Hebrews Talk 8 (4:14-5:10)
Chris Cooke · Hebrews
8 March 2026
https://media.glenabbey.church/talks/hebrews-talk-8-4-14-5-10

[0:00] I was pondering this week and I was thinking there's this sort of new role that has sort of gained traction in recent years, maybe to do with social media, and it's this role of the sort of coach or mentor.
[0:17] And you see a lot of this, maybe some of you actually are in some shape or form a coach or a mentor, or maybe you have received coaching or mentoring from somebody else.
[0:28] So, for example, that might be in your professional life.
[0:32] You may have been a coach or you may have been coached.
[0:34] It may be in the world of personal training in a gym where you have a PT, for short, in terms of that.
[0:40] It may be that you are or you have received coaching from, have you heard of these guys, life coaches?
[0:47] I always think that sounds quite arrogant.
[0:49] I'm able to advise you in every single aspect of your life with expertise.
[0:54] But there are people out there who are life coaches.
[0:56] And I'm not dissing this at all.
[0:58] I think that that relationship of coach and mentor with somebody can be incredibly helpful in all sorts of contexts.
[1:06] But what I was thinking about was, and I'm going to ask you this question, if you were looking for a coach or a mentor in your life, what sort of person would be the best sort of person for you?
[1:19] What sort of characteristics, what sort of attributes, what sort of personality might you be looking for?
[1:26] And I was pondering this this week, and the only environment that I've been where there are coaches in my local gym, I don't have a PT, I'm far too tight to spend money on that sort of thing, but there are lots of other people who do, and there are, in the gym that I go to, there are lots and lots of personal trainers available to choose from.
[1:44] And what I was doing when I was sitting this week, I was looking and thinking, I wonder why that person chose that PT, or that person chose that one, and so on.
[1:54] And my reflections are in no way scientific, they're only anecdotal, but what I started to see was, if there are young men, for example, who have a personal trainer, and there aren't many, because young men think they know it all, so they don't need one, but if they do have one, they tend to choose a personal trainer who is the perfect embodiment of the physical specimen that they would like to be.
[2:16] But then other choices and other people, they make their choices based in a much more nuanced way than that.
[2:25] For example, there are a number of young mums that come into the gym that I go to.
[2:31] And you realise as you look in terms of the person that they have chosen to be their personal trainer, it's very different.
[2:38] You see, they want someone who genuinely understands them.
[2:45] They want somebody who knows just how hard it is even to get out of the house in the first place.
[2:50] They want somebody who knows just how intimidating it is to cross the threshold into an environment like that.
[2:58] They want somebody who knows the chaos of the house that they've just left behind.
[3:03] They want somebody who understands them and can empathize with them, not just in terms of what they're wanting to achieve physically, but also in terms of their psychology and their emotions and so on.
[3:15] and so ideally what they're looking for is someone who has walked that walk before them and someone who truly gets it yes somebody in that situation wants their their pt to be qualified and and really know their stuff but probably even more than that they want them to understand and have empathy and have compassion.
[3:43] And if you're wondering what sort of thing I might be looking for, if I was looking for a coach, a personal trainer, to be honest with you, I think this is what I need more.
[3:51] If we put this up, I don't need a personal trainer so much as I need someone to follow me around and slap unhealthy foods out of my hand.
[3:59] And so if you are qualified or skilled in that in any shape or form, feel free to come up to me afterwards.
[4:06] We can explore fees and prices and all that sort of thing, if that's something you might be interested in doing.
[4:14] The verses that we are looking at today, at the end of Hebrews 4 and into the beginning of Hebrews 5, begin the writer's extended focus on the identity of Jesus as our high priest and what that means.
[4:32] It's an argument that sort of spans across chapter 5 and chapter 6 and chapter 7.
[4:37] So we're going to be looking at this for a while, but it begins today.
[4:41] And his focus here is not so much on the ceremonial role of the high priest.
[4:48] That one that we talked about on the Day of Atonement in the temple back in the early part of the series.
[4:53] But more in the role of the high priest in that practical support, that help and encouragement.
[5:02] for the people through the ups and the downs and the challenges and the joys and the sorrows of their journey towards their destination.
[5:13] And the writer's overriding goal in all that he writes across these three chapters is to fill his audience and is to fill us with just the amazement and the wonder and the joy and the assurance of grasping and knowing and then living in the reality that we have a great high priest
[5:43] and his name is Jesus.
[5:46] Because I don't think, if we're being honest, that that is a reality we live in all of the time.
