Melchizedek - Priest

Introduction

“Hey dol! Merry dol! Ring a dong dillo!” With those whimsical words, Tom Bombadil bounds onto the pages of The Lord of the Rings to meet Frodo and his friends. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, Tom Bombadil is probably the strangest and most polarizing character in the whole Lord of the Rings; some readers love him, some readers hate him, but usually for the same reason: Tom just doesn’t make sense. This “merry fellow” doesn’t have a backstory, he doesn’t fit any of the normal categories that most of Tolkien’s characters fit into. He seems to be a category of his own. And he even seems to operate by a different set of rules: he shows almost no interest in the hobbits’ quest, and even the One Ring holds no temptation for Tom and no power over him. He seems to come from a different story altogether. Complete master of his domain, steadfastly refusing to explain where he came from or where he’s going.

And yet, it’s because Tom stands outside the Hobbit’s story that he is able to enter their story and help them overcome weird, supernatural obstacles that they would be totally unable to conquer on their own. He enters the story by rescuing Frodo and his fellow hobbits from danger. He brings the hobbits to his home and feeds them. Then he finishes his role in the story by rescuing them again. After leaving Tom’s house, the hobbits wind up lost in a fog among haunted grave mounds. Before they even know what hits them, they find themselves knocked unconscious, and they wake up trapped in one of the grave mounds, at the mercy of its undead inhabitant: a barrow wight. Frodo, helpless to save himself and his friends does the only thing he can: he calls Tom. “Come Tom Bombadil, for our need is near us!” And Tom comes. He bounds into the place of death, singing merrily, banishes the barrow wight with nothing but his word, dissolves the enchantment of the tomb, and rescues the hobbits. He supplies them once again with what they need, and they continue their quest. Without this mysterious character from another story, the main story of the book would have come to an early end.

Melchizedek the Priest

Hopefully you’re starting to see where I’m going with this: Melchizedek is basically the Tom Bombadil of the Bible. Like Tom, he doesn’t seem to fit within the normal categories. Like Tom, he has approximately zero backstory. He just bounds onto the pages of the Torah from his own story. But like Tom, he also enters the main story and enables Abram to face an enemy that he is unprepared for by himself.

In Genesis 14, Abram more or less stumbles across Melchizedek’s domain in the course of his own travels. And if you’ve been following Abram’s story so far, this sticks out like a sore thumb. Abram seems like the one bright spot in the dark story of humanity so far, and even he is just a nomad, waiting to see how God’s promises will be fulfilled. Nothing else in the Bible would have prepared us for the ancient Canaanite city of Salem (aka Jerusalem) to already have an official priest-king loyal to Abram’s God looking after God’s holy mountain a full 8 or 9 centuries before David thinks about conquering this city and making it his capital. How? Who is this guy? We have to know more. But we’re not told. Melchizedek remains a mystery, a character out of another story, a story known only to God.

And that’s exactly what makes him such a good priest. Because a priest is someone who belongs to a different story, or rather, someone who belongs to God’s side of the story. A priest is a holy person. We’re told again and again that God is “holy,” but what does that mean? It means that God is completely “other,” he stands set apart from everything else that exists. It means he has his own perspective on the whole story of creation that no one else shares. And yet, throughout Scripture God sets human beings apart and calls them “holy.” He brings them into His side of the story. That’s what a priest is: a man plucked from the common, mundane, human story and placed into God’s story for the purpose of bringing other people into a right relationship with God.

Melchizedek does the office of a priest admirably in this story, checking all the boxes: He blesses Abram, speaking good words from God to him that give Abraham a glimpse of God’s perspective. He feeds Abram with bread and wine, the classic “side dishes” for a sacrificial meal with God. He even accepts Abram’s tithe offering. He is a priest par excellence.

Which is good, because Abram needs a good priest right now.

Abram and the King of Sodom

See, Abram’s encounter with this priest-king Melchizedek is tied closely to his encounter with another king: the King of Sodom. The confrontation with the king of Sodom that immediately follows our text seems like a harmless exchange from a human perspective. But from God’s perspective it is a spiritual battle, a danger that only faith can see.

Abram is on his way back from rescuing his nephew Lot. Lot had been living in Sodom when he was captured by invading kings from the East. So Abram called together all his servants and allies, attacked those kings in a night raid, saved Lot, and grabbed the plunder. A risky battle, but a resounding victory for Abram. But here comes the king of Sodom to meet him, with a bold offer: “give me back the people you rescued, but keep all the goods for yourself.” From the perspective of the human story Abram would have been fully within his rights take the offer, or even to say, “Go pound sand! You got pillaged fair and square, and I took it back fair and square, I’m keeping everything!” But he doesn’t. He responds in words that echo Melchizedek’s blessing, “I have lifted my hand to the LORD, God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth, 23 that I would not take a thread or a sandal strap or anything that is yours, lest you should say, ‘I have made Abram rich.’”

