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Introduction: Don’t Stop Believing 

We have finally gotten to Melchizedek, this mysterious character from the book of Genesis. He has been alluded to multiple times. Multiple times in the Book of Hebrews, as we’ve been going through, the writer of Hebrews has alluded to this character. He’s mentioned this guy. In fact, at one point, the writer of Hebrews says, The thing he’s most eager to talk about is Melchizedek. He’s like, I’m so excited. But then he tells them, but I can’t talk about Melchizedek because you guys are too immature. You can’t handle Melchizedek. He goes, you guys are still in the basics of the Christian faith. He’s like, you haven’t understood the basic doctrines yet. How can I talk about Melchizedek?

So then he goes and he talks about a bunch of other stuff, but he comes back and talks about Melchizedek anyway. He’s like, I want to talk about it, but I can’t because you can’t handle it. But I’m going to talk about him anyway. He’s so excited about Melchizedek. The reason why he’s so excited to talk about Melchizedek is that he sees Melchizedek as a picture of Christ. When we look at Melchizedek, we see an example of what Christ is like for us. And so he wants to look at that. Remember those who’ve been with us for the last few months as we’ve been traveling to the Book of Hebrews, the main point of this entire book is don’t stop believing. That’s the main point. The writer of Hebrews says, I want you to believe on Jesus and I want you to keep believing on Jesus.

Keep believing. Keep believing. Don’t stop believing in Jesus. That’s the main point of the Book of Hebrews. As we examine the Book of Hebrews, we realize what we can piece together. There are people in his audience, people he is writing to, who apparently are seriously considering walking away from the Christian faith. They are these Christians, they’re part of a church, and they are wrestling with whether or not they should abandon the Christian faith to go back to Judaism, the Old Testament. Religion. And he wants to exhort them, don’t go back. Keep believing in Jesus, don’t abandon Jesus. He knows the best way to keep someone with Jesus is to reintroduce them to how great Jesus is. So that’s what he keeps on doing. All throughout the Book of Hebrews, he continues to do this. This is not all that different than what we do when there are marital disputes.

As a pastor for my last 15 years of my ministry, one of the significant things in pastoral ministry, one of the things you deal with the most, is marital conflict. If you count up all the minutes as a pastor, if you’re a preaching pastor, the two things you spend the most minutes doing are preparing for sermons and doing marital counseling. That makes up about 97% of all the minutes in pastoral ministry. One of the techniques in marriage counseling that marriage counselors will often use is to sit down, when they sense that there’s contempt growing between a couple, sit down and try to remind them of why they fell in love in the first place. What was it about this person that made you want to be with them in the first place? And to try to go back to that and try to remind them. It’s one of the most effective tactics, or techniques, to get people to not abandon their marriage. It doesn’t fix the problems. There’s still conflict that has to be worked through. But one of the ways in which marital counselors try to keep relationships together is to remind each other what they like about each other. It’s not always effective. Sometimes one partner or both choose to exit the relationship anyway. That does happen, tragically. Some.

I know some of you in the room have walked through that. That is the sentiment, the tactic that the writer of Hebrews is sort of using here. He’s saying, you guys are in a relationship with Jesus. You’ve got a covenant with Jesus, and some of you are thinking about leaving him, abandoning him, divorcing him. You’re thinking about that. Let me remind you about how awesome he is and why you got into this in the first place. And that’s what he’s been doing throughout the book of Hebrews. He’s been trying to point out these things about Jesus that make Jesus worth following and loving, and adoring. Here, he pauses to utilize this mysterious Old Testament character named Melchizedek. He’s like, I want to remind you why you love Jesus by pointing out something in Melchizedek that helps us understand Jesus.

