During our series on the book of Acts we learned that most of the apostles had more than one name, specifically a Hebrew and a Roman name. For example, Saul didn't become Paul, Saul was his Hebrew name and Paul his Roman. This is a practice that had its roots in ancient times. Abram became Abraham, Jacob became Israel — names given by God. One of the most mysterious, however, is Joseph who was given the name Zaphenath-Paneah by Egypt's Pharaoh. One would think this was an Egyptian name, though no Egyptologists today can decipher it's meaning.
In chapter 12 we see the continuation of the lesson started in the last chapter showing us what living Christianity looks like. In chapter 11 we learned that Christianity is faith in Jesus, his accomplishments on the cross, in the power of his resurrection, and in his promise of eternal life. In this chapter we learn that it is faith that will provide the very best for you, even if you do not understand the reason for your trials. Tomorrow, in the final chapter of this tome, we will discover the third lesson, that if one has faith in Jesus' leadership, he will have faith in Jesus' leaders.
It starts out like an adventure novel, one rooted in ancient rites and secrets. Hebrews chapter nine lays out the priestly practices of the old covenant, describing the tabernacle that Moses knew as a tent within a tent. The outer structure was where the priests practiced their duties, and only one — the high priest — could enter the second tent to sprinkle blood on the holy artifacts, the altar and the ark of the covenant and even their own garments. It sounds grizzly and dark, death and blood working together for the covering of a nations sins.
Chapter seven begins an exposition on the superiority of Jesus, our high priest which won't conclude until chapter 10 verse 18. We'll divide this into sections that are natural in the text and lend themselves to shorter texts for our study. Section one's thesis is that it was God's unchanging purpose by oath to provide a perfect high priest to intercede forever and then save completely (7.1-28). This lesson naturally divides into two parts. Today we'll take the first section, discussing the superiority of Melchizedek's priesthood over the Levitical (verses 1-10). Tomorrow we'll discover how Jesus came into this order (11-28).
We have exciting news to relate from Think-Biblically.com headquarters. We've been working on a few projects for you, our faithful readers, and a couple of them are close to completion. I'll be sharing more of the details of these projects with you here, and on our Facebook group, when they are ready for your review. As exciting as this is, there is one problem. Time. There are only so many hours in a day, and it is nigh impossible to finish these projects at our current pace of publishing. For this reason we are making a temporary change.
The first ten chapters of Hebrews presents the case for Christianity to a Jewish audience, describing how and why Christ is superior to Judaism. In chapter 11, the author turns to a practical lesson; he will show us what living Christianity looks like. As we finish this series I hope to prove three points: (1) Christianity is faith in Jesus, his accomplishments on the cross, in the power of his resurrection, and in his promise of eternal life. (2) It is faith that will provide the very best for you, even if you do not understand the reason for your trials. (3) If one has faith in Jesus' leadership, he will have faith in Jesus' leaders.
In the opening verse of chapter eight we see that the chapter break is in a bad place. The author tells us he is about to provide the reason, or main point, of all he has discussed in chapter seven. While some of his reasoning is redundant, having already been argued, there are a few gems of interest he mentions along the way. Before we get to those, however, we need to review what the author is trying to prove, namely, that Jesus is a superior high priest to any among the Levitical priesthood, superior to Moses and even greater than Abraham.
In reviewing Hebrews and what we have learned so far, I've decided that is was premature to exclude the passages that talk of Melchizedek just because we covered the theology and background of this colorful figure in the introduction. There is much still to learn from these passages. So I am going to go back and cover the first part of chapter five for I think there is benefit in doing so. Tomorrow we will return to our logical progression through the book of Hebrews. Thank you for patiently working through this with me. As always, your comments are welcome.
In the final chapter we complete the lesson started in chapter 11, a word picture of what living Christianity looks like. In chapter 11 we learned that Christianity is faith in Jesus, his accomplishments on the cross, in the power of his resurrection, and in his promise of eternal life. In chapter 12 we learned that it is faith that will provide the very best for you, even if you do not understand the reason for your trials. Today we will discover the third lesson, that if one has faith in Jesus' leadership, he will have faith in Jesus' leaders.
Hebrews chapter ten cycles back through the author's previous arguments. The "law" (verse 1), its required offerings (verse 8) and every Levitical priest (v. 11) is described as a shadow of reality (v. 1) incapable of perfecting anyone (v. 1) but was necessary until the time that forgiveness of sins was won by Jesus (v. 18). As is his custom, the author pHebrews chapter ten cycles backresents several well-reasoned proofs from Old Testament texts (verses 5, 6, 7, and 16) that would have been well known by his Jewish audience. Here, however, he argues less for the superiority of Jesus and more for our need of Jesus.
Yesterday we started a study that begins in chapter seven. That study is an exposition on the superiority of Jesus, our high priest. We divided this into several sections that are natural in the text. Section one's thesis, which we discussed yesterday, is that it was God's unchanging purpose by oath to provide a perfect high priest to intercede forever and then save completely (7.1-28). This lesson naturally divides into two parts. Yesterday we examined the first section, discussing the superiority of Melchizedek's priesthood over the Levitical (verses 1-10). Today we'll discover how Jesus came into this order (verses 11-28).
During our study of Hebrews I confess to having made a mistake. The passage we were next to study, the remainder of chapter four and first half of five, has to do with Jesus being a priest in the order of Melchizedek. My study on this topic I inadvertently placed in the introductory material instead of here, where it belongs. After this series is complete, when I turn to re-writing it into a proper commentary, I will fix this error of placement. Instead of copying the information here for you to read a second time, I've decided to move on to chapter five starting in verse 11.
