A Priest Made Perfect (Hebrews 5:9-10)

You turn now in your Bibles to Hebrews chapter five. Hebrews chapter five, and we'll read together verses seven through verse 10. Hebrews chapter five. Verse seven, in the days of his flesh, he offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the one able to save him from death.

And he was heard because of his piety. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from the things which he suffered, and having been made perfect, he became to all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.

Let's pray. Father, it is our yearning and our desire to know you more intimately and more fully than we ever have before through the word that you have given to us. It is our desire to hear your meaning and your intention here in this text, and we pray that you would send and gift us the Holy Spirit to make that happen.

Give us understanding and insight and help us to appreciate the Lord Jesus Christ so fully because of what he has done and who he is and what he has accomplished on our behalf. May you be glorified here in your word and through our meditation upon it, and open our eyes and our hearts that we may behold in a wonderful things, we pray in the name of Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Christ as the Perfect High Priest in Hebrews 5

Well, it feels like it has been several weeks since I've been here, and I haven't been here very much in the last few weeks, and that's because I haven't been, and I don't like it when events coincide to keep me away from my church family for long periods of time or frequently, and I am very grateful for the men who have filled in for me in the last few weeks, Gordy Hunt and Cornel Razor and Dave Rich.

We are, as a congregation, extremely blessed with men who are able to handle the word of God and able and capable and gifted to preach and to teach scripture, and so my hearty thanks to those men and for their sacrifice in allowing me to get away for a little bit, but I am back, and you are cursed with me or saddled with me for the foreseeable future.

I see nothing in my plans that's gonna make me travel anywhere, so unless I lose my voice or my mind or my salvation, I'm going to be back here in the pulpit with you Sunday after Sunday for the foreseeable future.

So we are in Hebrews chapter five today, and we're gonna be looking today at verses nine and 10, and again, I would just take a second since it's been sort of on and off for the last month or so to remind you of what it is that we're covering in this passage, that what is at issue actually beginning back in chapter four, verse 14, is the qualification of the Lord Jesus Christ to serve as our high priest, and we recognize him as the one whom the Father has appointed to stand between us and the Father.

He represents God to us, and he represents us before God, and he functions as our high priest, and no Jew would have ever thought that somebody from the tribe of Judah could ever serve as a high priest because the order of Aaron and the high priesthood that is part of the Old Testament covenant and everything that Moses gave in the Pentateuch, all of that was to be from the descendants of Aaron, from the tribe of Levi, and specifically from the descendants of Aaron, so no Jew would ever think that somebody like Jesus, who was from the tribe of Judah, could serve as a high priest, and of course, Jesus doesn't serve as a high priest according to the priesthood of Aaron, he serves as a high priest according to an entirely different priesthood, the priesthood that is according to the order of Melchizedek.

So he functions as a high priest, not in that lineage that has all been set aside, put aside, and replaced by a better, a higher, a greater, and far more eternal and infinite priesthood, that of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is our high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.

And so the issue in chapter five is, is Jesus qualified to serve as our high priest? And the author is working through the arguments, and he's using the Old Testament qualifications kind of as a model, and he points out that no priest would take that honor of serving as a priest to himself, he had to be appointed by God, and so the question then is, was the Lord Jesus Christ appointed by the Father to serve as a high priest?

He answers that in chapter five, verses five and six, by quoting from Psalm 2 and Psalm 110, to show that the priestly Messiah, who was appointed by the Father, the Son, the divine Son, who was appointed by the Father to be the King, and a Messiah, was also appointed by him to serve as a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.

So was Jesus appointed?

Check.

He meets that qualification. Now, the second one is, is he able to deal gently with those whom he represents, to be compassionate and sympathetic? And the author answers that by showing that Jesus, in the days of his flesh, he was known as a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, he offered up prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears, he suffered and he was afflicted, he was tried, he was tempted, tempted in all points as we are yet, he was without sin, he even learned obedience to the things which he suffered, and his suffering uniquely qualifies him to serve as our high priest.

So is he able to sympathize with us?

Yes.