Melchizedek: Christ Type

 Now, Melchizedek was sort of popular in the first century. Melchizedek lived about 2,000 years before Jesus. About 2,000 years before the Book of Hebrews was written, approximately. But for some reason, scholars and historians don’t fully know why, in the first century, 2,000 years after Melchizedek lived, there’s sort of a resurgence in popularity in Melchizedek. There are a bunch of people living in the first century who are thinking about and talking about Melchizedek. He’s kind of a hot topic. He’s the lead on the news in the first century. There’s all these theories. You can read about them if you want to. You can find online 1st-century Jewish theories of Melchizedek. And they are so goofy. There are dozens of them that are so wacky. They were all floating around. This was my favorite one. I’m just going to share just one because it’s so wacky. The belief in the first century was that Melchizedek, 2000 years earlier, was born. His mom died tragically in childbirth, and they left the baby on the bed. Then some of the religious leaders went to another room. When they came back, Melchizedek had grown up into a teenage boy in the 10 minutes they were gone. That he was like a 14-year-old boy, and that he spoke multiple languages perfectly, and that he started to preach oracles of God. He started to preach to them. That was the belief of Melchizedek. This was very popular. And there are others. That one is the wackiest one in my opinion. 

So the writer of Hebrews knows, I want these Jewish Christians to stick with Jesus and not go back to the Jewish faith. To not abandon Jesus. Stick with Jesus. He also knows that they have all been discussing Melchizedek. They’re kind of in the know of all the weird things going on around. It was sort of, if you were living in the first century, there’d be a red hat. Like it would be MMGA rather than MAGA. It would be ‘Make Melchizedek Great Again’. That was happening in the first century. So the writer of Hebrews is like, wait a minute, you guys are into Melchizedek, but you’ve missed the point. You’ve buried the lead. You’ve missed the forest for the trees. You’re worried about all these weird little things about who Melchizedek is, and you’ve actually missed a point. Take a step back and you’ve got to look and see. Melchizedek is the one who shows us about Jesus. You guys are misunderstanding it. Melchizedek is all about Jesus. So this character you guys have been all up in arms about gives us an understanding of Jesus. 

Questions about Melchizedek 

And so this morning, our plan is for us to look at how the writer of Hebrews uses Melchizedek to highlight elements about Jesus. I want to answer three questions this morning. 

1. What is the history of Melchizedek? Where does this guy come from?

2. Who is this guy? 

3. Why does he matter? How does Melchizedek impact us? 

I’ll give you three practical observations as to how Melchizedek impacts us. So that’s our plan for this morning. Three questions. What’s his history? Who is he really? Why does he matter to us? I’ll answer those three questions for us this morning. Let’s pray one more time, and then we’ll look at the text together. 

So, God, thank you for the writer Hebrews, thank you for Melchizedek. Help us understand and help us see you better. I pray.

Amen. 

History of Melchizedek

Okay, first question. What’s his history? Look at Hebrews chapter seven, verse one.  If you have your Bibles, you can turn there or scroll there, whatever your preference may be. Hebrews chapter 7, verse 1. The writer of Hebrews says this, 

 “For this Melchizedek, King of Salem, priest of the Most High God, met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him.”

If you are not familiar with what he’s alluding to, let me pause and give you the gist. The writer of Hebrews was writing about 2000 years ago, the first century, but 2000 years before him in 2000 BC. So Melchizedek lived 4000 years ago. 2000 years ago is the book of Hebrews. So the writer of Hebrews is looking back 2,000 years earlier to a moment that is recorded in Genesis 14. In Genesis chapter 14, Abraham is living in the land of Canaan, the land we might call Judea or Palestine today. In that land, Abraham is living. There’s a bunch of these cities in the region, and Abraham’s nephew Lot is living near one of the wicked cities in the region known as Sodom.

Some of you may be familiar with Sodom and Gomorrah in the book of Genesis. So Lot is living near the city of Sodom, and Abraham is sort of a little further away, more in a wilderness around these cities. In Genesis 14, we learn that in the land of Canaan, four cities in the north band together, and then they travel south to attack the cities in the south. They raid them, they attack. They kill a bunch of people. They plunder, and then they steal a bunch of stuff, they kidnap people as slaves, and they take them back to the north. Well, one of the people who are taken as slaves from the south up to the north is Lot, Abraham’s nephew. 

