Heb 7:11–19 — The Law Made Nothing Perfect

Last week we looked at the first paragraph of chapter 7 verses 1 through 10 and we pointed out that this passage is dealing with a figure named Melchizedek who is not mentioned very often in the Bible. Mentioned only two times in the Old Testament, in Psalm 110 verse 4, that is quoted here in our text in verse 17, referring to Christ, you are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. And the other passage is in Genesis chapter 14, which is referred to there in our text at the beginning, when it describes the story of how Abraham met this figure after he was returning from the slaughter of the kings and rescuing Lot from the kings that had taken him captive. And how Abraham met this figure, Melchizedek, how he tithed all of the spoils of the war to him, and how he was blessed by this individual.

One of the key things that we looked at there in this passage is that the text makes a big deal out of the fact that he has no genealogy, unlike all of the other priests in the Old Testament. All of the priests in the Old Testament that are connected to the Levitical priesthood or the Aaronic priesthood. Those are interchangeable concepts. Levi is the tribe from which the Aaronic priests came. Aaron was a descendant of Levi. But in all the cases where a Levitical or Aaronic priest is mentioned in the Old Testament, it always gives his genealogy. That is very important. In fact, there are examples where there are some people who wanted to be a priest in the time after the exile when they were returning from Babylon to the land. And they said, look, we are part of the tribe of Levi. We could be priests. But they were not able to prove their genealogy. And therefore, they were told that they could not serve as priests because it was not certain. Their genealogy was not certain.

In contrast with that, this priest In Genesis chapter 14, this mysterious priest who is called Melchizedek, king of Salem, this priest does not have a genealogy listed in the text. There is no statement about where he came from or how he derived his priesthood. That does not mean that he was a supernatural figure. It does not mean that he was some sort of angel, or perhaps, as some have suggested, a pre-incarnate Christophany, a revelation of the second person of the Trinity, like the angel of the Lord. Some have suggested that. Maybe Melchizedek is some sort of supernatural being, and that is why it says he is without father or mother or genealogy. But we should not take it that way. We should not take it in that supernatural sense. Melchizedek was a real human being.

The way he is described in the Genesis account, in Genesis 14, is he is described as a king of one of the cities in the land of Canaan, the king of Salem, just like the other kings. Remember, the other kings were having this battle between the five kings from Mesopotamia and the four kings in the land. Those kings are also described as being real human beings. They were the king of Elam and the king of Sodom and the king of Gomorrah and so on. And so the fact that Melchizedek is described as the king of a known city in the land of Canaan shows that he is listed along with the other kings as a real mortal, not as a supernatural being.

Do not take that phrase there, he is without father or without mother, too literally, as if he is literally not without father or mother. The point is that there is no record in the text of his father or mother. He did have a father and mother, like every other human being does, but there is no record in the text of it. That is why the next phrase is, he is without genealogy. He is without father or mother or genealogy. There is no genealogy, there is no account of his heritage mentioned in the text.

And the author of Hebrews then is pointing to that silence in the text in contrast with the other priests, the Aaronic priests, who do have their genealogy mentioned, as a clue in the text that this Melchizedek must therefore be Although he is a real human being, he must therefore also be a type of Christ, a picture of Christ and his priesthood.

The author of Hebrews explicitly says that he is a type of Christ in verse 3. Verse 3 says, he is without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God. He continues a priest forever. He resembles Christ. He is a picture of Christ. He is a figure for Christ.

Later on in the text, it says something similar, going the other direction. Instead of saying that Melchizedek resembles Christ, verse 15 says that Christ arises in the likeness of Melchizedek. That is the other way of putting the same idea. This becomes even more evident, verse 15, when another priest referring to Jesus, arises in the likeness of Melchizedek. There is similarity but not identity between these figures.

