Help from far away?
I’m good with computers. When I lived in Europe, my family in Australia would occasionally ring me on the phone and ask for help with their IT issues. “Hi Dan, I’ve got so and so problem. Can you help me?” Some problems were possible to fix over the phone, but more often than not I just wasn’t able to help them being separated by that distance. I was far away and couldn’t help them. Have you ever had a similar experience?
Our reading from Hebrews chapter 8 says that Jesus is a high priest in heaven. But how can Jesus help me when he seems far away in heaven? Wouldn’t he help better if he’d stayed here on earth? He could have travelled around the earth healing people!? He could have organised tours around the globe showing doubters and skeptics his nail scarred hands and feet in person!? “How can Jesus help me when he seems far away in heaven?” We’re going to explore this question, and hear how Jesus our heavenly priest can and does help us.
(1) In heaven Jesus has a different position than earthly priests
Jesus is not like earthly high priests — he has a different position. Both the Old Testament priests and Jesus are priests who serve in the tabernacle/temple, but Jesus serves in the ‘true tabernacle’ in heaven.
The preacher of Hebrews says that Jesus ‘sat down at the right hand of the throne of Majesty in heaven’ (Hebrews 8:1). Jesus serves as he sits alongside the throne of Majesty; he is sitting alongside God the Father. This means he is in the position of a co-regent, co-ruler, and king together with God the Father. He achieved his position by doing something no earthly priest could do: Jesus obediently offered up his life in death as a sacrifice for the forgiveness of sin.
Have you ever heard the saying: “It pays to have friends in high places”? Well Jesus sits in the highest place you can get, and he is your friend! As a co-ruler and king in heaven, Jesus has the power to plead on your behalf. He has the king’s ear. As we heard last week, Jesus mediates between God and us, and he does this from right beside the throne, from a position of power and majesty and might.
“How can Jesus help me when he seems far away in heaven?” Because he’s in a position of power, pleading for you directly to God the Father.
(2) In heaven Jesus offers different gifts and sacrifices than earthly priests
Priests on earth offered gifts and sacrifices according to the law. Likewise, Jesus our high priest in heaven, also offers gifts and sacrifices, but these are different. Jesus offers different gifts not under the law. The preacher of Hebrews doesn’t spell out for us right here what these different gifts and sacrifices are. He simply says: ‘Every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices, and so it was necessary for this one [i.e. Jesus] also to have something to offer’ (Hebrews 8:3). Like the earthly priests, Jesus has gifts and sacrifices to offer in heaven. But the preacher doesn’t explain these just yet — he’s building up to this in chapters 9 & 10.
The gifts and sacrifices the earthly priests offered were ‘a copy and a shadow of what is in heaven’ (Hebrews 8:5). They were a copy. I have many drawings by my children in my office. These copies represent the actual thing they depict, but they are not that thing. The gifts and sacrifices the Old Testament priests gave were a copy, they are a child’s drawing representing and pointing to the real thing that is in heaven. Likewise they were a shadow. A shadow of a person is a one-dimensional and featureless representation of that person.
At risk of stealing the thunder from the preacher of Hebrews, the gifts and sacrifice that Jesus offers in heaven is his very own body and blood. (We’re going to unpack each of these over the coming two weeks). The gifts and sacrifices of flesh, blood, bread, and grain offered by the Levitical priests were a copy and shadow of the body and blood of Jesus. From heaven Jesus serves you and all God’s people across space and time with these most holy things: his body and blood. This way of serving is only possible from heaven.
“How can Jesus help me when he seems far away in heaven?” Because from heaven he offers all God’s people the gifts of his body and blood.
(3) In heaven Jesus mediates a new and better covenant
By ascending to heaven, Jesus established a new and better covenant. (A covenant is an agreement or relationship). God says, ‘I will put my laws in their minds, and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. … For I will forgive their wrongdoings, and will remember their sins no more.’ (Hebrews 8:10,12).
We might explain it like this: The Old Testament priesthood was treating the external symptoms of sin, patching up our human nature that is sick and broken. But the new and better covenant which Jesus brings is not just a patch up job, but something new. Forgiveness is written into the covenant. Forgiveness is not just a possibility if you do this step and this step and this step, but forgiveness is an accomplished act. It is finished. By dying on the cross, rising again, and ascending to the right hand of God, Jesus has begun and completed the forgiveness of sin. He doesn’t just treat the external symptoms of sin, but has done something internal to God’s people: he has written God’s laws (God’s Word) on our hearts and minds, inside us, healing us from the inside out.
“How can Jesus help me when he seems far away in heaven?” Because by ascending to heaven he deals with sin from the inside out.
Jesus serves you from heaven
So “how can Jesus help me when he seems far away in heaven?”
As we’ve heard, Jesus being in heaven means he can serve us in a new and better way. He’s in the position of sitting at the right hand of the King, pleading for you directly to the Father. He offers you and God’s people the better and true gifts of his own body and blood. And he makes you a new person, writing God’s Word inside you — on your heart and mind.
Jesus being in heaven does not mean that he can’t help you. It means the opposite. And in fact we discover that heaven isn’t far away at all! In Holy Communion heaven and earth are joined together. As we receive the gifts of Jesus’ body and blood in bread and wine, we sing with the angels in heaven. As we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we ask God to bring heaven to earth: “Your will be done, your kingdom come, on earth as in heaven.”
Blessing
This day and this week ahead: May Jesus serve you from heaven as your high priest. May he plead on your behalf directly to the King who sits on the throne of Majesty. May he offer you his body and blood as he establishes and mediates the new and better covenant, where God calls you his people and remembers your sin no more — for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
