Saved Completely by the Complete One: Hebrews 7:20-28

Pray: God, we are in awe of you and dumbfounded by the perfection of your plan. Grip us again with your glory. Make us to trust you by your grace in the gospel of Jesus. Accomplish your will in shaping us this morning for the sake of yourgreat name. Amen.

1. Lead into the text: What you really NEED
   1. When we say we need something, what do we mean? – We can’t survive without it… (the human body can survive as long as three weeks or more without food, but it won’t make it a week without water – those are things we need) I don’t really need a new iphone, I just feel like a do. But as a Christian, I actually do need the sustenance and support of a church family to be obedient to God’s call for his people… to grow effectively in Him and to multiply and mature disciples where we are and in every corner of the globe. – And of course, when God made us, he created us with an even more foundational need—a need for relationship to God himself.
   2. Our greatest need is God. And what we NEED for a restored relationship to God is perfection, which we cannot attain, which means that we cannot attain it even having God’s perfect law. What we need is a perfect One who can (and DID) perfectly fulfill the requirements of the law to be our atoning sacrifice AND rise from the dead to CONTINUE intercession for us as our Great High Priest.
   3. We ended last time with the setting aside of a former commandment in v. 18—that is, the Levitical priesthood system—and the contrasting introduction of a better hope in Jesus (v. 19), through whom we draw near to God. [read 11,18-19]
   4. What man has always NEEDED, even under the law, was to be granted salvation in relationship to God by His grace. That’s why Hebrews has expressed and will go on to explain that said restoration and ongoing fellowship with God is by faith – faith in God’s goodness to deliver on His promise to save those who believe Him.
   5. So, in spite of the helpfulness of the Levitical system to deal with sin on a regular basis before God, it was never a permanent solution. In spite of how good the law was, it couldn’t perfect—complete, fulfill God’s intended perfect restoration. In fact, it drew attention to our sinfulness! (Paul, Gal. 3:21-26 – law, sin, faith in Christ)
   6. Jesus is what we need. A perfect atoning sacrifice and a perfect priest forever. Continuing that discussion, and again to the theme of God’s promise with an oath, the point is made that Jesus was appointed high priest by oath rather than by law, making Him a better priest of a better covenant. A complete priest who can complete God’s intention—to glorify himself by redeeming a people for His glory.
2. So this “Better Hope” is introduced with an oath from God himself. And that oath installs a better covenant, which is guaranteed in the person and work of a priest who continues forever. [Read with me vv.20-28]
   1. In vv. 20-21, we see that Jesus was appointed a better priest with an oath.
      1. In process of comparison, the author clarifies that this appointment is different. The other priest were appointed according to the law, v. 28, which appointed men in their weakness—meaning in their flesh—by physical descent in the line of Aaron, and also therefore in imperfection. The perfection of Jesus is re-emphasized as we continue, but the point for now is the Son’s appointment by the Father’s oath.
      2. God’s certain promise (with an oath) and his unchanging purpose are based on his immutable character. – Again, the argument regarding Christ’s appointment by oath is that the divine oath is unbreakable and better (than legal appointment by physical descent).
   2. V. 22 curtly proclaims that he is the guarantee of a better covenant.
      1. Here this word guarantee or guarantor was a legal term for someone who stood in the gap at their own risk to guarantee the position or work or payment of someone else. (bc of a debt)
      2. Our hope rests on secure terms, bc HE is secure. (Illust: My rope swing at home… secure rescue rope… secure tree… I put a LOT of faith in that tree actually!... It’s hanging over my house!) – We are a people who long for security… and nothing could be more sure!
   3. Why is Jesus the guarantee of a better covenant? – bc he holds his priesthood permanently; he continues forever. And because he is the perfect mediator btwn God and man. – In vv. 23ff., the author draws the following conclusion: Christ can save us completely because of his permanent and perfect mediation.
      1. Vv. 23-24. The other priests died. Josephus says their were 83 of them from Aaron to the end of the levitical priesthood. But each of the these high priests ended his tenure in death. Christ’s tenure as priest began with his death…. And He rose again, so he holds his office forever.
      2. Why does forever matter? – Bc you had a beginning, but you were made to live forever. You need a solution that lasts forever. – (We are so temporal… * For some of us, time makes us tick.) To have eyes on Jesus is to have eyes on eternity.
   4. As we continue to be shown here that Christ’s priesthood is eternal and ultimate, THAT MEANS he is able to save to the uttermost (completely) …  those who draw near to God through Him (v. 25)
      1. By grace through faith in Him we receive absolute salvation because we have an absolute mediator who himself is one with absolute God. (Now go back and feel this text – 6:18-19a!)
      2. Last time, our lesson and application emphasized who provides the better basis for relating to God. The new covenant through our new high priest isn’t better simply because it is newer. He is better because he draws us nearer! He enables a fulfillment, a complete path of relating in intimacy with God. (The aim has always been that man should draw near to God in intimate relationship—the hole in our lives is filled only with God, our hunger satisfied only in God, our thirst quenched only by God, our innate yearning for joy found only in desiring God himself.) But the fact remains that God’s terms for drawing near to him is that there is ONLY one way, and that is through this Jesus, the Son of God born into the world to be a son of man in order that he might be our perfect mediator.
      3. Without Jesus, we’re sunk. For you and for anyone you deal with in describing the meaning and understanding of their existence, this all-critical issue of relationship to God through Christ is a full-on paradigm shift! – I’ve got this… or nobody’s got this… to HE’s got this!
   5. Again, how is it that He can do it? He always lives to make intercession!
      1. He is the mediator of a better (perfect/complete) covenant. Heb. 8:6 and 9:15!
      2. Best go-between EVER. And, for your part, most important INTERVENTION ever. – Never dies, never moves away, never off duty. Never inattentive, never unsympathetic.
      3. Christ’s intercession communicates the idea of his praying for his people. While we don’t know the content of said appeals, one would imagine they continue to be like his high priestly prayer in John 17. And what a comfort that should be to his people.
   6. That leads the author naturally into a recap about the foundational importance of what Jesus accomplished (that these other priests could not) to make possible our restoration to God. – He is a perfect priest because we need a perfect one to be our payment and because we need a risen and exalted priest who remains permanently enthroned above sin and death.
      1. So in v. 26“indeed fitting” because he is holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners, and exalted (holy: pure and righteous and therefore pleasing to God; innocent: free from evil or guilt; unstained: undefiled in terms of what was ritually expected; qualitatively set apart from sinners by his perfect life; then too he is spatially separated from sinners because he has been exalted upon his death, burial, resurrection, and ascension to the Father’s right hand) – We need holy, and we need exalted!
      2. V. 27 It is this once-for-all truth about him that makes what he does powerful and effective!
   7. And finally, v. 28 rounds out the central point of Jesus appointment by oath and not by law. Both because of who He is and as a reflection of what He accomplishes, only Jesus could be and is a Perfect Priest Forever. (read v. 28)