Psalm 110 verse four does not say, remember Psalm 110 begins with, the Lord said unto my Lord, David is the speaker, he is referring to Jesus as my Lord. The Lord, Yahweh, said to my Lord, that is Christ, sit at my right hand until I make all your enemies the footstool of your feet. And then a few verses later, this same Yahweh is speaking to his son and says, you are a priest forever. Now it does not say you are Melchizedek. It says you are a priest forever according to, after the order of Melchizedek.

So the author of Hebrews is interpreting Genesis 14 in light of Psalm 110 and saying this then supports my interpretation. The author of Hebrews is saying this supports my interpretation that Melchizedek, though a real human being, was a type of Christ who resembles Christ. He is not Christ himself, but he is a type and a picture of Christ. Why is the author of Hebrews talking about all this Melchizedek stuff? What is the importance of it? The importance of it is in verse 11. So now we are getting into our text today. His main argument is this.

The Law Made Nothing Perfect

He says, verse 11, if perfection had been attainable through the Levitical priesthood or the Aaronic priesthood, or on the basis of it, that priesthood, the people receive the law, what further need would there have been for another priest to arise after the order of Melchizedek rather than one named after the order of Aaron?

If the whole system that God had put in place through Moses with the people of Israel which included the giving of the law, the moral law, the civil law, the ceremonial law, and also the priesthood and the sacrifices, if that whole system, which we could call the law, if that whole system was able to give us perfection, and by perfection, the author of Hebrews means perfect access to the presence of God, we see that in our text in verse 19, that is through this better hope, through this better mediator that we are able to draw near to God, So drawing near to God is the same thing as perfection. So if perfection, if perfect access to the presence of God had been attainable through that whole system that we can call the law, what further need would there have been for a prophecy like Psalm 110 to occur in which the father says to his son, you are a priest, not after the order of Aaron, the Levitical priesthood, the Levitical system that was established under Moses and Aaron, but rather a priest after this new order, the order of Melchizedek. The author of Hebrews is making his argument here that Psalm 110 verse 4, this declaration that the exalted Christ is a priest, but he is a priest from a different order, This proves that there has been a change in the law.

That is a change in this whole system by which the people of God are organized and constituted as God’s people under all of these regulations, moral, civil, and ceremonial laws, to have access to the presence of God. They did have some degree of access to God. Once a year, the high priest was able to go into the Holy of Holies, but it was not permanent access. It was not perfect access.

The author of Hebrews then is arguing that based on Psalm 110 verse four and this oracle that looks ahead to the day of Christ’s exaltation and the fact that he is declared to be not only a king but a priest after this new order, this demonstrates that entire system has undergone a change.

A Change of Priesthood

Verse 12, for when there is a change in the priesthood, there is necessarily a change in the law as well. This is the main point of the text. A change of priesthood demonstrates a change of law. Now again, that word law is being used in a very expansive sense to include the entire system. It is not just referring to the moral law. It is not just referring to the Ten Commandments. It is referring to this entire system that we could call the law.

Even to this day, the Jewish people refer to it as the Torah. And by the Torah, they mean the entire regulation that God gave to God’s people as a system. You could think of it more like a constitution that establishes the people of God in a covenant relationship with God.

A Change of Covenant

This is the main point that the audience needs to hear. Remember, this letter is written to the Hebrews, that is to Jewish Christians, Hebrew Christians, who are being tempted to act as if the old covenant system, the law, the Torah, is still in effect. As if we should go back to the temple and worship God in the temple and respect the Aaronic priests that are serving there in the temple. That is one reason why we think this book was written before the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in A.D. 70, because the people are still being tempted to go back to that system of worship. They are being tempted to go back to a Christless Judaism, as if Christ had never come, as if the system that God put in place with Moses and Aaron back in the book of Exodus is still in effect. And so the author of Hebrews is saying, look at these facts that show us that whole old covenant system, this constitution for the people of God, Not only the moral law, but the civil and ceremonial law and the priesthood and this whole production that God established for God’s people to have a relationship with God and to draw near to God.