So Abraham gets wind of this. This moment where the kings and military leaders of the northern cities attack the southern cities. And he hears that his nephew is one of the slaves they have. So Abraham, in Genesis 14, tells us that he pulls together 300 skilled men. Now, the word skilled there is intentional. It’s a Hebrew word that sort of alludes to military training. These aren’t just regular dudes that Abraham got together. These were like the Navy SEALS of his entourage, right? So Abraham has an entourage of hundreds, maybe into the thousands of people, and 300 of them are these bad dudes you would not want to mess with. He gets his skilled dudes together, and they go north, and they make war against the leadership of the northern cities. They fight and kill a bunch of guys, and they take all the stuff that was plundered and stolen from the southern cities. They get all the stuff and all the people who had been kidnapped, including Lot, and they bring them back down into the valley, in between all the southern cities. 

When Abraham gets down into that valley, it’s known as the Valley of the Kings, where the different kings from the different cities would come out and meet. When Abraham gets down there, the kings of the cities in the south come out to meet Abraham. They’re very thankful that Abraham and his skilled men have brought their stuff and people back. The first guy to interact with Abraham is the king of Sodom. And Sodom says to Abraham, Abraham, thank you. As a reward, I want to give you a portion of all the stuff you recovered for us. Abraham says to the king of Sodom, No, thank you. I want no part of your stuff because you’re a wicked king in a wicked city. And I don’t want anyone in the world thinking I’m associated with you. I don’t want anyone in the world thinking I got rich off of you, you wicked man. I want no part of that. 

Side note, that’s a really good model for us today. We should be very, very cautious who we are making money with and off of. There are wicked practices we should be very, very careful that we’re not profiting from. We want to take a step back and go, no, no, no. And Abraham says this. Abraham says, I know that one day I’m going to be rich and famous and influential. And I don’t want anyone around here thinking it was because of Sodom. I want them to know it was because of the one true God. I want to live for his glory. A moment ago, Leon took us through the fourth question in the New City catechism. It is only right that we were created and would live for his glory. We want to live in such a way that He will get the glory. That’s how Abraham lives. 

Abraham Meets Melchizedek

Abraham then continues through the Valley of the Kings, and the next king that comes to interact with him is the king of the city of Salem. His name is Melchizedek. He is the king of Salem and the priest of the Most High God. Abraham comes to Melchizedek, and Melchizedek blesses him. He blesses him both for his valor, his actions to save Lot and the others, and blesses Abraham because of his refusal to associate with the wickedness of Sodom. Both of these, he blesses him, and Abraham then responds by tithing to Melchizedek. Look at Hebrews 7, verse 2, it says this, 

“And to him, Abraham apportioned a tenth part of everything.” 

So Abraham takes a tenth of everything he’s got, and he gives it to Melchizedek. Abraham pays a tithe. This is an interesting thing. Why would Abraham the great, Abraham, the friend of God, the founder of the Jewish faith, the founder of the Christian faith, the great patriarch, why would he feel the need to tithe to someone else? Why would he be receiving blessings? It should be the opposite. He’s the great one. He should be the one doing the blessing. But, interestingly, he is receiving blessings. Later in Hebrews chapter 7, the writer of Hebrews says this, In verse 4, he says, 

“See how this great man was to whom Abraham the patriarch gave a tenth.” 

How great must Melchizedek be that Abraham, who we think is great, tithes to him. Then, in verse 7, he says this. 

“It is beyond dispute that the inferior is blessed by the superior.”

He’s saying, the fact that Melchizedek is blessing Abraham and not the other way around tells us that Melchizedek is superior to Abraham. If you’re a first-century Jewish person reading this, you love Abraham. This would indeed be a mind-blowing thing. Why did he do that? Abraham is the man. Why is Melchizedek getting a tithe and doing the blessing? It is because Melchizedek is greater than Abraham. Why is he greater?

