Join us as we unravel the enigmatic presence of Melchizedek, a shadowy figure in biblical history who holds profound spiritual significance. This episode discusses the intricate connections between Melchizedek and Jesus, offering insights into the change from the Levitical priesthood to the eternal priesthood of Christ. Through a careful examination of scripture, we aim to provide clarity on how Melchizedek serves as a precursor to the Messiah and how his eternal nature affects our understanding of faith and salvation.
00:00:03 Introduction to the Mystery of Melchizedek
00:06:16 Jesus as the High Priest and His Connection to Melchizedek
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
SPEAKER 02 :
Everyone loves a mystery, so I have a mystery for you. There is this shadowy Old Testament character. He’s mentioned only once in the historical accounts of the Bible and only once in a prophetic psalm. His name is Melchizedek. And there are some truly strange things about him. He is a man of mystery. Let me set the story for you. Sodom was a city down in the Jordan Valley at the southern end near the Dead Sea. It’s where Abraham’s nephew, Lot, decided to settle when the two of them decided, you go this way and I’ll go this way because the number of cattle we’ve got is just too much for the land. So Lot settled in Sodom. Well, there was a war down this valley, and some kings came in, destroyed Sodom, took all the people of Sodom and the booty, the goods, and the people, and took them slaves, including Lot and Lot’s women. Well, Abraham, having heard that, got his men together, about 318 of them, all servants, trained men, born in his house. He had quite his own private army. And he took off after them, found them, defeated them, and restored all the goods and all the captives, and brought them back. And when he got back down into the area again, Melchizedek, king of Salem, met him there. We don’t know, as I said, very much about him. This is where it starts. Melchizedek, king of Salem, which means king of peace, brought forth bread and wine, and he was a priest of the Most High God. Now, up until this time, We know nothing of any priests. Abraham didn’t need a priest. I mean, Abraham knew God. Abraham made his own sacrifices. He didn’t have to have a priest come between him and God and offer sacrifices in his place. We have no idea of a priesthood. We have no idea of any intermediary work that they did. We just got this man who’s a priest of the Most High God who shows up. And he also brings bread and wine, which is suggestive of a ceremonial meal. It has overtones of the Lord’s Supper, doesn’t it, or of the Christian Passover. Well, Melchizedek blessed Abraham, and he said, Blessed be Abraham of the Most High God, possessor of the heaven and earth. And blessed be the Most High God which has delivered your enemies into your hands. And he, that is Abraham, gave to him, that is Melchizedek, tithes of all. Now this is also the first time in the Bible that the subject of tithing is mentioned. Later, tithing will be codified under Moses and acknowledged by Jesus Christ as well. But in ancient times, the tithe was a kind of tribute paid by lesser kings to greater. a king who had a big city going out and conquer a couple of smaller cities and put them under tribute, and they would have to give 10% of their produce to the big city, to that king. It was a form of tribute and acknowledgement of who was in charge and who was the greater. So the tithe then was 10% of whatever your gain was, in this case of the spoils of war. So if you managed to have 10 bars of gold, one of those bars was your tithe. Now, when you understand in the Old Testament how great Abraham was, he is easily the primary figure of the Old Testament. He’s greater than Moses. There seems to be none greater in the Old Testament than Abraham. Now, with that as a given, what’s going on when you find Abraham paying tithes to another man of whom we know next to nothing? That’s a mystery. That’s when we have this mystery man who shows up on the scene. We know nothing about him, and yet he’s greater than Abraham. Now, fortunately, we’ve got some references to this man in the New Testament. Almost a commentary, if you will, on the identity and the importance of this man, Melchizedek. And what we learn turns out to be rather surprising. The passage in question begins in Hebrews 4 and verse 14. The writer says, Seeing then that we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let’s hold fast our profession. Now the office of a priest is that of a mediator between God and man. And from Moses forward there was a hereditary priesthood. All priests were of the tribe of Levi, one of the sons of Jacob. The hereditary high priest had to not only be of the tribe of Levi, but he had to be a descendant of Aaron, the first high priest, as well. You almost have a double caste system, a priestly caste, and then within that priestly caste, another priestly caste, the high priest and his family. Now, there’s a problem here. Jesus is not a Levite. His genealogy comes through Judah, and there is no right for him to be a priest within the Mosaic Code. And yet, he is a priest, and a high priest at that. It’s pretty obvious that