CMLC 2024-10-27 Sermon

Howdy. Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.

Look up there in the sky. It's a bird. It's a plane. It's...

It's that. And the thing is, is that when I say that, so many of you know exactly what I'm doing, except for the little kids who are like,

what is going on right now. But Superman, Siegel and Schuster, who created Action Comics number one with Superman in 1938,

actually struggled for several years to develop the idea of Superman.

At first, Superman was a villain, a bald one at that, with mental powers.

Then, he became a hero, but he was a science experiment by some accident.

Finally, after several years, Superman was published with a very brief origin,

and slowly became a household named through comic books and comic strips and radio programs, TV shows, movies, cartoons, and everything in between,

even lunchboxes and t-shirts. I have a Superman t-shirt at home, or maybe I have it right here. No, that's a legend.

I don't want somebody turning on the feed and seeing the pastor doing that.

But Superman's origin story was not fully developed until later.

As his background became more real, it was also easier to look for his weaknesses.

We discovered Kryptonite from his home planet of Krypton, which could hurt or even kill him.

We saw that he was raised by farmers in Smallville who gave him good morals, but also knew his weaknesses and struggles.

The more we understood who Superman was, the easier it would be to hurt him and undermine his power, the easier to see that he wasn't perfect.

Now, imagine that you find someone with power and authority who comes out of nowhere in your own history,

possessing a relationship with God and able to bless your ancestors. A myth, a legend.

You're used to trusting and knowing your forefathers, your priests, your leaders, and now there is someone who doesn't fit the normal story.

This is what we have in Hebrews with the story of Melchizedek and the reason why this chapter keeps discussing the high priest.

The Jewish community during the time when the book of Hebrews was written saw their place with God as coming from their descent from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as well as Moses.

People who were called by God and promised a nation that would be blessed by God and have his presence with them.

But here, Melchizedek was someone in their stories who didn't fit that lineage.

When Abraham found out that his nephew Lot had been taken captive by four invading kings, he took some of his people and went to attack those kings to rescue his nephew Lot.

Now imagine there were five other kings and kingdoms who could not stand against the four invading kings.

That's why Lot was taken from Sodom in the first place.

But Abraham and his people, they were so capable and blessed by God that they were able to split up and to take on the four invading kings that we thought were more powerful and to rescue Lot.

And the others. We never thought of Abraham, the military leader before now.

Abraham and his people were so strong that they could do all this.

And they came back after slaughtering the invading kings and with all of the spoil they had with them, they encounter a priest king named Melchizedek.

In Genesis it says, And Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought forth bread and wine, and he was priest of God the most high.

And he blessed him and said, Blessed be Abraham, of God most high, maker of heaven and earth, and blessed be God the most high, who hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand.

And he gave him a tenth of all.

Who was this?

You have Abraham before he got his name Abraham, coming in from demonstrating his power and might with everything that came from his conquest and his victory.

And he's being blessed by some random person out of nowhere.

And then giving him a tenth of everything he had.

Who was he?

How did he know Yahweh?

And what right did this random person have to be a high priest of God?

After centuries, people came up with theories.

And according to Hebrews, the viewpoint had even gotten to the point where people assumed that he was mysterious because Melchizedek had no father and mother.

Clearly.

And in fact, if someone were to be seen as the Son of God at that time for much of the Jewish community, it would have been Melchizedek coming out of nowhere.

He was seen as the one who came from God without any human origins.

Now, hopefully you realize that we don't have any real reason to think that Melchizedek was some supernatural being or even the Son of God himself.

No capes, no flying, no magic.

The book of Hebrews is making a point about how people saw him, not necessarily adding new teachings to the church.

But there were even people in the history of the church who thought this and believed that Melchizedek might even be Jesus himself in a pre-incarnate form.

But other people very well could have known God before Abraham.

The descendants of Seth, Adam and Eve had three sons and the thirdborn was Seth.

This did not only include Abraham.

There were other people who knew about God as their Creator and the one they should worship.

There is no reason to think that only Abraham had knowledge of God.

Rather, it was the lineage of Abraham that was promised the future nation of Israel and eventually the Messiah.

But let's be honest, leaving someone as a myth much more interesting and enjoyable than knowing who the person really is.

And even if we do know their history, it's fun just to ignore it or even make up something different to fit our myths.

Presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson both were real people.

They did some things that were good and some things that were not.

Did they both lead our nation to its independence and beginnings?

Yes, they did.

Did they lead an insurrection and both of them have slaves?

Yes, they did.

And Thomas Jefferson also had some really strange views about God and the Christian faith to the point where he even just chopped out parts of the Bible to make more sense to himself.

When we look at the founding fathers, though, we would rather just make up stories of cherry trees to try to build them up in their character.

When we look back at people, even our own forefathers and ancestors, we discover good and bad.

St. Augustine, one of the more notable church fathers, struggled for many years with sexual sins, which caused his own beliefs about marriage and sexuality to become tainted and to affect many within the church even today.

Even whenever during Martin Luther's time and he would look at the priests that were there and see what was happening in their lives and became so disillusioned with what was happening and even Martin Luther himself.

If you go and read many of his additional teachings that we as the church do not hold to, you will find some strange things that you would not be happy about.

What we even see is that there are many who blamed warfare and bloodshed on Martin Luther's own letter writing and how many thousands died because of it.