Who is Melchizedek?

That leads us to our second question this morning. Who is this Melchizedek guy? That’s the second question I want to answer for you this morning. Well, throughout church history, there have been some Christians who have argued that Melchizedek is actually the pre-incarnate Jesus. That it’s Jesus showing up in human form hundreds of years before Jesus was born as a man. We call that a Christophany. So there are moments in the Old Testament where we see a person in human form, but it’s actually Jesus showing up. He’s not actually human. He just looks or appears to be human. That’s called a Christophany. 

There are several of those in the Old Testament. The most famous comes in the Book of Daniel. There’s a moment where three young men in Babylon, King Nebuchadnezzar tells them to bow down and worship, and they say no. So King Nebuchadnezzar has the fiery furnace turned up to the hottest it can go. It is so hot that the guards get near it and they burn up. They take these three young Jewish boys who refuse to worship the God of Babylon and bow down and worship King Nebuchadnezzar, and they throw them into the fiery furnace. They’re walking around. And King Nebuchadnezzar yells out as he’s looking into the flames. He goes, didn’t we throw in just three men? Why do I see four men walking around? And the fourth one looks like the Son of God. This is an incredible moment. True story. It actually happened. Three men are thrown into the fire, and Jesus shows up, appearing to be human. He’s not actually human, but he appears to be human. He rescues these three young men from the fiery flames, and he comes out. 

There are these other Christophanies in the Old Testament. So there have been moments throughout church history where various Christians, pastors, and scholars have argued that Melchizedek is one of those. It’s a Christophany. Scholars are kind of split on this today. But I would say I do not think Melchizedek is actually a Christophany. And most of the scholars that I trust the most would say, no, he is not a Christophany. There certainly are great Christians who would say, he’s a Christophany, and that’s fine. But when interpreting the biblical data, I don’t think that is the best interpretation. Now, I’m not going to explain that this morning. I was going to give you all the biblical reasons why Melchizedek is not a Christophany. But it’ll make the sermon go way too long. So, as painful as it was, I had to cut it from the sermon. But if you care, if you want to know, I’ve got the notes and I’ll be glad to share them with you.

I’m going to say this morning, my understanding of the biblical data. I think Melchizedek is not a Christophany. However, he is a type of Christ, meaning he foreshadows Christ. Melchizedek. God put him in place. God put him where he is, specifically to point forward to Jesus, or give us a foreshadowing of Jesus that we can look at. Melchizedek, who lived 2,000 years before Jesus, we could say, we think he gives us some understanding of who Jesus is. He is, I think, not a Christophany, but a type. Look at verse three. He says this, Hebrews seven, verse three, Speaking of Melchizedek, 

“He is without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life”

So some people say, Melchizedek doesn’t have a father, doesn’t have a mother. He must be Jesus. Well, that doesn’t quite make sense because Jesus does have a father and does have a mother. His father is God, the first person of the Trinity. His mother is Mary. So I don’t think he’s pointing out that Melchizedek literally didn’t have a mother and father. The point here is there’s no genealogy. That’s very unique because if you study through the book of Genesis, every major character in the Book of Genesis has a genealogy. We know exactly where he came from and where he died. Every major character in the Book of Genesis has a genealogy, with the exception of Melchizedek. The writer of Hebrews is making a point, saying that it was intentional. When the Book of Genesis was written, his genealogy was intentionally left out. Why? Because he resembles something. We’re trying to send a message. Look at the end of verse 2 there. Hebrews 7, verse 2. Speaking of Melchizedek, he resembles the Son of God. He continues as priest forever, but resembling the Son of God. 

