Now follow along in your copies of God's Word as I begin reading in Hebrews 7, verse 1. For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him. And to him Abraham apportioned a tenth of everything. He is, first, by translation of his name, king of righteousness. And then he is also King of Salem, that is, King of Peace. He is without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God, he continues a priest forever. See how great this man was to whom Abraham the patriarch gave a tenth of the spoils. And by the way, before we go further, I thought about just preaching a sermon on tithing because of this passage. You realize tithing is not tied to the Old Testament law. It came before the law was ever given. It continues into the New Testament. It's not a matter of simply practicing the Mosaic law of the Old Testament. Abraham tithed to Melchizedek. But I won't preach this Sunday, the Sermon on Tithing, but maybe in the future. Back in verse four, see how great this man was to whom Abraham the patriarch gave a tenth of the spoils? And those descendants of Levi who received the priestly office have a commandment in the law to take tithes from the people, that is, from their brothers, though these also are descended from Abraham. But this man, who does not have his descent from them, received tithes from Abraham and blessed him who had the promises. It is beyond dispute that the inferior is blessed by the superior." He's saying Abraham is inferior to Melchizedek. Verse 8, in the one case, tithes are received by mortal men, but in the other case, by one of whom it is testified that he lives. One might even say that Levi himself, who receives tithes, paid tithes through Abraham, for he was still in the loins of his ancestor when Melchizedek met him. Verse 11, now if perfection had been attainable through the Levitical priesthood, for under it the people received the law. What further need would there have been for another priest to arise after the order of Melchizedek rather than one named after the order of Aaron? For when there is a change in the priesthood, there is necessarily a change in the law as well. For the one of whom these things are spoken belong to another tribe from which no one has ever served at the altar. For it is evident that our Lord was descended from Judah. And in connection with that tribe, Moses said nothing about priests. So the Old Testament priests came through Levi. Melchizedek was not part of the Levite line, of course, because he was well before Levi was ever born. Levi was still, as he says, in the loins of Abraham, so to speak. So Jesus did not come from the line of Levi. And Jesus came from the tribe of Judah. And he says that there's no priest from the tribe of Judah. So he's building the case that Jesus is better than the Levites, and we'll come to that in the sermon. But Melchizedek comes from a genealogy that we don't know. And so in that sense, he is like Jesus, or Jesus is like, or he's a type of Jesus. Verse 15, I think that's where we stopped. This becomes even more evident when another priest arises in the likeness of Melchizedek, who has become a priest not on the basis of a legal requirement concerning bodily descent, but by the power of an indestructible life. For it is witnessed of him, and this is from Psalm 110 that we use as the opening call to worship, you are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. For on the one hand, a former commandment is set aside because of its weakness and uselessness. For the law made nothing perfect. But on the other hand, a better hope is introduced through which we draw near to God. And it was not without an oath. For those who formerly became priests were made such without an oath, but this one was made a priest with an oath by the one who said to him, the Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, you are a priest forever. This makes Jesus the guarantor of a better covenant. The former priests were many in number because they were prevented by death from continuing in office. But he holds his priesthood permanently because he continues forever. Consequently, and this is the summary of the whole chapter, consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost. those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. For it was indeed fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens. He has no need like those high priests to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people. Since he did this once for all, when he offered up himself. For the law appoints men in their weakness as hypes, but the word of the oath, which came later than the law, appoints a son who has been made perfect forever. This ends the reading of God's word. And by his grace would he enable us to be doers of his word and not merely hearers. Well, as we begin this new chapter, we're actually beginning a topic that the writer introduced back in chapter five. If you've been here, you'll remember that throughout the whole book of Hebrews, the writer has been proving that Jesus is superior to anyone and everyone. We started with the evidence that Jesus is better than the angels. He's better than the prophets of old. He's better than Moses, better than Joshua, better than Aaron, and better than the Old Testament priests. And then in chapter 5, he introduced a rather odd character. And I say odd because we don't know very much about this man, and yet he's exalted in the Bible above Abraham and