PRIEST

American Protestants in general bring some interesting cultural baggage with them when it comes to understanding certain aspects of the mediation of Jesus Christ. Both this week and next, we will be considering two concepts that run counter to the democratic and legal expectations of our American experience. The concepts in question are the Priestly and Kingship roles of our Lord Jesus Christ. You see, popular American theology understands both priests and kings as abominations in a free society where the individual has been allowed to make his own way since the founding of the English speaking colonies in the 17th century.

While that same protestant heritage understands, in part, the necessity of the death and resurrection of Christ, the particular means of working that out in the High Priestly role is little appreciated and misunderstood. I would think that several centuries of competitive capitalism and expanding democracy have contributed to a definite reluctance to accept the symbolism of the two mediator roles before us. So let us try as hard as possible to put off our cultural baggage in this regard so that we may truly be blessed in our better understanding of just what Jesus Christ has done for us.

Ironically, the book of Hebrews which is our greatest source text for this doctrine is also the book that was specifically written for the Jewish Christians who needed to learn to accept a weekly worship and way of faith that no longer practiced or acknowledged the ongoing Jewish sacrifices in their day. Just as our culture will look upon us as somehow quaint in our living a life of obedience to King Jesus, so too did the early Christians seem out of place amongst a multitude of sacrifice offering cults and religions in their time. Specifically today, we must consider the meaning and application of the priestly role of Christ in the accomplishment of our salvation.

I remember well, the Seminary professor who lectured us in our class on worship. He had decided that it was high time that the "church" finally put away all the nonsense of the bloody sacrifice of Christ. He particularly warned us against any hymns or passages that gloried in the blood of Christ. I guess, that my own rebellious nature led me to reject the "wisdom" that rejected the teachings of Scripture. I think I learned more in Seminary about what not to believe than what to believe. Since then, those very hymns that were once deplored have taken on a special meaning, a particular doctrine to be treasured if you will.

Notice if you will the emphasis of the writer to the Hebrews in verse eleven: "When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, that is to say, not a part of this creation." Just as our missionary in Mexico, has avoided any attack on the ruling religion there, the author here observes the "good things that are already here". But, and this is a great qualification about the Jewish sacrificial system, when when fully understood will nullify the practice for all time.

But, verse twelve insists, Christ accomplished so much more than the several millennia use of the sacrificial system. Look at verse twelve: "He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption." "Once for all", our text reads. This is why the protestant churches celebrate communion differently than what is common in the Roman ritual. We understand that Jesus is spiritually present, while the Roman theology believes that the bread and wine actually become the very body and blood of our Lord. The priestly roll fulfilled week in and week out in the Roman ritual, we realize is unnecessary, since the Scriptures clearly teach that Christ died once for all, not over and over again.

I say this as gently as possible because we have many Catholic friends, acquaintances and even members who grew up in that environment. As protestants, we take the next verse thirteen as gently as the author of Hebrews applied it to his brethren: "The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean."

We know now in the aftermath of Christ's coming that the whole sacrificial system looked forward to the greater sacrifice of Jesus Christ. So, just as the superiority of the Christian testimony overwhelmed the obsolescent Jewish testimony, we must agree with the admonishment of verse fourteen: "How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!"

There is that phrase that the liberals still detest: "The blood of Christ". How much the true church comprehends the necessity of that cleansing flow! Of course we live in a time that little understands the fact of sin, let alone any necessary atonement for sin. That great divide within the church was noted this week by Newsweek magazine. They reported that a Presbytery in Georgia of a different denomination than ours was faced with a dilemma. It seems that one of the members of that Presbytery had undergone several operations to become a female. When he/she (it) came before that Presbytery to have the change of name and gender noted, some "crude misbegotten bigots" had the audacity to protest and even vote against accepting the new condition. How insensitive to assume that anything sinful was being done? Thank goodness, we may be thinking that such goings on are not within our own denomination.

Yet, the egalitarian thinking that propels such creatures to not only question the greater wisdom of God, but to actually go on and do something about it, tells us very much about the American spirit in our time. If people are not equal, we generally believe that they should be and we have spent multiple fortunes to remold society in that egalitarian measure! How very different is the approach of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Look at verse fifteen for the limitation of the New Covenant: "For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance - now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant." Some are called and as John reports, none of those called are ever lost. We in this country are not used to the idea of a Priest offering sacrifices for some and not for others. I know that in the past I have been guilty in saying that everyone is equal in two places, in a court of law and before the judgement throne of Christ. Well, experience has taught me that the courts have failed in this respect, and theology is teaching me that were it not for the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, I would not demand equality and justice on the great Day of Judgement!