MelchizaWho? – Genesis 14

Hebrews 7 and the High Priesthood of Christ

You turn now in your Bibles to Hebrews chapter seven. Yes, it's a big day. We get to go to the next chapter, Hebrews chapter seven. And we're gonna read together just the first three verses. Not that we're actually gonna study these three verses, but we're gonna read them this morning anyway.

Hebrews chapter seven. 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, to whom also Abraham apportioned a 10th 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.

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. Let's pray together. Our Father, as we discuss very deep and profound things today, those things which pertain to a mature understanding of who Christ is and what he has done for us, it is our desire and our prayer that you would give us understanding and insight in your word.

Help us to be fed this morning, we pray, that you would feed us by the power of your spirit and by the work of your spirit in illuminating your word to us, that we may be edified and equipped and encouraged together as we look at this passage of scripture.

It is our desire that you be glorified here through this time, and so we pray it in Christ's name.

Amen.

Well, now we come to Melchizedek, and I doubt that there are any Christians in our country who woke up this morning and thought to themselves, I sure hope I get to go to church this morning and hear a sermon about Melchizedek.

Now maybe some of you, because you saw where we were going last week and you were here last week, you thought to yourself, oh goody, I get to wake up this morning and go to a church and hear a sermon about Melchizedek.

In fact, I feel sorry for all of those poor souls in all of those churches all over our country who don't get to go to church today and hear a sermon about Melchizedek. If that was you, you have hit the jackpot because we have now come to Melchizedek in Hebrews chapter seven, and we cannot avoid him.

And if you happen to be somewhat reluctant in your excitement about studying Melchizedek, I want you to understand I am sympathetic to that sentiment. After all, Melchizedek is not what we would consider to be a main character in scripture.

There are no books devoted to him explaining his life and who he was like you have entire books of the Old Testament where David is described or you have a book dedicated to Daniel and other books that are dedicated to various Bible characters.

They're major characters and there are no stories in our minds that we associate with Melchizedek. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that unless you did a little bit of preparatory work for this morning, that most people here probably would not be able to recite the details of the passage where Melchizedek is mentioned in the Old Testament and the story that surrounds him.

He's just normally not on our radar. And on top of the fact that he is not a main character and there are not a lot of passages devoted to describing or explaining Melchizedek, when we do see him and what we do see written about him is somewhat confusing.

We read in the New Testament that Christ is a priest after the order of Melchizedek and a priest forever and that God has sworn this. And then there is this connection between Jesus and Melchizedek that to us from an untrained perspective or maybe we're just not ready for it yet, it all seems a bit confusing.

How is Christ a priest and how is Melchizedek a priest and how did that play in with the Old Covenant and the Old Testament and who was this guy and why do we know so little about him from the Old Testament but so much is made of him, at least in the New Testament book of Hebrews, and where does he come from and who was he and what is his significance and what exactly is the connection with Jesus?

All of that can be a bit confusing. And then on top of that, thinking about Melchizedek, did any of you really think that discussion of Melchizedek is all that relevant to your day-to-day life and where you're at right now at all?

You might have thought to yourself, if you hadn't mentioned Melchizedek in chapter five and six and then promised to talk about him today, I probably could have gone the next year and not even thought of Melchizedek, never even entered into my mind.

The connection between Jesus and Melchizedek seems like something that professors at a seminary would sit around and talk about in high-backed chairs in their tweed jackets with the patches on the elbows, scratching their chins, surrounded by the mixed aroma of old books and polished hardwood and half-spent cigars, discussing the connection between Melchizedek and all that stuff and you think, that's good for them, but I got kids at home and I'm changing diapers and I have needs and I'm ill and I'm dealing with my parents who are aging.

What is the connection between Melchizedek and my day-to-day life? I promise you, there is nothing more relevant to the day-to-day demands of your life than understanding the role that Jesus Christ plays as your high priest and how he can do so as portrayed or typified by Melchizedek.

It's very relevant. Melchizedek and his connection to our salvation is far more relevant than you might at first suspect and it is far more interesting than maybe you might have first imagined. So we're gonna take this a little bit slow.