Is he able to understand our temptation? Yes, he's been tempted in all points as we are. Is he, can he be compassionate and gentle? Yes, because he has endured all of the trials and tribulations that are inherent in the human condition, being made a man, coming in the days of his flesh, being made in the likeness of men, and being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross, and in that suffering, he is able to sympathize and empathize and be compassionate and gentle with us, because he knows what we have endured.

So does he meet that qualification? Yes, he does. And so now the author turns to another qualification. Is he perfectly suited to be our high priest? Having met the qualification, being appointed by God, having met the qualification of being gentle and sympathetic, is he perfect?

Does he meet that, does he meet all of those qualifications in a perfect way? And then now the author's concluding his argument in verses nine and 10, where he speaks of the perfection of the Lord Jesus Christ, and I mentioned a couple weeks ago that there are these two very curious statements that are sort of difficult to understand.

What does it mean that he learned obedience? We talked about that last time. And what does it mean that he has been made perfect? You'll notice in verses nine and 10, where the author says he has been made perfect, and he became to all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.

And I see in those verses three aspects of the person and the work of Christ, which are related to his perfection. First, he is a perfect master. I get that from that phrase, that he is the savior of all those who obey him.

He became to those who obey him. He demands our obedience. He is worthy of our obedience. And to be saved itself, it requires an obedient response to the commands to repent and to believe. So he is our perfect master.

Second, he is a perfect savior. He is the source of eternal salvation, verse nine. And third, he is a perfect high priest, verse 10, having been designated by God and appointed as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.

He's a perfect master, a perfect savior, and a perfect high priest. Those are the three points we're gonna be looking at today. But before we dive into each one of those three, we have to answer this question.

What does it mean that he was made perfect? See, that's kind of a challenging or a difficult language that is used there because it sort of implies that at some point he was what? It was imperfect. And that's what it seems to suggest, does it not?

If somebody was made perfect by something or at some point, then that suggests very strongly that at some point prior to that, he was something other than perfect in that sense. And if he was something other than perfect, we have a word to describe that which is other than perfect.

We use the term imperfect. So if something happened to make the Lord Jesus Christ perfect, that rendered him perfect, what was he before he became perfect or was made perfect? Was he imperfect? And I'll make this question even more difficult to answer by reminding you that Hebrews chapter 13, verse eight, says that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

So if he moved in some sense from imperfection to perfection through some event, some action, some activity, or some point in time, if he moved from imperfection to perfection, that is a change, is it not?

Did he change from imperfect to perfect? And if he did, then in what sense can we say that he is perfect or was made perfect? And whenever we run across, this is just, this is free of charge, this is just something extra.

Whenever we run across something like this in scripture, where we see two statements kind of side by side, and it appears to us as if the author is contradicting himself or saying something that is irreconcilable in our own minds, we need to remember something.

We are not smarter than the biblical writers. And if this conundrum presents itself to us, we ought not to think that it was not on the mind of the biblical writer or that he was unaware of it. It is not as if he having in chapter one described Jesus Christ as being the exact radiance of God's glory, the perfect representation of his nature, being the one who created all things and sustains all things and upholds all things by the word of his power, being greater than the angels, affirming completely his divine nature and equality with the father.

We would expect such a one to be unchanging and immutable and perfect in every single way. Having said that in chapter one and affirmed that in chapter one, we ought not to think that the biblical author arriving in chapter five would say, then he at some point became perfect in a way that he was not perfect before.

If there's this conundrum or this seemingly irreconcilable two issues in our minds, just remember the biblical author was fully aware of it. The same author writes in chapter 13 verse eight that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.

So he is aware of that. So let's not think that we are smarter than the biblical author. This is what atheists do all the time. They read two verses, a chapter apart and say, see, it contradicts itself right there.

The author contradicts itself. No, the author is not contradicting himself. The author is smarter than you and me and everybody else in this room. He's fully aware of what it is that he is saying. So there's not an irreconcilable.

The only question is we have to ask. The only question we have to ask is how do these two things go together? In what way was he made perfect? Let's begin with the definition of that word perfect. Not in English, because we use that word in English to describe various things, which I'll illustrate for you in just a second.

