Sunday 14th
Hebrews 5:1-10
NIV (v2) – ‘He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray, since he himself is subject to weakness.’
ESV (v2) – ‘He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness.’
The text for today is expressing the necessary ability of every priest in the Old Testament to be able to represent the people and deal with the people because he himself knew the same weaknesses, we have already learned that because of what Jesus went through as a man, he is able as our great high priest to empathize with us in our weakness, we saw this in Hebrews 4:15 ‘For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.’ and in Hebrews 2:17-18 ‘Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.’
This should really encourage us and spur us on in our Christian life, we are not trying to make it on our own, we make it knowing that Jesus is interceding for us, he not only approaches God on our behalf but he comes alongside us, to help us, to carry us through.
I guess we have all been in a situation where someone has had a particular need and we feel helpless because we have not been in the same place to which they are found, it is always so much easier to enter into someone else’s experience if we have already been there ourselves. We can empathize with them because sometime in the past we had already been there. A typical example is a bereavement of a close family member such as a parent, it is not until we have lost a parent ourselves that we can truly know what someone else is going through when it happens to them.
I remember a very clear example, my mother died in November 2003 and less than two months later a lady in our Church at the time took ill and was taken into hospital, and I had a phone call from her son very early one Saturday morning to say that the hospital had rung to say she was dying, he asked if I would be willing to go over to the hospital. Now I was still feeling raw having only just lost my own mum, and so personally it was not an easy thing to do, but I wanted to be there for him and so went along and I sat there with him as his own mother passed away, but my own recent experience meant that at that very difficult time that he was going through I could empathize with him, I knew exactly how he was feeling because I had just been through the same.
This is exactly how it is with our great high priest, he has been where we are and he can empathize with us, he knows exactly how we are feeling and he is able to minister to us personally and minister for us in the presence of God.
This should encourage us, that even if we may have someone to turn to, we can still turn to Jesus, and even more importantly if we have no one to turn to, let us never forget we can always turn to Jesus, he is there in the presence of his Father on our behalf and for our behalf.
Over the next couple of days, I will continue to consider some various points concerning Jesus as our great high priest. Then as we continue through the book I will pick up on other points. As today we used a word beginning with the letter e (empathize) so will the other points. Example, Effective, Eternal.
Our verses tell us today that Jesus is where he is because he learned obedience, (v8 ‘Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered.’) that is that he was willing to fulfil his Father’s will right down to the minutest of details, and that meant going to the Cross and surrendering his life on our behalf.
This leads to our second word for tomorrow and that our great high priest has left us an example to follow.