A Perfect High Priest: God's Vision for His Son and Why We Can Rest in Him

It was Jesus who said, come to me, all who are heavy laden and I will give you rest. He said, take my yoke upon you and learn from me because I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls. You will absolutely find rest for your souls.

And what kind of a person would make a promise like that? Either he's naive, has no idea what he's talking about, maybe he's just wishfully thinking that he could deliver this kind of a promise or maybe he's proud Or maybe he's someone who can deliver exactly what he promised.

But how? How can he provide such rest? That's an incredible invitation. Come to me, every one of you who needs rest, and I will give you rest for sure. Well, our text this morning gives us some answers to these questions. Text this morning is in Hebrews chapter five.

We'll be looking at verses one through 10. Hebrews chapter five verses one through 10, probably my most ambitious amount of text since we've come to Hebrews. But God willing, we will take these thoughts together because they are meant to be understood together. Verse one, chapter five, Hebrews. For every high priest is taken from among men is appointed on behalf of men in things pertaining to God in order to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.

He can deal gently with the ignorant and misguided since he himself also is beset with weakness. And because of it, he is obligated to offer sacrifices for sins as for the people so also for himself. And no one takes the honor to himself but receives it when he is called by God even as Aaron was.

So also Christ did not glorify himself so as to become a high priest, but he who said to him, you are my son, today I have begotten you. Just as he says also in another passage, you are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. In the days of his flesh, he offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the one able to save him from death.

And he was heard because of his piety. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from the things which he suffered. And having been made perfect, he became to all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.

What was long understood that the Messiah would be a king. You're reading your old testament. You understand that. But what was less understood was that Messiah would also be a high priest. In fact, it's been discovered among the Qumran community and some of the writings there that there is this two Messiah theory.

Two messiahs. There is a kingly messiah, that would be for the general population of Israel, but there would also be a priestly messiah, one in the lineage of Aaron because both needed saving. But the careful student of the Old Testament would have understood that there was only one messiah coming, and that messiah would be both a king and a priest.

Zechariah six, you remember when those exiles were returning to the land after being in Babylonian captivity, they're wanting to build rebuild this temple that had been destroyed by the Babylonians. Much of Zechariah's prophecy is during that period. In verse 11 of chapter six, Zechariah wants to communicate a message that God had given him to those returning.

And he says this, he does this publicly. Word of the Lord came to me. And in verse 11, he says, take silver and gold, make an ornate crown and set it on the head of Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Then say to him, thus says the Lord of hosts.

Behold, a man whose name is Branch, for he will branch out from where he is and he will build the temple of the Lord. Yes. It is he who will build the temple of the Lord and he who will bear the honor and sit and rule on his throne.

Thus, he will be a priest on his throne and the council of peace will be between the two offices. Well, here's the picture. Zechariah, take the high priest, make this nice crown for this high priest, put the crown put the king or the priest on the throne and then put a the crown on top of him.

And then say to everybody here, look, here he is. Behold, a man whose name is Branch. So you get this image. Here's a priest but he's wearing a crown. Prophecy is that there is one coming who will be both a priest and a king and the council of peace, the rest.

Peace with humanity is going to be between the two offices of priest and king. So the student understood that. Messiah's glory would be that of the highest king and of the highest priest. And such was God's vision for his son. His son Jesus was to be both the highest king and the highest priest.

Through whom? This one, his son, highest king, highest priest. Through this one, humanity could make peace with God and find rest for their souls. This was God's vision for his son. And if you look back at verse four sixteen, verse right before this section, therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

That's really the last thought before we launch off into this great ocean of Hebrews that's gonna take us all the way to chapter 10. We're And gonna hear that same exhortation, be drawing near to the throne of grace. Does that sound very familiar? Come to me, you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Same invitation articulated differently. But all this comes out of God's vision for his son. What I wanna look at this morning so that you will rest in him, God's vision for his son. Show you where we're going. Look at perfect high priest. That is God's vision for his son to be a perfect high priest.