something, somewhere along the line, has changed. At least it’s changed for the Christian. In verse 15, For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like we are, yet without sin. And this seems to be a very important Christian doctrine. Jesus, as our high priest, is touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He’s not distant from us. He’s not far off. He’s not someone you could say to, well, Lord, I mean, I know you’re compassionate, but you just can’t understand what I’m going through here. Well, we can’t say that to him. Because he lived in the flesh, walked in the flesh, suffered in the flesh, and finally died in the flesh. And this says, he was in all points tempted like we are, yet without sin. Now there’s a theological argument that rages on and has through the centuries about whether it was possible for Jesus to sin. Most of the argument is nothing but semantics, because in fact we know Jesus did not sin. And the whole question boils down to, was it impossible for him to sin, or was it impossible for him to sin because he chose not to sin? Well, the truth is that if he was tempted in all points like we are, then it was possible for him to fail. The fact is that if he went into this trial with it being utterly impossible for him to fail, then he doesn’t know what I feel like. Because I face failure every day. I face the possibility of falling on my face every day. So if he was tempted like I’m tempted, then he had the possibility of failing. So we have a high priest here. who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He is in all points tempted like we are, but without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace. We don’t have to cringe when we come into his presence. We don’t have to sidle in as though we are in terror and we are afraid. We can come straight up to him and obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. For every high priest, Hebrews 5 verse 1, every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sin. And this man, now we’ve shifted now, the high priest taken from among men, that’s Aaron and Aaron’s sons. Now, these people can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way. That describes you and me, right? For he himself is compassed with infirmities. He understands man. And by reason of that, he ought, as for the people, so also for himself to offer for sins. The high priest, every year when he did his round of sacrifices and ceremonies to make an atonement for the people, had to first make an atonement for himself. had to get himself right with God before he could help anybody else get right. Now it goes on to say in verse 4, No man takes this honor to himself but he that is called of God as was Aaron. In other words, if God didn’t put you in the office, you had no business being around it at all. So also, Christ did not lift himself up to be made a high priest. Jesus did not do this himself. He didn’t claim it for himself. He did not usurp the office of high priest. No, no. But he that said to him, You are my son, today have I begotten you, also said in another place, You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Oh, here’s our man, Melchizedek. Now we find that God the Father, who said to him, You are my son, this day have I begotten you, also said that Jesus was a priest forever, not after the order of Levi, not a Levitical priest, but a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, a different level, a different order of priesthood. Now, he’s citing two Old Testament scriptures, and both of them, interestingly enough, come from the Psalms. The latter one, You Are a Priest Forever After the Order of Melchizedek, comes from the 110th Psalm, and it reads this way. The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. The Lord shall send the rod of your strength out of Zion. Rule in the midst of your enemies. Your people shall be willing in the day of your power, in the beauty of holiness from the womb of the morning. You have the due of your youth. The Lord has sworn and will not repent. You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Now, everybody seems to look at this and say, plainly this is a reference to the Messiah. The writer of Hebrews plainly saw it as a reference to Jesus, the Messiah. So consequently, not only is the Messiah a king, not only is he a conqueror, not only is he one who is going to make his enemies his footstool, he is a priest. The psalm continues, The Lord at your right hand shall strike through kings in the day of his wrath. He shall judge among the heathen. He shall fill the places with the dead bodies. He’ll wound the heads over many countries. This is the one who returns with a rod of iron to bring peace to the earth because he’s going to shatter the people who make war. He is a priest after the order of Melchizedek. But we’re not through with this yet. Stay with me. I’ll be right back.
SPEAKER 01 :
Join us online at borntowin.net. That’s borntowin.net. Read essays by Ronald Dart. Listen to Born to Win radio programs every day, past weekend Bible studies, plus recent sermons, as well as sermons from the CEM Vault. Drop us an email and visit our online store for CDs, DVDs, literature, and books. That’s borntowin.net.