That whole system has been changed. It has been changed and fulfilled because of the coming of Christ. Do not go back because Christ has come. Something new has come. The old covenant is no longer in effect. Now again, that does not mean that the moral law has been changed. The moral law itself cannot change. It is always wrong to worship another God. It is always wrong to commit adultery. Or to commit murder. Those moral laws that are summarized in the Ten Commandments continue.

But the entire system called the Torah, or the law in that broad sense, has been fulfilled in Christ. The author of Hebrews then is saying, if you look at Psalm 110 verse four and this declaration that Christ is a priest after a different order, that shows us that something has changed because when there is a change in the priesthood, going from Aaronic to Melchizedekian, that proves that there is a change in the law as well, that is in this constitution that defines who the people of God are. The author of Hebrews is making this point to call them back from assuming that the Old Covenant is still in effect, as if they can just live and operate under the Torah and all of its moral, civil, and ceremonial laws. There is something similar that we could apply today. There are many people today who are trying to teach the church and teach Christians that the old covenant, including the civil and ceremonial laws, are still in effect.

For example, there are a number of different movements that are like that, but one of them is called the Hebrew Roots Movement. The Hebrew Roots Movement is sort of a decentralized thing. It is not one particular denomination, although there are some denominations that are associated with it. It is more like an online thing with different people making arguments on podcasts and YouTube channels and so on.

But there is this movement called the Hebrew Roots Movement that is arguing that Gentile Christianity, has drifted away from its Hebrew and Jewish roots. That with the influx of so many Gentiles into the church, beginning in the second and third century, and with the change of using the Bible mostly in Greek rather than in the original Hebrew. They even argue, some of them, that even the New Testament itself was originally written in Hebrew and that the Greek manuscripts that we have now are not the original authentic text, which is not true. But they argue that we have become too detached from our Jewish roots. And so we need to go back to the Jewish foundations of the faith.

And they argue, look, look at Jesus himself. He was a pious Orthodox rabbi. Look at Paul. He was raised within the Jewish faith. He was even observing the Torah in many ways. There are some examples of that in the book of Acts, where he took a vow and so on.

So they are arguing that we need to get rid of this drift towards Gentile Christianity and we need to return back to a Jewish Hebrew version of Christianity. Their central argument is this. They are saying that it is more than simply that we should study the Old Testament. It is more than just saying that we should study the Old Testament in Hebrew. It is that we should actually observe the Torah. We should observe all of the civil and ceremonial laws in the book of Exodus and Leviticus and Deuteronomy.

So many of these Jewish roots Christians, they practice the Sabbath observance on the seventh day. We believe in observing the Lord’s Day as the new covenant Sabbath on the first day of the week, but they say, no, we need to go back to the seventh day Sabbath because that is what the Jews observed. And they will even observe it the way the Jews do today, which is they will begin on Friday night at sunset and continue until Saturday at sunset.

They say we should also observe all of the festivals of the Old Covenant. Remember the Feast of Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur and so on. We should observe all of those festivals. We should observe the dietary laws that distinguish between clean and unclean foods.

And they also emphasize that we should use Hebrew words for things, instead of using the Greek words that are used in the New Testament, we should use Hebrew words. Instead of calling Jesus, Jesus, we should call him Yeshua. Instead of referring to the law, we should call it the Torah. Instead of talking about the Sabbath, we should talk about Shabbat.

So they have this very strong Jewish flavor to their Christianity. And they are saying, in effect, that the law that is in that broadest, most comprehensive sense, moral, civil, and ceremonial, is still in effect. Now there are some within this movement who are still Orthodox in the sense that they affirm historic Nicene Orthodoxy, that is the Nicene Creed, which affirms the doctrine of the Trinity. God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But there are others within this movement who say even that is a Gentile corruption.

So they reject the Trinity as a false teaching. And so some of the Jewish roots or Hebrew roots teachers are actually heretical in their understanding of Christ. They deny the deity of Christ. They say, we believe he is the Messiah, but he is not the divine son of God.