above all the Levitical priests. He was both a priest and a king prior to the people of God ever having a priest or a king. His name, of course, is Melchizedek, as we've read. Well, as the writer of Hebrews says in chapter five, the whole topic of Melchizedek is hard to explain. That's the writer's words in Hebrews five. It's difficult because all we know about Melchizedek literally is given to us in three verses in Genesis 14, this one verse in Psalm 110, and this passage here for us here in Hebrews. But by the way, isn't that a wonderful statement about the inspiration of Scripture. God gives us this story of an odd man that appears just very, very briefly in Abraham's life in Genesis chapter 14. And then many, many hundreds of years later, the Holy Spirit inspires King David to predict, to give a messianic psalm referring to Melchizedek. And then many, many, many hundreds of years later again, the Holy Spirit inspires the writer of Hebrews to give us more details about this man, Melchizedek. We certainly have a wonderful God who has given us a wonderful book containing the story of our redemption. It is inspired, infallible, and inerrant. You can trust the Word of God. Well, back to this chapter. I think, again, it would be easy to get lost in the details of chapter 7 and miss the main reason why the writer brings up Melchizedek. The main purpose of the book, remember, is to give us assurance by proving that Jesus is better, that Jesus is superior to everyone and everything. And when you grasp the greatness of Christ, you will have a greater faith, a greater assurance that He is yours and you are His. Jesus is the superior high priest. He's superior to all of the Old Testament priests and kings. This passage reaches the crescendo in verse 25. You can see that through the word consequently, that's a simple way of saying everything that I have said in the first 24 verses, now this is why I've said it. Consequently, Jesus is able to save to the uttermost. those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them." What a rich, rich statement. The first 24 verses, no question, are complex. They're hard to understand. But verse 25 is wonderfully plain. It gives us three great promises. Christ saves to the uttermost. He always lives to make intercession for us. And this intercession and salvation are for those who draw near to God through Christ. Three great promises about our salvation that are revealed through Melchizedek and the high priests. The first one, Our salvation has no holes. Our salvation has no holes. Christ is able to save to the uttermost. When the writer says that, it means that there are no holes in our salvation. The ESV, our translation, we read from it, and several other translations use the word uttermost. Other translations will use words such as completely, that he's able to save completely. Or another one is that he is able to save forever. All of that means is that the point of our salvation is that it is complete. and it will continue forever. There are no holes, there are no missing parts in our salvation. He saves us to the uttermost, completely, forever. When our children were young, We, like you, buy gifts for our children, whether birthdays, or Christmas, or what have you. Anyone that has children has had the experience when they've at least reached the age three or higher, where you order this gift from Amazon, or you buy it in some local store, and it comes in a big box, and you're excited about it. The model on display looked incredible. You open the box, and there's a million parts. For someone like me, I love to assemble and disassemble things. Never mind about the instructions. But nothing can be more frustrating than when you assemble something and there are parts missing. It's completely useless. It loses its value. I have learned that the instructions, one of the very first pages after all their lawsuit protection, all the warnings, one of the first pages is a parts list so that you can look and make sure that all the parts are there before you start to assemble this complex thing. Well, even more important, our salvation has no parts missing. It is thoroughly complete. It is complete to the uttermost. It's forever. What a wonderful promise that we have from the Scriptures, that there is nothing missing in our salvation. Now, some may wonder, from what do we need to be saved? We've got a good life. I don't need salvation. I am incredibly blessed. Well, at this point, we need to be very clear about what the Bible says about salvation. What are we being saved from? And for today, specifically according to this passage. Well, I think John Piper said it best. He said, we need to be saved from God. Think about that. We need to be saved from God. And then Piper said, we need to be saved from the wrath of God that burns against all ungodliness and unrighteousness. We need to be saved from God. The major problem in our world and in our own lives is not our wayward children, or troubled marriages, or financial pressures, or failing health, or our cultural degeneration. That's not our main problem. They all point to our main problem, but they're not our main problem. The main problem in the world, everybody's problem, is how to be reconciled with God so that we escape his terrifying wrath at the judgment day. That's the main problem. And the biblical answer has always been the priesthood. Now that might not be what you were expecting me to say. The biblical