• A final application: Are you complete in Christ?
  1. Hebrews 9:28 tell us Christ came once to deal with sin but is coming again to save those who are eagerly waiting for him! Are you waiting for Him?
     1. That would mean that you know Him and understand His value. And when you treasure that value (when you treasure Him!), you can do nothing other than follow Him… pursuing him with all that you are and have. John 6:53-56,59-60,&66-69 (Peter – Lord, where else would we go? No matter what you ask of us! Nothing can change it. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God!)
     2. If you don’t think you need something, you won’t sell everything and leave all else behind to pursue and purchase it. – But that’s what happens when you see your need for Jesus. That’s what happens when you gain God by trusting in Jesus and then live waiting with anticipation for him to finish his promise.
     3. He can and will save you completely and bring that salvation to its completion, but with one condition. You must forsake all means of meriting righteousness before God and accept Jesus as your only means to draw near to God. And as you live and learn what that means, you must submit all other loves in this life to a supreme love for your Lord who loved you and gave himself for you. God promises that this is indeed a better hope that will bring you greater joy, but you need to trust him and obey him in it!
     4. Do you have that kind of understanding of who Jesus is? Do you have that kind of vision for the glory of God in Christ Jesus? And do you then see your place in God’s grand purpose and find your identity in Christ?
  2. Christians, to be complete in Christ means that we don’t need to seek completion elsewhere. Listen again to the assurances of 1 Peter 1:3-9!