That word is glorious. Praise God.
Well, once again, as we come to look in God’s precious Word, that indispensable principle of Bible study, we need to apply again: we need to come as little children. We need to come before the Lord just to let Him open His Word and minister Christ unto us.
This is His delight. He longs to do it, and we should never take it for granted. There is no amount of academics in the world that can unveil Christ. Our heavenly Father has to do that. We need God to show us God.
In the book of Job, my family—I do not mean my wife and I, but my son-in-law and his family—have been going through the book of Job. It is interesting to hear my little grandchildren talk about Job and what the Lord does.
One of the things that impressed one of my little grandchildren was that Satan could not do anything without God’s permission. That made a powerful impact on my grandchild: Satan needs permission.
The reality is that nobody can do anything without God’s permission. That is why this verse is so precious to me. Now, I know it was words by the prophet of rebuke to a rebellious people, but it contains a precious truth.
Isaiah 65:1:
I permitted Myself to be sought.
I permitted Myself to be found.
Is that not a great truth? God has given us permission to seek Him, and God has given us permission to find Him.
So, with His permission, let us commit our time to the Lord.
Father, thank You again that You have given us permission to seek Your face and to be found of those who did not even seek You. Lord, You are so gracious.
We pray this morning that You would sort of wrap things up in our hearts, unveil Yourself again, and just meet with us. We thank You so much that Your Holy Spirit lives in our hearts to turn the eyes of our faith unto the Lord Jesus.
Once again, we wait upon You, and we are thankful. Once again, I ask You, Lord, to protect Your people from flesh and blood and give us only what comes from You. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Well, brothers, we have come to our final look together at this wonderful theme. I hope it is not your final look at this wonderful theme.
God has impressed on my heart this weekend—and I pray increasingly on yours—the wonder that Christ is our High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek. Since He lives in us, we also are royal priests.
By way of a quick review, our first lesson introduced the truth that Jesus is a High Priest and that there are two orders. He is after the order of Melchizedek.
His ministry is basically outlined in the history of the literal Melchizedek, who met with Abraham and showed up in the nick of time after the war was done. He came refreshing, serving, and ministering. He came blessing and unveiling God as the Possessor of heaven and earth.
He unveiled the father of faith as one united to Him who is the Possessor of heaven and earth, therefore needing not a shoelace that this world can offer. Finally, he received the spontaneous surrender that comes out of having been given, as a gift, the spoils of the enemy.
That is who Melchizedek is. That is our High Priest, and that is what He does.
Then, last evening, we tried to begin to see that the old order is contrasted with the new order. Because of the finished work of Christ, all of the business in the outer court—since that business was concerned with a war not over, all about sin—has been canceled for the royal priest.
The message of grace is that everyone who is a royal priest is looking to the Lord Jesus Himself. All of the activity in the holy place—all the concern about growing and maturity, shining as the testimony, being holy and separated, and foul smells being removed—all of that business has also been removed from us.
Instead of business, rest.
Now, this morning, we will take our final look, and I want to focus a little more on not what it is not, but what it is. What is the royal priesthood? How does it look? How does it appear? How do we function as royal priests?
If I am indeed a royal priest, or if that body with which I fellowship are royal priests expressing the life of the royal priesthood, what will it look like?
For a simple outline, I would like to show what it looks like first in our own lives, in our own ministries, in our own families, and in our own fellowship. What does it look like in my life?
Then, Lord willing, we will take the next step and ask, what does it sound like in my message, in what I share? What is the royal priesthood in my message? Then, what does it look like in my worship?
Basically, that is what I would like us to consider: What is the royal priesthood? How does it appear in our lives? How does it appear in our message? How does it appear in our worship before the Lord?
Before we get to that simple outline, I have outline on outline on outline this morning. I have a lot to share. But let me make a couple of observations.
The first has to do with the fact that the new order is presented in Hebrews in contrast. As you know, the first order had to be set aside because it did not work.
It had to be set aside. Listen, please, to these verses: Hebrews 7:11-12.
If perfection was through the Levitical priesthood—for on the basis of it the people received the law—what further need was there for another priest to arise after the order of Melchizedek, and not be designated according to the order of Aaron?
When the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law also.
It did not work. It did not make anything perfect. It was only symbolic. It was not actual. It was only pictures.
Hebrews 7:17-19:
It is attested of Him, “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”
For, on the one hand, there is the setting aside of a former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness;
for the law made nothing perfect.
