PERSONAL JOURNAL/MEDITATION AND REFLECTION: Hebrews 7:1-10

1 For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham as he was returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him,

2 to whom also Abraham apportioned a tenth part of all the spoils, was first of all, by the translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then also king of Salem, which is king of peace.

3 Without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God, he remains a priest perpetually.

4 Now observe how great this man was to whom Abraham, the patriarch, gave a tenth of the choicest spoils.

5 And those indeed of the sons of Levi who receive the priest’s office have commandment in the Law to collect a tenth from the people, that is, from their brethren, although these are descended from Abraham.

6 But the one whose genealogy is not traced from them collected a tenth from Abraham and blessed the one who had the promises.

7 But without any dispute the lesser is blessed by the greater.

8 In this case mortal men receive tithes, but in that case one receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives on.

9 And, so to speak, through Abraham even Levi, who received tithes, paid tithes,

10 for he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him.

Now let us consider “this Melchizedek” from who’s order comes the priesthood of our high priest Jesus (Hebrews 6:20). He is “king of Salem, priest of the Most High God”. What we have here is a king-priest. Discussed in verse three, we have no account of this man’s origin, but we are simply told that he is a priest of the Most High God and the king of Salem. Now he “met Abraham as he [Abraham] was returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him”. So we have Abraham, the great patriarch and father of Israel returning from the slaughter of the kings, which was the battle he made against the kings in saving his nephew Lott. While Abraham was returning from the battle with all of his spoils he runs into Melchizedek and Melchizedek blesses him. Not only was Abraham blessed by Melchizedek, but “Abraham apportioned a tenth of all the spoils to him. So here is the greatest figure in Israel’s history paying a tenth to this unknown figure. And so all we know about Melchizedek is that he is king of Salem and priest of the Most High God and “by the translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then also king of Salem, which is king of peace.”

Verse three shows this even more fully in that Melchizedek is “without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God, he remains a priest perpetually.” Now this verse is not meant to make us think more highly of Melchizedek than we do of Christ. Let not our minds run off course from where the preacher is taking us. Melchizedek is not an angel, not the pre-incarnate Christ, not anything else, but he was the king of Salem and a priest. The reason for the preacher’s language is to show greatness of Christ’s priesthood. Notice that Melchizedek is made like the Son of God, not Jesus like Melchizedek. The preacher is simply showing that Melchizedek did not gain his priesthood from the Law or any other fleshly rule, but was made a priest by God and we need not ask any more questions.

“Now observe how great this man was to whom Abraham, the patriarch, gave a tenth of the choice spoils.” Here is the patriarch, the father of the whole nation of Israel, the greatest man of their history and the one on whose promise they seek their salvation in; and here he is paying a tenth to some unknown character that shows up out of nowhere. Now the law is on who is to collect a tenth from the people. It is “those indeed of the sons of Levi who received the priest’s office have commandment in the Law to collect a tenth from the people, that is, from their brethren, although these are descendents from Abraham. But the one whose genealogy is not traced from them collected a tenth from Abraham and blessed the one who had the promises.” What we have here is confusing. How can this man, who is not of the sons of Levi, who has not received the appointment by the Law, receive tithes from Abraham, the father of Levi? The preacher doesn’t wish to deal with that and for us to try and discover some secret knowledge would be both a waist of time and bring nothing but fallacies to our thinking. Rather, the preacher is making the point that “without any dispute the lesser is blessed by the greater.” The preacher has made his point—Melchizedek is greater than Abraham. Now what does this mean?

“In this case mortal men receive tithes, but in that case one receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives on. And, so to speak, through Abraham even Levi, who received tithes, paid tithes, for he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him.” The preacher again wants to greaten our understanding of Melchizedek by showing that he received a tithe, not based on the law of mortal men, but on the premise of one who lives on. Melchizedek is not with strained by a lack of genealogy. But rather, this lack of genealogy is superior, because Levi, the one who receives a tithe from his brothers, paid a tithe to Melchizedek while in his fathers loins. The Melchizedikian order is superior to the Levitical order and it is seen and true because Levi paid a tithe to the one greater than himself.

