Hebrews - Back to the Burning Bush Report #4 Melchizedek

The account of Moses’s distraction by a bush that appeared to be burning but never consumed is well known. The initial distraction quickly transformed into a holy encounter with God, Moses removed his shoes and walked barefoot on holy ground.

This is as typical as it is unique. Something gets our attention and before we know it, we’re grappling with a depth of thought that carries us towards God…or God comes close to us.

I’m reading through Hebrews in the New Testament (my money is on Paul as the author, but the authorship isn’t known).

This series is like a journalist reporting on scenes he’s been sent to comment on.

Report 4 – Melchizedek

‘In the likeness of Melchizedek…another priest has come, not according to the law…but according to the power of an endless life’ 7v15,16

Hebrews 7 and subsequent chapters are a Old Testament bible study led by the unknown author of the letter. It’s fascinating to follow his interpretation the Old Testament scriptures concerning Melchizedek.

Please, go ahead, dive in, and enjoy it to the full. Better still, perhaps read Romans and Hebrews in tandem and become so immersed in both that you end up letting the gospel bind you forever to the freedom it offers.

The purpose of this post, though, is not to summarise the bible study carried out by the author, but to fix our attention on the purpose of the letter.

The author is urging his Jewish brothers and sisters in Christ to push on, and push on specifically in Christ to maturity, sometimes translated as perfection, and not to fall back into the hands of the Law of Moses and re-embrace Judaism, but to keep their faith alive in the Messiah risen from the dead.

He asserts in 7v11 that maturity/perfection cannot be attained under or through the law, ‘If perfection were through the Levitical priesthood under which the people received the Law, what need would there be for the priesthood according to the order of Melchizedek?’

David had prophesied in Ps110v4 ‘The Lord has sworn and will not relent, You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek’ referring to the coming Messiah who would replace the Levitical priesthood with his own Melchizedek order priesthood.

The key phrase in this Report #4 is ‘the power of an endless life’, we could, in fact, reduce that further to ‘endless life’.

Every Christian believer in Christ is baptised into this endless life. It is our source of hope, and it is true whatever our circumstances. Endless life is far, far more than simply lasting forever as if time were the preoccupation of the Messiah.

He has the power to bring us to maturity, body, mind, and spirit.

Jesus modelled this for us:

‘And the child (Jesus) grew and became strong in spirit, filled with wisdom and the grace of God was upon Him’ Luke 2v40

‘And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and men’ v52

Later, of course, this would be amended to include opposition from other men, and ultimately his arrest, interrogation, torture, crucifixion, and death.

Dark days, weakness, sin, Satan – we continue to experience the reality of all these things, but none of them undermine or even touch the reality of being included in the Melchizedek order as priests in Christ, not powered by our own abilities and efforts but by the power of His endless life.

In fact, it is often by overcoming our weaknesses, setbacks, disappointments, shortcomings, and sufferings through Christ that we prove to be the stepping stones we needed.

Once again, we are standing on holy ground. Reading on from chapter 7 we learn that Jesus is standing in the true holy of holies, in heaven, and that we have been placed in Him…in His holiness.

When we have our eyes opened to see where we truly are, in the holy of holies in Christ, our response is to remove our shoes…removing anything that has become a barrier to His holiness. We are to walk here in contact with His holiness and let His holiness rub along the soles of our feet.

True Christianity is born in this intimacy. What we do in this world must, like with Moses, find its origin here, on holy ground.