It has to be replaced because it is weak and useless. It did not do what needed to be done. It did not have the reality.
Then Hebrews 8:13:
When He said, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete.
Whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.
You know, it is almost heartbreaking not only to think back in my own life, but to see so many who love the Lord Jesus and desire to serve Him who have not understood what our Lord Jesus has accomplished: taking us and delivering us out of the old and bringing us into the new.
They are exhausted, doing what the Lord allowed me in His great grace to do for seven years, until I crashed and had a breakdown in 1965. So busy. And it does not work.
All the energy, all of that work, all of that exhaustion, all of that loss and denial—and for what? For what?
My second observation has to do with 1 Peter 2:9-10:
You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
The apostle Peter presents our priesthood in terms of our union with Christ—our union with Him. He lives in us, and He is Melchizedek.
He is the High Priest who shows up on time. He is the High Priest who says, “The war is over.” He is the High Priest who refreshes, ministers, serves, and pours Himself out.
He is the High Priest who blesses and tells us how much we have in Him. He is the High Priest who receives the spontaneous response of surrender—a total surrender.
Now He lives in me, so He is that in me. He is that in you, and He is that in us. Our priesthood is Him: His life living through us as our High Priest.
As He lives in us, the excellencies of Christ are manifest, and therefore His priesthood is manifest.
I did not want to communicate the idea this weekend that Christ is a priest after the order of Melchizedek—a wonderful model—and that we should copy Him, be a priest like that, and try to imitate what He does. That is not the message.
It is an exchanged life, not a changed life. It is Him living in us and through us. I am not Melchizedek. The heavenly Melchizedek lives in my heart. Our priesthood is after the order of Melchizedek, but He is the Priest.
I love Hebrews 8:1-2. After seven chapters, he says, “The main point in what has been said is this: we have such a High Priest.”
Brothers, I know I do not love the Lord as I ought to love the Lord, but I have Him. I do not follow the Lord as I ought to follow the Lord, but I have Him. I do not honor the Lord as I wish I could honor the Lord, but I have Him.
I do not worship the Lord as I would love to worship the Lord, but I have Him. And you have Him.
There might be degrees in hunger and thirst after the Lord. There might be degrees in zeal, diligence, and discipline. But there are no degrees in heaven. You have Him. I have Him. No one has a monopoly on Him. We have such a High Priest.
I do not want you leaving this place asking, “Now, what do I have to do to become a royal priest?” You are a royal priest. I am not to do anything to become a royal priest.
He lives in your heart. He lives in my heart, and He is the royal Priest. The whole idea of the priesthood is one, two, three; A, B, C; little ones: look to Jesus, and you will know what the royal priesthood is.
It is not possible to keep your eyes fixed on Christ and miss the simplicity of the whole thing. When I describe what my life will look like if I am a royal priest, what I am saying is, “What will my life look like if I am appropriating the life of Christ?”
What will our fellowship look like if we are appropriating the life of our High Priest? What will our message sound like if I am appropriating Christ as my High Priest? What will my worship look like if I am appropriating the life of my High Priest?
He did not do it first so I could do it second. He did it once so I never have to do it. He comes to live again in your heart and in my heart.
All right, so let us begin. I want to contrast the new order with the most obvious features of the old order. Then we are going to go back and forth over four characteristics.
The war is over. He wants to serve us. He wants to refresh us. He wants to bless us. He wants to receive our surrender.
I do not usually do this, but I have already hinted that I am going to be all over the place in this message. My heart is really full on this theme. I appreciate the privilege of venting the little bit I have begun to see.
There are so many subpoints in what I want to share today. I have a few sub-subs and one or two sub-sub-subs. I know it will be easy to get lost on one of my trails.
So let me give you, very simply, right up front, what it looks like in my life. Let me state four simple principles.
First, since Christ is the Mediator of the new covenant, the royal priest lives by pure grace and has no confidence in the flesh, in contrast to the old order.
Second, the royal priest runs after reality, not pictures of reality.
Third, the royal priest, in contrast to the old, is at rest. He rests, and he is not totally exhausted trying to do what is done.
Finally, the new-covenant priest, the royal priest, offers a new-covenant surrender in contrast to the old surrender.
That is the big thing. Now let me ramble, and just sit back and try to enjoy what you see of Christ in this.
What does the priesthood look like in my life? The royal priest lives by grace and has no confidence in the flesh.