But the word that is translated perfect here in the Greek is teleo, is a form of a very common Greek word, telos. And there are a number of forms of this word. When you see in scripture a reference to the end or the completion or the accomplishment of something, it's most likely that telos, that Greek word that is used.

The word telos simply means an end. That's it, the end. It describes something that is the end or the accomplishment of something or the finishing of something. That is the telos. When it reaches maturity, completion, fulfillment, the end, in some ways we would say the perfection of what it is.

When it reaches that point, it has been made telos. And so this verb, having been made perfect, is the verb form of that word. The same word that is translated made perfect here in Hebrews chapter five is used to describe Jesus completing the work that the father sent him to do in John chapter four and John chapter five.

Listen to these two references. John four, verse 34, Jesus said to them, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. That word accomplish, that's the word, to fulfill it, to end it, to complete it, to do it.

That's the idea. John chapter five, verse 36, Jesus said, the testimony which I have is greater than testimony of John for the works that the father has given me to accomplish. The very works that I do testify about me that the father has sent me.

The very works that the father has given me to make perfect, to accomplish, to complete, to bring to an end, those are the things that I do and they testify about me, Jesus said. The word is used of reaching a goal in Luke chapter 13.

It's used of fulfilling a number of days, right, to complete the course of days appointed for something in Luke chapter two. It is used in Acts chapter 20 of finishing your course. Paul says, I have finished my course.

I've come to the end of it. I've accomplished it, I've completed it. I've perfected it, you could say. Now know what is lacking in all of those definitions of that word that I just gave you. What is lacking in all of those descriptions and in all of those uses is any hint of what sometimes we mean by perfect, referring to one's moral qualities.

That's how we use the word perfect, right? If we refer to the Lord Jesus Christ as being perfect and when we describe him in that sense, we're describing his moral qualities. He is without sin, without spot, without stain.

He is in every way perfect and pure and unblemished in his holiness and his righteousness. We use the term perfect to describe his moral character, his moral quality. Or sometimes in English, we use the term perfect to describe the presence of every virtue that one would demand or would need.

And in that sense, we're sometimes not even talking about moral qualities, but just the presence of virtues. He's perfect because he has everything that is necessary. So he is good, he is patient, he is long-suffering.

Every pleasing and pleasant and desirable virtue that we might want or desire in the Lord Jesus Christ, he possesses all of those. So he lacks neither moral perfection nor any of the virtues or characteristics that we would deem to be desirable or necessary.

In that way, he is perfect. But we also use the term perfect in our English language to describe what is being described here in all of these references that I just gave you, namely something that is perfectly suited or perfectly finished, sorry, perfectly suited or perfectly equipped for a task.

So for instance, if I were to be working on a project and I would say, what I need is a slotted screwdriver and you hand me a hammer. The hammer might be a perfectly good hammer for what hammers do, but I need a screwdriver.

So it's not that, no, it's a perfect hammer. It's not the perfect tool for the job. But if you hand me a screwdriver and I need a screwdriver, then you have handed me the perfect tool for the job. You've handed me something that is perfectly suited, perfectly qualified, perfectly designed for the task at hand.

And that is the way in which the word perfect is being used here by the English translators in our texts. It is not describing his moral qualities. He is morally pure and perfect from the moment of his birth, or actually from the moment of his conception, all the way through to the very moment of his death.

He is morally perfect and lacks no moral perfection. He has no blemish or spot or wrinkle at all. Not only that, but he possesses from the moment of his conception all the way through to the moment of his death, every pleasing and pleasant and desirable virtue that we might expect in a character like the Lord Jesus Christ.

He possesses all of that. So at no point was he made ethically perfect. At no point was he made morally perfect. At no point was he made perfect in his virtues that he possesses. But at some point he was made perfectly able to do something.

At the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, he lacked something that he possessed at his death. I think this through carefully. At the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, the God-man Christ Jesus lacked something that he did possess at the moment of his death.

At the moment of his birth, he was not qualified to serve as our high priest. That's gonna sound like heresy, but it's not. At the moment of his birth, he was not qualified to serve as our high priest.

