Sin frustrates people from enjoying God’s dispensing. When God condemned sin in the flesh through the death of Christ in the flesh (Rom. 8:3), He dealt with this hindrance to His dispensing. When Christ was crucified, God also wiped out the handwriting in ordinances (Col. 2:14) and stripped off the rulers and authorities, making a display of them openly and triumphing over them in the cross (Col. 2:15). After this, God raised up Christ from the dead, seated Him in the heavens, subjected all things under His feet, and gave Him to be Head over all things to the church (Eph. 1:20-22). God has also made Jesus both Lord and Christ (Acts 2:36). Furthermore, He has exalted Jesus to be a Leader and Savior so that He may give His chosen people repentance and forgiveness of sins (Acts 5:31). Now we need to see that, in His work, God has made Christ the High Priest.
Hebrews 5:5 and 6 say, “Christ did not glorify Himself to become a High Priest, but He who said to Him, You are My Son, this day I have begotten You; as also in another place He says, You are a Priest forever according to the order of Melchisedec.” Verse 5 contains a quote from Psalm 2:7: “You are My Son, this day I have begotten You.” This refers to Christ’s resurrection (Acts 13:33), which qualified Him to be our High Priest. For Christ to be our High Priest, He had to partake of our humanity and enter with this humanity into resurrection. With His humanity He can sympathize with us and be merciful to us (Heb. 4:15; 2:17). In resurrection, with His divinity, He can do everything for us and be faithful to us (Heb. 7:24-25; 2:17).
The context of the quotation of Hebrews 5:6, from Psalm 110, refers to Christ in His ascension and enthronement (Psa. 110:1-4). Ascension and enthronement are further qualifications for Christ to be our High Priest (Heb. 7:26). Christ was not only raised up from the dead by God, but He also ascended to the height of the universe.
God has made Christ our High Priest according to the order of Melchisedec. The order of Melchisedec is higher than the order of Aaron. The order of Aaron was for the priesthood only in humanity, whereas the order of Melchisedec is for the priesthood in both humanity and divinity.
Melchisedec came forth to minister bread and wine to Abraham after Abraham had fought to rescue Lot. He is a type of Christ as God’s High Priest. Christ is now a priest according to the order of Melchisedec, and His work is to come to us, today’s Abrahams, with bread and wine. When we come to the table, we enjoy the bread and wine supplied by our High Priest, our Melchisedec. The bread and wine on the table signify the body and blood of Christ who, as the embodiment of God, has been processed so that He may be ministered into us. The bread and wine contain the elements of Christ in His death and resurrection, that are being dispensed into us. As today’s Abrahams, we enjoy the supply of our Melchisedec, a supply of the riches of Christ, that is for God’s dispensing of Himself into us.
According to the Bible, there are two orders of the priesthood-the order of Aaron and the order of Melchisedec. The order of Melchisedec came before that of Aaron. The Aaronic priesthood deals with sin on the negative side. The ministry of Melchisedec, on the contrary, is positive. Melchisedec did not appear to Abraham with an offering to take away sin; he came with bread and wine to nourish Abraham. As such a High Priest, Christ ministers to us Himself in the bread and wine, as the embodiment of the processed God for our nourishment.
The book of Hebrews reveals that although Christ has completed His redemptive work, He is very active as our High Priest, ministering Himself into us in the processed bread and wine for our daily supply. This is why God made Christ a High Priest not according to the order of Aaron but according to the order of Melchisedec. Today Christ is not the sacrifice-offering High Priest; He is the bread-and-wine-ministering High Priest. He has redeemed us with Himself in His humanity as the sacrifice on the earth, and now He feeds us with Himself in His divinity as the supply of life in the heavens. His priesthood according to the order of Melchisedec is for God’s original purpose of dispensing Himself into us to produce a corporate expression for Himself.
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