SPEAKER 02 :
Returning to Hebrews 5 and verse 7, where it’s discussing the humanity, the fleshly weaknesses of Jesus, because as long as he was in the flesh, he had these weaknesses. And the writer says, “…who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplication, was strong crying and tears to him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared, though he were a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered.” You know, it’s hard to get your mind around that because we superficially at least think of Jesus as knowing everything, that he was perfect to start with. And I’m not prepared to offer any theological doctrine that disputes that in any way. And yet here we come face to face with the idea that Jesus learned obedience by the things that he suffered. In other words, going through the experience of the flesh, actually knowing what it felt like to be in the flesh, knowing what fear was like. Because, candidly, God in heaven, while he can look upon us and perhaps sympathize with our fear, there’s no indication that he would ever feel fear. And so Jesus empties himself of his divinity, comes down to earth in the flesh, lives in the flesh, and experiences fear. experiences dread, has to face death, and doesn’t want to do it. He understood and came to understand. And now we can go to him with a full knowledge and awareness that he understands our frame. He knows that we’re dust. He knows what our weaknesses are. And he can have compassion upon us. The writer continues, Being made perfect… He became the author of eternal salvation to all them that obey him, called of God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. Here’s our name again. Jesus Christ, who is called a high priest. of the order of Melchizedek as opposed to the order of Levi. The writer goes on to say, We have a lot of things to say about this, Melchizedek. They’re hard to be uttered, seeing that you are dull of hearing. It’s really hard to explain this stuff to you because you just don’t seem spiritually to be real bright about this. The writer continues with the discussion of Abraham to say, When God made this promise to Abraham, He needed to get it pretty well confirmed, and because he could swear by no greater, he swore by himself, saying, Surely I will bless you, multiplying I will multiply you. And so Abraham, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise. Then comes this point. For men verily swear by the greater, and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife. We swear by the greatest thing we can possibly swear by. So God, willing more abundantly to show to the heirs of the promise that his counsel, his advice, and his promise was unchangeable, he confirmed it by an oath, which means that God can’t go back on the promise. He has to come through. By two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lie, We have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold on the hope set before us. He’s given us the promise. We can trust that promise because we can believe God. We have that hope as an anchor for the soul, sure and steadfast, and which enters into the veil where the forerunner for us has entered. Even Jesus made a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. What does that mean? Well, there was a veil between the two compartments of the temple, the one called the Holy Place, the other the Holy of Holies. And the high priest only went behind that veil once a year, on the Day of Atonement, when he made atonement for himself and for the people. Now, this reference, the forerunner, Jesus, who was made a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, goes behind that veil to God, For us, the high priest of old, every time on the Day of Atonement when he made those sacrifices and went inside that veil and made presentation of the sins of the people and asked for their forgiveness before God, represented Jesus Christ. But we still haven’t figured out yet who is this Melchizedek. Well, in Hebrews 7, verse 1, the writer continues explaining, This Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him, to whom Abraham gave a tenth part of all, first being by interpretation king of righteousness, after that king of Salem, which is king of peace. Now, if you stop and think about that for just a moment, these titles… really are not proper for any human being you’ve ever heard of. King of righteousness? King of peace? Well, you probably remember from Handel’s Messiah that one of the names of the Messiah was Prince of Peace. Melchizedek seems very much to be a messianic figure, at absolute least a messianic type. Then he goes on to tell us more about him. He says he is without father, without mother, without descent. Now, we could take that as meaning that he had no genealogy, that there’s no record of his father and no record of his mother and no record of his genealogy, which by itself wouldn’t mean very much. But then our writer goes on and says, “…having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God,” abides a priest continually. The implication is that there is this priesthood, which is a perpetual priesthood, which has been from time immemorial and will be to time immemorial. It has echoes of the first verse of the gospel according to John. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Now, that doesn’t really give you a lot of slack and understanding that when it goes on to say that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, we know that it’s talking about Jesus Christ, that Jesus Christ was in the beginning with God, that he was God, that he was alongside of God. I know these terms seem strange and fall strangely on our ears, but let’s just take them for what they say. What it says, when it says that Melchizedek had neither beginning of days nor end of life, is that he is eternal. I have enough of a struggle trying to understand time without end. But when it comes to trying to understand time without a beginning, my brain shorts out.
