Hebrews 5

Hebrews 5:1

5:1 The first qualification of the Aaronic priest was that he had to be chosen from among men. In other words, he had to be a man himself. He was appointed to act for men in relation to God. He belonged to a special caste of men who served as intermediaries between men and God. One of his principal functions was to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins. Gifts refer to any offerings that were presented to God. Sacrifices refer to those special offerings in which blood was shed as atonement for sins. 5:2 He had to have compassion on human frailty and to deal gently with the ignorant and wayward. His own frail flesh equipped him to understand the problems his people were facing. The reference in this verse to the ignorant and wayward is a reminder that the sacrifices in the OT were for sins not done willfully. No provision was made in the law for deliberate sin. 5:3 But while his being human was an advantage in that it identified the priest with the people, his sinful humanity was a disadvantage. He had to offer sacrifices for himself as well as for the sins of the people.5:4 The office of priest was not something that men chose as a vocation. They had to be called to the work by God, just as Aaron was. God’s call was limited to Aaron and his descendants. No one outside that family could serve in the tabernacle or the temple. 5:5 The writer now turns to Christ and demonstrates His fitness as a priest because of His divine appointment, His manifest humanity, and His acquired qualifications. As to His appointment, its source was God Himself. It was a sovereign call, having nothing to do with human genealogy. It involved a better relationship than any earthly priest ever had. Our Priest is the unique Son of God, eternally begotten, begotten in incarnation, and begotten in resurrection. 5:6 Then Christ’s priesthood is of a better order because in Psa_110:4 God declared Him to be a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. This superiority will be explained more fully in chapter 7. The prominent thought here is that, unlike the Aaronic priesthood, this one is forever. 5:7 Christ is not only the sinless Son of God; He is also true Man. The writer refers to the variety of human experiences through which He passed in the days of His flesh to prove this. Notice the words used to describe His life and especially His experience in the Garden of Gethsemane: prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears. They all speak of His career as a dependent Man, living in obedience to God, and sharing all man’s emotions that are not connected with sin. Christ’s prayer was not that He might be saved from dying; after all, to die for sinners was His very purpose in coming to the world (Joh_12:27). His prayer was that He might be delivered out of death (JND), that His soul might not be left in Hades. This prayer was answered when God raised Him from the dead. He was heard because of His godly fear. 5:8 Now once again we come face to face with that profound mystery of the incarnationhow God could become Man in order to die for men. Though He was a Son, or better, Son though He wasHe was not a Son, that is, one of many, but He was the only begotten Son of God. In spite of this tremendous fact, He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. His entrance into this world as a Man involved Him in experiences which He would never have known had He remained in heaven. Each morning His ear was open to receive instructions from His Father for that day (Isa_50:4). He learned obedience experimentally as the Son who was always subject to His Father’s will. 5:9 And having been perfected. This cannot refer to His personal character because the Lord Jesus was absolutely perfect. His words, His works, and His ways were absolutely flawless. In what sense then was He perfected? The answer is in His office as our Savior. He could never have become our perfect Savior if He had remained in heaven. But through His incarnation, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension, He completed the work that was necessary to save us from our sins, and now He has the acquired glory of being the perfect Savior of the world. Having returned to heaven, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him. He is the Source of salvation for all, but only those who obey Him are saved. Here salvation is conditional on obeying Him. In many other passages salvation is conditional on faith. How do we reconcile this seeming contradiction? First of all, it is the obedience of faith (Rom_1:5; Rom_16:25-27): the obedience which God requires is faith in His word. But it is also true that saving faith is the kind that results in obedience. It is impossible to believe, in the true NT sense, without obeying. 5:10 Having gloriously accomplished the fundamental work of priesthood, the Lord Jesus was addressed by God as High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek.It should be mentioned here that though Christ’s priesthood is of the Melchizedekan order, yet His priestly functions are similar to those carried on by the Aaronic priests. In fact, the ministry of the Jewish priests was a foreshadow or picture of the work that Christ would accomplish. 5:11 At this point the author must digress. He would like to continue with the subject of Christ’s Melchizedekan priesthood but he cannot. He is under divine constraint to rebuke his readers for their immaturity and at the same time to warn them seriously against the danger of falling away. It is sadly true that our apprehension of divine truth is limited by our own spiritual condition. Dull ears cannot receive deep truths! How often it is true of us, as of the disciples, that the Lord has many things to say to us but we cannot bear them (Joh_16:12). 5:12 The writer reminds the Hebrews that they had been receiving instruction long enough now so that they should be teaching others. But the tragedy was that they still needed someone to teach them the ABCs of the word of God. You ought to be teachers. God’s order is that every believer should mature to the point where he can teach others. Each one teach one! While it is true that certain ones have a special gift of teaching, it is also true that every believer should engage in some teaching ministry. It was never God’s intention that this work should be limited to a few. You have come to need milk and not solid food. In the physical realm, a child who never advances from milk to solids is impaired. There is a form of stunted growth in the spiritual realm as well (1Co_3:2). 5:13 Professing believers who stay on a milk diet are unskilled in the word of righteousness. They are hearers of the word but not doers. They lose what they do not use, and remain in a state of perpetual infancy. They do not have a keen sense of discernment in spiritual matters and are tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting (Eph_4:14). 5:14 Solid spiritual food is for the full-grown, for those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. By obeying the light they receive from God’s word, these people are able to form spiritual judgments and save themselves from moral and doctrinal dangers. In this context the particular sense in which the readers are urged to distinguish between good and evil is in relation to Christianity and Judaism. Not that Judaism was evil in itself; the Levitical system was introduced by God Himself. But it was intended to point forward to Christ. He is the fulfillment of the ceremonial types and shadows. Now that Christ has come, it is sinful to return to the pictures of Him. Anything that rivals Christ in the affections and loyalties of men is evil. Spiritually mature believers are able to discern between the inferiority of the Aaronic priesthood and the superiority of Christ’s.