[5:54] Here's what the writer says in the verses that we're looking at this morning.
[5:58] Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus, the son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.
[6:07] For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are, yet he did not sin.
[6:19] Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
[6:31] Every high priest is selected from among the people and is appointed to represent the people in matters related to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.
[6:40] He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray since he himself is subject to weakness.
[6:48] This is why he has to offer sacrifices for his own sins as well as for the sins of the people.
[6:54] And no one takes this honor on himself, but he receives it when called by God, just as Aaron was.
[7:02] In the same way, Christ did not take on himself the glory of becoming a high priest, but God said to him, you are my son.
[7:10] Today I have become your father.
[7:13] And he says then in another place, you are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.
[7:19] And during the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death.
[7:29] And he was heard because of his reverent submission.
[7:34] Son, though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered.
[7:41] And once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
[7:55] We'll come back to the last three verses of chapter four as we lead into communion in a little while.
[8:01] But I just want to begin by focusing in on these 10 verses in chapter five.
[8:06] And as we do so, I want us again, like we've been doing, I want us to put ourselves into the shoes of the original audience, into the mindset of the original audience as they hear these words being spoken to them, being read out to them in their gathering.
[8:25] And you'll remember the writers already, a couple of other times already, just highlighted, not really said an awful lot about it, but just highlighted this identity of Jesus as their high priest.
[8:37] But again, if we put ourselves in their shoes, we would realize that actually him calling Jesus that would raise all sorts of questions in their minds.
[8:49] There would have been a number of barriers to them just being able to accept that Jesus could be their high priest.
[8:59] And there are really three core questions that would have cropped up in their mind.
[9:03] First, there's a question of heritage.
[9:06] These Jewish Christians, they would know that every high priest since Aaron has always been in the line of the tribe of Levi.
[9:17] You're not allowed to take a high priest from any other tribe.
[9:21] No one else is allowed to take that place.
[9:23] But yet Jesus, of course, if we know this was from the line of Judah.
[9:28] So how can Jesus from the line of Judah occupy this office, this role of high priest.
[9:38] Then connected to that, there is the question, and it's a serious question.
[9:41] You think of how serious this would be to this audience.
[9:45] There's the question of the implications for Judaism, what the writer is saying here.
[9:50] If the writer is claiming that Jesus is, at present, the true high priest, what does that mean for the high priest that is currently serving in the temple in Jerusalem?
[10:03] Is he now redundant?
[10:05] Is his role now obsolete?
[10:07] These are big questions for these people.
[10:12] Does the same go for the temple?
[10:13] Does the same go for the whole system of the sacrificial worship?
[10:18] And then finally, there's the crucial question of this.
[10:25] If Jesus is the divine son of God, as the writer has been arguing in earlier chapters,
[10:32] in all his deity and all his majesty and all his holiness,
[10:38] seated in heaven at the right hand of the Father and majesty, how could he be able to empathize with?
[10:48] How could he be able to understand the plight and the weakness and the experiences of ordinary people like them in the way that the high priest in the temple in Jerusalem came.
[11:03] Surely this is like a king on a subject.
[11:05] Surely he's just so far removed and would be so aloof.
[11:11] How could that be the key?
[11:14] So you see, the writer can't simply say to this audience, Jesus is our high priest, isn't it great?
[11:21] There are barriers that he has to get them past.
[11:24] There are questions that he has to respond to.
[11:27] And the way he seeks to do that here in these verses is to give them those robust answers to their questions through another compare and contrast exercise between Aaron, the original high priest appointed by God back in the story of the Israelites in the wilderness and Jesus.
[11:48] It's not unlike what he does with Moses and Jesus in chapter 3.
[11:53] It's just not quite as overt.
[11:54] So what we're going to do is we're going to look at Aaron, then we're going to look at Jesus, and then we're going to think through some of those implications.
[11:59] So he begins his argument then to this audience with what is deeply familiar and important to them, the role of the duties of the high priest in the lives of the people and the skills and the personality and the attributes and the characteristics that the role of the high priest requires.
[12:19] And he highlights Aaron as that original one, And it's interesting to consider how Aaron maps onto these verses, the first four verses in this chapter.
[12:32] If you think back to that story in Exodus, think back to that Israelite escape from Egypt, their years in the wilderness.
[12:41] God chose Moses to be their prophet,
[12:46] but he chose Aaron, Moses' older brother, to be their high priest.
[12:51] Why did he choose Aaron and not Moses for that role?