We'll look at God's vision for the high priestly ministry. We'll look at that in general. That's what the first four verses are about. Then we'll look at God's vision for his son more specifically and how Christ fulfilled the general priestly ministry requirements. And then we'll take a moment and just summarize why we can rest in him.

So that's where we're going this morning. So perfect high priest. To understand God's vision for high for Christ's high priestly ministry, we need to start by understanding God's vision for the high priestly ministry in general, that which was given to Moses. Four criteria of effective high priestly ministry that God envisioned.

First, the high priest was to be one from among men. He must be one from among men. Look at verse one of chapter five. For every high priest taken from among men is chosen. He's drawn up. He's taken. Oh, by the way, and throughout this, you're gonna see the that present verb, the one being, the one who's continually being taken up or drawn, or the one who is being appointed or the one who is be who is offering sacrifices.

All that's in the present tense, which indicates that the temple is still standing and is still in operation at the time of this writing. But here's the bottom line. He had to be from among men. He had to be one out of men. He had to be a man.

In order to understand man, he had to be a man. They didn't put animals as mediators. Of course not. Second, he must represent men before God. Look back at verse one. For every high priest taken from among men is appointed on behalf of men in things pertaining to God in order to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.

So he must be one from among men for the sake of men. But he also had to understand God. Notice the things pertaining to God. He had to understand what God wanted. He had to have a God word focus. And what did he do? He had to offer.

Notice he's has the purpose in order to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins. That's what a priest does. Offers up, brings on behalf of men to God, gifts and sacrifices. You had to know what kind of gifts, what kind of sacrifices. And notice for sins. You see the whole need for the high priestly ministry ministry came about because of sin.

Sin broke the relationship between God and man. And so the whole need for someone to mediate between God and man was necessary because of sin. You know why? Because God's not done with man. He still intends for people to bear his image perfectly. He hasn't given up on that idea.

If if so, we'd be done. There wouldn't be a mediator. If God was done with man, there wouldn't be any need to talk to him anymore, to have any more conversation or any more dialogue or any more anything. It'd be over. But God still wants a relationship with man.

God still has a purpose for us. That's why he's talking to you today. Why he continues striving with us. He wants a relationship with us. He still intends for mankind to be what he created him to be and that is a perfect image bearer. If you're in Christ, that is your future.

But to make that happen, someone, a representative of man, had to mediate between God and man for this relationship to continue. You may not know this about me, but over four decades ago, getting close to five decades ago, I was training to be the heavyweight champion, boxing champion of the world.

And that was the days of Muhammad Ali, and then Rocky came out. And that's what I was training to do. I I figured that's how you and and the way you train to be the heavyweight champion of the world is you've gotta listen to the theme song of Rocky.

Now back then, we didn't have all the devices and it would so you couldn't hear it wasn't readily available. So the only way I knew to listen to it and had to pump iron at the same time I was listening to it is I had to call the DJ of the local station and tell him play Rocky.

Play Rocky. Play Rocky. And it got to where he recognized my voice. And I would call, he'd pick up the phone and says, don't worry. I'm gonna play Rocky. Well, one day I knew this was these I needed to do something a little better, so I actually recorded.

As it was coming over the radio, I had this little recorder and I recorded it. So that way, every time I needed to go pump iron, I could turn it on. That was very short workouts because it only play a ten second piece. So you can imagine one day I'm going into two I got my recording, so now I'm able to do two repetitions or three repetitions.

I was really had some time, really gonna start. And then I push play, and I hear my little brother's voice coughing. He found my tape player and he recorded over my Rocky song. And so he goes, I was devastated. And that ended my heavyweight title pursuits right there.

And I was devastated. And I was angry. And I was devastated. My little brother I mean, he's little, little, little, little guy. And he felt really bad. He didn't know how to make it right. Went and talked to my mom. And basically, it he took everything took everything that he had, and then my mom to get involved to make up the difference.

And they went and brought me bought me a brand new Rocky tape, and I got the whole song. And I remember that moment because my mom came into me and said, somebody's very sorry for what they did. And he didn't have enough to cover it, but everything he had came out to make it right.