I know that's not gonna come as any kind of a surprise, but we have to be methodical because some of the things that we're dealing with in Hebrews chapter seven require a little bit of a laying of a foundation and to cover some things that maybe are not quite as familiar to us as we might wish that they were and so because we're gonna do that, we're going to be systematic and a little bit intentional in our study and we're going to jump back and look in a moment here at Genesis chapter 14 at where Melchizedek does appear in the Old Testament, but before we do that, I wanna set a little bit of a stage from Hebrews chapter seven and kind of give you a wide angle view from Hebrews chapter seven of Melchizedek and the role he plays.

Chapter seven is not the first time that Melchizedek has been mentioned. You'll remember back in chapter five, verse six, it's the first time Melchizedek is mentioned in the book of Hebrews where the author says, just as he says also in another passage, you are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek and I mentioned back then when we first saw Melchizedek's name appeared, I said to you that we will deal with Melchizedek eventually when you get to Hebrews chapter seven and I kind of gave you some details of Melchizedek back then, but I said we're gonna put a full explanation of who he is and what he did off to a later time.

Well, today is that later time, so now we're picking it up. Hebrews chapter five, verse six, is the first mention of Melchizedek. He's also mentioned down in chapter five, verse 10 when he speaks of Christ being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek and then in chapter five, verse 11, the author says, concerning him, that is Melchizedek, we have much to say, but you have become slow of hearing, dull of hearing and he highlights and talks about the spiritual immaturity and the inability of them to understand some of the more complex and the higher things of the Christian life and they had come to need a milk and the beginning, the elementary principles again and that was the whole warning passage.

The warning passage ends in chapter six, verse 20 where the author picks up Melchizedek again after sort of this parenthetical treatment of the warning passage. In verse 20, he says where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

Now, the author, he lets off Melchizedek in chapter five, verse 10 and then you have this warning passage where he is dressing their spiritual immaturity and their assurance that they have of salvation and then he circles back around and picks up Melchizedek again and all of that should remind us that Melchizedek is not elementary and basic Christian doctrine.

This is topper, upper shelf or top shelf or topper shelf if you want to do that. It is topper shelf Christianity. This is not something that ties in with the basic foundational elemental beginning stages of Christian truth and doctrine.

The elemental things that he talked about earlier in chapter six. This type of stuff is for mature Christians. Now, if you're an immature Christian or a brand new Christian, that doesn't mean that you can't understand any of this because you'll notice that the author talks about their spiritual immaturity back in chapter five and then when he's all done with that, what does he do?

Write into Melchizedek. So just because you're an immature Christian or a new Christian or this might be brand new to you, doesn't mean you're not able to understand this. I promise you I will do everything in my power as we work through chapter seven to make Melchizedek as simple and understandable as it could possibly be and his relationship to Jesus as it could possibly be.

But this is just to remind you that what we're dealing with is upper shelf Christianity. This is something that's not part of the basics. In other words, this is not gospel stuff. When you sit down and explain the gospel to somebody, you don't sort of pause and say, okay, hold on, have you heard about Melchizedek?

Did I explain Melchizedek to you before you can understand the gospel? No, you can go right into the gospel and I don't know how long I was a Christian, probably years before I even heard the name Melchizedek and had any understanding of who Melchizedek was or what his significance was.

But there comes a point where getting into another stage of our Christian faith and understanding, we gotta come to grips with who Melchizedek is. So he mentions Melchizedek in chapter five, verse six, chapter five, verse 10, chapter six, verse 20.

After the warning passage, he picks it back up and then in chapter seven, verse one, I'm just gonna want you to notice in the passage, chapter seven, the mentions of Melchizedek. Chapter seven, verse one.

For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who met Abraham as returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him. Look at chapter seven, verse 10. For he was still in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him.

Look at chapter 11, or seven, verse 11. Chapter seven, verse 11. At the very end of the verse, we read according to the order of Melchizedek and not be designated according to the order of Aaron. Chapter seven, verse 15, and this is clearer still if another priest arises according to the likeness of Melchizedek, who has become such not on the basis of a law, a physical requirement, but according to the power of an indestructible life, for it is attested of him, you are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

And verse 17 is the last mention of Melchizedek. Now, in doing that, you have just read every single reference to Melchizedek that's in the New Testament. Every last one of them. In fact, you have read four times as many references to Melchizedek as are in the Old Testament.