Since it is Christ who is in me, since it is Christ doing the refreshing, doing the serving, doing the ministry, doing the blessing, there is no glory for us. It is all His life.
In this connection, I love Philippians 3:3:
We are the true circumcision, who worship in the Spirit of God, glory in Christ Jesus, and place no confidence in the flesh.
He is the Worker. Philippians 2:13:
It is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
And 1 Thessalonians 5:24:
Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.
That is a royal priest: completely abandoned to the life of Christ who lives within, that Christ might live and manifest Himself.
Since He lives in me as the Mediator of the new covenant, it goes without saying that, since the new covenant is grace, one mark of the royal priest is that he will be living by grace.
Now, I also want to say this before we continue. When we are done describing, in my little words, the royal priesthood, you have to remember that we have only taken a little slice of His royal priesthood.
Remember, I suggested that He is also the Intercessor and also the Advocate. He not only lives in my heart as the Mediator of the new covenant, but part of the royal priesthood that we are not going to discuss has to do with intercession.
He is going to live in me as an intercessor. That is part of the royal priesthood. Part of the royal priesthood also has to do with advocacy and our dealings with brothers who sin and sisters who sin. How are we going to deal with that? His priesthood has to do with that.
But we are not touching that part. We are only looking at this wonderful part where He is the Mediator of the new covenant.
A second mark of the royal priesthood is that he will be embracing realities rather than pictures of reality.
A royal priest is in contrast to the old. The old was all pictures, all sight, all symbolic, all shadows. It was based on doing pictures.
What I am suggesting is that as you go on in the Lord, and I go on in the Lord, and He opens our eyes, increasingly our heart will be set on reality. What is actual? What is real? What is true?
So many get stuck on doing pictures. Now, I do not want anyone to misunderstand me. I am not out like Hezekiah, declaring war on all pictures, going up and down the land, finding the high places, and tearing things down.
That is not what this is about. I am not trying to tear down pictures. They did that during the Reformation too. They went around and knocked down images and idols and all of that kind of thing. That is not what it is about.
This is not the thirties, where Billy Sunday gets his little gang and goes up and down the streets of Chicago with baseball bats, breaking up the bars. That is not what I am trying to do when I am trying to show the royal priest.
I am trying to say that the royal priest has learned what is real, what is true, and he goes after that. The more you enter into the Melchizedek priesthood, the more you are going to go after the reality.
The pictures you may keep, but it is not clinging to a picture instead of the reality. Even in the Old Testament, they had pictures and reality. There was reality there too.
Jeremiah talked about the foreskins of your heart being circumcised. Moses also spoke about circumcision. That is the reality.
Isaiah 58 talks about the fast that God desires, and it describes the spiritual fast—what it really is. In the same chapter, it describes what the real Sabbath is and what it means to keep the Sabbath.
There are pictures, but there is reality. The royal priest goes after the reality.
Now, some pictures are clear. God’s people are different everywhere you go, and different ones will look at things in different ways.
I remember fellowshipping with a dear Mennonite brother, and he invited me to a foot-washing service. My approach to foot washing was that it is a picture, and there is a principle. Whether you say the principle is humility or refreshment or whatever it is, there is a principle. That is just a picture.
I decided, “Well, I will go to this foot-washing service,” which I did not really do. I went to a foot-rewashing service, because I washed my feet first. I am sure that ruined the whole picture of what it was supposed to picture.
But there are some things in the Bible that some will practice and some will not. There are strange groups that simply say, “The Bible says it, and this is what it is.”
For example, handling snakes. Some say that is not a picture; that is a reality, and God has called us to that. Then they will pass out poison and say, “Now drink it, because it is in the Bible, and that is not a picture.”
There are some pictures where we say, “All right, I can set that aside. There is a principle there. Let us have the principle.”
Passing out anointed handkerchiefs—some just drum that up because it is in the Bible. Some say we ought to take that literally, while others say, “No, it is just a picture. There is a principle there.”
Walking in somebody’s shadow and being blessed because you walked in their shadow—is that real? Is that a picture? Some give a hearty amen and say, “Let us take the principle there.” It may be humility, victory, union with Christ, the influence of a life, or something like that.
Some pictures are very closely tied to reality. This morning, we were talking about a picture, and yet there is a reality. Our brother encouraged us right away to make sure that we have the reality. It is not a tradition; it is a reality.
Casting out demons—is that a picture? Is that a reality? Anointing with oil—is that a picture? Is that a reality? Fasting—is that a picture? Is that a reality? Tithing—is that a picture? Is that a reality?