Morally qualified?

Yeah.

Virtuously qualified?

Yes.

Experientially qualified?

No.

He was not qualified to serve as our high priest. He was not qualified to provide us the righteousness that we need, because what we needed was a righteousness that belonged to another by virtue of his obedience perfectly to the law of God.

Had the infant Jesus Christ obeyed all the demands.

Of the law?

He had not. He had not lived under the demands of the law and been obedient to it. Had the Lord Jesus Christ at the moment of his birth resisted temptation?

Had he?

Didn't even know what temptation was at that point. He had not resisted temptation. He had not endured suffering, the mockery of men. He had not done good deeds. He had not fulfilled the law. He had not at that moment under the threat and in the midst of suffering been obedient and learned obedience.

The Lord Jesus Christ lacked something at his birth that he had at his death, and that was the qualifications necessary to serve as our high priest. And remember, that is the context and that's what's being discussed.

Not his moral quality, not his virtues. What is being discussed is, is he qualified to serve as our high priest? At the moment of his birth, the answer was no. At the time of his death, the answer was perfectly yes.

Why?

Because I needed somebody who knew what it was to be tempted. Did the infant Christ Jesus understand temptation? No, he did not. Now, the divine nature understood temptation, but he had not learned obedience.

He had not been tempted. He had not resisted temptation, been tempted in all points as we are at the moment of his birth. I needed somebody who would understand my suffering, the affliction of what it means to live in the human condition in a lifetime and to go through all the phases of infancy and youth and be teenage years and into adulthood and what it means to resist temptation in all of those forms.

Did the Lord Jesus Christ at his birth understand that? No, he did not. Had he obeyed the law of God? He had not. He had never been tempted. He had never learned obedience. He had never suffered. All of those things were necessary for him to be perfectly suited to be my high priest.

He lacked something at his birth that he had at his death, namely a life lived for the glory of God in obedience to the law of God with perfect righteousness, having suffered and learned obedience through the things that he suffered.

He was perfectly equipped or having been made perfect by that life lived to serve as our high priest. To show you what I'm talking about, indulge me in a thought experiment for just a moment. Could six-year-old Jesus Christ, six-year-old Jesus, son of Joseph of Nazareth, could six-year-old Jesus, the God man, perfectly God, perfectly man, could he have died on the cross and accomplished at six years old what he accomplished at the age of 33?

Could he have done that? Had he obeyed all of the law perfectly on my behalf? Had he resisted all of the temptations that I have resisted and struggle with? Has he been tempted in every way as I am? Had he endured suffering and affliction?

Would six-year-old Jesus be able to sympathize with 60-year-old you? Would he be able to do that? No, he lacked something at his birth that he acquired or had or attained, a resume, as it were, that qualified him uniquely to stand in our stead and to represent us before God to provide us the righteousness that we need.

That came through a life of living an obedient life to the Father on our behalf. In that way and in that way only, he was perfected. So the perfection is not describing his moral qualities. It's not describing his virtues of character.

The perfection here is describing a perfectly suited individual, one perfectly suited and perfectly able to function in all of these capacities. We needed one who has faced the same temptations and understand the demands of God's law and has experienced the hatred and opposition of a hostile world.

We needed one who had lived through all of human life as you and I do so that he could understand exactly what it is that you and I endure. We need one who is perfectly righteous in every way and had obeyed all of the demands of his law through a fully adult life so that he could stand in my stead and represent me before the Father and represent you before the Father and represent the Father to us and to serve as our high priest.

So what we're describing when we say that he was made perfect is we're saying he was perfectly suited. He was qualified. His resume was fulfilled and accomplished. In all that he lived and in his suffering and in his trials and temptations, he was in obedience in the midst of suffering, made perfectly suited to serve as our high priest.

He had the qualities then that were necessary for him to stand in our stead. And this is what is meant back in chapter two when we read this in verse 10. For it was fitting for him, for whom are all things and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings.

There's something that the Lord Jesus Christ endured in his suffering. He learned obedience through suffering. You'll notice that verse eight says, he learned obedience through suffering. There's something in his suffering that made him uniquely qualified to be our high priest.