Not all hold to that, but there are many who do. And there are also some famous examples of people who shifted from one to the other. Or they started off with just sort of dabbling with this Hebrew root stuff But then the more they got into it, they eventually turned out to deny the Trinity and the deity of Christ, which shows the danger of it. It shows the danger of this movement. But here is the decisive question.

Does the Mosaic Covenant, which the author of Hebrews refers to as the law, does the Mosaic Covenant in its entirety, the Torah, Does it continue to be binding as the covenant under which the people of God must live? And according to our text, the answer is resoundingly no. Our text clearly says, verse 12, there has been a change in the priesthood. We are no longer under the Aaronic priesthood. We are under this new priesthood, which is Christ, the Melchizedekian priest. Where there has been a change in the priesthood, then of necessity, there is also a change in the law that is in this. Comprehensive, life-defining, people of God-defining, covenantal administration that governs how we are to live and behave. The author of Hebrews says, if we have a new priest, and he is not from the Order of Aaron, but from the Order of Melchizedek, then we must also have a new covenant constitution defining who we are as God’s people.

Of course, what is the answer to that? What is the covenant constitution that defines who we are now in Christ? The author, if he was going to go on to say very clearly in chapter eight, it is what? It is called the New Covenant. The New Covenant, which was established in Christ’s blood. Of course, there is tremendous continuity between the old and the new. Continuity in a myriad of different ways. There is continuity of the moral law. The moral law does not change. There is continuity of teaching and doctrine. There is continuity of our understanding of who God is. There is continuity in terms of typology. All of those things in the old covenant that have passed away are still valid in the sense that they give us pictures of Christ and his work.

For example, all of the sacrifices, even though we do not offer sacrifices anymore, we can still read about those sacrifices in the book of Leviticus to help us to understand more clearly about Christ’s work and his atonement and his death for us on the cross.

So there is continuity between the old and the new, but in terms of this fundamental legal question, which covenant are we under? What defines who we are as the people of God and how we are to live? In terms of that question, we are no longer under the Mosaic Covenant. We are under the New Covenant. And the proof of that is the change of priesthood.

That is an interesting argument. Paul also makes the same argument in Galatians when he is arguing against the Judaizers who are trying to get these Gentile Christians to be circumcised. He also makes a similar argument that the old covenant is fulfilled and we are under the new covenant, not the old. But he does not use this particular argument for it. He does not use this particular rationale The rationale that he uses is a little bit different.

The rationale he uses is he goes back to the Abrahamic promise and sees that as being prior to the giving of the law at Mount Sinai. And he says the promise is based upon grace, but the law is based upon works. And the law was given to drive Israel to Christ to show them their sinfulness and their inability to keep it so that Christ would come and be born under it and fulfill it for us. The author of Hebrews makes a similar case for the transition from the old to the new, but he uses a different rationale.

His rationale is by appealing to this issue of the priesthood. That is why he spends so much time delving into this mysterious figure of Melchizedek. Now interestingly, there is an interesting tie-in between the way Paul argues in Galatians 3 and the way the author of Hebrews argues here in Hebrews 7 because Melchizedek, Melchizedek is his key argument and he is basing that on Psalm 110 verse 4, but Melchizedek is tied to Abraham. So he is making a similar kind of point, is he not?

Just like Paul said that the promise that God gave to Abraham is prior to the law, and the law came 430 years after. And it was given for a temporary purpose, leading us to Christ. And now that Christ has come, the promise is fulfilled in Christ because he is the offspring who gives us the inheritance.

But the author of Hebrews makes a similar point, which is he goes back not so much to Abraham, he does talk about Abraham, but he goes back to Melchizedek. But Melchizedek is tied to Abraham. Melchizedek is an important figure in the story of Abraham’s life.

And what is so interesting is that God is giving even Abraham these clues. That what is about to be fulfilled, he is going to have a son named Isaac and then Jacob and the 12 tribes, and there is going to become this great nation called Israel, that what God is doing with Abraham right now is provisional and temporary.

