The epistle of Paul to the Hebrews stands preeminently above all the other epistles in one particular feature, and that is it is crowded with arguments and illustrations from the Old Testament to prove Christian perfection.

To converted Hebrews no argument for sanctification would prove so cogent and powerful as those drawn from their own Scriptures. And in this respect the epistle to the Hebrews transcends any other book in the New Testament. In the third and fourth chapters is the argument concerning crossing the Jordan into the promise of soul rest.

In the fifth chapter is the argument of weaning the child, and the difference between liquid and solid food. In the sixth chapter is the argument of leaving the a b c, and being borne unto perfection. In the seventh chapter is the argument of the two ranks of priesthood, the order of Aaron and the order of Melchisedec. In the eighth chapter is the argument of the two covenants, the one written in stone, and the other written in the heart. In the ninth and tenth chapters, is the double argument of the two veils in the tabernacle and the difference between the daily sacrifice in the holy place and the annual sacrifice for the most holy. In the eleventh chapter is the biographical argument and illustration of perfect believers. In the twelfth chapter is the argument and marvelous parable of the two Pentecosts, the one at Mt. Sinai, the other at Mt. Sion. Each of these arguments contain proofs and illustrations, so rich in suggestion that to elaborate them all with confirmatory proof texts, and apply them to the realities of conscious experience of the spiritual life, would make a volume. In several chapters there is an allusion to Melchisedec, who was king of Salem (afterwards Jerusalem) and a priest of God in the days of Abraham.

In the 110th Psalm we have the prophecy that Paul elaborates in the seventh of Hebrews concerning a priestly order, higher than that of Aaron. But the force and beauty of the argument can be understood only when interpreted in the light of Christian perfection, and as teaching that the elect followers of Jesus are to advance from the initial Christian life typified by the Levitical order into perfect spiritual union with Jesus, by which, as sharing the oneness of Jesus, they graduate into the Melchisedecian order. There are three or four strong points in the chapter to prove that this priestly order applies to the true saints of Jesus.

Paul says that Melchisedec was first by interpretation king of righteousness, which in the Greek is the same as justification, and after that he was king of Salem, which implies perfect peace. This proves that Paul’s logic was driving toward the doctrine of Christian perfection, or an inner life of perfect peace, which comes after the work of justification.

He then proceeds in the same chapter to present four points in which the priestly rank of Melchisedec was superior to the Levitical order.

1. It was superior in the point of life long service. A Jewish priest could not begin his public ministry till twenty-five years of age, and unless he were a high priest his public ministry closed at the age of fifty. Hence there was great limitation in his service as to time. But in the case of Melchisedec there was no such narrow restriction. He did not inherit the priestly office from his ancestors, nor did he have to relinquish it at any special age to a successor; doubtless he was a prophet and priest from a young man, and continued so as long as he lived; and as he had his call and commission directly from the Holy Ghost, and not from any ecclesiastical establishment, so in this respect he was in his ministry without pedigree, and without a specified time of service. There was a perceptible parallel to this in those believers who by the full baptism of the Spirit enter into the true priestly life of Jesus. Before the believer is filled with the light and the liberty of the Spirit, he is, as Paul says in Galatians, “under governors and tutors,” as to times and seasons, and his inner religious life is subject to specified beginnings and endings, corresponding to the outward life of the Levitical order. But when he is set free from all spiritual bondage, and flooded with the liberty wherewith Christ sets him free, he enters the Melchisedecian order, and if he apprehends his full privileges and will advance in the Spirit, he is lifted beyond the rules of superannuation, and of waiting on the slow rules of a human priesthood, and so does not wait for Sanhedrim orders to begin saving souls, nor terminate his flaming ministry at any specified age, “But like unto the Son of God, he abideth a priest continually.” These emphatic words of Paul have a far reaching meaning, extending into the coming millennial age, which is abundantly confirmed by other Scriptures, that the Melchisedecian order of saints are to be the priests under Christ in the millennial age. John declares that “God hath made us kings and priests unto God, forever and ever,” and when we are linked in perfect union with Jesus, our priestly office is to be perpetual, both in this life and the life to come.

2. The next point of superiority is, that the Melchisedecian order is world wide, for all nations and kindreds, regardless of caste or creed. The Levitical priests could serve God only for their own membership. How many thousands of Christians in all ages have lived and died who felt they could have no liberty in religious service, except in the pale of their own denomination. In a hundred different ways this spirit of imperfect religious experience manifests itself along lines of caste, or creed, or mode of dress, or position in prayer, or manner of song, or preaching, or taking the Lord’s Supper, or something sectarian, which reveals a cast-iron narrowness in religious thought and worship.

A Levite could offer sacrifice only for a Jew, and all who are of that order of believers are in some respects so limited still. But Melchisedec was subject to no such limitation, he could offer sacrifice and intercession for any man, of any nation, or any creed under heaven.

The whole world was his parish. When a believers enters into the real scriptural fulness of God, he passes from the Levitical order, which is like a landlocked river, into the Melchisedecian order, which is the limitless ocean of divine love, where names and sects and party lines vanish, and he can serve God in boundless liberty, with believers of any name, without hanging to any mode of prayer, or mode of baptism, or mode of communion. This is the real priesthood of Jesus, and those who are to reign with him in his coming kingdom will be only those who are baptized of the Spirit out and beyond all national and race prejudices, and all sectarian narrowness.

For only such will be qualified to be priests and princes in all the earth. Psalm 45:16.

3. The next point of superiority is that the Melchisedecian order are both kings and priests united in the same person. In the Jewish economy, a Levite could not be a king, and the princely tribe of Judah could not serve as priests. But Jesus was born of Judah, and yet he was made a priest, and this union of the two offices in himself lifted him beyond any example in the Jewish church, and in this respect he was like Melchisedec, who was both a king and a priest. This same argument applies to us. It requires a second work of grace, and the full baptism of the Spirit, to bring us where we enter the twofold life of princely power with God, and princely intercession for other souls, and the student of Scripture will notice, in those places where we are called “a royal priesthood, and “kings and priests unto God,” it is in connection with the work of sanctification. There are vast multitudes of believers in every age who serve God in a lower order of divided power, as in the Jewish economy, but to be among those who form the Bride of the Lamb it is essential that we be lifted into the union of spiritual power, where all the princely and priestly functions are both combined, as in the case of Jesus and Melchisedec.

4. The last point of superiority is, that the Melchisedecian priesthood was instituted with an oath. “If perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, what further need was there for another priesthood after the order of Melchisedec?” Verse 2. Proving the whole argument was for Christian perfection. We are told in verse 21 that the Levitical priests were made without an oath, but the Melchisedecian order was made “with an oath.” This oath is nothing more or less than that entire and irreversible consecration to the eternal will of God which no one but a child of God can make, and by which, according to Moses, there is a double avouchment. We avouch ourselves to be utterly and everlastingly the Lord’s, and he avouches himself to be our everlasting God. Deuteronomy 26:17. A man can be born and grow up to be a citizen without taking any oath of allegiance, but when he joins the army, and unites the office of a soldier to that of a citizen it must needs be with an oath, because the very idea of soldier implies laying down one’s life and requires a degree of loyalty greater than that of mere citizenship. Conversion makes us citizens of God’s kingdom, and the sanctifying baptism of the Spirit constitutes us soldiers, but we enter this higher rank of loyalty with an oath of eternal fidelity. This is the order of Melchisedec.