And in that way, he was perfected. He was suitable. We needed one who would die in our place, pay our price, provide us with righteousness, rise from the dead, defeat the devil, remove the fear of death, sympathize with our weakness, understand our trials, know the frailties of humanity, understand temptation, come to our aid and intercede for us.

Six-year-old Jesus could not do that. 33-year-old Jesus could do that. He was perfected. In all that he lived, in all that he endured, he was made perfectly able to serve as our high priest. Now at this point, you're probably observing that we are a good portion of halfway through this.

We haven't even talked about master or savior or high priest or any of that outline that I gave you at the beginning. And you're thinking to yourself, how are we going to do that? Having endured all of that groundwork, now we can apply that to those three offices.

Since we understand what it means that he was made perfect, we can see that he is a perfect master, a perfect savior, and a perfect high priest. So let's look at each one of those three, move beyond just the first five verses of verse nine.

Jesus as the Perfect Master

What does it mean that he is a perfect master? You'll notice the verse nine says, he has been made perfect. He became to all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation. All those who obey him is a description of believers.

And don't let that pass in front of your eyes. Jesus Christ became for all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation. That perfectly describes what it means to be a believer. This is what marks believers, obedience.

Disobedience is what marks unbelievers. A righteous heart and a redeemed heart, one that has been born again, is one who obeys the Lord Jesus Christ. So we find him to be a perfect master because he demands of us obedience.

In fact, the very first command that you must obey in order to become a believer in Jesus Christ is to turn from your sin and believe upon him. That is the entrance of the gospel. And so the very first call to you as a sinner is, repent, turn from your sins, and believe upon him for eternal life.

Believe in the one whom the Father has sent. That was his command. And so having embarked upon a pathway of obedience, this is the mark of every believer. We are those who obey. He is our king, he is our master, he is our Lord, he is our Kyrgios.

There is no question when he says do what we are to do. We don't equivocate, we don't negotiate with him, we don't go back and forth as to whether or not we should do it. The redeemed heart is one that pursues a path of lifelong obedience to the commands of Jesus Christ.

And this is how believers are described all the way throughout the New Testament. In Acts 5, verse 32, Peter says, and we are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him.

Who gets the Holy Spirit? Those who obey him. How do we get the Holy Spirit? By believing upon the Lord Jesus Christ. Believers are described as those who obey him. Romans 1, verse 5, we've received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for his namesake.

Faith is described as the obedience of faith. This is what faith is, it's obedience. We cannot say that we believe upon somebody and that we are disobedient to him. If I believe him, I will obey him. And if I obey him, it is a mark of my obedience.

Romans 2, verse 8 describes unbelievers as those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness. See, everybody obeys something. We either obey righteousness or unrighteousness.

We either obey the truth or we obey unrighteousness. If we are obedient to him, that is the mark of those who are saved. Obedience. Romans 6, verse 17, thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient to the heart from that form of teaching in which you were committed.

2 Thessalonians 1, verse 8, promises that Christ will come again, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and those who do not obey the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. To repent and to believe the gospel is the very first expression of a redeemed heart.

The very first thing that a regenerated heart does is turn from an abandoned sin and place faith savingly in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the very first thing we do is respond in obedience to that command.

Turn and believe, repent and believe. An obedient heart does that willingly and joyfully. And the very evidence of saving faith is obedience. And Hebrews chapter 11, verse 8, speaking of Abraham, it says by faith, Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out of the place to he was to receive for an inheritance.

What is the mark of faith?

It's obedience.

A faith-filled heart is an obedience heart. So do not for one instant think that you can live your life in rebellion to God, disobeying the commands of Christ, refusing to bow the knee and refusing to bow the heart before him, shaking your fist at heaven, going your own way, doing your own thing, that you can live your life in high-handed rebellion against his throne and his sovereignty and his word.

And then on the last day, find that he is your savior from sin. That will not happen. He is the kind and gracious savior to all who obey him. And he is a righteous and wrath-filled judge to all those who will not.