Now we need to make sure that we are not loosing focus of what the preacher is really trying to stress here. He isn’t trying to build up Melchizedek for the sake of making Melchizedek look better. Rather, he is building him up and the order of His priesthood to make Christ look better. Christ is the one who is coming into that order and the one who is greater than that of the Levis. The New Covenant priesthood is better than the Old. That is what the preacher is trying to stress here and we cannot loose focus of that.

PERSONAL JOURNAL/MEDITATION AND REFLECTION: Hebrews 6:13-20

13 For when God made the promise to Abraham, since He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself,

14 saying, “I will surely bless you and I will surely multiply you.”

15 And so, having patiently waited, he obtained the promise.

16 For men swear by one greater than themselves, and with them an oath given as confirmation is an end of every dispute.

17 In the same way God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of His purpose, interposed with an oath,

18 so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us.

19 This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil,

20 where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

“For when God made the promise to Abraham” in Genesis 12, God promised to bless and multiply him making him a great nation. He promised to make Abraham the father of a great nation even though Abraham had no children of his own. And since God “could swear by no one greater” than Himself, since He is the supreme of all things and above all things, He “swore by Himself.”

We need to take a few seconds to just step back from this and look at what the preacher has said. Let our hearts not pass over this without thinking deeply on the greatness of God he wishes to express. Here is a God that stepped down into the realm of earth to communicate with a man named Abraham and make promises to him for no purpose or reason outside of Himself. God did this out of His complete freedom. And He promised Abraham that He would make him a great nation. Abraham did not deserve this. Abraham was a pagan who was an enemy of the living God until the God of the universe called him. After He called him, God promised Abraham and swore to him by Himself since He can swear by no one greater because He is the greatest. The God who communicates to man and makes Himself known is the one and only living God who transcends above all creation.

“And so, having patiently waited, he obtained the promise. For men swear by one greater than themselves, and with them an oath given as confirmation is an end of every dispute.” Abraham, though he had not received the promise when God made it, nor did he have a son to fulfill the promise given by God, he “patiently waited” and obtained the promise when God chose to fulfill it in His timing. Now, when a man wishes to end an argument he gives his word with an oath. By this the argument is ended because confirmation is given. “In the same way God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable of His purpose, interposed with an oath”. Not only has God given His word in a promise to bless Abraham, He gave an oath to show that the promise was unchangeable. “So that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us.”

In Genesis 22:16 the angel of the Lord said, “By Myself I have sworn, declares the Lord, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son, indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars in the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your seed shall possess the gate of their enemies. In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.” God, having made the promise then chose to swear by Himself, making an oath, so that by two things that cannot be changed, the promise and oath, because God cannot lie make our confidence unshakeable. Therefore we who have taken refuge in this promise and oath have strong encouragement to take hold of, to cling to and trust in, because of the hope set before us that we are in the promise given to Abraham. The Abrahamic covenant is the source of our refuge and strength because we believe that God is faithful.

“This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil, where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.” We can claim the Abrahamic covenant because we have Jesus who has entered in as a pioneer, our forerunner, for us. He entered within the veil, that is He has passed into the heavens and into the presence of God and has become our high priest interceding for us forever, never to be replaced, according to the order of Melchizedek. A new order that has replaced the old and one that is everlasting.

We continue to see the preacher of Hebrews stress the point that God is a God of communication; He is the God who spoke and continues to speak and desires to make Himself known. He has done this by making a promise and oath to Abraham and He continues to do this by speaking through His Son who has entered into the heavens and intercedes for us as our high priest forever. Because of this we should take strong encouragement. God made the promise to Abraham and has kept it fulfilling it in Christ by His death and resurrection. Why, after having such a great hope should we fall away? All praise to the God who has spoken and been faithful to the end, amen.