Hebrews 4: Jesus is Greater than the High Priest

Pastor Scott Jonas

Glendale Lutheran Church

Hebrews 4

Jesus> The High Priest

            We continue through the book of Hebrews, discovering all the ways Jesus is Greater.  He is greater than Angels, greater than humanity, greater than Moses and today, greater than the High Priest.

            So first, let’s understand who the High Priest was.  The high Priest was the top of the pyramid of priests created by our Lord under Moses.  The tribe of Levites were set apart as priests who would attend to the House of God, the Tabernacle.  God gave specific instructions on how the Lord’s tent was to be built and the Levites oversaw the construction and the maintenance.  Aaron was the brother of Moses.  From his line and his line only, they would be the priests responsible for the sacrifices at the altar.  Aaron himself was the first high priest.  He represents the people as a whole.  He alone can enter the innermost part of the tabernacle, the holy of Holies, and that once a year to make atonement for the nation’s sin.  The pyramid is as follows:  The Levites, Aaron’s family line, the High Priest.

            The High Priest served as a mediator of the covenant between God and the Hebrews.  It is through the priesthood that a purified and sanctified Israel is able to serve God and receive his blessing.  The high priest is the holiest of positions.  It is the greatest honor a Jew can imagine, even greater than the King.  Imagine the responsibility that comes with the position.  You are the ambassador for God.  You are the representative of his people on earth.

The thing about a mediator is that he is stuck between two worlds.  He has two constituencies.  He has to keep those above him happy and those below as well.  If he cares only about one of the constituencies then he can not do his job.  A High Priest is like a teacher who must identify with both his students and her principal.  A High priest is like a manager who needs to cherish the customer and her boss.  A high priest is like a doctor who has to fight for both the patient and the principles of the administrator.

There is a famous story about Ronald Reagan and his ambassadors.  Whenever he recruited a new one he would call him into the oval office and point to a globe.  “Point to your country”  the gipper would say.  The nervous would be ambassador would look for his outpost wherever it was around the world and point.  Reagan would shake his head and say no, “Try again.”  The country we send you to is not your country.  The United States of America is your country.  The President was above the ambassador and the American people were below.

There are so many way a mediator or a high priest can fail.  Imagine a high priest who loves God but not his people.  He is devoted to the Lord but he doesn’t care if the people perish.  He offers personal prayers but not communal ones.  He makes sacrifices for himself but not the nation.  That is a high priest fail.  Or it can go the other way, a high priest who loves the people but not the Lord.  All of his actions towards those under him would be in vain because he had no faith.  Another high priest fail. 

High priest fails are throughout the history of Israel.  Aaron oversaw the Golden calf debacle.  It seems like he was scared of the people so he allowed them to go against God’s specific worship instructions.  When Moses came down off the mountain he shared the Lord’s displeasure.  The Idolaters died but Aaron was spared.

Years later in the time of Samuel the Prophet, there was a high priest named Eli.  He failed because he allowed his sons to abuse their position as priests.  There was a specific procedure how the priests received their food.  They were to take a fork and stick it into a pot that was boiling a sacrifice, whatever came up with it was their food for the day.  Instead they forced worshippers to give them whatever they asked.  They were using the priesthood as a way to get fat and rich.  Their father even said to them, “If someone sins against a man, God will mediate for him, but if someone sins against the Lord, who can intercede for him?”  High Priest Fail.

Going from the Tabernacle to Solomon’s Temple made the high priest position even grander and more lucrative.  By the time of the Greeks it had become a prize sought after by unscrupulous men.  In 174 BC, you could buy the office of high Priest.  By the time of Jesus, the high Priest had become at best bureaucratic and at worst an abomination.  Just as Luther discovered 1500 years later.  Absolute power corrupts men and positions.

            Hebrews 4:14   “Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

            You and I need someone who loves the Father Whole heartedly and loves us just as much.  Jesus is the only one who knows God perfectly and you just as intimately.  He trusts the Lord and he trusts you.  He is fully committed to his heavenly Father and he is fully committed to you.  He is the greatest mediator between the Father and man.