Some go so far as to say everything is a picture. National Israel, they say, is just a picture of a spiritual thing. The local church is not really there; it is a picture of a spiritual thing.
What I am trying to say is that the royal priest increasingly will go after the reality. The picture will not get in the way of the reality. As you go on as a royal priest, be concerned with the reality.
Usually, things invisible become the reality. The way the Bible describes the invisible—the first illustration in Hebrews 11—is “things that are not.” He made the whole universe out of things that are not. That is invisible: things that are not.
By the way, that is how He does the new creation too: out of things that are not. If you want Him to really do something in your life, give Him the raw material: nothing. When you give Him nothing, look what He can do with it. That is what He wants.
Things that are far off are invisible according to the Bible. Things that are spiritual and eternal are invisible. The more you go on in the Lord, the more you are going to live by faith and not by sight. You are going to go after the reality.
David saw that when he sinned with Bathsheba. “Sacrifice and offering You did not desire; a broken and contrite heart You wanted.” Then he gave that, and then he said, “Now I can offer my burnt offering.”
He did not throw the picture away. He used the picture, but he had the reality first.
Hebrews 10:4 says:
It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin.
It was only symbolic. We do not throw out the reality pictured by the picture.
In the outer court, I told you those five offerings: one pictured surrender, one pictured repentance, one pictured confession, one pictured vows, and another pictured rededication. We do not throw that out.
But we do not need to go through the picture to get the reality. We cannot do the picture to get the reality. You have the reality. If the picture helps you, that is different.
There is a movement among the Christian Jews—I do not know if you are familiar with that, but it has come up in the area where we are now—where, if you are a real dedicated Christian, you are going to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles and celebrate the Passover.
They say that God has called us to get involved in these pictures. There are pictures and there is reality, but the heart goes after the reality.
Let me illustrate it for you. I do not have to lay my hands on the head of a goat and symbolize some exchange of the innocence of the animal coming into me and my guilt and sin going into the animal. I do not have to put ashes on my head in order to repent and tear my garments.
But do I have to repent? You see, there is a new-covenant repentance. There is reality, and we do not throw out the reality.
Listen, for example, to Jeremiah 31:18-19. It is my favorite Old Testament verse on repentance:
I have surely heard Ephraim grieving, “You have chastened me, and I was chastened like an untrained calf;
bring me back that I may be restored, for You are the Lord my God.
After I turned back, I repented;
after I was instructed, I smote on my thigh.
I was ashamed and humiliated.”
After I was turned, then I repented. I did not turn to repent. I was turned, and then I repented. I saw the Lord, then said I, “Woe is me.”
There is that new-covenant repentance. Am I responsible to repent? The answer is, if I do not, I am sinning against the Lord.
I not only can trust God to work that in me; I must trust God to work that in me. That is not only once-for-all repentance; that is moment-by-moment repentance.
But I do not have to have the old-covenant worry about it: Did I mean it? Was I sincere? Did I say the right words? Did I have enough faith? Was it the right kind of faith?
Feelings are deceptive, pro and con. You cannot trust your feelings. Sometimes I feel so alive and I am dead as a doornail. Sometimes I feel dead, and I am really alive. It is amazing.
We cannot trust our feelings. Our only hope is in the Lord, in the grace of God, in the work of the new covenant.
God will not repent for me, but He stands ready to make my repentance real. He will not repent for you, but He stands ready to make your repentance real.
That is the royal priesthood. He does not throw out the realities. He does not throw out confession, dedication, and sanctification. He does not throw those things away, but he goes after the reality through the new covenant.
You are going to see, as you go on as a royal priest, that you are going to constantly be bumping heads with the Aaronic priests who put a lot of stress on the pictures and not so much on the reality.
That is a royal priest: he lives by grace. That is a royal priest: he wants the reality.
Then the third characteristic: the royal priest knows a little bit of rest—rest concerning everything. He is at peace. He is not that busy guy that we discussed last night. He has taken by faith that he is seated with Christ in heavenly places.
That brings me to this ministry of Melchizedek. I think this will illustrate the rest, because with every stage of that ministry there seems to be a new dimension of rest.
For example, do you know how much rest will come into your life and heart if God enables you to really believe—really believe—that the war is over?
We were singing about it, and I sensed, when we sang “It Is Well with My Soul,” that you understood some of that rest. Then later, the prayer responded to that: “Thank You, Lord. Thank You, thank You, thank You for delivering me.”