And that even the priests that are going to come from Abraham’s offspring through the tribe of Levi, and then from Levi down to Aaron, that even those priests are imperfect, temporary, they are mortal men, they die and they get replaced one after the other. And so God is telling Abraham that what he is about to fulfill, he is going to give Abraham literal offspring in the literal land. What God is about to fulfill with Abraham is itself not the final fulfillment.

It is only a picture. And so he gives Abraham these clues in this incident where he meets this mysterious figure called Melchizedek, is a clue to that. It is a clue even to Abraham that there is something greater that is to come beyond even the immediate horizon of his own children and family and the formation of the nation of Israel. Abraham himself is learning to look beyond the earthly fulfillment in the land to something greater to come in the days of the Messiah. That there will be a priest after the order of Melchizedek. This passage I think is so helpful.

Law and Grace under the Old Covenant

Not only does it provide a resounding answer to those such as the Hebrew Roots Movement and others like them who try to say that the Mosaic Law as a whole, as a constitution governing God’s people is still in effect, but it also gives us a solution to an age-old problem that theologians have wrestled with for so long. And that is, how do we view the Mosaic Covenant? On the one hand, the Mosaic Covenant seems to be an administration of the covenant of grace. There are so many things in the Mosaic Covenant that are gracious.

The whole sacrificial system that provides a means of atonement for sin. The fact that at the very beginning of the preamble to the Ten Commandments, God says, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Therefore, keep these commandments in response to my action of grace in saving you. But on the other hand, there are other things in the Mosaic Covenant that seem to point in a different direction. There are certain things in the Mosaic Covenant that sound very legal and works-oriented.

For example, you have in Leviticus 18:5 the statement that the one who does these commandments will live by doing them. That sounds like salvation by works.

You also have in Deuteronomy chapter 28 and also repeated earlier in Leviticus, the curses of the covenant. Remember all the curses? That you have to do all of these things, and if you do not, you are under a curse. The Apostle Paul even quotes that one in Galatians 3 verse 10.

He says the law cannot justify us because the law requires perfect obedience and none of us are able to keep the law perfectly. The law says that the one who cursed is the one who does not continue in all the things written in the book of the law to do them. And then of course you have the fact that the entire system came to an end in the exile because of Israel’s disobedience to God. The whole story of the Old Testament is that not Israel kept the law and lived by it, but they broke it and they kept sinning against God and turning to worship idols. And it got so bad that God eventually said, although you are my covenant wife, I am going to divorce you because of your rebellion against me. And he sent the nation and he sent the people into exile in Babylon.

That sounds like works. It does not sound like grace. That sounds like judgment and wrath. It does not sound like a gracious covenant with means of atonement and how can we respond graciously in gratitude to the fact that I am the Lord your God who saved you and brought you up out of the land of Egypt. That sounds like judgment and wrath and curse.

So how do we deal with these mixed signals that we find in the Mosaic Revelation, the Torah itself, This whole constitution that God gave the people, it contains aspects that sound like they are gracious and also aspects that sound very legal and works-based. Our text is so wonderful because it gives us the solution to that problem. Our text says in verse 11, there is this parenthetical comment there. It says, for on the basis of it, and the it refers back to the Levitical priesthood. On the basis of the priesthood, the people received the law. That is, they received, they were organized at Mount Sinai. It is recorded in the book of Exodus, beginning in chapter 19 and continuing on to chapter 24 when Moses sprinkles the people with the blood and says, this is the covenant that God is making. They were organized and constituted as a covenant people under the law, under this Mosaic Constitution on the basis of the priesthood.

So our text then helps us to see that we are not going crazy when we struggle with the fact that the Mosaic Covenant seems to be sending mixed signals. Sometimes it sounds very works and heavy and full of wrath and judgment and exile. But then sometimes it sounds very gracious. There is a means of atonement. There is a way to have sins be dealt with.

