Jesus is the great high priest of a new covenant, who fights against your enemies to give you victory. Deuteronomy 20:4

The priesthood reminds the people of God who God is and what he is capable of doing on behalf of those who trust in him.

You may be familiar with priests or the term priest if you are catholic, but what is the purpose of the service of the priest? What role did they play in historic Israel and how does God use the structure of the priesthood, and how does Jesus serve this role for believers as a priest above priests?

In Deuteronomy, Moses is given instruction by God on what people who belong to God and serve God must do to please him and to show obedience and loyalty to him. In essence in the Old Testament righteousness, right standing with God, came through obedience to the laws given to Moses by God on how to be with him, so that God is with the people of God.

Moses shares in Deuteronomy 20 what the people of God are to do, how they are to act. Specifically, when they face war, God tells Moses,

“When you go to war against your enemies and see horses and chariots and an army greater than yours, do not be afraid of them.” Why? “Because the Lord your God, who brought you up out of Egypt will be with you” (Deuteronomy 20:1-4).

So the first command is to never be afraid of your enemies, the enemies of the people of God, even if that enemy is greater than you, because God, who has proven himself able to deliver from captivity will be with you in all of the battles that you, his children, the people of God, face.

Then God says to Moses, “when you are about to go into battle, the priest will come forward and address the army and he will say, ‘Hear Israel, today you are going into battle against your enemies. Do not be faint hearted or afraid; do not panic or be terrified by them. For the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory” (Deuteronomy 20:3-4).

The responsibilities given to the priesthood is to remind the people of God that God has chosen them and they are the people of God; and to remind them the kind of God that they serve.

When in war or when up against an enemy it is the responsibility of the priest to say that the people of God never fight alone, the army of God is with those who are with God and God fights for his people against the enemies of the people of God for the sole purpose of giving victory to God on behalf of the people who serve him, those who are with him, who trust him and believe that he is a God of war, who gives victory to his people in battle.

In Biblical times priests led armies into battle and gave them instructions for going to war with their enemies. This is because Israel historically are the people of God, a nation whose God fights with them and for them, subduing their enemies when they allow him to lead and when they follow his commands.

Jesus as the great high priest of a new covenant still has enemies, there are still battles that God is fighting with and for his people. We know that Jesus has won the ultimate victory at calvary and all authority on earth and heaven have been given to him, but the enemies of the kingdom of God still wage war against the people of God to try and defeat God’s people in several ways.

Deuteronomy 20 says the enemy will come against you with strength and numbers and will use their greatness to try and win the war against your heart so that you lose confidence in God, in Jesus as the great high priest of a new covenant to defeat them because of their great army. But Deuteronomy 20:1 says, “when you go to war against your enemies and see horses and chariots and an army greater than yours, do not be afraid of them, because the Lord your God, who brought you up out of Egypt will be with you.”

Because of their seemingly overpowering numbers they will try to make you lose heart, become faint-hearted, afraid, try to make you panic and become terrified by them (Deuteronomy 20:3). But it is the role of the priest to stand before the army and say that there is something from the Lord that you need to hear this day, although “today you are going into battle against your enemies, do not be faint hearted or afraid; do not panic or be terrified by them, for the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory” (Deuteronomy 20:3-4).

It is the role of the priests to remind the armies of the Lord who they belong to and that they do not fight alone, they belong to God Almighty and it isn’t their weapons or their numbers, their strength, ability or confidence that will give them victory. Victory comes from God, and he is with them when they go into battle.

The enemies of God who are already under the authority of Jesus will not stop at using terror and their great numbers to try and defeat the people of God, they will also try to reason with the people of God and convince them to put their faith in what they value as more valuable than trying to fight against them or defeat them.

The enemies of God will say don’t attack us, because you may die, think of the new house you’ve built and have yet to live in, the new career you’ve started and have yet to reap the rewards of, think of your new spouse that you’ve just married and have yet to build a family with. The priest’s role is to tell the commanders of the people of God who are listening to the enemies of God, who value what the enemies of God value and believe in what the enemies of God believe in and trust what the enemies of God trust in more than God to “go home” (Deuteronomy 20:5-9) “so that their fellow soldiers will not become infected with doubt and become disheartened too” (Deuteronomy 20:8).