I think you have a taste of that. But some are just constantly dealing with the sin problem. If you believe the war is over, it is done.
May I give a caution here? May God help you not to misunderstand me, but to understand me. There is a lot of talk these days about spiritual warfare.
Make sure, brothers, when you share truths about spiritual warfare, that you do not do it in such a way that someone thinks the war is not over.
There is spiritual warfare. We are not blind. But it cannot contradict the fact that the war is over.
The old order—that was the whole business of the outer court: dealing night and day with sin, confessing, repenting, turning, resisting, and rededicating yourself.
There is warfare. We are not blind. You have to read the Bible, and it talks about wrestling not against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalities. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but spiritual, mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds set up against the knowledge of God, and so on.
But we have to communicate that it is the wrestling of faith. It is standing, therefore, having our armor on. It is not fighting a fight that has already been fought and won.
You say, “What will it look like if I am a royal priest?” Well, I will be living by the pure grace of God. My heart will be set on reality, and I may keep some pictures and dump some, but I want the reality. I do not want just the picture.
I will know that the battle is done. I will be very careful, when I talk about spiritual warfare, that I am not confusing somebody into thinking that they have to fight the sin problem all over again.
In the old order, they lived constantly under condemnation. They lived constantly as victims of their past.
No royal priest has a right to be the victim of the past, because the battle is over. No royal priest has a right to live under condemnation, because sin has been dealt with on the cross.
The old man is dead. The war is over. It offers us real forgiveness, not just symbolic forgiveness—an end to sin altogether.
I love this verse, Hebrews 9:26:
Otherwise, He would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world;
but now once at the consummation of the ages He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.
When He appears the second time—and that is not in the context of His coming again, but when He appears as Melchizedek—He appears without sin unto salvation. Not to deal with sin, because it is dealt with.
This is a strong expression, they tell us, in the Greek: He has put away sin.
When our kids were growing up, that was a constant theme in the house: “Put away your toy. Clean up the house. Put away your toy.”
If my kids put away their toys like Jesus put away sin, they would have to annihilate their toys.
When my wife does the dishes, she puts away the dishes. But she does not put away the dishes like Jesus put away sin, or we would not have a dish in the house.
If she broke the dishes into a million pieces and dropped them in that trench we were talking about at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, it would not be a picture of the way Jesus has put away sin.
So Christians who are being terrorized by past sin or living under condemnation of present sin, if you are in that boat, ask God to open your eyes afresh to what is the finished work and what He has done.
A royal priest knows the work is finished. Tetelestai. It is finished. Paid in full.
The royal priest is different. He is not like the average Christian, because his issue is not battling with Satan. His issue is not, “How am I going to get rid of that guilt? I just feel so bad about what I have done. I have messed up.”
He is not going to be dealing in the present tense with condemnation—living under this question, “Am I really forgiven?”—and all that kind of thing. He is not going to be dealing with assurance of salvation. He is almighty clean.
You know, they say justified means “just as if I never sinned.” That is only half of it. The other half is “just as if I had always been Jesus.” I am clean—just as if I never sinned, just as if I had always been Jesus.
That is a royal priest: somebody who lives by pure grace, somebody whose heart is set on reality and not pictures, somebody who is at rest and not anxious about anything.
When Melchizedek came after the war, he came refreshing Abraham, ministering to him. Letting Jesus refresh you is a wonderful characteristic of the royal priesthood.
You know, by knowing the Lord, I used to be so concerned: “Am I growing in Christ? Lillian, can you measure my growth? Am I feeding? Am I studying the Bible the right way? Am I doing it enough? Should I get another system of Bible study?”
When you are looking to the Lord, you are not going to neglect your Bible. You can look to the Bible and neglect the Lord, but you cannot look to the Lord and neglect the Bible.
I was so concerned about the testimony: “How are we going to get the Word out? How are we going to saturate the neighborhood? How are we going to reach them for Christ? How are we going to keep that lampstand shining and the flame burning?”
I do not have to worry about that anymore. Look to Christ. I am feeding on Christ. He is serving me. He is ministering to me. He is taking care of the maturity, the growth, and the testimony.
I do not have to worry about, “Is this right in my life? Should I give this up? How close to the edge should I go and still not offend the Lord?” I do not have to worry about foul smells if my eye is on Jesus.
I do not want foul smells if my eye is on Christ, and neither will you. That is the royal priesthood.