And I would submit to you that it was Melchizedek’s blessing, his proclamation, that enabled Abram to see the danger of this confrontation and escape it. Melchizedek had said

English Standard Version Chapter 14

Blessed be Abram by God Most High,

Possessor of heaven and earth;

20  and blessed be God Most High,

who has delivered your enemies into your hand!”

God has delivered your enemies into your hand. In other words, “This was not your victory Abram, it was God’s. God rescued Lot, God won the victory for you. The spoil doesn’t belong to you, or even to the king of Sodom, it belongs to God.” That is the perspective from God’s side of the story that enabled Abram to see the danger and avoid it. God used Melchizedek, his priest, to give Abram the provision and perspective, the courage and clarity to avoid even the appearance of evil and to testify by his actions that all his victories come from God. Both the victory over the kings of the East and victory over the king of Sodom belong to God.

Our Spiritual Battles

Brothers and sisters, we are also no strangers to spiritual dangers that only faith can see. Situations happen sometimes that seem straightforward or innocent from our human perspective, but when looked at from the perspective of God’s story, they’re full of complexities and unseen pitfalls.

I would suggest that this is why so many of the people that will ask you future pastors to do a wedding for them will already be living together. From the practical, human perspective, cohabitation seems to make perfect sense. It makes financial sense to share rent, it even seems to make relational sense to ease into marriage slowly. It’s only when you understand the role marriage plays in God’s story, the way that marriage is supposed to reflect the radical commitment Christ made when he came to live with us, that you can even begin to see the danger to your faith, the way that it could pull you out of God’s story.

But pastors and deaconesses are not immune to these kinds of temptations, oh no, far from it. In ministry you’ll be pulled into situations that are more complex and messy than you realize. An influential donor wants to make a generous and public donation to the church, a donation that seems like a massive positive until you start to see the kind of control the donor wants in exchange for his generosity. Your congregation gets involved in a lawsuit to defend its rights to religious freedom, rights that are totally legitimate from a human standpoint, but you underestimate how much a nasty lawsuit will undercut your witness in the community. You get called in to bring reconciliation to a family conflict, and you think it’s clear who is in the wrong and needs to repent, that is until you get closer to the situation and see that it is far more complicated. Situations like these often require all the courage and clarity that you can muster, but often courage and clarity are the last thing you feel like you have. And unlike Abram, you don’t always succeed in avoiding the temptation. Maybe more often you’re like Frodo and the hobbits: trapped before you even know what hit you, entombed in conflict and sin. You need God to strengthen you with his provision and give you his perspective. And even more than that you need someone from outside your story to rescue you from the power of sin and death. You need a good priest.

Christ Our Priest

So it’s a good thing you have the best. Jesus Christ is the priest in the order of Melchizedek, who is better than even Melchizedek. He comes to do the office of priest as no one else can do it. He comes into our human story of sin and death to rescue us from enemies we are totally unable to overcome on our own, to feed us with the provision we need, and to bring us into God’s story. Because Jesus, like no other priest who came before him, truly belongs to God’s side of the story. He is the Holy One of God.

And Jesus is no stranger to rescuing sinners from situations where they are helpless to rescue themselves. Think for a moment about the apostles. Jesus spent years intensively pouring into them the perspective of the kingdom of God, proclaiming God’s victory to them, preparing them to speak for Him. On the night he was betrayed, right before the great crisis, when the powers of darkness were approaching for the final confrontation, he fed them with bread and wine like Melchizedek had done so long ago, bread and wine that was more than physical provision. It was Jesus’ own body and his blood of the new covenant, a sacrificial meal that filled them with Jesus’ own life and salvation.

And what did they do with all this provision and perspective when the conflict came? Ran away. All of them. Just like all of us have done, they failed before they knew what hit them. But when Jesus is your priest, defeat is never final, not for them, not for us. It wasn’t their victory to win. Because even when Jesus was left alone, crucified by the powers of evil and buried, he bounded into the place of death, almost like old Tom Bombadil, singing merrily. He banished that wicked old barrow wight Satan with nothing but a word. He broke the enchantment of death and broke open hell and the grave to rescue all of us who were bound that way. And when his disciples met him again, what did he do? Kept being a priest. He was there to break bread for them again. He forgave them for their failure. He opened their minds to understand the Scripture, to finally get God’s side of the story. And as he ascended to sit at God’s right hand, a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, he blessed them. Even the greatest spiritual danger of all is no match for Jesus, the priest of all priests.

Conclusion

So if you are out of your depth, if you’ve been caught in a conflict that you can’t see a way out of, if you’ve been trapped by temptation, hear the blessing of your priest, “Blessed are you by God Most High, possessor of Heaven and Earth, and blessed be God Most high who gives you the victory.” If you’ve been defeated by sin, know this: you are forgiven. Not your victory, Jesus’s. And your priest is waiting for you still with bread and wine to strengthen you, and good words of blessing to help you face the next challenge. Because there will be another challenge, so do the only thing you can: call on Jesus: “Come Lord Jesus, great High Priest, for our need is near us.”

Amen.