Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas

NT Framework - Our Priest is ready

• Jeremy Thomas • Season 6 • Episode 189

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In Judaism, the priest was in Jerusalem and you needed to travel to them. In Catholicism, the priest has certain times they will hear confession. In Christ though, our priest (The High Priest) is always available. 

More information about Beyond the Walls, including additional resources can be found at www.beyondthewalls-ministry.com 

This series included graphics to illustrate what is being taught, if you would like to watch the teachings you can do so on Rumble (https://rumble.com/user/SpokaneBibleChurch) or on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtV_KhFVZ_waBcnuywiRKIyEcDkiujRqP).

Jeremy Thomas is the pastor at Spokane Bible Church in Spokane, Washington and a professor at Chafer Theological Seminary. He has been teaching the Bible for over 20 years, always seeking to present its truths in a clear and understandable manner. 

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Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and our series on the New Testament framework. Today, a smaller, bite-sized piece from the larger lesson. We hope you enjoy it.

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Let's look at the third and fourth point, also both relating to his priesthood. Okay, and we'll look to Psalm 110.

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Psalm 110 is the most quoted Psalm in the New Testament. Psalm 110 verse.

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Like Melchizedek was before the Jewish system got started. So it's a return to something pre-Jewish here in Jesus' uh King priesthood. Now this is a a psalm that actually the Lord Jesus Christ dealt with the Pharisees on, and they struggled with this saying. So verse 1, the Lord says to my Lord. This is a Davidic Psalm. So David is saying this, right? David is saying, the Lord says to my Lord. And one of the big questions is, well, who could be David's Lord? I mean, David was the king. Who's higher than him? Who's higher than the king? Well, evidently somebody is, right? Somebody in verse one is higher than him. And he refers to him as my Lord, my Adonai. Okay, that Hebrew word Adonai, this title for God. And then there's another figure in verse one, right? And that's all capitals there. Do you have that in your Bible? Like all capitals, Lord, L-O-R-D, in all caps, which is always uh Yahweh. It's signifying to us the tetragrammaton. You know, the four letters that signify God, God's name. Y-H-W-H, Yahweh. Okay, we add some vowels in there so we can pronounce it, but there's none in the Hebrew. It's just Y-H-W-H. Okay. So you have Yahweh, and he's saying to Adon, and this is what David is is listening in on this conversation. Yahweh says to Adon, sit at my right hand. So we have two figures here that are both higher than David, and David observes the conversation. It's evidently between Yahweh the Father and Adon the Son, right? The Father than the Son. And the Father says to the Son, Sit at my right hand. Now that's the session, right? That's it. That's what happened when he went up at the ascension and he disappeared into the cloud. The next place he was was right here. And this conversation is the conversation that David heard. And that he prophetically recorded for us here. He saw the Father saying to the Son, Sit at my right hand. But notice there's a time frame until he's going to be sitting there until, there's your time word, until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet, which means to totally subjugate his enemies. That subjugation, has that happened? Has the subjugation of God's enemies happened in this world? No. We're waiting for the second coming. That's when this will happen. That's when the subjugation will happen. So he's going to be sitting at the right hand of the Father until the second coming, and that's when he's going to get up and he's going to come back, right? And he's going to literally take over the earth and set establish his kingdom. So verse 2, the Lord will stretch forth your strong scepter from Zion. Here we are again in Zion, right? Called in the other passage Mount Zion. It's on the earth. It's a place that we know of today. Rule in the midst of your enemies. Your people will volunteer, and now we get into the Jewish people who are involved. Your people will volunteer freely in the day of your power. In holy array from the womb of the dawn, your youth are to you as the dew. And then verse 4, we have it. The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek. Melchizedek. So king in verses 1 through 3, priests in verse 4, right? He is a king priest. But notice in the session there, the session in verse 1, he's going to be sitting there. As we saw in Psalm 2, he's praying that the Lord will give him the nations as his inheritance, the earth as his possession. He's praying, and he's waiting. Okay. So these are some of the things that he is doing in his current session. Now he's also, as we'll see in Hebrews, uh Psalm 1104 says in Hebrews that he is now a priest. So we might as well look at Hebrews 7.21. Hebrews 7. In fact, if you don't, if you don't come to Sunday school, uh Ken Bryan is doing a series on Hebrews. We got through chapter 3, so you're still in time, maybe, to understand chapter 6. I'm not sure. You may have to back up and go listen to the previous lessons because I don't know if you can understand chapter 6, the really controversial section, unless you understand chapters 3, 4, and 5. Right, Ken? Yeah, we're putting a plug in for that. Okay, really important. And um in the book of Hebrews, right, Jesus is better than everything. He's better than the angels, he's better than Moses, he's better than the old priesthood, okay, the Levitical one. And that's that's what he's saying here. And there's a lot of applications to that. That's why I want you to come to the class at 9 30 next week. But notice chapter 7, verse 21. Here's where he quotes that Psalm 1104. He says, in 21, for they indeed became priests without an oath, but he with an oath, through the one who said to him, and here it is, Psalm 110 and verse 4, the Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, you are a priest forever, so much the more also Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant. See, these two things are going together. This priesthood that Jesus now operates in at the right hand of the Father in his session, he's functioning as our priest, our great high priest. How many of you go to Jerusalem and go to a Levitical priest? Nobody? Good, because that system is over. It's been replaced with another system. Look at chapter 7, verse 12, while we're here. Well, 11 and 12. If perfection was through the Levitical priesthood, as they administered the Mosaic law and the sacrificial system, right? He says, for on the basis of it the people received the law. He says, if that if that could lead to perfection, what further need was there for any other priest to arise according to the order of Melchizedek? I mean, what would be the point? Okay. But then he says, verse 12, for when the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law also. Okay, so in other words, you had a Levitical priesthood, right? It was functioning up until the cross.

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Okay.

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But that priesthood has now been changed, right? Who's the priesthood now? Jesus, it's a Melchizedekian priesthood. Now, if you change the priesthood, what does verse 12 also say you have to change? The law. Now, question, are we therefore under the Mosaic law? No, because the priesthood's been changed. The only ones who could administer the Mosaic law were the Levitical priests. So if they're not administering it today, guess what? You certainly cannot function under it. Because they're the ones who administer it. But if we are under a different priesthood, a Melchizedekian priesthood, then that means we're under a different law. In the New Testament, in Galatians 6.2, it's called the law of Christ. It's also called that in 1 Corinthians 9 21. James calls it in James 2.12 the law of liberty. That's definitely not the Mosaic law. It's a new law that's being administered by a new priesthood, a Melchizedekian priesthood. And of course, as we saw in verse 22, it's based on a covenant. It's based on a covenant. How many of us are under the Mosaic covenant, the one that was made at Mount Sinai? Zero. Zero of us. Is that a bad thing? No, that's a good thing. We're under a better covenant, verse 22 says. It's the new covenant, right?

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Thank you for joining us on Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas. If you would like to see the visuals that went along with today's sermon, you can find those on Rumble and on YouTube under Spokane Bible Church. That is where Jeremy is the pastor and teacher. We hope you found today's lesson productive and useful in growing closer to God and walking more obediently with Him. If you found this podcast to be useful and helpful, then please consider rating us in your favorite podcast app. And until next time, we hope you have a blessed and wonderful day.