Key Verse: “Help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16 NKJV)

14-16 Now that we know what we have—Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God—let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch with our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all—all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.

Reflection: (Hebrews 4:14)

Christ is superior to the priests, and His priesthood is superior to their priesthood.

To the Jews, the high priest was the highest religious authority in the land. 

He alone entered the Most Holy Place in the Temple once a year to make atonement for the sins of the whole nation (Leviticus 16). 

Like the high priest, Jesus mediates between God and us. 

As humanity’s representative, He intercedes for us before God. 

As God’s representative, He assures us of God’s forgiveness. 

Jesus has more authority than the Jewish high priests because He is truly God and truly man. 

Unlike the high priest, who could go before God only once a year, Christ is always available to hear us when we pray,

Reflection: (Hebrews 4:15)

Jesus is like us because He experienced a full range of temptations throughout His life as a human being. 

We can be comforted knowing that Jesus faced temptation – He can sympathize with us. 

We can be encouraged knowing that Jesus faced temptation without giving in to sin. 

He shows us that we do not have to sin when facing the seductive lure of temptation. 

Jesus is the only perfect human being who has ever lived. 

Reflection: (Hebrews 4:16)

Prayer is our approach to God and we are to come “boldly.” 

Some Christians approach God meekly with heads hung low, afraid to ask Him to meet their needs. 

Others pray flippantly, giving little thought to what they say. 

Come with reverence because He is your King. 

But also come with bold assurance because He is your Friend and Counselor. 

1-3 Every high priest selected to represent men and women before God and offer sacrifices for their sins should be able to deal gently with their failings, since he knows what it’s like from his own experience. But that also means that he has to offer sacrifices for his own sins as well as the peoples’.

4-6 No one elects himself to this honored position. He’s called to it by God, as Aaron was. Neither did Christ presume to set himself up as high priest, but was set apart by the One who said to him, “You’re my Son; today I celebrate you!” In another place God declares, “You’re a priest forever in the royal order of Melchizedek.”

Reflection: (Hebrews 5:4-6)

Hebrews 5 stresses both Christ’s divine appointment and His humanity. 

The writer uses two Old Testament verses to show Christ’s divine appointment. (Psalm 2:7; 110:4). 

At the time this book was written, the Romans selected the high priest in Jerusalem. 

In the Old Testament, God chose Aaron, and only Aaron’s descendants could be high priests. 

Christ, like Aaron, was chosen and called by God. 

Reflection: (Hebrews 5:6)

Melchizedek was a priest of Salem (now called Jerusalem). 

Hebrews 7 explains Melchizedek’s position.

7-10 While he lived on earth, anticipating death, Jesus cried out in pain and wept in sorrow as he offered up priestly prayers to God. Because he honored God, God answered him. Though he was God’s Son, he learned trusting-obedience by what he suffered, just as we do. Then, having arrived at the full stature of his maturity and having been announced by God as high priest in the order of Melchizedek, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who believingly obey him.

Reflection: (Hebrews 5:7)

Jesus was in great agony as He prepared to face death (Luke 22:41-44). 

Although Jesus cried out to God, asking to be delivered, He was prepared to suffer humiliation, separation from His Father, and death in order to do God’s will. 

At times we will undergo trials not because we want to suffer but because we want to obey God. 

Let Jesus; obedience sustain and encourage you in times of trial. 

You will be able to face anything if you know that Jesus Christ is with you. 

Reflection: (Hebrews 5:7)

Have you ever felt that God didn’t hear your prayers?

Be sure you are praying with relevant submission, willing to do what God wants. 

God responds to His obedient children.

Reflection: (Hebrews 5:8)

Jesus’ human life was not a script that He passively followed. 

It was a life that He chose freely (John 10:17-18). 

It was a continuous process of making the will of God the Father His own. 

Jesus chose to obey, even though obedience led to suffering and death. 

Because Jesus obeyed perfectly, even under great trial, He can help us obey, no matter how difficult obedience seems to be. 

Reflection: (Hebrews 5:9)

Christ was always morally perfect. 

By obeying, He demonstrated His perfection to us, not to God or to Himself. 

In the Bible, perfect usually means completeness or maturity.

By showing our experience of suffering, Christ shared our human experience completely.

He is now able to offer eternal salvation to those who obey Him (See Philippians 2:5-11 for Christ’s attitude as He became human).

Reflection: (Hebrews 5:9)

The “eternal salvation” we have been offered means the elimination of a verdict on our sin. the setting aside of judgment, and the award of undeserved membership in God’s family. 

It is a change in destiny, an awakening of hope, an overcoming of death. 

Salvation turns a person toward heaven and inaugurates a life of discipleship with the living Christ. 

It is God’s invitation to you.

God’s energy invested in you. 

Salvation is the reason you can smile in the morning and rest in the evening. 

God loves you, and you belong to Him.