Because there's no mention of Melchizedek outside of Hebrews and there's no mention of Melchizedek for the rest of the book of Hebrews. Because in chapter seven, the author lays the foundation of who Melchizedek is and his significance and his connection to Jesus and Jesus's high priesthood.

And then in chapters eight, nine and 10, the author works out the implications of that. Because Melchizedek, because Jesus is a priest after the order of Melchizedek, therefore, what we have in Jesus is a better high priest, a better priesthood, who offered better sacrifices with a blood better than that of bulls and goats as an enacted a better covenant founded on better promises with a better hope.

That's chapter seven, eight, nine and 10. So chapter seven lays the foundation of who Melchizedek is and then eight, nine and 10 work out all of the theological implications of that. So though we're not gonna be talking about Melchizedek from now until your great grandchildren graduate from high school, the implications of what we're describing with Melchizedek all the way through chapter 10, those are evident and it is all tied together.

Chapter five, verse six, when he speaks of Christ being a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek, that's not the first time that the high priesthood of Jesus is mentioned. That goes all the way back to chapter two, verse 17, where he starts this theme of the high priesthood of Jesus and then all the way through the rest of this book of Hebrews, the implications of that, as I said, are slowly and methodically and theologically worked out and they're profound implications.

So the question for the author of Hebrews is this, how can Jesus be a high priest? If he is not of the tribe of Levi, which he wasn't, and he is not a descendant of Aaron, which he wasn't, and only descendants of Aaron and people in the tribe of Levi could be priests or work in the tabernacle, have anything to do with the religious functions and the offering of sacrifices and offerings, et cetera, how could Jesus serve as a high priest?

Why is that high priesthood of Jesus necessary and how can he fulfill any kind of a priesthood if he didn't belong to the tribe of Aaron? That is the concern, the central concern regarding the high priestly ministry of the Lord Jesus and that's what the author is intending to answer in chapter seven.

Genesis 14 and Abraham’s Rescue of Lot

So now, Melchizedek is mentioned eight times here in the book of Hebrews. He's mentioned twice in the Old Testament. His name only appears two times in the Old Testament and if time permits, we will get to both of these references but for certain, we wanna go back to Genesis chapter 14.

So turn back to Genesis chapter 14 and we're going to look at this incident in the life of Abraham where he meets Melchizedek. Now as you're turning there, I wanna drop on you a couple of preliminary considerations.

First, this discussion about Melchizedek and who he was and his significance is not something that was just started in the first century with the author of Hebrews. It's not something that we're just picking up today.

This was something that even in the time of Jesus, the Jews of his day, the rabbis and the theologians and the scribes, et cetera, they had discussions and writings amongst them as to who Melchizedek is and what his significance was.

So this was something that was addressed and spoken of and discussed as it were even outside of the Christian church. The Jews were having conversations about who Melchizedek is. So in the church context, the author of Hebrews, he has an answer as to who Melchizedek was and what his significance is and that's what he explains here.

So though the idea of Melchizedek may seem like it strikes our ears as a little bit odd and sort of out of the blue, like where did this come from and how is he getting all of this? This was something that was being discussed amongst the scribes and the writers and the intelligentsia.

Amongst the seminary professors sitting in their high wingback chairs with their tweed jackets on with the elbow patches. In the first century, those were the ones discussing who Melchizedek was. So now the author is gonna answer some of that for us.

And the second thing, second preliminary consideration, I want you to notice that there's a connection in Genesis chapter 14 between Abraham and Melchizedek. They meet each other and we're gonna read about that here in just a second.

The author of Hebrews, he's been discussing Abraham as well. So in both these places where Melchizedek is mentioned, Genesis and in Hebrews, these two figures, Abraham and Melchizedek, they are connected.

Because we have been looking at the promises given to Abraham in Hebrews chapter six and how God fulfilled that and how he is an example of whom we can trust, of a God we can trust and rely upon to always fulfill his promises.