[12:56] Well, it's because of the central aspect of the role highlighted in verse one.
[13:00] Every high priest is selected from among the people.
[13:04] He is one of the people and is appointed to represent the people in matters related to God.
[13:11] And if we remember, Moses was adopted by Pharaoh's daughter, and he was raised from a very young age in the luxury of the royal palace.
[13:23] By stark contrast, Aaron, along with the rest of the people, was raised and grew up as an Israelite slave in Egypt.
[13:32] The people would have seen him suffer and struggle alongside him.
[13:37] They would have seen him experience their hardship, their pain, Their shame of being slaves under these Egyptian masters.
[13:48] Aaron was from among the people.
[13:51] Moses, in that sense, was not.
[13:56] And we see that then, that natural and instinctive affiliation of Aaron being for the people, highlighted throughout the Exodus narrative.
[14:09] sometimes with disastrous consequences if we think of the most obvious story of the idol, the golden calf.
[14:18] And yet even when Aaron capitulated to the people in that sense and got all their golden jewelry together and made that golden calf, it's interesting that God didn't use that episode and shelve his plan to make Aaron their high priest.
[14:37] he continued with his plan.
[14:40] Aaron didn't claim the high priestly role for himself, as this writer alludes to here, but fulfilled the calling of God who appointed him.
[14:47] God didn't give Aaron that honor because he was morally perfect.
[14:51] It's quite clear that he wasn't.
[14:54] But because, in the words of this writer, he was able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and in going astray since he himself is subject to weakness because of his weakness.
[15:11] That's what makes him the right fit.
[15:13] Remember back to week two of this series when we looked at the temple and the tabernacle, how Aaron and every high priest since all the way up to the time of the writing of this letter, they first had to sacrifice a bull for their own sins before they sacrificed the goat for the sins of the people.
[15:34] Because of his own weakness and his own sinfulness, Aaron was able to empathize.
[15:40] He was able to help the people with gentleness and with understanding and with compassion.
[15:49] He was able to curb his frustration and his impatience with them because he knew he was the same.
[15:57] He knew in his heart he was just the same as them.
[15:59] He was prone to the same weakness and ignorance and strength.
[16:04] In Aaron, the people had one of them who could empathize with them and so could be trusted to represent them and advocate for them well before God.
[16:17] God in his mercy gave them Aaron, not Moses, as their high priest.
[16:24] So that's Aaron.
[16:26] That's every high priest in his line that has followed him all the way through to whatever ancestor would have been the high priest in the temple when the writer is writing this letter.
[16:39] And then now with that foundation laid of what is familiar to them, the writer now swings the spotlight round onto Jesus.
[16:51] And he begins to respond to their questions.
[16:57] So in verses 5 and 6, he deals with that first question.
[17:01] How could Jesus in the line of Judah ever rightly claim to be high priest?
[17:09] Well, look at how he responds.
[17:12] He does what he's done already twice.
[17:14] He brings out the Psalms again.
[17:17] Remember, he's already brought out Psalm 8.
[17:20] He's already brought out Psalm 95 and said, look at your own scriptures.
[17:23] Look at what is said.
[17:24] Look at what is prophesied.
[17:27] and he does the same again here now with a combination of two messianic psalms psalm 2 and psalm 110 and he puts them in front of these people and he says look at what is said here's what he says in the same way christ did not take on himself the glory of becoming high priest christ didn't jesus didn't take this on himself he was appointed by god look at what the psalms say Psalm 2, you are my son.
[17:53] Today I have become your father.
[17:57] And then he says in another place, Psalm 110.
[18:01] A psalm, in fact, that Jesus himself is recorded in the gospels of attributing to himself when he is talking to the Jewish leaders.
[18:11] So this isn't anything new in that sense.
[18:14] But what he says here is, you are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek, the son, the Lord at the beginning of Psalm 110 is also then appointed the priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.
[18:31] So basically what the writer is saying to them here and putting these Psalms in front of them is this, look, see how David prophesies, see how he proclaims that the coming Messiah is also the one who God has said will become the high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
[18:49] In other words, it was always God's plan that one day he would appoint his son as the people's ultimate and eternal high priest.
[19:04] The high priesthood in the temple in Jerusalem was never meant to be the ultimate thing.
[19:11] It was always only meant to be a shadow pointing to the ultimate role of the son as the great high priest.
[19:21] That's what the writer's trying to get these people to see.
[19:26] And in fact then it's crucial.
