A Better Priest

Text: Hebrews 5

Introduction:
  1. Better Ordination
    1. Contrast a priest and prophet
      1. Priest represents men before God
      2. Prophet represents God before the people
    2. Details of the priesthood
      1. In the OT it was the line of Aaron, Levi that ministered as priests
      2. Their ministry was to the "saint" not to the lost
      3. Only the priests went into the temple
      4. Only the high priest went into the Holy of Holies
        1. Did this once a year
        2. Had to offer a sacrifice for his own sins first
      5. There was NO provision for willful sins, only sins of ignorance (Ex. 21:12-14; Nu. 15:27-31)
      6. There was provision for sins of ignorance and weakness
    3. Qualifications for ordination
      1. He had to be a man
        1. So he could have compassion (5:2)
        2. So he could identify with man
      2. He had to be acceptable to God
        1. Calling was from God, not by men
        2. Today, we are priests and need to be acceptable to God
    4. Christ's Ordination
      1. Great high priest, not just a mere "high priest"
      2. Resurrection makes His High Priestly ministry possible
        1. He. 5:5 quotation from Psalm 2:7
        2. It is referring to His resurrection, not His incarnation
  2. Better Order
    1. Order of Melchizedek, not Aaron
      1. We will go into detail in ch. 7-10
      2. Brief history
        1. Melchizedek mentioned in Gen. 14:17-24 & Psalm 110:4
        2. Some think he was a pre-incarnate Christ
        3. I think he was a type of Christ
          1. He had no record of beginning or ending typifying Jesus' eternality
          2. He was both priest and king like Jesus
          3. Abraham defeated Chedarloamer and Melchizedek came out to bless him
          4. Abraham gave him tithes of the spoils and returned everything that belonged to the king and the cities
          5. Melchizedek means "king of Salem" or "King of Peace"
    2. Eternal order, not a mortal order
  3. Better Offering
    1. Offered "once for all"
      1. The OT priests had to offer sacrifices continually
      2. Blood of goats only "rolled back" sins until the true "Lamb of God" could take away sin
      3. This explains
        1. Why we no longer offer animal sacrifices
        2. Why we do not need to have "mass"
    2. Didn't have to be offered for Himself
      1. Jesus was sinless
      2. OT priests first offered sacrifices for their own sins
  4. Parenthetical Challenge (Don't Be a Baby)
    1. "Dull of hearing"
      1. Not able to teach yet
      2. Living on milk
        1. Milk is the earthly work of Christ; Meat is the heavenly work of Christ
        2. They trusted him for salvation (earthly work)
        3. They were not trusting him for daily victory (heavenly work)
      3. Inexperienced
        1. "unskillful" = "inexperienced"
        2. The key is putting into practice what you hear
        3. The "inexperienced" is a baby
          1. Newborn babies are cute
          2. Ten year olds with rattlers and pacifiers are disgusting
        4. Baby Talk
          1. Being offended by the truth
          2. Listening to any preacher not discerning the good from the bad
          3. Why doesn't he do it my way?
    2. Discernment lacking
      1. This is the mark of modern American Christianity
      2. We can't discern between good and evil in the church!
        1. Madison Avenue controls us more than "Thus saith the Lord"
        2. George Barna gets a better hearing the Bible
        3. Pragmatism: What works instead of what is right
          1. Dances, rock concerts, etc. to draw a crowd
      3. My position has not changed over the past ten years
        1. Hopefully my disposition has
        2. But it seems that plain preaching bothers people instead of changes people
        3. There is nothing that I preach that all fundamentalists didn't preach 15 years ago
        4. But people don't want strong preaching anymore
        5. They want to tickle their ears and make them feel good
        6. Balance
          1. I don't want you to feel beat up every time you come to church.
          2. I want to preach the positive as well as the negative
      4. People want heaven after death, but not too much religion and obedience before death