answer to our problem and our need to be reconciled with God has always been revealed through the priesthood. The reason that there were priests in the Old Testament is that priests were needed to intercede between man and God. They entered the holy place where others were not allowed to go. They offered sacrifices for man so that sins would be forgiven. All of that priestly system and the sacrifices were meant to teach us about our sin and the wrath of God and the judgment, the inescapable judgment that was going to come because of our sin. The point of it all was this, God has made a way to get right with God. and was revealed through the priesthood. God has made a way to get right with God. He provided the priest in the Old Testament and then he provided his son, the final superior priest. And so the reason for all this teaching about Christ and Melchizedek in verses one through 24 is because the eternal superior priesthood of Jesus is our hope of eternal salvation. God's wrath never changes. There's only one hope for sinners like you and like me. We must have a faithful high priest who will intercede for us forever. We need a king of righteousness. We need a king of peace. We need someone without beginning or ending, someone who will never die or need to be replaced. We need someone greater than Abraham, greater than Levi, someone like Melchizedek, who blessed Abraham, who received tithes from Abraham. We need a new and greater high priest. All that the Old Testament priesthood could do was to point toward the one superior high priest whose sacrifice of himself would guarantee our salvation and grant us hope. God's way of solving our sin problem and giving us hope is revealed through the priesthood. God has done it. He's given us a priest, his own son. It was God the Father's idea. He sent the priest. He sent his own son. This is the love of God rescuing us from the wrath of God. And because of God's great love for us, There's no holes in our salvation. His sacrifice is complete. It's perfect. That's one. Our salvation has no holes. Secondly, our salvation has no end. The second great promise, verse 25, is that our salvation depends on the active work of Christ forever and ever, not merely on the past work of Christ. It says that Jesus is able to save forever since He always lives to make intercession. necessarily wise to always talk about or refer to our salvation as a past event, something that happened when Jesus died and rose again on the third day. Those are historical events, they're true, they're important, we ought to talk about them, but our salvation is much more than just a past event. It continues on. Christ died and rose, but today we are saved by the eternal intercession of Jesus for us. He always lives to make intercession for us. We are saved eternally by the eternal prayers of our high priest, Jesus Christ. Now this is another point of comparison with Melchizedek. In verse 3, Maybe the most difficult verse, description at least of Melchizedek, where it says that he was without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God, he continues a priest forever. At first this is a very confusing statement. It has led some to think that Melchizedek was not a man but an angel. It has led many, and this is a pretty interesting view and a pretty strong view, is that He was the pre-incarnate Christ. You see, there are several times in the Old Testament where Jesus appeared to His people, and there are some that are very plain. This one isn't quite as plain as those, but it's possible. It is a possibility. Others have even said that Melchizedek was actually Shem, one of the sons of Noah that blessed Abraham. And Shem did live a very long life, and it's possible, historically possible at least, that it was Shem. But none of those of you really carry a lot of strong biblical support that you could say dogmatically that that's what it is. I tend to lean more toward the explanation that this was a common way in Jewish tradition to refer to someone whose genealogy was not known. That they have no father or mother, it's simply not known where he came from. The history doesn't record when he died. It's not that he was eternal, there's just no record of it. Also, the fact that Melchizedek is not a Levite, and obviously since Aaron hadn't been born yet, or that Levi hadn't been born yet, there's no historical connection, obviously, to the Levites. But also, it's important because in the Levites, they were limited to only 25 years of service as a priest. From the age 25 to the age of 50 was the time frame that they could serve. And the fact that Melchizedek does not have a record, historical record of his lifetime, it gives the appearance of eternality. See, Melchizedek is what we call a type of Christ. He is not Christ, some think that He is the pre-incarnate Christ, but He is a type of Christ. Such as we use the Lamb on the Day of Atonement is a type of Christ. He is not the Christ, He is a type. He represents what is to come in its fullness. And that's my personal opinion of Melchizedek, and I say my personal opinion because it's difficult to prove dogmatically, because there's just not enough given to us in the historical record. But I don't think that Melchizedek was eternal. I do think he was a physical man, a king of Salem, or otherwise as the ancient city of Jerusalem. He is a sign, a type, a representation of the Christ. But the point being here is that Jesus has no