[19:28] It's crucial that Jesus isn't in Aaron's line, that he isn't from the tribe of Levi, that his high priesthood actually comes from a different order, through a different order, through the order of Melchizedek.
[19:42] And I know some of you might be asking here, who is this person Melchizedek?
[19:48] Well, Melchizedek's a mysterious character.
[19:51] He only gets mentioned very briefly in Genesis when he meets with Abraham.
[19:56] I'm not going to tell you too much about that because in chapter seven, the writer goes into a lot more detail.
[20:01] So we're going to hold our water on Melchizedek for now, unless you want to go and do your own research, find out all about who he is.
[20:08] but a mysterious character.
[20:09] But it's enough to say for now this, that a high priest being appointed through this different eternal line, you are a priest forever.
[20:22] Well, that marks a new epoch.
[20:27] That marks God doing a new, distinctive, better, forever thing.
[20:36] This is not just another one of the high priests in the line of Aaron.
[20:39] This is unique.
[20:42] This is something totally different.
[20:47] And then, of course, that then leads to the answer to the second question.
[20:53] the implications for Judaism, and the implications are massive.
[20:57] They are so significant.
[21:00] If God has appointed a new forever high priest, well then that old order of priests in the line of iron has now been made obsolete.
[21:08] That's what the writer is saying.
[21:09] Like I say, we need to really understand just how serious this was to these original readers.
[21:14] If Jesus is appointed high priest in the order of Melchizedek, well then the high priest in the temple in Jerusalem him and everyone associated with him, well, their time is done.
[21:27] That's what the writer's saying.
[21:28] That's what he's implying.
[21:32] And again, if we think of where we are in terms of history here, this is AD 65, just a few years before the temple would be destroyed in AD 70, never to be rebuilt.
[21:49] God very soon.
[21:55] These people who are wrestling with Jesus or Judaism, very soon there will be no more choice.
[22:05] The old thing was on its way out.
[22:06] It was time to choose the new and the better and the forever in Jesus.
[22:15] So that's the responses for two of their questions.
[22:20] but what then about the third?
[22:21] And this third, if we're being honest as people who are not Jews, this question is the one that's probably the most pertinent to us.
[22:30] How could the Son of God in heaven, seated at the right hand of the Father in all, like I said, His majesty and glory and holiness,
[22:43] how could the Son, how could God Himself ever be able to empathize with the plight and the weakness and the experience of ordinary people.
[22:54] Now again, look at how the writer responds.
[22:59] During the days of Jesus' life on earth,
[23:05] he directs them to his incarnation.
[23:09] He offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears.
[23:18] to the one who could save him from death.
[23:21] And he was heard because of his reverent submission.
[23:23] Son though he was.
[23:26] So he's basically saying, yes, he was.
[23:27] He is the son of God.
[23:29] That is who he is.
[23:30] But son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered.
[23:36] He learned obedience.
[23:39] And once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
[23:50] How could the Son of God in heaven ever be able to deal gently with us?
[24:00] With those who are weak and broken and ignorant and so prone to go astray.
[24:13] How?
[24:13] Because he became one of us.
[24:19] This unique aspect of the gospel, he became one of us.
[24:24] The word became flesh and made his dwelling among us and he suffered.
[24:34] He cried out in anguish.
[24:36] He shed tears.
[24:42] And he experienced so much of the scope of what it is to suffer and struggle as a human being.
[24:50] He experienced hunger and thirst and exhaustion.
[24:53] He experienced the sorrow of loneliness.
[24:56] He experienced the rejection of those closest to him, the betrayal of those closest to him.
[25:04] He experienced, he knows the pressure of temptation and the pressure of testing
[25:13] in a far, far more intense way than any of us can ever imagine because he's the only one that didn't capitulate.
[25:25] He's the only one that is still without sin.
[25:29] Think of the sorrow he knew.
[25:35] Think of him weeping with Mary and for Mary at the tomb of her brother and his friend, Lazarus.
[25:47] You read that story and how John captures the depth of the emotion and the sorrow.
[25:59] Or think of him weeping as he looks at Jerusalem and the people.
[26:06] and he sees, he sees ahead how their rejection of him there
[26:12] would then eventually lead to that time in the future, AD 70, where the temple would be destroyed,
[26:21] where they would be scattered again.
[26:23] He foresees this and he weeps.
[26:29] Or think of his anguish in the garden.
[26:33] My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.
[26:42] Jesus was no over-exaggerator.
[26:50] Imagine the depth and the pain of what he must have been going through to say those words to his disciple.