That is the dividing one. He is a savior to those who obey him. He has become, having been made perfect, he has become to all those who obey him, the source of eternal life. Not to some of those who obey him, but thankfully to all of those who obey him, he is the source of eternal salvation.

That is good news. It is the faith, a faith that is not marked by obedience is a false faith. It's a mirage. It's mental assent. It's acknowledging something that's true because saving faith is not, do you understand this?

Have you heard the message? Okay, pray this quick prayer. Repeat after me and check the box on the back of the card and pass that down the aisle to the usher. As he comes through, welcome to the family of God.

That's not saving faith. Saving faith is I will pick up my cross. I will count myself unworthy of anything. I will die to myself. I will follow Christ and I will lay down my life if necessary. That is the demand of the gospel.

Not pray some prayer and welcome to the family of God. The call of the gospel is a high calling. And so the call of the gospel is you died and you must be willing to die because you're going to die and Christ is your life.

So turn to him or perish. That's the call of the gospel. And the one who turns to him in obedience to him, as so as not to perish, they are the obedient ones. He has become to all those who obey him, the source of eternal salvation.

And notice that it is an eternal salvation. Oh, one of the things that I want to point out, this mark of obedience in the context of what we're talking about here just earlier, remember what the second warning passage was back in Hebrews chapter three and chapter four.

Do you remember what that whole warning passage circled around and revolved around? It was the wilderness generation. What marked the wilderness generation? Obedience or disobedience?

Disobedience.

So we read in chapter three, verse 18, to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were disobedient. Chapter four, verse six, they failed to enter because of disobedience.

Chapter four, verse 11 warns us that we not fall through following the same example of disobedience. It's disobedience that marked them. It's disobedience that kept them out of rest. It's disobedience that marks those who are outside of Christ and are cut off from the rest of God, not the rest of God, but the rest, which is from God.

It is obedience that marks those who are saved by him. You want salvation in Jesus Christ? You want eternal salvation? He provides it to all those who obey him, who repent and believe and bow the knee to this great master, this perfect master.

He is our master and he is our king. Second, he is a perfect savior. He became the source of eternal salvation, not just a perfect master, who demands obedience and is worthy of our obedience, but he is a perfect savior.

He has become, to all those who obey him, the source of eternal salvation. The word source there is kind of an interesting word. I found this curious. When I started to look at that word, it didn't mean what I thought it was going to mean.

This was kind of surprising to me. That word is only used five times in all of the New Testament. Three of the times that it is used, it is used to describe the charges that are brought against the Lord Jesus Christ and the question of his guilt.

In fact, that word that is translated source of our salvation is translated guilt in at least two other places out of the five places that is used, guilt. How does the word guilt get translated source?

That doesn't seem right, does it? Didn't seem right to me. And yet in Luke chapter 23, verse four, the issue was with Jesus before Pilate, and Pilate said, I find no guilt in this man. It's the same word translated source.

In Luke chapter 23, verse 22, I have found in him no guilt demanding of death. And then again, in chapter 23, verse 14, these three times it's used by Luke, all three times. In 23, verse 14, it's used of the charges that are made against Jesus.

In other words, I find in him none of these charges to be true, so it's translated charges and it's translated twice, guilt. How then do we get to chapter five of Hebrews and it's translated source? In what way?

There's a connection here. Think legally for just a moment. If you have a question of a criminal who has committed an act before you, you can say that he is guilty, right? And so you bring against that guilty party, you would bring certain what?

Charges in the court of law, right? And what you are doing by bringing charges against one in determining their guilt or their innocence is to see if the one who is being charged, who is either guilty or not guilty, if he is indeed the one responsible for the actions that he is being charged with.

Is he the responsible party? Is he the source of this? Is he the cause of it? Is he the origin or the reason for this guilt or innocence? And so it is translated source here, but it has the idea of carrying the one who is responsible for.

So we could say that Jesus Christ has become the guilty one for our salvation, or he has become the one responsible or charged with our salvation. And in terms of our salvation, we would say that if salvation were a crime, there is only one perpetrator of that crime in all of the universe and who is it?