Because when the people of God go to war with the enemies of God, the people in leadership and everyone else must believe that God, he is a God who rescues, saves and delivers and gives victory to his people.

The victory that Jesus, as the great high priest of a new covenant has won over his enemies is complete and he leads his people to complete victory.

In biblical times this is exemplified in the command given to the armies of God that when they would attack a city they were to give the city two options: peace and be subject to forced labor where they would work for the people of God or refuse peace and be attacked by the armies of God killing all the men and taking the remaining people and livestock as plunder (Deuteronomy 20:10-15).

This is how the enemies of the Lord, of Jesus, the great high priest of a new covenant are to be regarded, to either take their place under the authority of the kingdom of God and work to achieve his mission or be taken as plunder for the people of God. This is how the enemies of God are to be regarded by the people of God under the authority of Jesus as the great high priest of a new covenant.

“However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy them—as the Lord your God has commanded you. Otherwise, they will teach you to follow all the detestable things they do in worshipping their gods (and you will sin against the Lord your God)” (Deuteronomy 20:16-18).

In biblical times the priests and the commanders of the armies of the Lord’s army were instructed to destroy the people in the land of their inheritance to wipe them out because this was the land that God was giving to them as an inheritance. Now, under Jesus as the great high priest of a new covenant what is being completely destroyed are not people but purging the evil practices that they do from among God’s people.

If in the land that you live people worship and value money and career and finances over the power of God, if in the land where you live people worship and value the strength of armies over the power of God, if in the land where you live people value the wisdom of people and gifts of family more than the wisdom of and gift of God in Jesus, God’s people are instructed to remove that kind of thinking and behavior from among them, so that God’s people can be recognized, associated and defined not by their families, careers, wealth, status or national security but by their belief in Jesus as the great high priest to be with them when they go into battle and to give them the victory; that he is the one who has authority over all of these things to give and to take away.

Jesus is the great high priest of a new covenant, who has spoken the rise and the fall of enemies.

One day the king of Assyria sent commanders to Jerusalem and threatened to destroy the city and told the people of Jerusalem not to trust God. The commander of the Assyrian army tried to reason with the people of Jerusalem by saying, “surely you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all the countries, destroying them completely. Will you be delivered” (2 Kings 19:11)? Then he proceeded to tell them that all of the gods of the nations that they destroyed were destroyed along with their worshippers and said, “did the gods of the nations that were destroyed by my predecessors deliver them? Where are their kings” (2 Kings 19:12)? Then the commander of the Assyrian army shares a list of countries that were defeated by the Assyrian armies and their kings that were put to death, he said this to put doubt in the hearts of the people of God.

Then the King of Judah prayed this prayer:

“Lord, the God of Israel, enthroned between the cherubim, you alone are God over all the kingdoms of earth. You have made heaven and earth. Give ear, Lord, and hear; open your eyes, Lord, and see; listen to the words Sennacherib (Assyrian commander) has sent to ridicule the living God. It is true, Lord that the Assyrian kings have laid waste these nations and their lands. They have thrown their gods into the fire and destroyed them, for they were not gods but only wood and stone, fashioned by human hands. Now, Lord our God, deliver us from his hand, so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you alone, Lord, are God” (2 Kings 19:15-19).

God then used his prophet Isaiah to operate in the role of the priest and to share the word of God and to remind King Hezekiah and all Jerusalem what kind of God he is, the God who defends his people, saves them from their enemies and gives victory (2 Kings 19:34).

God speaks through Isaiah that not only is God the one who saves his people but he is also a God who allows his enemies to “lift their eyes in pride” and to ridicule and blaspheme him, to ascend heights of glory through their many victories. Because, as God Almighty, ruler over all kingdoms of the earth, God has spoken and planned and has made everything happen on earth (2 Kings 19:22-25).   

