Christ: Apostle and High Priest

A few familiar verses that I think are very obviously relevant to our consideration this weekend and that I trust might be a blessing to us. The epistle to the Hebrews, please, and chapter 3. Hebrews and chapter 3. I should say it's a great privilege to be here, my first time in Mount Sterling and it's good to enjoy fellowship with the Lord's people. Hebrews chapter 3 and we'll commence reading at verse number 1. Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus, who was faithful to him that appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house.

For this man was counted worthy of more honour than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath built the house hath more honour than the house. For every house is built by some man, but he that built all things is God. And Moses verily was faithful in all his house, as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after.

But Christ, as a son over his own house, whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end. And we know that God blesses the reading of his word. As I said already, the relevance of these verses is very obvious.

It's the great exhortation that we have, an exhortation that is suitable for those who are holy brethren and an exhortation that is relevant for those who are partakers, those who have fellowship in a heavenly calling. And those are lovely expressions in the context of this epistle and we could take time to consider them, but I want us to focus our minds just for a little on this exhortation that we are to consider the apostle and high priest of our profession, Christ Jesus. You will know, of course, that the epistle to the Hebrews is really not quite bookended perhaps but is contained by two exhortations to consider.

The word in our English Bible appears four times, but this word appears just twice. And it's a lovely balance to observe that in this verse, we are to consider Christ. And when we come over to chapter 10, we are exhorted to consider one another.

And you know, really that would give us a very good summation, wouldn't it, of our responsibility as believers, our responsibility first of all to be occupied and taken up with the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, but a responsibility that we have to each other as well, to consider one another. And I love the way it's rendered in our King James Bible, to provoke one another unto love and to good works. It's good to be a provocative brother and a provocative sister in the sense of Hebrews chapter 10.

And if we're to achieve that, we'll need to consider one another. This word consider, you know, it's important that we feel something of the weight of it. This is not a passing glance.

This is not just a brief thought and we move on. The idea behind this word that we have here is to look carefully and closely and diligently. And you know, I find that a challenge to my soul.

As I think of the day that's passed with its activities, with its busyness, with so much to occupy us and some distractions that I suppose are necessary, but we'd have to confess a great many that we welcome into our lives for really no particular reason and to no particular profit. And amongst all the busyness of the day, amongst all the thoughts and the messages and so on, how many moments, brethren and sisters, have we occupied with this great task to consider carefully, diligently, thoroughly to consider, to think about our Lord Jesus Christ? You know, we live in a world that is not really a friend to this sort of thinking. And you know, those who work in education are constantly concerned about the shortening of our attention spans and the ways in which our minds flit around.

And that may be a disadvantage when it comes to secular things, but it is a very serious issue when it comes to our spiritual lives. And we must, we need to develop habits of considering our Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, that will be our privilege in the will of the Lord over the days that lie ahead, to consider him in his word and to try and understand something more of his work, his person and what he is doing presently on our behalf.

And so we are to consider him, but we are to consider him as the apostle and high priest of our profession. And we're going to be doing the second part of that really in the meetings that lie ahead. So I would like just for a few minutes this evening to think about the first part and to think about the Lord Jesus Christ as the apostle of our profession.

You'll notice that the two aspects that are brought before us align with Moses and with Aaron. And the writer is going to take them up and develop them in that order. And in the verses that we have here in chapter three, he is going to address the superiority of Christ to Moses.

And then as we move into the chapters that follow, and we'll be thinking something about them in the Bible readings, he goes on to develop Christ's superiority to Aaron. But if the verse anticipates what is to come, you'll notice that it also, in a sense, summarizes what has gone before. In chapter one of the epistle, we have Christ brought before us as the son of God.

Now, one of the great emphases of chapter one of the epistle is that he is supreme when it comes to revelation. God spoke in sundry times in diverse manners unto the fathers by the prophets. But at the end of those days, he has spoken unto us in son.

And there we have the the apostle of our profession, the one who reveals God. Come into chapter two. And it's not now so much the thought of the son of God and revelation.