He came also blessing, showing how rich we are. May God open our eyes.
You know 1 Corinthians 3:
Let no one boast in men.
All things belong to you, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come; all things belong to you, and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.
Everything is yours. The royal priest is continually seeing all that he has in Christ.
One thing I like in that list—“all things are yours”—is death. Is that not wonderful? Put death in there. All things are yours: death.
Did you ever thank God that death belongs to you? Death belongs to me. That is part of the all things you have because you have Christ.
In the old order, you did not hear a message like that. Instead, every day you would hear the same thing: “You have to repent. You have to confess. We need a revival. We have to have another service. We have to get right with God. We have to stop being lazy.” That is all you would hear.
In the new order, what you hear is, “The war is over. He wants to serve you. You are so rich in Christ. You are multibillionaires in Christ.” This is the new order.
Let me illustrate from the last thing that Melchizedek did to Abraham, when he received the tithe of the spoils of the enemy.
There was a surrender in the old system, and there is a surrender in the new system. I think the clearest way to communicate it is to ask you to either listen or turn to Romans 6:13.
Do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness;
but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.
Present yourselves as those alive from the dead. Abraham tithed the spoils of the enemy.
In the old order, they could not tithe the spoils of the enemy because the war was not over. They had no spoils of the enemy. They were still fighting the enemy.
When they were told to give the whole burnt offering as a symbol of their surrender, they were not surrendering themselves as alive from the dead, but as dead. That is how they were surrendering themselves.
I am going to describe a surrender that I am very familiar with because it comes right out of my own life.
Somebody is constantly failing, constantly sinning, constantly messing up. Take a peek into my confession room, and you would have heard me pray something like this:
“Here I am, Lord. I blew it again. I messed up. I know I promised You I would not, and I promised that would be the last time I would ever get involved in that. But, Lord, I really did it this time.
“I have hurt Your testimony. I have hurt my family. I have hurt myself. I have hurt everybody. Lord, I want to come back to You.
“I give You the broken pieces. I heard the gospel song: You can take the broken pieces and do something with the broken pieces. Here are my shards. Here is my mess. Here is my sin.
“Lord, I have really messed up. Please take my blunders. Take my helplessness. I surrender all to You. I am a mess. Lord, take it.”
Now, I am not trying to be critical of the old order, because I did that for so many years. But let me ask you reverently: What does God want with that mess?
“Here, Lord, take one mess. I have really screwed up this time. Lord, take it.”
God says, “I took it once to the cross. That is enough. I do not want that thing again. Stop giving Me your mess.”
Do you see the difference? In the old system, that is all they had to offer: their mess. That was their confession.
But He says, “Present yourself to God as those alive from the dead.” Wow, that is a lot different.
If you see yourself in Christ, and you see yourself holy, sanctified, filled with the Holy Spirit of God, seated with Him, and blessed with every blessing in heavenly places; if you see yourself with the fullness of Christ filling your life and flowing over on all sides, what would happen if you gave that to Him?
That is the surrender that Abraham gave when he tithed the spoils of the enemy. That is the spontaneous surrender that comes out of victory.
That is the royal priest: one who has reckoned himself with Christ, who is identified with Him, who has been opened to all the fullness of God, and who says, “Lord, all You have given to me, I can do nothing else except give it back to You.”
Now God says, “Watch what I will do with that.” That is not trying to build again the broken house or put up again the burned-out house. This is all brand new. This is the royal priesthood.
He lives by grace, with no confidence in the flesh. He goes after realities, and he can set the pictures aside. He just wants the reality.
He is at rest about everything. He is not in the struggle against the indwelling corruption in my heart. That has been dealt with on the cross.
He surrenders as a byproduct of the fullness he has received.
I spent a lot of time on what it looks like in our lives. Just take the same truths: what will it sound like in my message?
Remember, the royal priesthood—the whole priesthood—basically had to do with God’s people. It had to do with royal priests ministering to royal priests.
I am going to show you at the end that it also touches the world. But basically, it is for ministering to God’s people.
What will my message sound like? Well, I know it will not sound like the message of the old covenant: “You have to surrender. You have to repent. You have to confess. You have to dedicate. You have to make promises. You have to keep vows.”
“You have to read through the Bible in a year. You have to have a morning offering, and then you have to have an evening offering. You have to begin the day with God and close the day with God.” It will not be that.