So the point the writer of Hebrews is saying, we look at the Book of Genesis, we see no genealogy. There’s no end to the ministry of Melchizedek. Similarly, because we don’t see an end to the ministry of Melchizedek, we will never see an end to the ministry of the Son of God. That’s the picture he’s pointing at. He’s like Melchizedek. That gives us a glimpse of what Jesus will be like. His ministry will never end. The word resembling here basically can be translated as a good copy. Melchizedek is a good copy of Christ. Christ is the original. Melchizedek is the copy. Jesus is the real deal. Melchizedek is the photocopy, the Xerox. So we can look at the Xerox and have a good understanding of what the original was like. But Jesus is the real deal. Melchizedek resembles him or points to him, giving us understanding of the real deal, Jesus. 

Look at the second half verses. Skip back up to verse 2. If Melchizedek is not the son of God, who is he? What is he all about? Look at the second half of verse two. It says this. 

“Melchizedek is first by translation of his name, King of righteousness, and then he is also king of Salem, that is, peace.” 

So he’s highlighting two things. One, his name, Melchizedek, gives us insight into who he is. And two, his title gives us insight into who he is. So his name is Melchizedek, which literally means king of righteousness. He is the king of a city called Salem. Salem means peace. Salem is the city that will later become known as Jerusalem. So he’s the king of the city that would become Jerusalem. Jesus will be the king of the New Jerusalem. So there are these parallels between Melchizedek and Jesus. There are these two things about Melchizedek. He’s righteous and he’s peace. He’s the king of righteousness. So he’s the king of a city. He’s bringing law and order to society, as he should. He’s a good judge, making sure criminals face justice. He’s all about righteousness, the right things being done simultaneously. He is the king of peace. He is the one who advocates for peace to make peace. 

Remember, we as humans are born sinners, and we choose to sin. We are sinners by choice and by birth. In our natural state, we are at odds with God. You are hostile toward God. You are on God’s naughty list. When you are born and throughout all the days of your life, you are on the naughty list. You deserve the wrath of God. But we have an advocate named Jesus who shows up, and he advocates for peace between us and God. So Melchizedek is both of these. He’s righteous. Criminals must be punished, and he advocates peace. We want to find a way for peace to be had between Criminals and the judge. He is these things. He is both the king and the priest who advocates for peace.

Side note. This would be shocking to a first-century Jew because the idea of somebody being both a king and a priest was a big no, no. Every time Melchizedek is mentioned in the Bible, he’s mentioned as being a priest and a king. In Genesis 14, in Psalm 110 and he’s mentioned here in Hebrews. Every time he’s mentioned, he is mentioned as both a king and a priest. That would have been incredibly uncomfortable for a first-century Jew because that was against the Old Covenant. The Old Covenant separated kings and priests. When the kingship is established and Saul becomes the first king, it is very clear. The priests are to be from the line of the Levites, the tribe of Levi. The kings are to be from the tribe of Judah. There’s a separation. The reason why there is the separation is that if you have one man doing both roles, he’s the king and he’s a priest. If he were to fail, if he were to sin and blow it, you’d have too much of the covenant being broken. So we want to separate the powers, give some group of people, the Levites, power over the priestly duties, and then give the tribe of Judah the kingly duties. You separate those because inevitably, those men are going to fail. So if the priests fail, the entire covenant’s not broken, only a part of it’s broken. And if the kings fail, well, at least only a part of the covenant is broken. 

The separation of powers sort of gives us a little bit of latitude, there’s some room for error. So you would never want anyone in your covenant to be both king and priest. That’s way too much power in one person. If he fails, the entire covenant breaks. And in the Old Testament, God made it very clear that the Old Covenant was actually conditional. He told the Jews, I will be faithful to you only if you are faithful back to me. There are these laws, he gave them more than 600 of them. There are these clear expectations. If the Jewish people broke those laws, God told them, I’m going to divorce you. I am not going to be with you forever and ever. If you are not faithful to me, I will not be faithful to you. So the Jews are thinking, we have got to make sure we don’t break too many of the laws, so let’s separate the priest and the king. So if you’re a first-century person reading this, and you go, Melchizedek is the king. And the priest, yikes. There’s too much power in one person’s arms. The covenant’s too weak. 