And the answer is that it was on the basis of the priesthood that God gave the law to the people. There is an interlocking relationship between these two dimensions that are in the Mosaic Revelation. The Mosaic Revelation contains these two aspects. It contains the law, which says, do this and live. And if you do not do it perfectly, you are under a curse.

The Need for a Mediator

But God gave that to the people, our text says, on the basis of the priesthood. And that makes perfect sense now. Because how else could a sinful people receive the law unless they had a priesthood to mediate, to give them atonement, to help them to deal with their failures so that they could still have a relationship with a holy God. And so the application for us is clear. As sinners, we cannot relate to the law directly. We can only relate to the law through a priest, that is, through a mediator.

If you want to just disconnect that clock, I think that will solve the problem. We installed a clock back there. It is a digital clock. We are still figuring out how to use it. The purpose of it was for me so that I could see how far, how long I am going in the sermon. So that is a warning to me that I need to wrap it up. So the application for us is that as sinners, right, we cannot relate to the law directly. We must have a priest. We must have a mediator. The law says you must do all these things perfectly. And if you do not, you will surely die. You are under the curse. You are under God’s judgment.

Thank the Lord that we have received the law. We have received God’s commandments to live in a way that pleases Him. Not directly as if it all hangs on us to do it perfectly, but we have received the law on the basis of the priesthood of Christ. On the basis of Christ’s work. He is the one who has fully kept the law in our place. He is the one who has satisfied the demands of the law.

Think about it. Is it not amazing to think when you look at the life of Jesus in the gospels, he lived a perfect law obedient life. He even kept all the ceremonial law as well. He kept it all. He kept it perfectly. He is the only person, the only man in the history of the world who perfectly, obediently kept God’s law to the very end, even to the point of death on the cross. What a glorious high priest we have.

There is a wonderful tradition within the seceder tradition of the Scottish Presbyterian Church. The seceders were a group of Scottish Presbyterians who seceded from the mainline Church of Scotland back in the 18th century. And they are sometimes called the Merrow Men because they loved this one book called The Merrow of Modern Divinity. And this Mero tradition or this Seceder tradition talked about how we receive the law of God, not from the hand of Moses outside of Christ, but we receive the law from the hand of Christ.

It is from the hand of Christ that we receive the law. And that then gives us great encouragement that we know that if we make a mistake or if we sin against the Lord, that not everything is lost. We know that we have a mediator who will intercede for us and that out of gratitude for his grace and forgiveness, we can then recommit ourselves to live a life of gratitude and obedience to the Lord. Do not try to relate to the law outside of Christ apart from a mediator. You can only do it through Christ, through his mediation.

It is on the basis of the priesthood that we receive the law, looking there at that parenthetical comment in verse 11. The law itself is good and holy and righteous, and all that it demands is good, but it does not have the power to deal with your guilty conscience. It does not have the ability to transform your heart from within. That only comes from Christ and from the priesthood of Christ.

In our day, we do not really think of priests as being that important. If we think about priests, we think about Roman Catholic priests. And their job is to turn the bread into the body of Christ and do the sacraments for us. That is not what a priest is about. That is a very distorted understanding of what a priest is.

A priest is a mediator and that is why we have Jesus Christ. We have the law of God given to us through the mediation of our great high priest. And the wonderful truth is that it is not simply looking back 2,000 years to what happened when he hung upon the cross for our sins. That even now he has been raised from the dead and ascended into heaven and even now he intercedes for us as our great high priest. He mediates our relationship to God and to his holy law. Even now he is your high priest. Not according to the order of Aaron that is based on mortal men and their sinners as well, but based upon the order of Melchizedek, this divine, glorious high priest who gives us perfect access to the presence of God. Those priests could not do it. They were faulty. They were weak. They were sinners. They had to offer sacrifices for themselves before they could go in and offer sacrifice for the people. But our high priest is perfect. Our high priest continues to live. He will never die.

Our high priest now, in power and glory, not only as a priest, but as a king at the right hand of God, is reigning in our hearts by his Holy Spirit within us. How wonderful it is that we are members of the new covenant mediated by Christ.