And the author of Hebrews connects Melchizedek and Abraham together and because they appear in the same passage here in Genesis chapter 14. So let me set up a little bit of the context. Weeks ago, we looked at Genesis chapter 12 where God called Abraham out of Ur of the Chaldees and gave him a promise.

Remember there are three things that God promised to Abraham. A land, a multitude of descendants to fill and occupy that land, and then one particular descendant, the seed through whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed.

And that seed is the Lord Jesus Christ. So a land, a people to occupy that land, and a seed through whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed. Those are the three things that God promised to Abraham back in Genesis chapter 12.

In Genesis chapter 13, God reiterates that promise. Look down at verse 14. Oh, by the way, Genesis chapter 13 tells the story of Abraham and Lot separating. Okay, so that's a little bit of a key context here.

Abraham and Lot had separated. Remember their herds, both of them were too wealthy and had too many flocks and too big of herds to really occupy the same land. So Abraham said, look around you, take what you want, I'll take what's left over.

And Lot saw the area of Sodom and thought that that was great, so he settled there. Look at chapter 13, verse 13. Now the men of Sodom were wicked exceedingly and sinners against the Lord. Verse 12 said, Abraham settled in the land of Canaan while Lot settled in the cities of the valley and moved his tents as far as Sodom.

So that's where Lot settled. So Abraham and Lot have separated from one another. That's in chapter 13. And then after Abraham had given to Lot his pick of the land, his pick of the territories as it were for his flocks, verse 14 of chapter 13 says, the Lord said to Abraham after Lot had separated from him, now lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are northward and southward and eastward and westward.

For all the land which you see, I will give it to you and to your descendants forever. I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth so that if anyone can number the dust of the earth, then your descendants can be numbered.

Arise, walk about the land through its length and breadth for I will give it to you. And then Abraham moved his tents and came and dwelt by the oaks of Mamre which are in Hebron and there he built an altar to the Lord.

So God reiterated the promise. What part of the promise? Look around you, Abraham. Do a 360, panorama, get up on the highest mountain in the land and look around you. Every bit of this land I will give to you and your descendants and I will give you descendants to fill this land.

That was the promise that God gave to Abraham. An unconditional promise, a promise that is still in effect today. That's their land. They own it. God gave it to them. It's still their possession and it will be everlastingly.

That was the promise in chapter 13 reiterated. And then we come to chapter 14. Chapter 14 is a little bit of context. We're gonna go through the whole chapter just so you can see, because there's something significant in the first part of it.

So let's read chapter 14 with me. And it came about in the days of Amraphel, king of Shinar, Ariok, king of Elassar, Chedorlaomer, king of Elam. Don't feel sorry for me, just don't mock me with the pronunciations, okay?

We're gonna do our best, we're gonna go through this.

Where are we at?

Chedorlaomer, king of Elam and Tidal, king of Goan. And that they made war with Bera, king of Sodom, and with Bersha, king of Gomorrah, Sinab, king of Adma, and Shember, king of Zeboam, and the king of Bela, that is Zohar.

Complex? Did you catch any of that, by the way? He said, no, I got lost in your pronunciation of Chedorlaomer. I'm just gonna pronounce him Chedorlaomer, from here on out. Chedorlaomer, Chedor isn't cheese, lamer isn't, that's lamer than anything else.

I've heard today.

Chedorlaomer is how we're gonna pronounce his name. It'll be smoother, you'll see as we go through. Verse three, all these came as allies to the valley of Sinim, that is in the Salt Sea. So what you have in verses one to three is you have four kings who live outside of the land of Israel.

They have invaded the southern part of the land of Israel down in the regions by the Dead Sea, in the southern part, the Salt Sea. The Salt Area, which is in Gedi, where David hid with his mighty men.

That's all in the southern part of the land of Israel, down in that southern part. Okay, so they have invaded there, and those four kings have made an alliance. And they have invaded together this land against these five kings that he lists in verse two.

And all of these, that is the four kings, came as allies to the valley of Sinim, that is the Salt Sea. Now, what we have here is basically a typical international squirmish. You have kings over these little individual city-states who have all made alliances together to go in and to plunder and conquer these other peoples who lived in the land of Israel, the southern end of that land, and to oppress them and to take from them and plunder them, and they were to do this together.