And my feelings of hostility disappeared. And you think about we need a mediator. We need somebody to say to God, God, we are sorry for what we've done. And there is no way we can undo the effects of sin and the havoc it has caused upon this world.

Please, I wish there was something we how do we make it right? And then one comes along, a mediator who says, yes, I have. I know how to make things right with God. Here's the offering. Pour out your wrath completely on me. Here's the offering. Here's the changed heart.

Here's the changed attitude. And so that's what a high priest was to do, was to to go on behalf of man. He had to be won from men, but he also had to represent men before God and offer those appeasing sacrifices and gifts to make things right. Third criteria, a high priestly ministry was that he must be sympathetic toward men.

Look back at verse two. He can deal gently with the ignorant and misguided since he himself also is beset with weakness. And because of it, he is obligated to offer sacrifices for sins as for the people, so also for himself. He is able one of the things of a high priest is he has to be sympathetic.

He has to be able to conduct himself with moderation. That's the idea, to deal gently. He has to deal gently. He has to be able to restrain. People in their ignorance and in their misguided thinking do some very irritating things. And in the context of sin, they do awful things.

You need somebody who's gonna represent us who is sympathetic with the ignorant and misguided and then just blow off, fly off the handle and blow them off. And this could be true under the Mosaic code because the high priests were imperfect. They too were sinners. They too were sometimes ignorant and sometimes very misguided.

And so those offering offering presents and gifts on behalf of men were sympathetic to the ignorant and misguided. The ignorant are word agnostic, those who don't know. And the word for misguided is those being led astray, being deceived. We need somebody who is able to be sympathetic with those of us who are clueless and misguided.

Notice the word weakness. He understands because he also too is weak. Idea being he also too has disease or infirmities, limitations, inabilities. He's clothed with surrounded. He's wearing weakness himself. So he can identify with those he's representing. And because of it, he is obligated to offer sacrifices for sins.

For sins. There's a whole lot of ignorance and misguidedness and weaknesses that come out because of sin. And so God's vision for the high priestly ministry involved someone who would be sympathetic toward men. And fourth, clearly, he had to be called by God. He had to be called by God.

Look back at verse four. And no one takes the honor to himself but receives it when he is called by God even as Aaron was. Aaron didn't come up with the idea, hey, you know, think I'll be a high priest. That's what we need. Moses, what do you think?

No. He was called, and subsequent high priests who had entered were also called. Aaron would say, you know what? It's my turn. My turn. No. They had to be called. It's an honor. No one takes this privilege to themselves but must be called. That is he must be summoned to the task.

So God's vision for the high priestly ministry, generally speaking, high priest had to be one from among men. He must represent men before God. He must be sympathetic toward men, and he had to be called by God. And Christ fulfilled all of these characteristics. So keep going. Look at God's vision for his son.

It's clear that God intended to glorify his son by making him a high priest. I wanna step through this. God had a vision for his son. And first of all, it's to glorify him. It was to glorify him. He called him. Jesus didn't grasp this title. God called him.

Look at verse five. So also Christ did not glorify himself so as to become a high priest. He didn't take this task on himself. He didn't reach out. But God, God's vision for his son involved the high priest. In fact, God's vision for his son involved glorifying him in two ways.

Two ways. First of all, to glorify him as king. Look back at verse five. So also Christ did not glorify himself so as to become high priest. But he who said of him, you are my son, today I have begotten you. We've already walked through this psalm early on.

That's why we can move a little more quickly through this text now. He's already used Psalm two seven. In fact, he's already used Psalm 110. He's gonna come back to these psalms. Psalm two, if you remember what's going on there. He uses Psalm two to demonstrate that Christ is superior to the angels and we should listen to him.

Remember what Psalm two is all about. Nations raging against God and his Messiah, saying we're gonna throw off their cords. They are not going to control us. Then God says this in Psalm two six, I have installed my king upon Zion, my holy mountain, Terrifying his enemies. And then he goes on, very next verse, verse two seven.