            Jesus is not the middle manager that we are used to.  We are used to middle manager’s like Michael Scott of the Office, who put their own needs ahead of the customer and their boss.  Isn’t that what we are used to?  In fact, when you experience something different it flabbergasts you.

            I’ve told you about my friends Linda and Daryl.  They lost their job in Wisconsin and have to travel back to California.  They are physically, emotionally, financially and spiritually spent.  Last weekend they rented a UHaul trailer and started to our house 7 hours away.  Right away there was problems.  Despite the fact that they packed the trailer according to instructions, it swayed violently at 35 miles per hour.  At 11 oclock at night they had to stop call UHaul and ask for help.  There is no way they could drive to California like this.  They were at the mercy of their customer representative.  I don’t know who this person was but I love them.  She had pity on them, sent a mechanic who got them on the road.  More than that, they allowed them to trade up their trailer for a much bigger van at no cost.  And they offered to pay for their gas for the trip.  That representative cared about them and they represented their company excellently.  Linda cried at the grace and goodness.

            How much greater is Jesus than that.  He loved his father so much that he offered to leave his side to come to earth.  He loved us so much that he became a baby.  We have Babies here Monday through Friday.  I would not want to be a baby given the choice.  Jesus did that for you.  So that 30 years later when the time was right he sacrificed himself on the cross.  What high Priest sacrifices himself on the altar?  Only one!

            Therefore we can approach the heavenly Father with Jesus by our side.  We are the student approaching the principal’s desk with our favorite teacher holding our hand.  We are the customer approaching the owner of the company with a rep who knows our misery.  We are the patient approaching the hospital administrator with the loving doctor who delivered us when we were born.

            Even those do not quite express Hebrews chapter 4.  Try this.  We are sons and daughters approaching our Father with our brother by our side.  Our Father loves us, Our brother, Jesus loves us.  Have confidence in that!

Hebrews 3: Jesus is Greater than Moses

Pastor Scott Jonas

Jesus> Moses

Hebrews 3

8/19/18

Jesus is Greater!  The book of Hebrews proclaims Jesus is greater than Angels, Greater than humanity, and today Greater than Moses.  This week I visited Lucielle Massie at Meramac bluffs.  She wanted to hear what I was preaching on so I told her that this week’s title is “Jesus is Greater than Moses.”  She replied, “Well, everyone knows that!”

We know that, but this was a stumbling block for the Hebrews of the first century.  To them, Moses was an Icon.  The greatest prophet of God.  He was Israel’s first leader who brought them into a relationship with the almighty.  They thought of God through Moses’ eyes.  His life story was recited like we retell Jesus’ life story.  All Christian children can recite the savior’s birth with details about shepherds, angels,, and a manger.  All Jewish children could recite the old testament’s savior’s birth with details about the Pharaoh, the nile river and a basket.  We see God through Jesus.  They saw God through Moses.

It’s easy for us to discount the hebrews’ feelings.  We see Moses in proper perspective.  He was merely God’s messenger.  Through Moses God gave the Law and the Gospel, the Ten Commandments and the covenant.  You don’t deify the messenger whether they be Angels or people.  Everyone knows that.  Maybe, we should deemphasize the Old Testament. 

           

            There are some pastors who believe that the Old Testament is a stumbling block for the opposite reason.  Instead of Glorifying old testament characters they are horrified by them.  Abraham sacrifices his son.  Moses announces the death of every first born Egyptian.  And God engineers it all.  Maybe we should deemphasize the Old Testament. 

            Maybe you have had the same thoughts.  Let’s just stay in the New Testament.  Better yet let’s focus in the Gospels.  If we really want to be sure we should just preach on the red words, Jesus’ words.  That way we are sure to know the truth.

In Hebrews 3, it says “Therefore Holy brothers and sisters, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses was faithful to God’s house.

The author of Hebrews wants you to know the truth as well.  So he or She starts off by saying “consider”  Jesus.  That is a pretty weak translation.  “Consider” Jesus means to look at him directly and intently.  Stare at the Savior and everything else will be clearer.  You will learn who God is, who you are and who your fellow brothers and sisters are.  Consider Jesus.