And those four kings ended up conquering those five kings. And so this is just standard international squirmish. Now, when I say international squirmish, these were city-states. So these are kings not of tens of millions, armies of tens of millions or anything like that.

We're not talking about armies of hundreds of thousands, maybe armies of hundreds, maybe armies of thousands. These are small. And keep in mind that this is not like China invading the United States. The land of Israel was about as wide as the Idaho Panhandle.

So this would be like the king of Noxon and Heron and Trout Creek making an alliance together and coming in and invading the Idaho Panhandle and conquering the king of Clark Fork and Hope and Sandpoint and Dover and Priest River.

That's what it would be like. So this is not a massive scale, and I'm gonna say Clark Fork without making any jokes because some of you laughed when I did that. This is an invasion on that type of a scale.

These are city-states, just hundreds of people in these armies that go out and they just plunder others, like tribes, that's what's going on. Now, some of the places are unknown to us that we just read there.

Some of them are known to us. Shinar is up in Babylon, which is north and east of the land of Israel. So you have people to the east, to the north, who have come down and they have invaded the land of Israel.

Some of the names are unknown to us. Some of the names are known to history. Picking up at verse four, 12 years they had served Chedder-Lamer, but the 13th year they rebelled. See how much easier it is when you just pronounce that Chedder-Lamer.

In the 14th year, Chedder-Lamer and the kings that were with him came and defeated the Rephaim in Ashtaroth, Curname, and the Zuzim in Ham and the Emam in Shavah Kiriathim and the Horites in their Mount Sierre, as far as El Perrin, which is in the wilderness.

Now, Mount Sierre, did I say Mount Pierre? I don't know, I don't know what I just said. But Mount Sierre, if you've ever seen Indian Jones, The Last Crusade, you remember the picture of that massive thing carved into the stone where the goblet is stored in there?

That's Mount Sierre, that's where the Edomites live. That's an actual place in the southern end of Israel, but it's way down in the south end of that. That wasn't a stage set up. That's an actual place you can go and tour today.

Now, the chalice is not inside of there, just in case you're curious. You can't go and see the chalice. That's not where they store it, but that place at Mount Sierre is what we're talking about. So the southern end of Israel, the four kings come in, made alliance, and they came in, they conquered all of that region, and then where are we at?

Verse seven, then they turned back and came to En Mishpet, which is Kadesh, and conquered all the country of the Amalekites and also the Amorites who lived in Hazazon Tamar, and the king of Sodom, and the king of Gomorrah, and the king of Admah, and the king of Zeboam, and the king of Bila, that is Zoar, came out, and they arrayed for battle against them in the Valley of Siddam against Chedorlamer, king of Elam, and Tidal, king of Goim, and Arafel, king of Sinai, and Ariok, king of Eleazar, four kings against five.

All that kind of repeats what we just said. Four kings made an alliance. They came into the southern region. They conquered all this territory and came back in, and they managed to conquer and go to war against these five kings who also had an alliance.

Verse 10, now the Valley of Siddam was full of tar pits, and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, and they fell into them, but those who survived fled to the hill country. Then they took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah and all their food supply and departed.

They also took Lot, Abraham's nephew, and his possessions, and departed, for he was living in Sodom. So having conquered all of that region, they plundered people and possessions. So they had all of this spoil and all of these peoples.

Now those four kings, in making that alliance and coming in and conquering all of those people, made one fundamental mistake. They came after the nephew of the one king in that area who had Yahweh on his side.

And if they had left Lot alone, you probably wouldn't read about what happens next, but they didn't. They took Lot and his possessions, so verse 13 says, then a fugitive came and told Abram the Hebrew, and this, by the way, is the first place in scripture where Abraham is called a Hebrew.

Now he was living by the Oaks of Mamre, the Amorite brother of Eshcol and brother of Aner, and these were allies with Abram. When Abraham heard that his relative had been taken captive, he let out his trained men, born in his house, 318, and went in pursuit as far as Dan.

