To begin a brief reflection on Hebrews 7:23-28, I invite you to reflect upon the difference of our respective historical settings. It was not difficult for an ancient age to reflect upon the notion of priesthood and sacrifices. Both were part of their daily life. They had the task of offering sacrifices regularly to God as part of the worship of the people. They had a special sacrifice for the sins they had committed. Frankly, the places where these sacrifices occurred must have been bloody places. It cannot have been pleasant. It was costly to those who brought their sacrifice, for they brought the best of their flock or herd.
In the Christian notion, Jesus has become priest forever. He does not have to offer any sacrifices, for he was himself the one necessary sacrifice. Such a sacrifice is an expression of love. God has taken within the being of God, the violence, bloodiness, and costliness, of forgiveness and sacrifice.
Here is what we forget about forgiveness. Forgiveness is costly primarily to the one who forgives. The one who forgives gives up the right to justice or revenge and chooses mercy. Anyone who has truly forgiven another knows what this means.
Why has the Father acted this way in the Son? God wants an intimate friendship with us. Think of it this way. Most Christians welcome those who will pray in times of trouble, prayer partners who will support them as they walk through the valley of the shadow of death. We are happy that our friends, and people we do not know, pray for us. Nevertheless, this text says we have the most important prayer partner of all, the risen Christ!
When we grasp the significance of this sacrifice, we see self in a new light. I see my sinfulness on the one hand and I see hope in the other. The sacrifice God has made of himself in the Son clarifies the horror of our sin. The human condition is sickening in so many ways. Tossed into the mix are our personal sins. Yes, the incredibly hard things in life, people or circumstances, make us face our limitations, mortality, and weakness.[1] Given the mess we so often make of our lives, Christ has opened the possibility for new life. Will we walk through the door?
Verses 23-24 offer a further contrast between Jesus and the Levites, stressing that Jesus is one person while the Levites were many. 23 Furthermore, the former priests were many in number, because death prevented them from continuing in office. The only way the high priests of old could claim to be a continuing intervening presence for the people was through the normal cycles of successive generations. According to Jewish historian Josephus, by the time of the fall of the Second Temple in A.D. 70, there had been 83 high priests since Aaron. 24 However, he (Jesus) holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Thus, "forever" finds its fulfillment in the one, eternally saving act of Jesus and by his eternal heavenly rule that has come about because of that sacrifice. Jesus' priesthood is eternal, because not only is Jesus himself eternal, but also because Christ need not repeat his saving action. As the "eternal one," Jesus the high priest never faces the Levitical priest's inevitable moment when his duties are "handed off" to the next generation. Jesus' position as high priest is unique and unchanging. Seated at the right hand of God, he is fixed and forever. Jesus is eternally available as the personal intercessory for a sinful humanity seeking God. 25 Consequently he is able for all time to save those who approach God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. The author paints the perfect picture. He depicts Jesus as the perfect mediator because Jesus combines divinity and humanity into one. Since the priesthood of Jesus is unending, he can unendingly save and make intercession. Jesus speaks out on our behalf before God. We should not envision Jesus in some pitiful, prone position, pleading to God for mercy. The author's exalted vision enthrones Jesus as both a high priest and a king ‑‑ one who sits at God's right hand and asks what he will of his heavenly Father. The Father never denies the Son's requests or petitions. Along the theme of intercession by the risen Christ and by the Spirit, we have other examples in the New Testament. Paul could say that the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accord with the will of God, and that the risen Christ is at the right hand of God, interceding for us (Romans 8:27-34). John could say that if we sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous (I John 2:1). Thus, the reconciling work of the Savior covers, not just his sacrificial death, but also the earthly course of his witness to the imminence of divine rule and the work of the exalted Christ, especially his intercession for believers with his sacrificial death on the cross.[2]