I will surely tell of the decree of the Lord. He said to me, you are my son. Today I have begotten you. So keep in mind in the context of Psalm two, God's son is God's anointed one or king, anointed king over humanity. And he is God's answer to human rebellion, a holy king who's gonna perfectly administer justice and guide toward righteousness.

He is God's answer to human rebellion. He's also the source of blessing to all who will trust in him. You see Jesus could not have glorified himself by taking the honor of the king since all these prophecies predate the manger. He was king at birth. The same is true about his high priestly role.

Couldn't grasp the high priest office on his own. He was appointed it. And that's the emphasis at present. High priest. You think about as as king, his role was to govern over every realm of creation, including Satan. But his role as high priest was to raise up a people who would be able to perfectly bear the image of God, a people who would be constantly in communion with God, a people who would overcome Satan.

He's king. Yes. He's he overcomes Satan, but now he's gonna raise up people who will do the same thing. That's a whole different task. That's the task of the high priest. And so he goes on to speak of another way in which God, hence, to glorify his son, and that is to glorify him as high priest.

So gonna to God brought forth that. The king. Today, I have begotten you. Speaking of that resurrection moment, terrifying his enemies. Yes. I have installed my king. Here he is. And likewise, verse six, just as he also says, you are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

God brought Jesus forth as king but also as high priest. And so again, the writer refers back to a psalm he's already referenced, indicating that Jesus is greater than the angels in chapter one. But Psalm 110 is again about God exalting Christ over all his enemies. You remember I've already preached through this, so we don't go back.

But I do wanna call to your mind a few details. Remember in Psalm 110, two periods of time for the Messiah were prophesied. The latter part of Psalm 110 speaks of a time when Christ will shatter his enemies. But before that period of time, there is a time when the Messiah is ruling in the midst of his enemies.

He is seated at the right hand of Yahweh, and he is ruling in the midst of his enemies. And how is he doing that? He is doing that through his people who will volunteer freely to serve him. Psalm 110 verse two says this, the Lord will stretch forth your strong scepter from Zion saying, rule in the midst of your enemies.

Your people will volunteer freely in the day of your power in holy array from the womb of the dawn. Your youth are to you as the dew. So it's these volunteers whom he purchased, who also must be kept, who he will be ruling in the midst of his enemies through.

And there's a lot of forces that are gonna be trying to turn these volunteers back. They get them to deny Christ, to shake them up, to make them wanna go back to Egypt, so to speak. Forces that want to fall them away and could succeed except for one thing.

Christ said he will certainly not cast them out. And no one will snatch them from his hand. That speaks of his high priestly ministry. Yahweh has given his people to Christ and he will certainly not cast them out. And it's in this context, in Psalm 110, that God solemnly promised that the Christ will also be humanity's high priest.

The very next verse, after speaking about these volunteers through whom he's gonna be ruling in the midst of his enemies, come to Psalm 110, which is cited in Hebrews, says this, the Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

And this is the verse being referred to in Hebrews five six. He's a priest. A priest is someone for the well-being of the people. And it is Christ's high priestly role that keeps us, his volunteers, in God's good graces. Gonna be in the order of Melchizedek, king, priest, and much more is gonna be said about him in the chapters to come.

But the right hand of God is about ruling power, but it's also about mediation. God, Christ mediating on behalf of his people. The two offices joined together, a priest upon his throne. There's no disconnect between the king and the one who approaches God. There is no distinction between our king and the one who approaches God on our behalf.

They're one and the same. And that's why we can rest in him. Our priest and our king want the same thing for us. Union eternally with our heavenly Father. And therein, we can find rest. So we can learn a basic life lesson about Christ likeness here. Point of all this is that Jesus wasn't about advancing himself but doing the will of his father.

He was called by God to do what God had called him to do, and he simply did it. And this is a lesson that we all need to learn, isn't it? Just simply do what God is calling you to do. The sooner you understand this, the greater you will rest.