This is the only place in the Bible where it calls Jesus an Apostle.  We are used to the disciples being called apostles.  In fact anyone who is sent in the name of Jesus can be called an apostle because it means “sent one.”  Jesus is the one sent by the father.   To do what?

“For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses—as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself. 4 (For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.) 5 Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, 6 but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son.”

Why was Jesus sent?  He was sent to build the House of God.  The house of God was not Moses’ tabernacle.  The house of God was not Solomon’s temple.  The house of God is not this sanctuary.  The house of God is all believers from Genesis to today.  Abraham and Sarah, Moses and Miriam, Joseph and Mary, You and I, we together are the House of God.

            One of the ways we can understand the Old Testament, the New Testament and today is to visualize a house so big that it incorporates every person who belongs to the Lord.  Even mansion that cost over 100 million are puny compared to God’s house.  It has wings that stretch on and on.  It has floors that reach up to the sky.  There is always more places to explore, unopened rooms to try, beauty to discover because this has been Jesus’ building project for Millenia.  It started with Abraham and it’s not finished yet.

            In this analogy,  Jesus began as the architect.  He designed the house.  Before time began he layed out every beam, joint, tile and window covering.  Every detail.  He chose everyone who would add to his house.  Jesus is the Architect.  We have a couple of architects in our congregation, Klaus and Vivian Kattendidt.  When I first got here, I visited them in the home they created together.  They were so proud, and so happy to show it off.  Likewise Jesus loves the house he created.  The house that you are a part of.

Jesus is the cornerstone to the house.  He wanted his house to last forever so it was built on the strongest thing possible, himself.  Jesus is the foundation of our faith and the foundation of his house.

Jesus is also the front door to his House.  He says so in John.  He is the entrance between the outside and the inside.  No one enters unless he is open to it.  Hebrews calls Jesu the High Priest.  What is a high priest but a bridge builder between the outside and the inside.  A go between.  Jesus is the front door.

            Now where do others fit in this structure that God is building?  Where do old testament people fit?  Where do we fit?  I imagine that Abraham and Sarah are the front porch.  They were the first thing the Jews encountered when they entered the house of God.  Abraham was an outside guy. He preferred the porch because there you can see the stars.  But it is still part of the house.

            Then you enter the door and the first thing you encounter is a huge entry way.  I’m talking bigger than you can imagine.  Two stairways that come together at the top.  The largest chandelier you ever saw on a ceiling that looks like the sistene chapel.  The Jews entered the house of God through Abraham and then Moses. Moses is that entryway. 

You can keep going with the illustration.  Jacob is the stairs; Jacob’s ladder and all.  Joseph is the multicolored tapestries found throughout the home.  But it’s not just filled with Old Testament faithful.   Peter is the rock that makes up the most expensive Marble flooring.  Paul is the Library, filled with every book imaginable.

You and I are there as a part of God’s house.  I see myself as a coffee table.  I make people feel comfortable to sit and chat about life and God.  I probably have those child protection bumbers on me so kids can play.  What are you in the house of God? A window (a clear thinker)?  A floor (someone who holds people up)?  A wall (Someone who protects)?  A ceiling (Someone who oversees)?  A couch (Someone who comforts)?  A bed (Someone who brings peace)?  A Kitchen (Someone who serves)?  A Garage (Someone who fixes)?  A bathroom (Someone who brings relief)?  Jesus knows where you fit.  Believe me.

It doesn’t matter that you have flaws.  Everyone in God’s house has them.  Moses killed a guy.  He ran away from his people.  He gave God excuses.  He hit the rock in anger.

The author of Hebrews wants the Jewish people to know that God is expanding.  A house means a building but it also means family.  The Jewish people were living in the entry way.  Which is fine, but there is so much to explore.

The same could be said for you and I.  We live in the Lutheran wing which is cool but it gets boring after a while.  The Lutheran wing has wood panels, bookshelves galore,  a huge organ in the palor, 16^th century furniture and fridges full of beer.  It’s awesome.