26 For it was fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, blameless, undefiled, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens. This new priesthood is better than the old priesthood because, by definition, Jesus the high priest himself is better. Jesus is unique in his sinlessness and his exalted position at the right hand of God. Paul could express a similar thought in stating that God made Christ to be sin, even though Christ knew no sin, so that in Christ, we might have righteousness before God (II Corinthians 5:21). Because Jesus suffered all human trials and temptations and yet remained obedient, because he experienced genuine temptation but did not yield to it, Jesus is "fitting" and "does indeed fit our condition" (NEB). Some have suggested that Hebrews tends toward a Platonic idea of perfection. However, recently, scholars have insisted that the claims of perfection, as we find here, have an intimate tie to the realities of time and space, flesh and blood, of the incarnate Logos. Jesus is a "fitting" priest not because he represents some Platonic idea of perfection. Jesus is the highest "high priest," in a class by himself, because he lived a human life yet through obedience remained "separated from sinners." 27 Unlike the other high priests, he has no need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins, and then for those of the people. Although the author is familiar with liturgical customs, we must observe that the high priest did not make such sacrifices daily. He offered such sacrifices only on the Day of Atonement. On the Day of Atonement, Aaron was to offer the bull as a sin offering for himself and his house (Leviticus 16:16). He would then offer two goats for the sins of the nation. In the Levitical priesthood, the priest had first to offer a sacrifice for his own sins before the Law deemed him "clean" and thus legitimately appear before God to offer sacrifices for the sins of others. Thus, the sinning priest has brought gilt upon the people and will need to offer a bull without blemish as a sin offering to the Lord (Leviticus 4:3). In my visit to Israel, the tour guide noted that the Temple Mount area would have been a bloody place. The priests were to offer the sacrifice of a bull every day as a sin offering for atonement, and even a sin offering for the altar that will consist of two one year old lambs (Exodus 29:36-42). Imagine thousands of people bringing sheep and goats to the temple area. Imagine the struggle of the animal. Imagine the priest slitting the throat of the animal. Imagine the blood spilling pouring out on the rock upon which priests made the sacrifice. This was a violent and bloody place. It cannot have been pleasant. This offering he did once for all when he offered himself. This high priest made one sacrifice, once for all and most remarkably by the offering of himself, anticipating the argument of Chapters 9-10. Clearly, Jesus has unique qualifications as our new high priest. This language is a reminder that the suffering servant made his life an offering for sin (Isaiah 53:10). The Son of Man came to give his life a ransom for all (Mark 10:45). Jesus offered his life as a sacrifice for others. Paul expresses a similar thought when he says that in the death of Christ, he died to sin, once for all people (Romans 6:10). He suffered for sins once but for all persons, the righteous one for us who are unrighteous, to bring us to God (I Peter 3:18). Further, thinking of the death of Jesus as an offering, Christ gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God (Ephesians 5:2). In this sense, the sacrifice of Jesus is different from all others in the Old Testament, since the people and the priests had to repeat such sacrifices. For this author, that means the sacrifices were unable to save anyone. Thus, the unique sacrifice of Jesus is the culmination of salvation-history. Yes, the Father has set times and periods of history (Acts 1:7), Jesus closing a lengthy period of preparation. Christ ends the Law in order that righteousness would become open to all who believe (Romans 10:4). The Son offers himself for the reconciliation of the world. In this passage, we can speak of the saving work of Christ only as Christ offered himself as the high priest who makes atonement for the sins of the people.[3] 28 For the law appoints as high priests those who are subject to weakness, due to their human condition, but the word of the oath, linked to the priest-king Melchizedek in 7:15-17, referring to a new and perpetual priesthood replacing the old, which came later than the law, appoints a Son who has been made perfect forever. This concludes the thoughts of the author on the discrepancy between the old priestly tradition and Jesus as the new high priest. The contrast is between what was only temporary, the law, with what is permanent, the high priest who is the Son who fulfills the plan of the Father. The story of Melchizedek is in Genesis 14:17-20. Melchizedek was a unique individual because, among his other traits, nowhere in Scripture is there the mention of his death. Old Testament tradition teaches that Melchizedek, in fact, did not die, and so remained forever a priest. Jesus, the perfect Son, thus becomes the fulfillment of God's promise for a new, eternal priesthood. He himself is both perfect and the perfect intercessory agent to obtain God's forgiveness for our sins and restore us to a right relationship with the Divine.
