“We Have Such an High Priest.”
The High Priestly Ministry of Christ
FROM THE DAWN of human history man has craved a priest or mediator who would represent him to God. Among men there is a universal sense that there is a God who has been offended by man’s wrongdoing and who must be appeased. From earliest days an instinctive feeling has been expressed that the one who can do this must be someone capable of compassion for human frailty, and yet who possesses special influence with God. The patriarch Job lamented, “There is no umpire between us, who might lay his hand upon us both” (Job 9:33 RSV).
This universal desire resulted in the creation of orders of priests who, men ardently hoped, would be able to mediate with God on their behalf. It can confidently be affirmed that human priesthood reached its zenith in Judaism, but the story of the Jewish priesthood only serves to reveal how tragically it failed those who pinned their hopes to it. It is only in Christ, the ideal High Priest, that this deep and hidden yearning of the human heart finds complete fulfillment.
The writer to the Hebrews clearly sets out the necessary qualifications for a Jewish high priest. “For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins: who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity” (Hebrews 5:1–2). It will be noted that the two great essentials were: Fellowship with man. He must be linked to other men by the ties of a common humanity. He must be “taken from among men.” In no other way would he be “able to have compassion” on those whom he was to represent. The idea behind the words “deal gently with” has been expressed as “able to have a moderated feeling toward” the ignorant. That is, he would be neither too lenient nor too severe. Sympathy and compassion are of the essence of the idea of priesthood.
But merely human qualities were not sufficient for an office that demanded so delicate and demanding a relationship. There must also be authority from God. The high priest must be “appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God” (Hebrews 5:1 RSV). He cannot be self-appointed. “No man taketh this honour unto himself” (Hebrews 5:4). His is a divine appointment.
Does Christ satisfy these requirements? Indeed He does. In order to help the race of which He had become part, He was made “in all things … like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God” (Hebrews 2:17). And in order that this identification might be complete, He came not as a king, but as a workingman. He experienced the “pinch of poverty and the cark of care.” He knew the heights of popularity and the depths of rejection. He was indeed “taken from among men.”
He also received His authority from God. “So also Christ glorified not Himself to be made an high priest, but he that said unto him, Thou art my Son” (Hebrews 5:5). He was not self-elected, but God-appointed.
Further, He was morally and spiritually qualified to exercise this ministry. The High Priest who “ever liveth to make intercession” for us is “holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens” (Hebrews 7:25–26). He faithfully fulfilled His whole duty to God. He was entirely without guile. He was stainlessly pure. Although experiencing the full blast of human temptation, He was morally separate from human sin. Because He conquered temptation and emerged sinless, He was exalted to the right hand of God.
Three statements are made in the Hebrews letter in this connection. He is able to succor. “In that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted” (Hebrews 2:18). Because He was truly man, our Lord was able to meet man on the plane of his human need. We are willing to aid those requiring help, but too often we have to mourn our inability to do so. Our High Priest knows no such limitations. It should be noted that Christ’s ability to succor the tempted is grounded not in mere pity, but in costly propitiation. “It behooved him … to make reconciliation [propitiation or expiation] for the sins of the people” (Hebrews 2:17). It is because He thus suffered that He is able to succor.
He is able to sympathize. “We have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning” (Hebrews 4:15 RSV). He never condones or sympathizes with our sin, only with our weaknesses. He always condemns sin because it incurs judgment and breaks fellowship with God. As our advocate He keeps open the way of restoration of lost fellowship upon repentance and confession. Because He has borne the penalty and exhausted the judgment of our sin, He is able to cleanse us on sincere confession (1 John 1:9).
He does sympathize with our weaknesses. Sympathy is the ability to enter into the experiences of another as if they were one’s own, and sympathy is deepest when one has suffered the same experience. Christ was “in every respect tempted as we are.” He felt the grueling pressure of sin on every part of His nature, yet He emerged without yielding to its allurement. He can thus enter sympathetically into the suffering of those passing through the fires of testing.
He is able to save. “He is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). Since He lives for ever as our mediator and High Priest, He is “able to bring to final completion the salvation of all who draw near to God.” The present tense is used here, signifying “a sustained; experience resulting from a continuous practice.” The idea is therefore, “He is able to keep on saving those who are continually coming to God by him.”
