Such a high priest truly meets our need—one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens.
Hebrews 7:26
Go into a car dealership and the first question from the sales associate is, “So, what are your needs for your car?” Sit down with a financial adviser and they ask a similar question, “What are your financial needs and goals?” When you go to buy a house, the realtor will ask about your needs too. How many bedrooms? How many baths? What school district were you thinking about?
Needs are a big question in all areas of our lives. Our shopping list is really our needs scribbled down on a crumpled piece of paper. Driving directions are a list of needs that we have to go through to get to our destination.
The question of needs is nothing new. They Hebrews were struggling with their needs. It went something like this. If Jesus died for all our sins, then our need for forgiveness has been taken care of. Once and for all. So, if all sin is totally paid for, why do we have to keep on making sacrifices?
So, this is why the writer is spending so much time on this priesthood question. If Jesus didn’t die for all our sins, then we better get back to the Temple and start offering sacrifices again. And we’ve got to make up for all the sacrifices we’ve been missing while we got sidetracked.
But Jesus isn’t just another priest. Not on your life. He’s way so much different and better than any other priest. In the history of all the priests in the word, Jesus stands alone. Every other priest had to make a sacrifice for their own sin. But not Jesus. Just look at these five very unique qualifications that Jesus brings to the table.
Holy. Jesus was personally holy. Because of the way he was conceived by the Holy Spirit[1], Jesus was born without our sinful nature[2]. He’s never been dirtied by sin.
Blameless. Jesus in his person and personality was free from evil. This let him live a gentle life. He didn’t have to try and impress people. He was comfortable and calm within himself, not needing reassurance from anyone else.
Pure. Even though Jesus lived in a sinful world, surrounded by evil just like you and me, he stayed free from everything that’s deformed or stained. It never infected him personally.
Set apart from sinners. There was a space between Jesus and everyone else. He wasn’t in a bubble, but he was insulated from our sin infecting him. His contact with sinners never made him one.
Exalted above the heavens. After coming down from heaven, he returned without being changed or made dirty by living down here with sinners like you and me.
It’s amazing to me that he could come down to this filthy planet that we’ve just totally messed up, and that he could go back to heaven[3]. Heaven, the place of perfection and the total absence of sin. Sin didn’t stick on Jesus. Sinners didn’t leak their sin onto Jesus and make him one of us.
Think about it this way. When I was a kid, my mom told me that it was time to mop the floor. She filled the bucket up with hot water. Using the mop to stir in the floor cleaner, she then handed me the mop and told me to get to work. And that’s what I did.
I put the mop in the water and then squeezed out the excess. Then I started mopping the floor. All the dust and dirt came off the floor and onto the mop. I then put the mop into the bucket and rinsed off the dirt and started mopping again. The more I mopped, the dirtier the water got. This is the way it works in this world.
But not with Jesus. On the cross he takes all our dirty sin on himself. He cleans us through and through. But he never gets dirty. It’s like he cleans the floor, but the mop and water never get dirty. He pays for all our sins and it doesn’t make him dirty.
When the Hebrews were reading this letter for the first time, just touching something unclean would make you unclean. You then had to do something to become clean again. You couldn’t touch a dead body or someone sick. Touching blood immediately made you unclean. As the priests were getting ready to make a sacrifice, they had to make sure they didn’t touch anyone or anything unclean. They even had to make sacrifices to make themselves clean.
This is another thing that makes Jesus just so different and amazing. He’s not only a priest who’s free of sin, but he’s the spotless lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world[4]. He was without blemish or defect[5].
Now, it’s up to us. Are we going to receive God’s one-time sacrifice for all sin, or are we going to continue living with guilt and shame? Are we going to try and make ourselves better? Are we going to try and meet our own needs, or are we going to trust in Jesus?
Noodling Questions
How do you figure out what you need? How do you move things on/off the list?
How does Jesus take all our sins and not get dirty himself?
Why is receiving Jesus’ payment for all our sins so humbling?
[1] Luke 1:35
[2] Psalm 51:5
[3] Luke 24:51
[4] John 1:29
[5] 1 Peter 1:19
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