[27:01] and then fervently praying with sweat like drops of blood, my Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me, yet not as I will, but as you will.
[27:15] Think then, that moment on the cross, as he speaks those words of Psalm 22, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
[27:29] Perhaps the writer has in mind specifically the garden in particular.
[27:35] Perhaps he has in mind the whole gamut, the whole scope of Jesus' experience in his 33 years walking this earth when he concludes, Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered.
[27:59] and once made perfect.
[28:00] And again, we're not talking about moral perfection here.
[28:02] Jesus was morally perfect.
[28:04] It is morally perfect.
[28:04] This is perfection for the role of high priest.
[28:09] Once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him and was designated then by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
[28:19] He learned what he had to learn.
[28:24] He experienced what he had to experience.
[28:28] He suffered what he had to suffer
[28:33] so that he could be our perfect high priest.
[28:38] Son, though he was, he learned obedience, like I said, not in a moral sense, but in experiencing the painful cost of obedience to his Father in this broken and sinful world.
[28:50] As the word in heaven, as the son in heaven, obedience to God, obedience to the father, there's no barriers to that.
[28:59] It was just all joy.
[29:04] But in the flesh, in this world, he learned just the depth of the cost of obedience.
[29:15] And then he was made perfect through that to be the sympathetic and the compassionate great high priest for the journey that we need.
[29:26] For all those who obey him.
[29:29] In his great mercy, God has given us his son, not only to secure our rescue from our slavery of sin and death, but also to be our high priest.
[29:40] one who will walk with us and support us and encourage us with an empathy and an understanding and a compassion learned and made perfect in his own suffering.
[29:55] We have a high priest who will lead us step by step on a journey that he has already completed,
[30:05] that he's already gone ahead of us in.
[30:08] We have a high priest who is praying for us, interceding for us at the throne and being heard for us because of his reverence of mission and sinlessness before the Father.
[30:27] We have a great high priest
[30:31] and his name is Jesus.
[30:36] and so as we move towards communion then that brings us back to the verses at the end of chapter four therefore since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven jesus the son of god there's two exhortations here let us first hold firmly to the faith we profess
[30:59] for we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses but we have one who has been tempted in every way just as we are yet he did not sin let us then exhortation to let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need
[31:27] let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.
[31:32] When you are tempted to despair
[31:41] because of sorrow or rejection
[31:49] or loss or confusion,
[31:55] Because just putting one step in front of the other in just the difficulty of day-to-day life is so much.
[32:04] That you're tempted to give up, that you're tempted to give in.
[32:10] The writer's saying, look at Jesus.
[32:15] He's saying, look to Jesus.
[32:20] And he's saying, go to Jesus and go with Jesus to the throne of God.
[32:30] Remembering that he knows, he understands, he is compassionate towards you, he is for you.
[32:36] His role as your high priest is to be for you and to intercede for you before that throne.
[32:44] And because of his reverent submission, he will be heard.
[32:51] and so that second exhortation that we are to approach with him
[32:56] God's throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need and we again as we think about what would have been going on in the minds of the original hearers of course they would have been thinking about the imagery of the tabernacle approaching God's throne would mean approaching the mercy seat within and inside that holy of holies behind the curtain behind the veil going into the very presence of God
[33:27] and being welcomed there and again that place that none of them were ever allowed to go only the high priest once that once a year we need to understand that to understand what the writer is saying here you don't have to hold back you don't have to hide in the shadows because
[33:51] of the shame that you might feel because our without sin high priest has provided with his own blood, the perfect once and for all sacrifice, your sins.
[34:11] And we constantly need to remind ourselves of this.
[34:15] Your sins are dealt with forever.
[34:20] The veil into the holy of holies, into the presence of the living God has been torn in two by the death of Christ.
[34:28] And now, not the blood of a goat, but the blood of the sinless, spotless Lamb of God, our high priest Jesus, has been sprinkled on the mercy seat, on the throne of God,
[34:48] and has reconciled to God to us forever.
[34:51] And so we can enter into the holy of holies beyond the veil and we can approach that mercy seat.
[35:08] We can approach that throne with confidence with our high priest beside us interceding for, praying for.
[35:23] And as we see and experience his grace and his mercy, we know that the character of the father is exactly the same.
[35:30] And the throne, the character of the throne is one of mercy and grace.
[35:40] So the call is to live in that reality.
[35:47] to go with our high priest behind the curtain into the very presence of God and enjoy and experience his grace and his mercy.