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Jesus Christ is our High Priest (Hebrews 4.14). He is also the mediator of a better covenant which was established upon better promises (Hebrews 8.6). As our High Priest, He performs the functions of our Priest while we serve as underling priests within His Kingdom. “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” (1 Peter 2.9). Consider these relationships as we continue to consider the role of Jesus Christ in extending mercy to us as participants in the second (better) covenant.

“Then indeed, even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service and the earthly sanctuary. For a tabernacle was prepared: the first part, in which was the lampstand, the table, and the showbread, which is called the sanctuary; and behind the second veil, the part of the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of All, which had the golden censer and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which were the golden pot that had the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant; and above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail. Now when these things had been thus prepared, the priests always went into the first part of the tabernacle, performing the services. But into the second part the high priest went alone once a year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people’s sins committed in ignorance.” (Hebrews 9.1-7; emphasis mine, jb).

The purpose of the Hebrews writer in citing these facts about the tabernacle and the first covenant was to demonstrate that Jesus came to fulfill the types and shadows that were existent in the Old Covenant. The Old was the shadow and the New is the substance. The mercy seat as mentioned in the previous passage was but a foreshadowing of the things that were to come through Christ and the New Testament. Where the High Priest could only approach the mercy seat once a year and then with sacrificial blood for his own sins, Jesus Christ obtained mercy once and for all. He does not enter continually year upon year, rather His entrance into the presence of the Father occurred but once when He ascended back to the heavens following His resurrection. The term mercy seat has a specific and significant part in that picture; we will presently explore that a bit more.

“…God set Christ Jesus forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed, to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.” (Romans 3.25-26; emphasis mine, jb). Though one could hardly be expected to recognize it, the word propitiation in Romans 3 is the exact same word as is translated mercy seat in Hebrews 9. Literally, Jesus became our mercy seat! It was in Him and by Him that the Father recognized our need for mercy and manifested it through the gospel.

As underling priests of our great High Priest, we ought to be the world’s greatest advocates of mercy in as much as He was and is the basis for our standing before God!

Questions:

1. What is a type or shadow as concerning the Old Testament and the New?

2. What does propitiation mean? How is it akin or represented by the mercy seat?

3. What should the fact that God showed us the greatest of mercies at the Cross have to do with our being advocates of mercy?

4. What would it mean to the Church if all professed believers “…put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; bearing with one another, and forgiving one another…; even as Christ forgave…”? (Colossians 3.12-13)

"Today's Little Lift" from Jim Bullington

Comfort in Isaiah II (12-14-10)