Our High Priest is able to save us completely. There is no personal problem for which He has no solution, no enemy from whom He cannot rescue, no sin from which He cannot deliver—because He ever lives to make intercession for us.
Since the writer to the Hebrews assures us that He is “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8), we can gain some light on this subject from His intercession when on earth. It will be noted that most of our Lord’s recorded prayers were intercessory—offered on behalf of others. On only one occasion did He assert His own will, and then it was that His loved people should share His glory (John 17:24).
Two words are used of our Lord’s ministry of intercession. The first refers to rescue by someone who happens upon another in need and helps then unsought. Our Lord’s prayer for Peter is an illustration (Luke 22:31–32). Unknown to himself, Peter was about to face a tremendous spiritual crisis. His omniscient Lord knew it, however, and in the presence of His disciples said, “Simon, Simon, Satan hath desired to have you”—plural, all you disciples—”but I have prayed for thee”—singular—”that thy faith fail not.” This was unsolicited intercession that anticipated a need of which the subject was unconscious. In the event, Peter failed the test, but his faith did not fail.
The second word, “advocate” (1 John 2:1), signifies one who comes to help in response to a call of need or danger, one who pleads our cause and restores us. So whether our need is conscious or unconscious, we have a great High Priest who “lives to make intercession for us.”
Our idea of intercession is often associated with agonizing entreaty or tearful supplication. It is sometimes erroneously conceived as an endeavor to overcome the reluctance of God. But our High Priest does not appear as suppliant before a God who has to be coaxed into granting a divine blessing. He appears as our advocate, not to appeal for clemency but to claim justice for us—to claim what we are entitled to in virtue of His sacrifice on Calvary. He obtains this for us from a God who is “faithful and just to forgive us our sins” (1 John 1:9).
Five bleeding wounds He bears,
Received on Calvary,
They pour effectual prayers,
They strongly plead for me.
Forgive him, O forgive, they cry,
Nor let the ransomed sinner die.
C. WESLEY
His intercession is not vocal, an audible saying of prayers. When Aaron the first Jewish high priest made his annual appearance in the Holiest of All in the Tabernacle, he uttered never a word. The silence of the sanctuary was broken only by the tinkling of the golden bells on his garment. It was the blood he bore that spoke, not Aaron himself (Leviticus 16:12–16). It is the presence of our intercessor before the throne, bearing in His body the evidence of His suffering and victory that speaks for us.
The story is told of Amintas, a Greek soldier who was to be tried for treason. When his brother Aeschylus who had lost an arm in the service of his country heard this, he hastened to the court. As sentence was about to be passed, he intervened and holding up the stump of his arm cried, “Amintas is guilty, but for Aeschylus’ sake he shall go free.” Even so does our High Priest and intercessor intervene on our behalf.
His intercession is personal. “Seeing HE ever liveth to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). It is His personal responsibility, which He does not delegate to angels or men. He is never so preoccupied as to be unable to care for our concerns. As on earth, so in heaven He is still One who serves His creatures.
His intercession is in perpetuity—”He EVER liveth to make intercession for them.” He died on the cross to obtain salvation for us. On the throne He lives to maintain us in salvation. It is in this sense that “we shall be saved by his [risen] life” (Romans 5:10). We could not live the Christian life for a day were it not that He lives to intercede for us.
He Receives and Presents Our Prayers.
To all our prayers and praises
Christ adds His sweet perfume.
AUTHOR UNKNOWN
How can our consciously imperfect prayers be acceptable to our holy God? The answer is in the above lines. Our High Priest receives our prayers and mingles with them the incense of His own merits. “Another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given to him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne” (Revelation 8:3).
Every prayer of faith presented by the Son who is always in harmony with the will and purposes of His Father becomes His own prayer and meets with the acceptance accorded to Him. Our prayers do not ascend alone, but steeped in His merits, and His intercession is always prevailing.
In view of all that precedes, it is small wonder that the writer of the Hebrews letter sums up his dissertation on the High Priestly ministry of Christ in these words: Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens [Hebrews 8:1].