            But God’s house has other wings that are just as impressive.  The catholic wing is similar to the Lutheran wing but it has more statues and crucifixes.  The Baptist wing is lively.  Every living room has a hot tub big enough to immerse your whole body under.  The Pentecostal part of God’s house has fans every where.  The Holy Spirit blows from room to room.  The Non-denominational wing has amazing speakers and sound system.  The music is fun and catchy.  The African Methodist wing is the most joyful of them all.  The walls shake.  The hands of the clocks go from side to side.  It makes you feel the gladness of God.

God’s Church is a living house.  The Lord looks at you and sees a beautiful home he created.  Moses would be the first to tell you, explore the whole house.

Hebrews 2: Jesus is Greater than Humanity

Pastor Scott Jonas

Hebrews 2

Jesus>Humanity

            Hebrews Chapter two.  Last week’s sermon on chapter one was entitled Jesus is greater than Angels.  This week it’s Jesus is greater than humanity.  So Let’s take a honest look at modern humanity.

            I love experiments that shine light on where we are as a human race.  Thursday and Friday I attended the Global Leadership Summit telecast.  A woman shared this experiment.  Graduate students were told that they had 5 minutes to go across campus and give an impromptu presentation.  Along the way, they found somebody injured asking for help.  That person was an actor but the graduate student didn’t know that.  All they knew is that they had to get somewhere on campus in a hurry and in front of them was someone in physical need who is pleading for their help.  What percentage of the graduate students stopped and helped?  Come up with a number in your head.  How many say that over 2/3 of people stopped and helped?  How many people say that less than a third of people stopped?  How many say it was somewhere in between?  It was less than 10%.

            It gets much worse.  The graduate students were not picked at random they were at a very specific type of school.  It’s called a seminary.  They were all studying to be pastors.  The impromptu presentation was a devotion on the good Samaritan.  While they were contemplating Jesus’ parable about loving your neighbor they ran past a hurt human being.  90% of them did that.  I probably would have been one of them.  You probably would have been one of them.

            Hebrews chapter 2 says that humanity failed to save the world.  So God sent Jesus as the savior.

Modern people don’t believe this.  They act as if humanity is saving the world.  There is a word for that, Humanism.  This philosophy believes that people are basically good at their core. If we just get our minds together we will figure out all of the problems that haunt us.  Poverty will be eradicated.  Greed will be no more.  Racism will be a thing of the past.  The world is getting better because humanity is getting better.  God has nothing to do with it.

            There are pretty good stats to track that world conditions are improving.  In the year 1800 around 15% of the world was literate, today that number flips to 85% who can read and write.  The life expectancy in America in 1800 was under 40 years old.  Today it is twice that and the same is true around the world.  Personal Income was around $1000 in 1800 averaged out across the globe.  Today it is four times that taking inflation into account.  In 1800, over 90% of the world lived in extreme poverty.  Today it is less than 10%.  The world is vastly more educated, resourced, and healthy.  So the story that we tell ourselves is that humanity is exceling.  We don’t need God.

But that ignores everything that happened before 1800.  Before Jesus came the world was progressing and regressing.  Innovations would be made but kings and cultures would hoard them.  Then a bigger army would come along and wipe them out.  The average human being was destitute, illiterate and destined for a short brutish life.

That is why God sent messengers into the world.  As Hebrews says, He sent Angels to give us a message of hope.  Hold on because help is coming.  The Angels were not the last messengers of hope.  God sent prophets who brought humanity the good news.  God has not forgotten us.  He has a plan.

            God created humans a little lower than himself.  We received qualities from our maker.  We have the capacity for empathy.  We can see someone who has fallen off a bike and feel the need to go over and offer a helping hand.  God gave us the capacity for love.  We can see a fellow creature and have compassion on her.  God gave us a capacity to care.  We are able to take responsibility for one another.  When we see someone who is lacking we can take ownership and say, “It is my responsibility to restore you.”  Angels weren’t given empathy, love and responsibility.   It was Adam and Eve and you and me.

            But Adam and eve fell into sin and you and I continue to repeat the pattern.  Every king of every nation has repeated the pattern.  So God sent the ultimate messenger, his son.  If people listen to Angels and Prophets then surely humanity will listen to the Son of God. 