God's not calling you to do something that he hadn't called you to do. Great rest. Resting, your heavenly father that he knows what he's doing by putting you, gifting you, placing you. Don't covet beyond those bounds. That's the place of great rest. That's the place of great fruitfulness.

Simply do what God's calling you to do, and then rest. But there's a second vision that God has for his son, to glorify him, yes, but also to perfect him. To perfect him. Look back at verse seven. In the days of his flesh, he offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the one able to save him from death and was heard because of his piety.

God doesn't just want him to be king and high priest. He wants him to be a perfect king and a perfect high priest. We need more than just a high priest. We need a perfect high priest. And this perfecting process begins here in verse seven and it continues through verse eight.

Notice what it involves. It involves the days of his flesh, verse seven. The days of his incarnation. Notice what he was familiar with loud crying, tears, intense tears, intense crying. It happened during times of great anguish. You see, the son of God came into the world to experience the fallen world and all of its pains and sufferings.

And notice what he did. He offered the days of flesh of his flesh, he offered up both prayers and supplication. This is what priests do. They offer up. Thanks to God. What did he offer up? Prayers, entreaties, requests, lots of requests to meet certain needs. He was a man that went through this world understanding human need, And he cried out to God repeatedly to meet those needs, the supplications, please for mercy, protection.

He was a man in need. In fact, the word is for olive branch. It's an interesting thing. When people would go in to the temple, they would often carry an olive branch, prayer a request, a humble plea for mercy and help. But Jesus was constantly offering prayers throughout his life.

And they were intense situations. But throughout it, his trust in God never failed. He's sympathetic from a different side of the coin. He's sympathetic not as someone who has sinned and needs mercy himself, but he's sympathetic because he knows the full weight of temptation and yet without sin.

He did all of this. He reached out to the one able to save him. Whatever he did, he did in communion with God regardless of the pressure. Notice he he lifted up loud crying and tears prayers and supplication with loud crying and tears to the one able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his piety.

He lifted up his cries to the one who could save him out of death, out of the realm of death. And he was heard. Why? Because of his piety. Because of his reverent submissiveness in all things. That's what piety is, reverent submissiveness to God. He always knew what to ask for that would please his father, that would maintain union with his father.

And so God always granted that. Even in Gethsemane, you remember when he was saying, take this cup from me, yet not what I will, but what you will. This perfecting process continues in verse eight. Look at verse eight. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from the things which he suffered.

He learned obedience. Jesus Christ learned obedience. How can this be? How can the son of God learn obedience? Well, it's his role as the son of man. The son of God, as the son of man, had to go through the learning process in order to be a perfect high priest.

And this shouldn't surprise us. Yeah. God was perfect. But the God man had to go through a growth process. We saw that early in Luke chapter two. You remember in Luke chapter two fifty two, and Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and with man.

Man. There was a growth process. The boy had to become the baby had to become mature, a completed man, perfection. And this process certainly included his priestly office. And suffering is what qualified him to be a sympathetic high priest. Notice back at verse eight, he learned obedience. The Greek, the article is there.

He learned the obedience. The obedience. He didn't just learn how to obey. He learned the obedience. He learned by experience the full depth of what it takes to obey God in a fallen world. He knows exactly what is needed and exactly what time it is needed so that communion with the father can be maintained in a fallen world amidst all the sorrows, all the persecutions, all the trials, and everything that would cause a person to want to turn away and break union with God.

That is what sin is, breaking fellowship with God. And he knows exactly what is necessary. He knows the obedience of faith. Word obedience. He came to fully comprehend and understand obedience and what our heavenly father is asking of us. And that qualifies him to be a perfect high priest.

This is another basic life lesson in Christ likeness, isn't it? Trials are necessary. If trials were necessary for Jesus to become the man that God wanted him to be, how much more will we expect that to be true of us? Remember the familiar words of James chapter one verse two, consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance, and let endurance have its perfect result so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

That's exactly what our high priest had to go through to become perfect. Don't confuse perfect. It's being completed, with sin, but a maturity. See, God's vision for his son was to glorify him and to perfect him, but there's a reason so that he would be the source eternal salvation to all his people.