So Abraham had his own private little army, people born inside of his household, probably slaves or servants or staff members. He was able to muster an army of 318 people, and he went in pursuit of these four kings as far as Dan.

Do you know where Dan is? Dan is as far north in the land of Israel as you can get. It is all the way up on the northern border at the headwaters of the Jordan River. That's where Dan is. Abraham and his men pursued and drove these four kings out of the land.

Verse 15, he divided his forces against them by night, he and his servants, and defeated them, and pursued them as far as Hobra, which is north of Damascus. Damascus is outside the land of Israel. It's even further north than Dan.

He brought back all the goods and also brought back his relative Lot with his possessions, also the women and the people. Abraham's army of 318 men conquered those other four kings who were all allied together.

That's why I say this is a small army. It's not that God can't do, God couldn't conquer an army of a million with 318 people. He can, but that number gives you some idea of the type of armies that we were dealing with amongst those different people groups.

Okay, so Abraham got back everything that God had given to him. Now, before we jump to Melchizedek, which is the next verse, just a second, why was this recorded, this invasion with the four kings against the five and the conquering and taking Lot and going and Adam, Abraham goes and he takes back possession of that and brings them all back, this massive war that went on.

Why did the Holy Spirit put that in there? And there's a lot of stuff that the Spirit could have told us about. Abraham, why this? So go back to chapter 13. What had God said to Abraham? Look around you, all of this land I'm going to give you.

And the next thing you know, they're invaded by four kings. They conquer that possession, that piece of land, take over all of that right under Abraham's nose and take his family, Lot, and his possessions.

Obviously, these people are a threat to Abraham. Do you see what has happened? God has promised Abraham the land. And the very next thing that Abraham sees is the invasion of that land whom God has promised to him.

I think that the reason the Spirit of God put this in here is to demonstrate to us and to Abraham that there is no army on the face of the earth, there is nothing that can happen in human history that will keep God from fulfilling his promises.

Because then he immediately gives Abraham the grace and the victory to go in and to conquer, to drive them out and to take back what God had given to Abraham. And that's a precursor of what Joshua would do 500 years later.

That's exactly what Joshua did. He came in and said, the land is ours and we're here to occupy it now. God had already given the land to Abraham, those kings invaded it, and Abraham drove them right out in partial fulfillment to that promise of God.

So now verse 17. Then after his return from the defeat of Chedder-Lamer and the kings who were with him, thankful we don't have to read all names of those kings again, right? Just Chedder-Lamer and the kings who were with him.

The king of Sodom went out to meet at the Valley of Sheba, that is in the king's valley. Now remember, Lot was part of Sodom and Abraham had rescued Lot and all of his possessions back. And now the king of Sodom, after Abraham had all of Sodom's possessions and Sodom's people and Lot and all of Lot's possessions, he has rescued all of that and brought it back down south to where Abraham lived.

Verse 18, or verse 17, says that the king of Sodom was there, I'm gonna skip over Melchizedek for a second, down at verse 21. The king of Sodom said to Abram, give the people to me and take the goods for yourself.

Abram said to the king of Sodom, I have sworn to the Lord God most high, possessor of heaven and earth, that I will not take a thread or a sandal thong or anything that is yours for fear that you would say I have made Abraham rich.

The king of Sodom went up to Abraham to get everything that belonged to him and he was content to just give Abraham all of the spoil. You keep all of the possessions, just let me have my people back. Just give me back the people, you keep all that they possess.

Maybe as trade just for what Abraham had done, Abraham had risked everything, gone after these people and done what the king of Sodom could not do and now Abraham had it and maybe the king of Sodom was willing just to give that to Abraham for the sake of, look, your time, your trouble, to replenish you for that, just let me have the people and you can keep the possessions and Abraham said no.

No, I have sworn by the God who owns everything, I'm not gonna take anything from you. Why would Abraham not take the spoil? He didn't want anybody to say that the king of Sodom, a wicked king, had made Abraham rich.

God had already promised to Abraham prosperity and the people and the land, everything. Abraham knew what was coming to him, he knew it was his and there was no way anybody was gonna be able to say, well, yeah, you're only rich because you plundered those people and you took a bunch of stuff from the wicked king of Sodom.