            God put everything in humanities’ hands in the garden.  Man and woman were supposed to secure health and fruitfulness for everyone.  But we threw it away.  Creation was a never ending resource that we squandered.  So God sent Jesus to do what humans were not able to do.

            He became the new adam.  The Father put everything under his feet.  He left nothing out of his control.  He reclaimed creation.  It may not look that way.  He showed us how it is done.

            In order that this world may live he had to die.  He was a seed that was planted in the ground.  When he emerged from the earth in the resurrection it was like a little sprout of a vine emerging.  The resurrection of the Son began a growth of life that slowly spread over Asia, Africa, and Europe.  This vine grew over North America, South America, over every continent.  It took 2000 years of growth for the life of Jesus to spread over all of creation.  Wherever Christians brought the Gospel, life flourished.

            You would think that Jesus would disown us for the mess we made but Hebrews says it is the opposite.  Hebrews 2 says that Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers and sisters.  That is an amazing story.  Humanists story is that people are cosmic accidents who figured out how to not kill each other.  Our story is that the creator of the universe came down and suffered for his brothers and sisters.

            If you only love humanity then you will never see Jesus.  But if you love Jesus, he gives you a world of brothers and sisters.  And if we love Jesus we will try to tell them a better story than we are educated monkeys figuring things out.  We will our brothers and sisters the truth.

            That Experiment in the beginning of the sermon is a good reminder for us.  Whenever we think that that we got life all figured out, we do something that reveals our true nature.  All it takes is a little busyness to take away the things that make us a little lower than the Angels.  It is so easy for us to lose our humanity.  The good news is that our humanity is never truly lost.  Jesus picks it up for us and hands it back.

Hebrews 1: Jesus is Greater than Angels

Pastor Scott Jonas

Hebrews 1

Jesus > Angels

8/5/18

We just finished the book of Genesis where we met our creator.  We also got to see the beginning of his plans for salvation.  He chose Abraham, Isaac and Joseph as the representatives of a covenant.  The Lord will be their God and the God of their decedents.  Before Genesis, we were in the Gospel of John, where Jesus presents a new covenant which is given through his body and blood on the cross for you.  Two covenants:  One in Genesis for the Jews and one in John for everyone.

Today we begin a study of Hebrews.  The author is unknown but the purpose is not.  Hebrews is written in eloquent greek to a Jewish audience.  Its purpose is to prove that Jesus is greater.  He is greater than all of the great things in the Old Testament.  Jesus is better than the first covenant.  He is more worthy than the Heroes of Genesis: Abraham, Melchizedek, and Joseph.  Jesus is higher than Mankind, Priests and even Angels.  Jesus is more important than Doctrine, The Holy of Holies and even the Law.  The book of Hebrews takes all of the things that Jews teach are valuable and show that those things point up to Jesus.

In chapter one of Hebrews, the first point is that Jesus is greater than Angels.  To understand what this means let me tell you a little bit about how first century Jews valued Angels.  It might surprise you.  The original hearers of this book saw God as distant, transcendent.  Angels were intermediaries between God and mankind.  They came to believe that God spoke to man through Angels and angels carried the prayers of mankind into the presence of the Lord.  We read in Exodus that the Ten commandments were given directly from God to Moses.  But in New Testament times, Jews believed that God gave the law first to Angels who then passed it on to Moses, direct communication between man and God was unthinkable.

First Century Jews believed that God lived surrounded by angelic hosts.  Sometimes Angels could be an Army but in greek and Hebrew the word Angel simply means “messenger.”  Angels were the means through which God brought his word and his will to earth.  Jews believed they were made of an ethereal fiery substance.  Some of them who were near the throne of God overheard God’s plans.  Other Angels were believed to be part of God’s consulting body, like advisors to a president.  God  would run things by them.  In fact, when it says in Genesis “Let us make man” many Jews believed that was the one God speaking with Angels.  The Angels protested the making of man and woman.  They were jealous of another created being who God loved.  Therefore they attacked Moses on his way up to Mount Sinai.

