sacrifice’ are, as revealed by the life of Jesus our Lord, the most substantial description of who we are and how we are to live.

Today’s passage explains us how Jesus became the Eternal High Priest. With regard to Jesus’ being the Eternal High Priest, there are largely three aspects we need to look at. one is his likeness and gentleness with us sinners who are ignorant and going astray. Another is his sonship and God’s calling. And the last is his obedience as a redeeming sacrifice. Jesus’ being the Eternal High Priest is a grandiose three-dimensional architecture connecting God and sinners through himself like Jacob’s ladder reaching high to the throne of God. This is not a simple job at all. Rather, this is a very complicated project that requires an extreme care and that, with just one misstep, may end up in a disaster. In June last year, there was an accident spotlighted worldwide. Twelve Thai boys in a youth soccer team and their coach were trapped in a deep cave filled with water. When they were missing in the Tham Luang Cave, nobody knew exactly where they were and whether they were still alive. Some brave divers dived through the long narrow channels at the risk of their lives, and finally after 10 days of missing, British cave divers Richard Stanton and John Volanthen found the boys stranded about 2 miles deep from the entrance. When the boys heard the divers’ voice, it might sound like an angel’s voice from heaven truly.

 

The boys trapped deep inside the cave is quite similar to ourselves trapped in our sins. The cave was deep and dark, and there was no way out except the long narrow water-filled passage. They were completely disconnected from outside. After many days without food and drink, they almost starved and thirsted to death. They didn’t have any hope. What they could do was merely crying and dying. Then all of a sudden, a rescuer came out of water and shouted to them, “How are you?” Verse 2 of today’s passage says, “He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray, since he himself is subject to weakness.” Like the divers came down to the boys trapped deep in the cave and sit beside them, Jesus also came down from heaven to “be with” sinners in its real sense. In order to be with sinners, Jesus trapped himself in the weakness of flesh, which didn’t have a way out and from which nobody had ever escaped alive. This is true. This is really what Jesus did for us! Jesus sits beside us and stays there gently. In Jesus’ view, our sin is our weakness. Our wickedness is our weakness. Our ignorance and going astray is pur weakness. Even our intentional, purposeful, arrogant, and deceitful crime is our weakness. Our whole being is our weakness, and because of our weakness as such, he remains gentle and peaceful to us. He never turns his face away and even he searches for us and comes along with us however deep we go down into the cave. Jesus’ gentleness withstands even the deepest sin of the world, and this is why he became our Eternal High Priest.

 

God called his Son Jesus as a priest, and with regard to this, verse 4-6 says: “No one takes this honor upon himself; he must be called by God, just as Aaron was. So Christ also did not take upon himself the glory of becoming a high priest. But God said to him, ‘You are my Son; today I have become your Father.’ And he says in another place, ‘You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.” According to these verses, it is ‘honor’ and ‘glory’ to become a high priest. To be honest, I have never thought in this way. Standing between holy God and stiff-necked sinners and enduring the tension between the two parties until the body is torn down can never be an honor or glory. But the above-mentioned cave divers Richard Stanton and John Volanthen were much different from me. The two were later awarded the George Medal, the second highest civil award of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth, and in an interview with BBC News, Mr. Volanthen told that, while his award was much appreciated, from his perspective as a parent, the most important thing was that the boys were rescued, saying, "I don't think anyone could ask for any greater honor than being able to be a part of the team that returned the Wild Boars [football team] to their families." This is really amazing. They could have neglected the misfortune of a few poor Asian families far away on the opposite side of the earth. They could continue enjoying their safe and comfortable life at home. But they looked at this accident from the parent’s perspective, and took it as an incomparably great honor to rescue the children to their parents. For them, this honor was so honorable that it was worth going through all the scary life-threatening trials. Jesus, the Son of God, looked at the world from the Father’s perspective, appreciating the Father’s desperate heart toward missing Adam and His only greatest issue “Where are you, Adam?” Sharing the Father’s loving heart toward the sinners, it was a great honor and glory for the Son to go down to earth and to be the priest of the lost, even greater than his divine glory in heaven, although it meant unbearable shames and pains. To Jesus, this was a family affair between the Father and His lost children trapped in their sins, and he joyfully gave up his heavenly glory in order to be the brother of the lost and to return them to their Father in heaven. This is why Jesus became our Eternal High Priest.

 

Although Jesus came down to earth to find the lost, it was totally another matter to bring them back the Father in heaven. It was because they were trapped in their sins and were as weak as dead ones. In rescuing the Thai boys in the cave, the divers first installed a line leading them out through the two-mile long twisted and up-and-down narrow passage that was dark and full of water. Then each of the boys jumped into the water together with a pair of divers, one of whom held the boy’s air tank and led him ahead and the other shed light and backed the boy up from behind. Altogether they moved slowly, led by the pre-installed line. In rescuing the lost in the world, what Jesus did first was paving a way of life from earth to heaven, and the second was installing a life line between himself and each of his followers. How did Jesus pave a way of life from earth to heaven? It was through his obedience to God’s will. Let me read verse 7-10. “During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obeyed him, and designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.” Jesus paved a way of life through the valley of the shadow of death, and it was by his reverent submission and obedience to God. Jesus obeyed God until he died on a cross. on the night before the suffering, Jesus prayed to God, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). The cup that Jesus was going to drink was the cup of death. But Jesus believed and knew that this obedience to God’s will led him to life. Jesus remained in the Father’s love by obeying His will perfectly. Obedience is the only way to be united with God and to remain in His love and life. once Jesus passed through the valley of the shadow of death and set up the way of life there, he became the source of eternal life for each soul who is connected to him through the same life line, namely, obedience. In this way, Jesus has been carrying out his calling as our Eternal High Priest for each of us.

 

Isaiah 50:10-11 says, “Who among you fears the Lord and obeys the word of his servant? Let him who walks in the dark, who has no light, trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God. But now, all you who light fires and provide yourselves with flaming torches, go, walk in the light of your fires and of the torches you have set ablaze. This is what you shall receive from my hand: You will lie down in torment.” According to this word, when we are trapped in the cave deep and dark, there are two kinds of people. one is those walking in the dark by relying on God and obeying the word of his servant. And the other is those lighting their own fires and walking their own ways even deeper inside of the cave. Today’s world is full of flaming torches attracting people deceitfully and leading them away from God and away from His salvation. Rather than following the false lights, we should listen to our Lord Jesus and obey his word even when he leads us to walk in deadly darkness. As Jesus paved a way of life through his obedience until dying on a cross, it is our way of life to obey Jesus and walk his way of cross. Jesus is truly our Eternal High Priest, and there is none other than Him. Praise the Father for giving us His Son as such a wonderful Eternal High Priest!