Look back at verse nine. And having been made perfect, he became to all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as high priest according to the order of Melchizedek, having been made perfect, having been completed as high priest, having experienced everything that the high priest needs to experience in order to be a perfect, sympathetic high priest who represents man and who also understands God.

He became, literally he was brought forth. Salvation. Look at that. He was brought forth. That's what God was doing and all that. He would be the cause, the reason for eternal salvation in his people. Imagine, a salvation that is everlasting, a security that never ceases, a refuge never to be abandoned, a haven of blessing forever, a sanctuary of rest forever.

What eternal salvation is. It's what Sabbath rest is about. And notice to whom he is the source of eternal salvation. He became to all those who obey him, to all the ones following him, to all the ones obeying him. And what is he saying? Come to me and I will give you rest.

Draw near to the throne of grace over and over. That's the first place you need to obey him in. Draw near to God. Keep drawing near to God. It's the ones who are subject to him, the ones who are obeying him that he becomes the source of eternal salvation.

You see, you need to come to him. While he is king over all humanity and he is judge over all humanity, he is not high priest, but only those who obey him. And that's why so much space in the book of Hebrews is going to be written about Christ's high priestly ministry.

As our high priest, he is the source of our eternal salvation, not we. And that's the basis of our rest. So God's vision for his son is to glorify him, to perfect him, and to be the source of eternal salvation. Now listen, we do not have to do what Jesus did.

We do not have to suffer to the degree that he did, but we do need to maintain the confession of what he did. And that's what the writer is exhorting the Hebrews Hebrews who are turning back. They are letting go of their confession of Christ, going back to Judaism or back to something else.

We do need to be diligent to rest in him by maintaining our confession of him. This is who he is. He is God. He is king. He is high priest. So we need do to to be be diligent diligent by maintaining our confession in him, and we need to be diligent in resting in him by drawing near to the throne of grace.

So Jesus' invitation to come to him for rest was not the wishful thinking of a great visionary or the deluded thoughts of a hyperinflated mind. It was the promise of an individual who could deliver exactly what he said. Come to me, and I will give you rest. Keep coming to me, and I will keep giving you rest.

So why we can rest in him? Why can we rest in him? Well, number one, he is one of us. Number two, he represents us. So he's perfectly one of us. He represents us perfectly. He is sympathetic to each of us perfectly. He is appointed by God. He is the perfect king.

He is the perfect high priest. And the administration of rest is between his two offices. You remember as we were talking about Sabbath rest some time ago, that Sabbath rest involves reflecting on something that is complete, something that is perfectly, something that is finished as God did in creation.

Reason the Sabbath came about, the seventh day, was to reflect upon something that was complete, something that was done. To add one more thing to creation or or to take one thing away would be to diminish the perfection of it. And only then can you rest. To step into God's rest, you must step into something that he has done, something that he has completed because there is no rest in our own self because we're not perfect and we're not complete and nothing we do is complete.

And so when we reflect upon ourselves, we can grow anxious or we look at our world around us, we can get very anxious. But then we're called to reflect upon him. And what has he done? He has given us a perfect king. He's given us a perfect judge.

The world is going to be right one day. Until then, we can rest knowing that we have a perfect high priest who's bringing about everything for our good and for our conformity to his likeness so that we may be those perfect image bearers that God intended us to be.

We have a perfect high priest. So obey him. And some of you need to come to him today and start obeying him right there. Right? Heavenly father, we do come to you this morning in Jesus' name, recognizing that you really have established him at your right hand as king, judge, and the benevolent and loving and mediating high priest of us, his people.

What a privilege it is to be brought near to you in Christ. And so we come with confidence, drawing near to you, knowing that we will receive mercy because he is sympathetic. We will receive grace because that is the very essence of the throne, throne of grace, in our time of need.

We will have what is necessary at the right time because we have a perfect high priest. And so we delight to rest in him today. In Jesus' name. Amen.