God says through Isaiah, “In days of old I planned it, now I have brought it to pass, that you have turned fortified cities into piles of stone. Their people, drained of power, dismayed and put to shame” (2 Kings 19:25-26). Then God speaks a word to the enemies who threatened to destroy Jerusalem and says that not only is he greater than the nations that rage against him, but that he will make them turn and run in fear from his people (2 Kings 19:27-28, 32-33). And it happened. The people of God did not have to fight because God was with them to give them the victory.  “That night the angel of the Lord went out and put to death a hundred and eighty-five thousand in the Assyrian camp. When the people got up the next morning, there were all the dead bodies” (2 Kings 19:35).

“If you fully obey the Lord your God and carefully follow all his commands I give you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations on earth. All these blessings will come on you and accompany you if you obey the Lord your God: You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country. The fruit of your womb will be blessed, and the crops of you land and the young of your livestock—the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks. Your basket and your kneading trough will be blessed. You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out. The Lord will grant that the enemies who rise up against you will be defeated before you. They will come at you from one direction but flee from you in seven. The Lord will send a blessing on your barns and on everything you put your hand to. The Lord your God will bless you in the land he is giving you. The Lord will establish you as his holy people, as he promised you on oath, if you keep the commands of the Lord your God and walk in obedience to him. Then all the peoples on earth will see that you are called by the name of the Lord, and they will fear you. The Lord will grant you abundant prosperity—in the fruit of your womb, the young of your livestock and the crops of your ground—in the land he swore to your ancestors to give you. The Lord will open the heavens, the storehouse of his bounty, to send rain on your land in season and to bless all the work of your hands. You will lend to many nations but will borrow from none. The Lord will make you the head, not the tail. If you pay attention to the commands of the Lord your God that I give you this day and carefully follow them, you will always be at the top, never at the bottom. Do not turn aside from any of the commands I give you today, to the right or to the left, following other gods and serving them” (Deuteronomy 28:1-14).

Prayer: Psalms 35

“Contend, Lord, with those who contend with me; fight against those who fight against me.

Take up shield and armor; rise and come to my aid. Brandish spear and javelin against those who pursue me. Say to me, “I am your salvation.”

May those who seek my life be disgraced and put to shame; may those who plot my ruin be turned back in dismay. May they be like chaff before the wind, with the angel of the Lord driving them away; may their path be dark and slippery, with the angel of the Lord pursuing them.

Since they hid their net for me without cause and without cause dug a pit for me, may ruin overtake them by surprise—may the net they hid entangle them, may they fall into the pit, to their ruin.

Then my soul will rejoice in the Lord and delight in his salvation. My whole being will exclaim, “Who is like you, Lord? You rescue the poor from those too strong for them, the poor and needy from those who rob them.”

Ruthless witnesses come forward; they question me on things I know nothing about. They repay me evil for good and leave me like one bereaved. Yet when they were ill, I put on sackcloth and humbled myself with fasting. When my prayers returned to me unanswered, I went about mourning as though for my friend or brother. I bowed my head in grief as though weeping for my mother.

But when I stumbled, they gathered in glee; assailants gathered against me without my knowledge. They slandered me without ceasing. Like the ungodly they maliciously mocked; they gnashed their teeth at me.

How long, Lord, will you look on? Rescue me from their ravages, my precious life from these lions. I will give you thanks in the great assembly; among the throngs I will praise you. Do not let those gloat over me who are my enemies without cause; do not let those who hate me without reason maliciously wink the eye.

They do not speak peaceably, but devise false accusations against those who live quietly in the land. They sneer at me and say, “Aha! Aha! With our own eyes we have seen it.”

Lord, you have seen this; do not be silent. Do not be far from me, Lord. Awake, and rise to my defense! Contend for me, my God and Lord. Vindicate me in your righteousness, Lord my God; do not let them gloat over me. Do not let them think, “Aha, just what we wanted!” or say, “We have swallowed him up.” May all who gloat over my distress be put to shame and confusion; may all who exalt themselves over me be clothed with shame and disgrace.

May those who delight in my vindication shout for joy and gladness; may they always say, “The Lord be exalted, who delights in the well-being of his servant.” My tongue will proclaim your righteousness, your praises all day long.”