The first century Jews were elaborate in their angelic inventions.  They gave names to Angels like Raphael, Uriel, Phanuel, Gabriel.  There were 200 Angels who controlled the movement of stars.  There was an Angel who controlled time.  There was an Angel over the Sea.  There were Angels of the frost, rain, snow, hail, thunder and lighting.  There were destroying Angels like Satan and protecting Angels.  Every nation had it’s guardian Angel as did every individual.  So many were the Angels that the Rabbis could even say, “Every blade of Grass has it’s angel.”  It was almost as if the Jews created their own system that resembled Greek gods and magical creatures.

Almost all of these beliefs are not found in the old testament.  They’ve been added by rabbis through centuries of speculation.  You can see how this bad theology created a false belief that Angels were a necessary intermediary between the Father and his children.  We do need a go between but it is not Angels.  It is Jesus Christ. 

Hebrews 1:1 says, In Old days God spoke directly to the Prophets.  Now, God speaks through his son.  Jesus is the radiance of the glory of God.  Angels are created limited beings.  But Jesus is the exact imprint of the Father’s nature.  His relation to the Father is like the relationship between a King’s stamp and the seal impression on a royal decree.  Angels don’t move stars, Jesus upholds the universe by his power.  Angels can’t absolve you of your sins only Jesus can.  Angels don’t sit next to the Father only the Son is at the right hand of the throne.

Angels serve a purpose.  They are messengers.  In the scheme of things, Angels are the mailmen of God.  Everyone gets excited when you receive an important package from Grandma.  But what is most valuable.  The mailman?  The package?  Or Grandma?  Grandma who has known you since you were born and loved you your whole life.  Grandma should be the more valuable than any gift that fits in a box.  Grandma should be worth more to you than the messenger who bring you that box.  In the same way Jesus should be more precious to you than the messengers between you and him.  That includes me.  And more precious than any gift he has given you.

When you hear the mixed up theology of first century Christians, it makes you wonder what is our personal bad theology?  To look at that we only have to look at what made Angelology so fascinating.  It was mysterious.  It was anecdotal.  And it was supernatural.

Those are attributes that catch our hearts and imagination today.  You still have stories about angels that grip people.  I read a book by Eric Metaxes called “Miracles.”  In it were some Angel stories.  One was about a Christian man who was worshipping in a cathedral on the East coast.  Out of nowhere, he saw a fifty-foot Angel in the sanctuary.  The Angel was so colorful that it was like He was in high definition and everything else was black and white. 

Another example, I was listening to a broadcast in which a woman detailed her horrific car accident near Jeff City.  It was so bad that the fire department could not get her out with the Jaws of Life.  While she was waiting for the authorities to figure something out, a catholic priest came by and asked if she wanted to be prayed over.  She did.  It took so long to get her out of the car that many people were around the accident taking pictures.  As she was recuperating in the hospital she and others reported that they witnessed the priest caring for her but none of the pictures on the scene showed him.  Quickly, people believed that he was an Angel.  It makes a great story.

Months later, a priest who was not from the area figured out that he was the mysterious priest.  He was not an Angel but a flesh and blood servant of Christ.  A messenger of the Gospel.  He just happened to be substituting for a local priest who had a ministry at the Jeff City prison.  He stopped when he saw the awful accident and got out and helped as he could.  After he prayed with the woman and she was sent to the ER he went on his way.

When the priest heard about the commotion his mysterious act caused he went back to Jeff City and visited the woman.  He introduced himself and she began to cry.  He was afraid that he had spoiled her experience.  Maybe she believed that he was an Angel and it meant God was looking out for her.  When she stopped crying he apologized.  She said, “I’m not disappointed that you aren’t an angel.  I never thought you were.  I am so grateful to the Lord that he had you  and others on that road that day.  You all prayed for me when I needed God the most. 

Our faith doesn’t need Angel stories.  Jesus is greater than Angel stories.  He lived, died and rose for you.  He cares about every detail of your life.  You can speak to him directly if you are in mortal danger or looking for a parking space.  Jesus is greater than all of our superstitions.  Jesus is greater than all of the magic this world has to offer.  Jesus is greater.  Jesus is greater.