The themes and focus of the author of Hebrews sometimes appear to be far afield. On one hand, there is the repeated theme of the wandering people of Israel ‑‑ a theme emphasized and popularized by the work of Ernest Kasemann. Hebrews uses the "wandering" Israelite image to urge Christian steadfastness and hope in the face of the "wilderness" of our worldliness. Hebrews promises that our wandering will eventually lead to rest (Hebrews 4:1‑11), that our sojourn in this "foreign land," the world, will end, and we will be granted admission to our heavenly homeland. The height of heaven is the other major focus in Hebrews. The author discusses at great length and in detail the heavenly status of Christ and the role as our divine high priest that he now holds. Obviously, this theme is the thrust of this text.
Yet, the focus of Hebrews is not so otherworldly and "heavenly minded" that it does not have earthly relevance and regard for the troubles and torments believers face in this world. What the author accomplishes is a widening of our horizons, letting us see beyond our own personal world of concerns so that we may catch a glimpse of the divine plan, the divine scope, of God's work and Christ's love.
All of Hebrews' heavenly imagery and musings on the divine stress the ongoing, never faltering faithfulness of God. The sacrifice of Christ for our sake makes a faithfulness known‑‑ a sacrifice made once and made for all.
“This, then, is the Christian religion,” wrote Martin Luther in his lectures on Isaiah, “One has sinned. Another has made satisfaction. The sinner does not make satisfaction; the Satisfier does not sin. This is an astonishing doctrine.” Luther is right: This doctrine is astonishing and becomes all the more difficult to comprehend by the language of high priests and intercessions and sacrifices for sin that we encounter in this passage from Hebrews. What does it mean to “make satisfaction” for sin, and what role does Jesus the Satisfier — our “high priest” — play in this divine-human drama? The language of sacrifice was not technical theological terminology in the ancient world, but came from day-to-day experience. None of the language of Hebrews would have seemed odd to people who were accustomed to seeing sacrifices performed in the Jerusalem temple every day.[4]
The perfect sacrifice that fulfills the will of God took place in our stead and for us. God did not need to act as priest and to suffer as a sacrifice. We need this Mediator and divine mediation. The will of God towards us is the purpose of this sacrifice. In Christ, what we need has taken place. We could not bring it about for ourselves. Our reconciliation, our peace with God, our access to God, our freedom for God, and therefore the basic alteration of our human situation, is what the priestly office of Christ accomplishes. The perfection of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ is the perfection of the love with which God has loved us. In making this sacrifice, God loved us in perfect love. Barth may go too far in saying that the only good thing that one can report of us is that God made this perfect sacrifice in our place and for us. Without this perfect action of God, we would be lost.[5]
However, we live in a different era. It is a challenge for us to comprehend a world in which people and priests routinely offered sacrifices for sin, and in which Jesus came to act as a high priest and offer himself as a sacrifice. What the author of Hebrews offers us is a vision that widens our horizons and lets us see beyond our own personal world of concerns so that we may catch a glimpse of the divine plan, the divine scope, of God’s work and Christ’s love.
Jesus, the perfect Son, thus becomes the fulfillment of God’s promise for a new, eternal priesthood. He himself is both perfect and the perfect intercessory agent to obtain God’s forgiveness for our sins and restore us to a right relationship with the Divine. As Luther said, “The sinner does not make satisfaction; the Satisfier does not sin. This is an astonishing doctrine.”
Americans have long accepted the idea of second chances. Many of the world’s great religions offer some sort of procedure for forgiveness and new life. We want to believe “that what’s done is not always done, that the broken can be fixed, the ravaged restored — that you can have another swing, can wipe the slate clean, and you can go back to square one.” In many professions, for example, one needs to pass an exam. Yet, we can fail it, and still have another chance. The only test that counts is the last one.
