For every high priest taken from among men is appointed for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins. (2) He can have compassion on those who are ignorant and going astray, since he himself is also subject to weakness. (3) Because of this he is required as for the people, so also for himself, to offer sacrifices for sins. (4) And no man takes this honor to himself, but he who is called by God, just as Aaron was. (5) So also Christ did not glorify Himself to become High Priest, but it was He who said to Him: “You are My Son, Today I have begotten you.” (6) As He also says in another place: “You are a priest forever According to the order of Melchizedek”;

The author of Hebrews is unknown. Our verses today begin the main section of Hebrews on Jesus as our High Priest. The Old Testament provides us, on the one hand, with the sense of the sovereignty, majesty and power of God. On the other hand it confronts us with the reality of human failure and needs. In light of these points the importance of sacrifices and priests emerges. We need to understand who God is and who we are. The only way to approach God was through His ordained mediator and the fact that all the Old Testament priests were themselves sinners points to the Inadequacy of the Old Covenant priests and the need for the perfect and forever High Priest, Christ Jesus, who provides us in His completed work with access to God.

In the Old Testament priests alone were designated to make offerings to God on behalf of the people. In due time Jesus Christ offered Himself as the perfect and final sacrifice for our sins. The gospel has to do with our fundamental alienation from God because of sin and the gracious provision God has made in His Son. Christ was designated by God as our perfect priest forever. The author’s point is that Christ jesus, in His prayers and obedience through His suffering, shows He can sympathize with us in our suffering. He is the perfect and forever High Priest who is the source of eternal salvation to all who obey Him. Eternal salvation in Christ is here contrasted with the temporary nature of Old Testament sacrifices.

Any system of salvation by good works makes Christ’s death unnecessary. We are saved by faith alone, in Christ alone, apart from works, but the kind of faith that saves necessarily results in good works. The High Priesthood of Christ and its ramifications is the primary subject of the epistle to the Hebrews.