2:17 Therefore he was obligated in all things to be made like his brothers, that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make atonement for the sins of the people. v18 For in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.
Even though our English translations place these two verses at the end of the second chapter, they rightly belong with the thoughts being introduced in the third. The writer has completed his comparison of Christ with the angels, and has conclusively shown that He is superior to them in every way. Now he moves on to the primary theme of the book, Christ’s superiority in His priestly service. In this context He will compare Christ with Moses, with Joshua, with the Sabbath, with the Old Testament priesthood as a whole, and its sacrifices in particular, and with Melchisedeck.
Therefore he was obligated in all things to be made like his brothers
This first part of verse 17 acts as a bridge between the long argument in chapters one and two and what follows. For this reason … because as representative Man He was reclaiming all that God had originally given to mankind. For this reason … because He was to taste death for everyone. For this reason … because He was the Captain bringing many sons to glory. But also for this reason … that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest.
that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make atonement for the sins of the people.
Primarily, priesthood is about two things: access and representation. Under the Old Covenant, only the priests had access to God. The people could come into the outer court of the temple, but they could not enter into the temple proper, the Holy Place. That was for the priests alone. Yet even the priests could not enter into the inner sanctuary, the Most Holy Place. Only the High Priest had that privilege, and then only once a year, under cover of the smoke of the incense, and with a rope tied around his ankle so that if he were to die in the presence of the Lord, the other priests could pull him out without being killed themselves.
That was not how God had intended it to be. He had told the people of Israel, “Even though the whole world is Mine, you will be for Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” (Ex. 19:5-6) In other words, God wanted a nation of people who had free access to Him, and would truly represent Him to the rest of the world. The people, however, chose a second-hand relationship, and cut themselves off from the possibility of entering the presence of God. Part of Christ’s mission in restoring the world to the plan of the Father was to restore that access to the Throne of God. For Himself, He already had that access, and had done for all eternity. In order to restore that access to man, it was necessary for Him to be so totally identified with man that when He entered the Throne Room, we entered with Him. In our own sinful natures we could never enter the presence of the holy God, but in Christ we can enter freely.
There was really only one reason for the Old Testament priest to have access to God, and that was so that he could represent man before God, and God before man. Since God’s people had chosen not to have a face-to-face relationship with Him, someone else – the priest – had to represent them before Him, and to be His representative in their midst. As God’s representative, the priest was to teach the Law and ensure that the people understood their covenant obligations. He was also the one who enforced that Law – no “separation of Church and State” in those days! Even kings were subject to the enforcement of the Law by the priests, as is illustrated by the story of Uzziah in 2 Chronicles 26.
As the people’s representative before God, the priest had to take the people’s prayers and petitions – and even their thanksgiving – to God through the sacrificial system. Most importantly, he had to carry the sins of the people, both those of individuals and those of the nation, before God, and ensure that those sins were “covered” by the blood of the animal sacrifices that were offered. That was the only way they could continue in their covenant relationship with God.
In order to be God’s representative, the priest had to be godly. Hence there were, for him, far more stringent restrictions on his lifestyle than there were for the common people. Yet no matter how closely the priest followed the requirements of the Law, he could never meet the standards of God’s holiness. The best that the best priest in Israel could ever hope to be was a partial and very imperfect representation of God. Christ, however, was not merely the perfect representation of God, but He was God: all the fullness of the deity in bodily form. (Col. 2:9)
In order to be man’s representative, the priest had to be human. Obviously, this was not a problem for the priests of the Old Testament. They were human. Whether or not they chose to acknowledge it, they were subject to all the same weaknesses, testings, trials and temptations as those whom they represented. Therefore, Christ also had to be fully human. He could not represent man unless He was one of us.
As God, Christ could only give us the Law. He could show us what God is like: His holiness, righteousness, justice, compassion, power, truth … But God had already revealed Himself, at least partially, to man, and man’s response had been to push Moses forward as a go-between. As God, Christ could not be the mediator between God and man, because man would simply have sought out another go-between to stand between himself and Christ.
As man, fully identified with us, He became the perfect mediator: able to enter the Throne Room and take us with Him, able to bring the perfect sacrifice – Himself – to provide full expiation, not merely covering, for our sins, able to restore the relationship between both individuals and the body of mankind and God.
For in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.
There is another aspect of Christ’s mediation. The priest of the Old Testament not only brought reconciliation between man and God, but between man and man. He was the settler of disputes and the dispenser of justice. For this role, it was a distinct advantage if he had lived a bit! If the priest had experienced trials, losses, struggles and heartaches, he was much more likely to be able to deal compassionately with those who came to him.
The word “testings” is translated in the KJV as “being tempted”, but the original word has a much broader application than simply the temptation to sin, relating more to a testing of character which may come through temptation as we normally understand it, or may come simply through the trials and difficulties of life. Undoubtedly, Christ knew both well.
It is difficult for us to comprehend that Jesus, who was God, could have experienced genuine temptation to sin, especially when we understand that for temptation to be real there must be the possibility of yielding. Yet Scripture makes it clear that such a possibility must have existed, otherwise His victory over sin would have been meaningless.
Perhaps we can understand it more readily if we consider that the greatest sin for Jesus would have been to walk away from His mission as Saviour and Redeemer. If we then think about His struggle in Gethsemane, when the full horror of what fulfilling that mission would cost broke upon Him, we can see something of the reality of temptation for Him. What caused Him to break out in a sweat of blood, and to plead desperately with the Father to take this cup from Him? Surely not just the physical trial that awaited Him, as horrific as that was. No, the sinless One suddenly comprehended the fullness of the sin of mankind that was about to be dumped upon Him. Yes, He had walked for thirty-three years in this sin-steeped world, He had seen sin in its ugliest – but that was only from outside. Now He was about to experience it from within: all the sewerage of man’s sin was about to be dumped over Him, so that it touched not only His body but the very depths of His soul. He was about to “become sin”, and though it is unlikely that any of us will ever, this side of heaven, fully comprehend what that meant, we can surely understand the power of the temptation to flee to the farthest reaches of the universe and beyond to avoid it.
We have salvation only because He overcame that temptation, and chose His Father’s will above the screaming of His body, soul and spirit. But beyond salvation, we have help, we have comfort. The temptation He felt that night was beyond any we will ever experience. He knows what temptation feels like, and is able to walk with us when we experience it. The emotion He knew that night was beyond any heartbreak, any fear, any horror that we will ever know. When we walk through those things, He is able to understand. The rejection, and the physical suffering, that were His portion, were beyond any we will have to walk through. He is able to help us when we go through trials.
Truly, He is a High Priest who has identified with us in the very depths of our experience and beyond.