Such a desire for the second chance is not only an American desire, but also a deeply rooted Christian desire.
We are sinners. We can pick up the newspaper every day and note examples of the broken human condition. We need look no further than our own lives to see this brokenness. We want “do overs.” We know that our sins have left us broken, ravaged, unclean, and impure, and we desperately desire that someone — or something — will restore us to wholeness. We are anxious to find a way to turn back the clock, take the test again, or clean up the mess.
We discover from Hebrews a love that suffers.
The letter to the Hebrews emphasizes the importance of sacrifices in the temple at Jerusalem as a pattern for restoring humanity to a new relationship with God. I direct your attention to the sacrifice contained in love and forgiveness.
In the Christian notion, Jesus has become priest forever. He does not have to offer any sacrifices, for he was himself the one necessary sacrifice. Such a sacrifice is an expression of love. God has taken within the being of God, the violence, bloodiness, and costliness, of forgiveness and sacrifice.
Given the mess we make of our lives, we need someone like Jesus who loves us enough to pray for us always. Christianity offers an amazing clean-up campaign. The Christian cleanup campaign that can restore our lives to purity and wholeness is available to anyone who places their hand into the hand of Jesus and walks with him. We call it placing our trust and faith in Jesus Christ.
First, the nature of love is that it suffers. When a spouse goes through a challenging time one suffers with them. If you are a parent, and children hurt in any way, even if it is through their own choices, you suffer for them. You may have to practice some tough love, withdrawing some forms of love for the moment, but with the hope that healing will come to your relationship. Love and forgiveness are costly in that they open us to the risk of suffering for others. Love calls the lover to suffer with the beloved in their adversities and pain. The only way to avoid such suffering love is to stop loving.
Second, God has done something difficult to imagine. God has seen the disordered and fractured lives of human beings, the failed relationships of love and justice in human community, and has loved us enough to suffer the hatred, cruelty, and injustice of the cross. Love and forgiveness are indeed costly. We need to remember, however, that forgiveness is primarily costly for the one who forgives. The one who forgives gives up certain rights. In one sense, God could be angry with us forever. We have misused and abused the wonderful gifts of independence and freedom that God gave us. In another sense, God could not do that, for you see, the word that defines God is love. The one who forgives bears the cost of restoring the relationship and refuses to hold anything against the one forgiven, even though one has every reason to do so. Such love is costly on the part of the one who loves and forgives. Love so amazing, so divine, opens us to the possibility of reconciliation with God and with each other. Our text says that Jesus went all the way to the cross, “once for all when he offered himself” (v. 27). Complete cleansing, you see, calls for nothing less than a cross.
Third, we, too, need to pick up a cross to heal the wounds in our lives. Cher has it right in the lyrics of her song, “If I Could Turn Back Time.”
If I could turn back time
If I could find a way
I’d take back those words that hurt you and you’d stay
I don’t know why I did the things I did
I don’t know why I said the things I said
Love’s like a knife it can cut deep inside
Words are like weapons they wound sometimes.
Most of us have had done or said something we wish we had not. Yet, we cannot turn back time. We have two directions that we could go that will become burdens to living a full life and abundant life. Guilt is our way of looking at things we have done in our past and beat ourselves down with it. It becomes a burden that eats away at our souls. The other direction we can go is just as destructive. Resentment and revenge are our ways of holding something against others for what they have done or said to us. It will also eat away at your soul. In both cases, we are in bondage and in desperate need of liberation and healing. The foundation for this healing and liberation is in the cross.
[1] Ben Patterson, campus pastor at Westmont College, quoted in Leadership, Summer 2002, 51.
[2] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology, Volume 2, 448)
[3] Pannenberg (Systematic Theology, Volume 2, 443)
[4](William C. Placher, “Christ takes our place: Rethinking atonement,” Interpretation, January 1999, 12).
[5] Barth Church Dogmatics, IV.1 [59.2] p. 282.
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