end. God uses a common, ordinary Jewish practice of the limited service of a Levitical priest to show that Jesus is not limited by time. He has no end. He is the eternal Son, the eternal High Priest. Your salvation has no end. Therefore, it is not only complete, it goes on forever. Jesus always lives to make intercession for us. Therefore, we should not fear the judgment, We don't have to fear judgment day. Our salvation is complete. There's no holes. There's nothing missing that God will say, oops, forgot about that one, didn't you? Jesus didn't cover that one. No, it's complete. There's no holes. But it's also eternal. You don't have to fear possibly losing your salvation. Jesus always lives to make intercession for us. He never stops interceding for you at the throne of God. If He did stop, we'd be in trouble. But He always lives to make intercession. And then lastly, our salvation has no alternate saviors. Notice again, verse 25, He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him, through Jesus. So what do we need in order to be saved? We need to draw near to God through Jesus. Don't go back to Judaism. Don't go back to the old way of living. Jesus is the only way. There are no other paths to God. He is the only high priest that can pay for our sin by offering himself as our sacrifice. Melchizedek was a king of Salem, or ancient Jerusalem, which means king of peace. But notice what he says also, the title that comes first. His name, Melchizedek, means king of righteousness. And I think the order of these names or titles is extremely important. He's the king of righteousness and the king of peace. You cannot have peace until you have righteousness. Without the righteousness of Christ, there is no peace. Melchizedek, or any priest, could not make a sinner righteous. Well, he could rule righteously, and he did so apparently. He's the king of righteousness. He ruled righteously, but he could not make someone righteous, only Christ. And this is how Jesus is better than Melchizedek. Christ can make you righteous. He also has provided the means. Through His sacrifice, He provided the means to make us clothed in His righteousness. And when the righteousness of Jesus is applied to our account, then we can be at peace with God. Then we can draw near to God. Without the righteousness of Christ we have no hope, we have no peace. Now the verb here, draw near, indicates a present continuous action. We don't need to get too technical, but it's not, he does not say that we drew near at one time. When we were a child, we accepted Christ. When we walked an aisle, we drew near a past action. No, this is a present continuous action. It means that we continue drawing near to Him. If we don't continue drawing near to God, then we have no reason to think that we are being saved by the Lord Jesus Christ. And this connects us again to the warnings of chapter six, that there are those among us that are not with us. that are not of us. They're not of us because they are not still with us. They have left us. But you are continuing to draw near. You are continuing. You're still with us. God has made it possible for us to draw near to Him. That's absolutely mind-blowing that the God who is holy in all ways has made it possible for sinners like you and me to draw near, and it's through Jesus. Isn't it a wonderful thing to know that God bids us to come? Come near to me. This great holy God of righteousness and love and wrath actually says, draw near to me through my Son, your High Priest. Draw near, come, and I will never cast you out. Christ is able, He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him. because He always lives to make intercession for us. Our salvation has no holes. There's nothing left unfinished or incomplete. Our salvation has no end. God is not unjust. He will keep you forever. Our salvation has no alternate saviors. Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain and He washed it white as snow. There's no other name given among men by which we must be saved. Jesus is the only way, the truth and the life. There's no other way to the Father except through Him. So draw near. draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Let us pray. And as I pray, I invite the officers to come forward for the Lord's Supper. Our Heavenly Father, we thank You that You sent Your Son, our great High Priest, who is even better than Melchizedek, to provide a salvation that is thoroughly complete, that will never end. And Father, how thankful we are that there are no other saviors, that Christ is sufficient. Oh Lord, forgive us if we live in guilt, practically saying that our salvation isn't complete. O Lord, forgive us if we live in constant doubts, denying your promises that our salvation will go on forever. And O Lord, forgive us if we have placed our hope in something other than Jesus. He is superior to everyone and everything, but that is so easy to say. and so hard to live by. O Father, grant us the faith to live in gratitude and joyfulness, knowing that we are saved completely. Grant us, O Lord, the confidence, the boldness to live faithfully to the end. without any fear. Lord, grant us the audacity to live so boldly as to not simply desire comfort, safety, or security. but to live passionately that Jesus is the only way. There is no other. And everybody needs to hear about it. Grant us, O Lord, the ability to be doers of your word. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.