It will not even be the list of elementary things that we are to set aside: foundational things, repentance from dead works, faith toward God, and resurrection. It will not even be that.
I will be presenting Christ. You will be presenting Christ.
Not about Him. Not doctrine. Presenting Him.
They preached Christ—not spiritual disciplines, not themes, not doctrines, not things you should know as Christians. Him: His glory, His name, His life, His righteousness, His purposes, His will, His blood, His ascension, His session. You will be preaching Christ.
Since the war is over, I will be sharing the truth that the war is over.
If a sinner—and by that I mean someone who has not yet come to know the Lord—came to you, and you were testifying and sharing with them the gospel, and they seemed responsive and open, would you say, “Because of your openness and willingness to confess, God has awakened you and you have seen your condition”?
Would you tell that sinner, “Because of your attitude right now, I promise you, as His servant, Christ will die for you”? Would you tell them that?
You would never tell a sinner that Christ will die for him. You know why? Because He has already died. You would say, “It is finished. He has already done it.”
A Christian comes to my door: “Ed, you have got to help me. I am so addicted to this thing. I am a Christian. I love the Lord. These passions, these lusts—what am I going to do? I want so much to get right. I cannot stop. Help me.”
Do you think I, as a royal priest, am going to tell that dear Christian, “Because of your attitude, because of your faith, because of your desire, Christ will deliver you”?
I will not say that. I will not tell him Christ will deliver him, for the same reason I would not tell a sinner that Christ will die for him.
I will announce to him that the war is over, that He has already delivered you, and that He has already taken that old man to the cross.
That is the message of the new-covenant priest. It is already done, and they need to hear it. They are constantly fighting a war that they do not need to fight anymore. It was fought once and finished—perfectly finished.
There is a new thing going around. I do not know if it has touched your area, but somebody called me up one time and said, “Ed, can I come into your heart?”
I said, “What?” He said, “Can I come into your heart?” I said, “What do you mean by that?”
He said, “Well, you know, we need accountability. I would like to come into your heart, and I would like you to have me come into yours.
“You tell me all your junk, and I will tell you all mine, and we will watch over each other. If you carried my card with my name and phone number, then when you started getting in trouble, you could reach in your pocket, call me up, and I would be there.
“You would be there for me, and we would have no secrets. Everything would be out in the open.”
Well, the first thing I said was, “No, you cannot come into my heart. ‘Search me, O God, and know my heart,’ but not, ‘O friend, know my heart.’ I do not want you in my heart.”
I do not even want to search my own heart. If I saw what was down there, it would kill me apart from the grace of God. I do not want to see that.
That whole idea is, “I cannot deal with my old sin nature, so if I can get a fellow sinner to help me, maybe two of us can handle my old sin nature.”
You are just going to add to the sin. He is going to call me up and say, “Hey, just checking on you, brother. Are you watching pornography?” Then I am going to add to my lust the sin of a lie and say, “No, things are going great. I am not watching anything.”
It is not going to work, because it is done, brothers. That is all done. The new-covenant priest, the royal priest, is not going to get involved in that.
What else will you hear? If Christ is in your message and you are a new-covenant priest, you are going to tell them, “Listen, I know you love the Lord. You want to serve Him, but first He has to serve you.”
He has to wash your feet before you wash their feet. I would try to take their eyes off all their service and show them that He is serving them.
Because He lives in me, He is going to serve them through me. I will be there—not so that you can come into my heart and start digging up stuff—but if Christ is ministering through me, I am going to be available for you, and you are going to be available for me.
We are going to die to ourselves. It does not start with death and then we know His resurrection, but that we might know Him and the power of His resurrection, being made conformable to His death and having fellowship in His sufferings.
I need His life in order to die. You need His life in order to die, that He can live through you and minister to others. That is what we tell them. That is our message.
If I am a new-covenant priest, I hope this year anyway, and maybe through the years, if I have had the privilege of standing before you, it may not have come out in these words, but I hope you heard me say, “It is over. It is done. He has done it all.”
I hope you heard me say, “He loves you and wants to serve you.” I hope you heard me say, “You are rich in Christ. Let me show you how rich you are in Christ.”
I hope you heard me say, “It is automatic. You are going to surrender to Him. It is a byproduct.” That is the message of a royal priest.
One more thing, and we will close. This is just surface, because in my own heart I have only begun to see this. But I have the bones. Let me give you the bones.
According to Hebrews 5:1:
Every high priest taken from among men is appointed on behalf of men in things pertaining to God, in order to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.