It's the thought of Christ as the son of man and his work of reconciliation. And if in chapter one we have the work of the apostle, then in chapter two we have the work of our great high priest. Then we come down to the end of chapter two, and we have two great reasons brought before us for the humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Verse 14, for as much then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same. And why did he do that? Well, he did it in order to be a deliverer that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death. And of course, when we're thinking of the one who delivers God's people, we're thinking of Christ and in his Moses character, we're thinking of Christ in his apostle character.

But that's not the only reason for his incarnation. That's not the only reason for his humanity. It was in verse 17, wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren.

Why? That he might be a merciful and a faithful high priest. And we have again the high priest character of Christ brought before us. So this verse is really one of the hinge verses in the epistle, and it summarises for us some of what has gone before, and it opens up to us avenues of truth that lie ahead.

It's the only occasion that this title apostle is applied to the Lord Jesus Christ. It's an interesting thing, a very interesting study, that when we think of the epistle to the Hebrews, I suppose we often think of it, and rightly so, as an epistle that is all about the preeminence of Christ, and the greatness of Christ, and that Christ is better, and again we'll be no doubt seeing some of that in the readings that lie ahead. But it's not only an epistle about the preeminence of Christ, it is an epistle about the priority of Christ.

And there are quite a number of expressions that are used, some of them quite rare, some of them only used once, some of them only used in the epistle, that speak to us of Christ as the one who is first. He's the apostle here in this chapter. A little later on we'll discover that he is the pioneer, that he is the captain, he is the one who goes ahead and he makes a way.

We'll discover that he is the author of eternal salvation. And we will discover in chapter 6 that he is the forerunner, that he is the first one to cross the line and to arrive within the veil. And even when we're thinking of him as high priest, that expression, that prefix that is used, the arch-priest, it has the idea not just of preeminence, but it has the idea of priority as well.

And the writer is writing to these believers who are suffering, and these believers who are in great difficulty, and he's reminding them that they don't have to cut a path. They don't have to make a way, that there is one who has gone before, and there is one who has gone through, and there is one who has gone in. And they're not making their own path.

And they're not breaking their own way, but what they have to do is simply to follow him, this one who is the apostle and the high priest of our profession. It's a nice expression, an interesting expression of our profession, of our confession. It's linked with a heavenly calling.

And of course that is one of the great themes of this epistle. And we will be seeing the movement, we will be looking at earthly things to some extent in the readings, but we will be doing so to understand the greater and the grander and the more enduring and eternal things that are heavenly, those things that are linked with our profession. So we are to consider him carefully, to consider the Lord Jesus Christ, we are to consider him as the apostle and high priest of our profession.

But in what sense are we to consider him? Well the writer says we are to consider him as being faithful. That's really the sense of the word. It's not, brothers and sisters, just that he was faithful.

And thank God that he was faithful when he was here below. And we love to think of that one who was the perfect servant. But you know his faithfulness has not ended.

That faithfulness will be seen in a millennial day. Because the pleasure of the Lord will prosper in his hand and that exhortation to behold the servant of Jehovah is one that has a millennial context. But we can think of his faithfulness in the past, we can think of his faithfulness in the future, but thank God that we can think of his faithfulness in the present.

And he's faithful to God. Oh perhaps the sense at the end of chapter 2, a faithful and a merciful high priest, there may be the idea there of his faithfulness to us. And you know that's a great thing.

But his faithfulness to us would really count for very little if he were not also faithful to God. He is faithful to him that appointed him as also Moses was faithful in all his house. And then we move into the contrast.

And we have a contrast here between Moses and Christ. Mind you it's a lovely commendation of Moses isn't it? It says that he was faithful in all his house. I'm glad that Moses was faithful.

You know if Moses hadn't been faithful we wouldn't be able to have our first Bible reading tomorrow morning. And if Moses hadn't been faithful then the writer to the Hebrews would have had great difficulty in expounding some of the truth that is brought before us. And Moses was faithful.

And we should be thankful for that. And he says that Moses was counted worthy of glory. But he says I want you to understand this that there's one who's worthy of more glory.

And you see brethren and sisters the point is this. It's not just that Christ is worthy of more glory than Moses. But he's worthy of a different sort of glory than Moses.

