Christ, our only mediator
After he was perfected, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him, and he was declared by God a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek. Hebrews 5:9-10 CSB
From Friday, we saw how Jesus “learned obedience,” in that, even though Jesus being God means that He is all-knowing, when the author wrote that phrase from verse 8 to show that Jesus gained the experiential knowledge of suffering. So, when we now get to this phrase, “after He was perfected,” the author means that Jesus was fully complete in every qualification of being a High Priest. We do not mean that Jesus was imperfect before suffering on the cross. As commentator Lea writes, “Jesus’ perfection was the completion of someone who had faced trials, endured them, and learned to trust God through them.” Because He passed through these trials perfectly, “He became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him.” This phrase is similar to Jesus being the “Pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings (Hebrews 2:10).” Through His death on the cross, being the perfect sacrifice for us, He became the source of our salvation to those who respond and obey Him. Through Christ’s redemptive work, especially what He went through the agony in Gethsemane and suffering in Golgotha, salvation was accomplished for those who believe Him. “Israel will be saved by the Lord with an everlasting salvation; you will not be put to shame or humiliated for all eternity” (Isaiah 45:17). Closing this section, Jesus “was declared by God a High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek.” The high priests of old were successive, going through the generational line of Aaron. Yet, Melchizedek was an accepted high priest outside the established line of high priests. Therefore, Jesus being aligned to the order of Melchizedek shows that He is apart from the heredity succession, establishing that Jesus was placed as our High Priest by divine appointment, the Father. “The Lord has sworn an oath and will not take it back: ‘You are a priest forever according to the pattern of Melchizedek” (Psalm 110:4). The author of Hebrews emphasized the priestly role of our Lord Jesus Christ for He is not only the One who should reign as King in our lives but He intercedes for us. “Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is the one who died, but even more, has been raised; he also is at the right hand of God and intercedes for us” (Romans 8:34). Christ is our mediator. “For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, a testimony at the proper time” (1 Timothy 2:5-6).
Blessings,
Isaac De Guzman
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