But the writer of Hebrews is going to make a point. No, no, no. When you have the right king priest, you want all authority on that one priest, that one king. The covenant we have now, the covenant that we have as Christians with God, is conditional as well. God has promised to be faithful to you, but here’s the condition: not your faithfulness. God has promised to you as believers. I will be faithful to you so long as the king priest is faithful to me. Our king priest, whose name is Jesus, he is always faithful. A Jewish person had to live in angst. What if we blow it? That’s the Old Covenant. The new covenant says it’s conditional, but it’s conditioned on someone else’s efforts, not yours. And that king priest, he’s never failed and he never will fail.

This is why the writer of Hebrews thinks it is maddening that you would leave and abandon the New Covenant to go back to the Old Covenant, the weaker covenant that was so fragile, so much so where we had to separate the powers, this conditional covenant that was conditioned and dependent on our ability to be faithful. Why would you abandon Jesus to go back to that? So when we look at Melchizedek, he gives us a picture of what Jesus is like as King Priest. All the chips have been moved to the center of the table. We are all in on Jesus, and he will never fail us. 

Why Does This Matter?

Last question for this morning: Why does this matter? The fact that Melchizedek is like Jesus, why does this matter to us? I think there are a few things I’ve already said, probably kind of alluded to, but let me give you three reasons why this matters to us. 

1. Melchizedek stood for righteousness and peace. This shows us that Jesus stands for both righteousness and peace.

Jesus wants criminals punished for their crimes. Jesus wants peace to be advocated between criminals and the court. He wants both, and therefore we ought to want both as well. John, chapter one, says this about Jesus: that he was full of grace and full of truth. Both. We, in our modern society, tend to err on one or the other. Some of us are all about truth. We want the righteous thing to happen. We don’t care about anything else. We’re just righteous. And righteousness is good. Then there are other people who lean toward peacemaking or advocating for peace, or being gracious and merciful. No, we should let this person off the hook. Let’s be gracious. Let’s not hold this against them. We kind of ping off the extremes. Ask yourself right now, which one are you? Just ask yourself, am I more likely to want to stand for righteousness and hold people accountable, or do I want to be gracious and peaceful and advocate for people? 

There’s a spectrum, and everyone is on this spectrum. I think American politics is largely governed by where you are on the spectrum. If you’re someone who’s all about righteousness, you’re going to lean toward being more conservative. If you’re someone who’s all about peacemaking and being gracious, you’re more likely to trend leftward in your politics. There are caveats, but that tends to be the case right now. Full disclosure, I’m going to show my cards. I am very conservative. I’m all about righteousness. Yes, we need rights. We need law and order. This is right. This is good. And I see in myself, in my own heart, sometimes the tendency to not advocate for those who might be seeking peace. I find in my own heart that sometimes I lack sympathy for people. That’s not good. Now, I’m not saying it’s wrong to have strong political opinions. I have strong conservative ideas. If you want to argue about that, we can do it another day. But that’s where I’m at. I don’t think that’s wrong or bad to have strong political opinions. But we want to pause and ask Where am I on the spectrum? Take inventory. Where are my pitfalls? If you’re over here, if you trend more leftward, you have to ask, am I being so sympathetic that I’m not standing for righteousness?

Melchizedek was both the king of righteousness and the King of Salem. Jesus is both the king of righteousness and the king of Salem. He is full of grace and full of truth. We also should seek to be like Jesus. Now, of course, we’re all going to fail. We’re never going to get it quite right. Jesus always gets it right. But we want to pray. This should be a frequent prayer in our lives. Melchizedek is righteousness and peace, and we should seek to be both to the best of our ability. 

2. Just like there’s no end to the priesthood of Melchizedek in Genesis, there will be no end to the priesthood of Jesus. 

