In the five messages of this book we will particularly cover a unique matter in the New Testament, that is, the New Testament priests of the gospel of God. Many people know what the term priest means. In brief, a priest is one who devotes himself to the service of God. According to the record of the Bible, the matter concerning the priests is not a small one. Genesis 1 and 2 show us several special points in God’s creation of man. First, God created man in His image and after His likeness; this indicates that He wanted man to express Him (1:26a). Second, God gave the governing authority on earth to the man whom He had created; this shows that He wanted man to be His representative to rule over all things on earth (v. 26b). Third, God created man with a spirit (2:7), the organ by which man contacts and receives God. Fourth, after creating man, God placed man in front of the tree of life (vv. 8-9); this indicates that God wanted the man who was created in His image to have His life. Therefore, God’s intention in creating man was that the man whom He created would have His image to express Him and would be His representative to exercise authority for Him on earth. This God-created man had a spirit within him to contact God and receive God into him as his life and life supply. God made such an arrangement according to His intention for the man whom He had created so that man might serve Him, and to serve God is to be a priest to God.
The Old Testament shows us that a priest is one who serves God and draws near to God. He is a person who is very intimate with and close to God. God wants His priests to impart His word and His desire with Himself into His people and to bring them before Him to be united with Him. The priests, on the one hand, bring God to men, and on the other hand, bring men to God. This is the priestly service in the Old Testament.
We know that the things mentioned in the Old Testament were mostly types and shadows, and these types and shadows have been fulfilled and realized in the New Testament. The matter of the priests is no exception. In the New Testament the type of the priests has been fulfilled, and the shadow of the priests has been realized. Concerning the priestly service, there was a great turn from the Old Testament to the New Testament, a turn which began with John the Baptist. John was born into a priestly family; he was the only son of Zachariah, who was a leading priest. Hence, according to God’s ordination, John was a priest by birth. According to the biblical record, he can be considered the last priest of the Old Testament, but he rejected that service and turned to another service. When he grew up to full age and was ready to fulfill his priestly ministry, he should have lived in the holy temple to learn how to be a priest, and he should have eaten the priestly food, put on the priestly garments, and carried out the priestly work. Instead, he lived in the wilderness, a deserted and wild place that is without culture and religion (Matt. 3:1-4). The life he lived was also in a wild condition; he wore camel’s hair and ate locusts and wild honey. The things he did were seemingly very wild. He cried aloud, preaching repentance unto God, and he buried the repentant ones, one by one, into water. From that time, with him there was a turn from the Old Testament priestly service to the New Testament priestly service, from something physical to something spiritual. This was unique.
In the Old Testament the priests offered mainly cattle, such as bulls and goats, as sacrifices, but what John the Baptist offered were repentant sinners. He turned to become the first God-ordained priest of the gospel of the New Testament, offering not sacrifices, such as bulls and goats, but sinners gained through his preaching of the baptism of repentance (Matt. 3:5-6). Hence, beginning with John the Baptist, the work of the New Testament priests of the gospel is primarily to offer saved sinners as sacrifices to God. Unlike the Old Testament priests who worked on bulls and goats, the New Testament priests work on sinners.
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