Because says the writer he who built the house hath more honour than the house. Recently if I look a bit sort of pale and worn and stressed it's because we're in the middle of moving house. And of course that involves all sorts of unpleasant things.

You have to put all your books in boxes for example and you can't get at them. Which is difficult when you have to come and take Bible readings. But anyway I'm getting my excuses in early you understand.

But it also involves going around and looking at houses. And you see all sorts of houses. And you think why would somebody build a house like that or why would somebody paint their walls red like that.

But even the most impressive houses sadly our budget doesn't run to anything really impressive. There are some beautiful and impressive houses. And you stand and you look at them and you're impressed by their scale and you're impressed by the thought that has gone into them and the way the building has been executed.

Well says the writer to the Hebrews imagine that you're looking at a house however grand it might be. And along comes the man who built it. Along comes in our terms the architect.

Now are you going to continue going on about the house and how lovely the house is, how beautiful it is, how attractive it appears or are you going to be taken up with the one who designed it and the one who built it. And of course the one who built it is greater because he's produced it. And not only has he produced it but he has conceived it.

It has come from him. It has its origins with him. And so there's a glory that is due to Moses.

But the writer says now Christ's, the glory that is due to Christ is not just different in its degree. It's not just a quantitative difference, it's a qualitative difference. It's glory of a different kind and it is the glory due to the one who built the house.

And then he goes on to say something that is really remarkable and important and something I think that is a verse that is often overlooked as a great statement of the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ. He says every house is built by some man and that is what I suppose we would call a statement of principle. That is something that we know to be true.

But then he says he that built it all things is God. Now what's the relevance of that if it is not a statement of the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ? And that's precisely the point that the writer is making here. He says Moses, you know, he was faithful and he had a faithfulness in the things that were God's.

He was faithful in all his house. A great endorsement, brethren and sisters mind you, wouldn't it be nice if they were able to write that on our gravestone. Faithful in all his house.

I don't think there are many commendations that would come much higher than that. The writer to the Hebrews, writing remember to people for whom Moses was a figure that they greatly revered, he says now, just you appreciate this, that just as the builder is greater than the house, so the creator is greater than his creation and we have this tremendous statement of the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ. He that built it all things is God.

It's an interesting word, that word for building. It can mean the construction of a house, but it can also mean the completion and the furnishing of the house. And of course, we've already been reminded in this epistle that the Lord Jesus Christ, it was through him that he made the worlds.

And we are reminded that he upholds all things by the word of his power. And this is similar truth to what we have in the epistle to the Colossians. By him all things consist.

But it's different. Because when Paul writes the Colossians and he speaks of all things consisting by him, he is reminding us this, that everything is held together by his power. That's a remarkable truth, brethren and sisters, isn't it? The very molecules, the very atoms of creation are held together.

They cohere because of the power of our Lord Jesus Christ. But the writer to the Hebrews is making a different point. It's not now that all things are held together by him, but the idea of upholding has the idea of holding up and carrying to their destination.

And this is the one by whom God made the ages. And he's not just the creator in the construction of the building, but in its completion, in its fitting out. And it was all accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ.

It was all accomplished by the one who is our great high priest. And the writer is going to pick up that theme. And again, and again throughout this lovely epistle, we are going to read of things that he did and things that he does.

And why does he do them? He does them for us. For us. One of the great expressions in this lovely epistle.

And mind you, he's been introduced to us in the opening verse of the chapter as Jesus. And again, one of the characteristics of the writer to the Hebrews, that again and again, he will refer to Christ by the name of his humanity, to remind us that this is the one who is truly man. And a little characteristic that he has, he'll just keep the name right to the end, as though he builds up towards it.

Consider the apostle and high priest of our profession. Who is it? It's Jesus. But he's God.

And he's the one who made all things. He's a son over his own house. And brethren and sisters, what a wonderful thing it is to appreciate this, that we are his house.

And there's a great deal more in these verses than I've been able to think about this evening. But I trust that they'll be a blessing to us and that we will have help to obey the exhortation of the opening verse of this chapter. And as we turn to the word of God, that we'll glean much, but that we'll not miss the opportunity to do what the writer says and to consider the apostle and high priest of our profession and to consider him as being faithful.

Trust the Lord, and God will bless His Word.