I’ve already said this, but it’s worth saying again. We don’t see an end to the ministry of Melchizedek, and we will never see an end of the ministry of Christ. He will advocate on our behalf forever. First Timothy, chapter 2, verse 5. The apostle Paul says this.

“For there is only one God, and only one mediator between God and man. That is Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all.” 

There’s only one mediator between God and man. His name is Jesus Christ. Later, in Hebrews chapter 7, verse 25 says that Jesus makes intercession for them. He lives to make intercession. Church. Can I tell you something? Jesus is praying for you right now. Jesus, the Son of God, the Creator of everything visible and invisible. He is praying for you by name. I want to guarantee you the Father is listening to his son in John 10. My lovely wife read it for us earlier. John 10. Jesus says, My sheep, hear my voice. I give them eternal life. They will never perish. No one will snatch them from my hand. 

The reason why you will stick with Jesus forever and ever and ever and never walk away from him, and spend eternity the way the angels did, is not because of you. It’s because the priest will be advocating for you and holding onto you forever and ever and ever and ever and ever. I can tell you, if you are a believer in Jesus, you will be with him forever. I can guarantee you that. Not because of you or what you have done, but because of Christ and what he has done. His priesthood goes on forever.

3. Melchizedek enjoyed communing with people. That is a picture of the fact that Jesus loves to commune with his people.

In Genesis chapter 14, when Abraham comes back from the battle and he’s in the Valley of the Kings, he rejects the King of Sodom. He comes out, he sees Melchizedek, the King of Salem. Melchizedek blesses him, and Abraham tithes to him. Then Melchizedek does something absolutely beautiful. He brings out some bread and some wine. He sits down on the battlefield there in the middle of the Valley of the Kings with Abraham. He says, let’s commune together with some bread and some wine. Does that remind you of anyone? After the battle is won, the King Priest sits with some bread and wine. Jesus makes that offer to us today. Here’s what Jesus says in Revelation chapter 3, verse 20, 

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come into him and eat with him and he with me.”

Church, Jesus loves you. He invites you to come eat with him. The picture we see of Melchizedek, of all the things going on in the Valley of the Kings, there’s this war. Melchizedek pauses and says, Wait. Eat together. That’s what Jesus says to you this morning, in the midst of all the craziness of the world. Let’s pause, let’s eat together. I want to eat with you. I want you to eat with me. I want to enjoy you. I want you to enjoy me. Jesus says to his people, Let’s have some bread. Let’s have some wine. Find your rest in me this day and all your days, forever and ever. 

Communion

That brings us to communion. That’s why we take communion every single week. We take some bread and we take some wine. Not because it’s some random ritual that we came up with, but because our great King Priest has said, Come to me. Let’s have some bread and wine together. Each week here at Horizon City Church, we pause and we take communion to remember our great High Priest, our King, who forever lives to intercede for us. The one who stands for righteousness and stands for peace. The one who loves us and invites us to commune with him. In just a moment, we’re going to pass the baskets as we do each week. Grab whichever one is your preference.  Hold onto it. I’ll come back and lead us. 

If you are a believer here this morning, if you are a genuine follower of Christ, if you would say, he’s my King Priest, if that’s you, I invite you to take communion with us this morning. This is open to you. But if you are here this morning, you would say, Kenny, I’m still not sure that I’m all in on Jesus. I’m not sure that I am thoroughly committed and love this King Priest named Jesus. I’m not sure that’s me yet. If that’s you, I would say I’m thankful that you’re here. I’m thankful for your willingness to be honest with yourself this morning. When the baskets come, I’d encourage you to let the baskets pass, but don’t let the moment pass. May today be the day you say to Jesus, I take you to be my King Priest.

If you have any questions about what that means, what does it really look like? How do I do that? I’d love to sit with you after the service and have a conversation with you. But for those of us who love Christ, who are all in on this great King Priest, I encourage you to come. I invite you to participate in communion with us this morning. Let’s remember what he has done on our behalf.