When we want to believe that someone is all good or all bad, we will oftentimes lash out at what we discover when we look at the past, denying some things that are true and making up some things with no evidence at all.

But where does that leave us with Melchizedek?

Why would he be so important to the Hebrew Jewish community at that time?

Why even need to make things up at all?

In many ways, because Melchizedek was seen as being above the law, almost beyond the law.

The Jewish community saw their life as constantly being focused on whether they had done enough to fulfill the law to prove their faith to God.

But the law had come from Moses, and Abraham was even before Moses, and then Melchizedek didn't even have to abide by Abraham's standards, let alone Moses, because he knew God without knowing Abraham.

But does that mean that Melchizedek was not supposed to follow God's law?

Did Melchizedek have a loophole for not obeying God?

No, that's definitely not true, because we are all expected to follow God's law.

No one is above it.

Even if not everyone has it clearly specified the way that the Hebrew people did, that doesn't mean that we are allowed to do whatever we like.

But what's interesting about all of this is that the Hebrew people, struggling with whether to follow Jesus, they weren't even looking at Melchizedek anyway.

They were looking at the Levitical priests. They were looking at their laws.

They were of the opinion.

If they continued to make sacrifices with the priests and followed the laws perfectly, they could somehow find their salvation with God themselves, prove that they were good enough.

And this wasn't even sustainable.

Not only were none of the sacrifices that they made ever perfect enough for God, but the priests themselves weren't even good enough.

No matter how hard they tried or how much they sacrificed, it would never fully wipe away their sins.

Even if Melchizedek really was this perfect priest with no father and no mother, and being the pattern by which the Messiah would eventually come, we have no idea where he comes from,

then why were people continuing to look at the old laws from the Levitical law, instead of following the true high priest who came in the order of Melchizedek?

The one who came with a better covenant, the one who came with a better sacrifice, Jesus, who sacrificed his own life as the better covenant with God. Why not?

Isn't it amazing how we keep losing track of God's will and God's ways because we want to pursue what other people have to offer all around us?

Someone on TikTok says something, try this product, try doing this action, try acting like this. We don't know anything about them, but somehow they convince us to be just like them.

Or we hear someone shouting loudly, and even though we know what sort of person they've been, we ignore it to gain a new hero.

But the true Messiah, the one we're meant to follow, asks us to follow him in spirit and in truth, with our very hearts and minds and lives, yet we can't even be bothered.

Even knowing that Jesus truly is the Son of God, we ignore his sacrifice that calls us to be gracious and merciful because we'd rather sacrifice other people on the altar of public opinion and our own angers and desires.

We don't want the new covenant of forgiveness and mercy. We still want blood because we're not satisfied.

We spend a lot of time looking at different laws.

And when I say laws, I don't mean actual governmental regulations. What I mean is the expectations that we have for ourselves and for others.

Somehow we think that if we can prove that someone is guilty of one specific thing, then we ignore them and hate them.

And if we can demonstrate that someone else has done one specific thing we like, then we ignore their sins and love them above all else.

But there's no one who's righteous. No, not one.

Even discovering that Melchizedek himself is truly human, it shouldn't be a surprise. He wasn't the true Messiah. Why?

Because even if he was not beholden to the laws of Moses or even of his ancestor Abraham, he was still subject to the law of God.

That showed that he is someone who is sinful and in need of a Messiah himself.

Why do we even want to take the time though to bother with Jesus?

Why even take on another high priest with so many high priests that have been flawed before?

I'll give you a comparison to explain.

When I was an engineer and I was a chemical engineer and I debated many times whether to stay in chemical engineering or to become a mechanical engineer.

Because I did not enjoy chemicals at all. I didn't enjoy chemistry at all. I really did, to be honest.

And I thought about changing to mechanical multiple times, but one of my professors sat me down and explained this to me.

A mechanical engineer knows what is expected and finds the best machinery to make it happen.

A chemical engineer is the one who tells you what to make in the first place. And so I didn't change.

We keep going to people who spoon feed us what we should do and how we should act.

Even though they don't even know themselves how to do it.

But Jesus says, this is who you are and who you get to be because of who I am and what I've done for you.

Jesus is not the same type of high priest as anyone else.

He's not the same icon. He's not the same beacon. He's the one who always existed.

Who knows everything needed to forgive sins and to bring eternal life. Who made the way for us.

Many of you may have been pursuing any number of things to feel safe and good in this world.

Without Jesus, you have nothing.

Any number of laws followed or sacrifices made will not achieve anything.

It is only what Jesus did on the cross for us all that brings life and salvation and hope with God.

And if you have not talked with God and acknowledged that you are a sinner, someone who does what is wrong and needs forgiveness

and thanked God for sending Jesus to bring you salvation and to lead your life.

I hope you do so today.

So I don't know who has been your high priest.

I don't know whom you turn to when you're worried or upset or looking to feel safe in the world.

As if some person is going to bring hope and salvation and make everything right.

But there is no everyday person who is going to fix this world.

No Levitical priest. No mythical Melchizedek.

The son of God who was born in Bethlehem with his human mother and his divine father is the only place where we find hope and peace.

The only one who can be our true high priest and make a way for us in this world and beyond.

The one who not only died but also rose again and brought us everlasting life.

Whatever else, whomever else you have been following, let them go.

Let Jesus be your way, your truth, your life.

And may Jesus continue to be the true one who makes a way for us with God and with his future for us by his sacrifice and by his intercession for us.

Thanks be to God.