SPEAKER 01 :
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SPEAKER 02 :
Melchizedek is beginning to come a little bit into focus. Well, at least as much into focus as we’re likely to ever be able to get him. He is a man without father, without mother, and without descent. He had no beginning of days nor end of life. He is a priest, and he is a perpetual priest. Now, consider, the writer of Hebrews says, how great this man was unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils. He’s greater than Abraham. He has no beginning of days, no end of life. I’m beginning to think what we’re looking at is Jesus Christ before he was Jesus Christ. He was in the Old Testament, present in the Old Testament, interacting in the Old Testament. In fact, New Testament epistles tell us he actually was the agent of creation of the world. So Jesus was there, and apparently Abraham met him as Melchizedek. Now consider him, the writer of Hebrews asks. Verily, they that are of the sons of Levi, who receive the office of a priesthood under Moses, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of their brethren, even though they themselves are descendants of Abraham. But he whose descent is not counted among the Levites actually received tithes of Abraham and blessed him that had the promises. Now, the writer of Hebrews has a very complicated way of expressing this, but what he’s driving at is this. that Melchizedek was greater than Abraham, and Abraham in turn was greater than Levi. And without all contradiction, we read, the less is blessed of the better. So Melchizedek was better than Abraham. Now here, men who die, the Levites, receive tithes. But there, in Melchizedek’s case, he received them, of whom it is witnessed that he died. You get the contrast? The Levites were men. They died. Melchizedek didn’t die, which suggests that he’s not a man at all. Continuing in verse 9, And as I may so say, Levi, also who receives tithes, actually, figuratively speaking, paid tithes in Abraham because he was still in the loins of his father Abraham when Melchizedek met him. Levi hadn’t been born. But since he was a descendant of Abraham, then Abraham, in paying tithes to Melchizedek, represented even Levi, accepting the supremacy of Melchizedek. Now our writer makes a dangerous shift. He asks, If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, for under it the people received the law, what further need was there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchizedek and not be called at all after the order of Levi or Aaron? Now, you’ve got to realize he’s writing to Hebrews and the Levitical priesthood was established. It was the only priesthood they knew. that the temple and its rights and its services were all important to these people, and now he is suggesting that their priesthood was far from perfect. If it had been perfect, there wouldn’t have been any talk about another one. Then he says this, For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law. What law? Well, any law that had anything to do with the priesthood. It’s all changed. For at whatever time Melchizedek becomes once again our high priest, we have no further need for the services of Levi or the sons of Aaron or the priesthood that is there. And as I said, this would have been very controversial among the people who first read the book of Hebrews. He goes on to say this, For he of whom these things are spoken pertains to another tribe, of which no man gave attendance at the altar. The law simply did not permit anyone other than Levi to approach the altar to offer a sacrifice. Jesus was not of Levi. As the writer continues, It is evident that our Lord sprang out of Judah, of which tribe Moses spoke nothing concerning the priesthood. You know, it really is troubling to some people because that particular passage, just right there, I just read it to you, it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Judah, makes Jesus a Jew. And those who hate the Jews hate that idea as well. So what have we learned about our mystery man, who is obviously not a man, who’s called Melchizedek? We know that he is a perpetual priest. And we know he is without father, without mother, without beginning of days or end of life. He is eternal. We know that he holds the office that Jesus Christ now holds. And we’re led to believe that the character in the Old Testament, Melchizedek, was none other than the one you and I have come to know as Jesus Christ, who is consecrated a high priest by God forevermore. The writer of Hebrews kind of ties this up by saying there were lots of priests who were Levites because they died. But this man, because he continues ever, has an unchangeable priesthood. Wherefore, he is able to save completely those that come to God, seeing he is always alive to make intercession for them. For such a high priest became us who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens. And he doesn’t have to daily, like those high priests, offer up sacrifice first for his own sins and then for the people’s. He did this once when he offered up himself. The law, you know, makes men high priests who have infirmity. But the word of the oath of God… makes the Son who is consecrated forevermore. Until next time, this is Ronald Dart.
SPEAKER 01 :
You were born to win. The Born to Win radio program with Ronald L. Dart is sponsored by Christian Educational Ministries and made possible by donations from listeners like you. If you can help, please send your donation to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560 White House, Texas 75791 You may call us at 1-888-BIBLE44 and visit us online at borntowin.net.
Join us as we unravel the enigmatic presence of Melchizedek, a shadowy figure in biblical history who holds profound spiritual significance. This episode discusses the intricate connections between Melchizedek and Jesus, offering insights into the change from the Levitical priesthood to the eternal priesthood of Christ. Through a careful examination of scripture, we aim to provide clarity on how Melchizedek serves as a precursor to the Messiah and how his eternal nature affects our understanding of faith and salvation.