Hebrews 8:3 says:
Every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices; hence it is necessary that this High Priest also have something to offer.
In our worship, do we, as royal priests, have something to offer Him?
I like how our brother guided us in the table today and called attention to the fact that it is unto Him. We started this morning’s lesson with, “We are gathering together unto Him.” It is all unto Him.
Let me give you a list of four sacrifices royal priests offer. There are probably others.
The first is this: the royal priest continually offers himself as one alive from the dead.
Psalm 51:17:
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise.
Romans 12 says:
I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
That is what royal priests give. They give themselves constantly to the Lord.
Then there is the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. Hebrews 13:15:
Through Him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.
You want to know what to give Him? What we have been giving Him: “Thank You, Lord. Thank You, Jesus.” Praise and worship.
Listen to Psalm 107:21:
Let them give thanks to the Lord for His lovingkindness,
and for His wonders to the sons of men.
Let them offer sacrifices of thanksgiving,
and tell of His works with joyful singing.
Psalm 116:17:
To You I shall offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving,
and call upon the name of the Lord.
Does a royal priest have anything to offer? Yes, himself. I give, as one alive from the dead: “I give me to You.”
Anything to offer? Oh, yes. “Thank You, Lord. I praise You, Jesus. Thank You.” Offering praise to Him.
Anything else to offer? Psalm 4:5:
Offer the sacrifice of righteousness,
and trust in the Lord.
A holy life. It is the grace of God that teaches us to be wise and sober in this generation, not the law of God. The grace of God teaches us.
So we offer a holy life.
My favorite verse so far—and this is new to me concerning what the royal priest offers to God—is this. I knew it had to be here because, in my understanding of Scripture, I could be wrong on this, but I think every Bible truth ends in missions.
I think if it is a real Bible truth, that is the worldwide heart of God: it ends in missions.
As I was seeking for this, because I know every truth ends in missions, and I know the royal priests are dealing with royal priests and we are dealing with the people of God, I came across this verse: Romans 15:15-16.
Oh, how precious this is. Paul says:
I have written very boldly to you on some points so as to remind you again, because of the grace that was given me from God,
to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles, ministering as a priest the gospel of God,
so that my offering of the Gentiles may become acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.
What can I bring God? I can bring me. I can bring praise and thanksgiving to Him because the war is over, because He serves me, because He wants me to know how rich I am, and because He has given me a victory.
I want to thank Him for that. I can let Him live in me in such a way that I have a holy life.
But the gospel, the good news—this good news—He calls, as a priest to God, to bring the good news to the lost so that I can take the Gentiles and offer them as a sacrifice to God.
This is a royal priesthood. May God take us forward in this royal priesthood, that we might show forth the excellencies of Him who has called us out of darkness into His great light.
In review, and we are done: What does a royal priest look like? He lives by grace. He goes after reality. He is at rest.
He does not say to his brother sinner, “You know, struggle now against that thing. Be of good courage. God will deliver you.”
He says, “Be of good courage. He has overcome the world.” Not you—He has overcome the world. You are in Him; you have overcome the world.
You know what John says about the world: it is over against the will of God. All that is in the world—but he that does the will of God has overcome.
Everything that stands between you and the will of God, He has overcome. Everything that stands between me and the will of God, He has overcome.
Then that surrender—that is the royal priest. That is our message to others. That is our message for our life.
Lord, we end this conference. We want to give ourselves afresh as those alive. Lord, we want to give our thanks. We want to give our praise.
Lord, we want to live holy lives, because that honors You. That is Your name. That is Your reputation on the earth.
We want to take the gospel to that desperate world who knows nothing of this, so that we can offer them to Him and He can see the travail of His soul and be satisfied.
May God release us as His royal priests. Again, do not ask, “How can I be a royal priest?” You are.
Do not let Satan make a goal out of a starting point. That is the starting point. If you make a goal out of a starting point, you lose both the goal and the starting point.
Let us pray.
Father, thank You so much for all that You have inspired this priesthood to mean. We pray that You would begin to work in our hearts the wonder of all that it means that the work is done.
The wonder that You would come, put on the slave apron, and then minister to us. The wonder of how wealthy we are in You.
Forgive us for adorning ourselves in the world’s garments when we are so rich in Christ.
Thank You, Lord, for such a victory that spontaneously we want to give ourselves to You. Work these things now in our hearts, we pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Thank you, brothers.