The High Priest And Prophet Of God

Exodus 19: 24 - 25, Then the LORD said to him, "Away! Get down and then come up, you and Aaron with you. But do not let the priests and the people break through to come up to the LORD, lest He break out against them." So Moses went down to the people and spoke to them. NKJV

In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul teaches us a very enlightening principle that gives us understanding as to why God does what He does. Paul tells us that even though God is Spirit, the natural comes first and afterwards, the spiritual. Why would God set up His kingdom in this manner? We must remember that God created us with a natural body instead of creating us as a spirit-being without a body. God created us as a human, bound to the earthly realm so that we could choose with our own freewill whether or not we would serve Him. In other words, He created us so that we could make the choice.

Unfortunately, Adam made the wrong choice. Nevertheless, God made us as flesh first, so that we might be able to redeem carnal man from sin. After the natural order of things was set in motion by Adam, God sent Jesus to earth in the form of man to redeem us. As a result of His great love, we can now make the choice to become like Him through our faith.

Most of what is contained in the Old Testament was written with the understanding that God had a plan. His plan would begin in the natural realm, but would later be transformed into the spiritual in the New Testament. Jesus taught the Jews in His day by using a method called "parables." These stories helped the Jews understand spiritual principles based on physical things that they could grasp. In much the same way, God designed the Old Testament to be based on the physical realm to represent or to reveal what He wanted to occur in the spiritual realm on earth.

When God uses natural "things" in the Old Testament to teach us spiritual principles or to reveal prophetic utterances that can be understood by humans, it is called "typology" or a foreshadow of things to come. Now let's get to the purpose of today's word for you.

In today's scripture, we read that Moses was alone with God on Mount Sinai. Later, we see that God commanded Moses to leave His presence on the mountain and to come back up with Aaron. We know from scripture that Moses was the greatest prophet of the Old Testament. We also know that Aaron represented the order of the High Priest. We see Moses, the prophet, being sent down by the Lord from God's holy hill only to return with Aaron. Once again, God is using symbolism to show us something prophetic that would be fulfilled in the New Testament. When Jesus came to earth to redeem fallen man from sin, He descended from God's holy hill as God's prophet to proclaim the "Good News" to the lost.

However, after Jesus completed the work of His Father on earth and reconciled man and God through His cross as High Priest, He ascended back to the Father in heaven. When Jesus returned to the Father, He wasn't just the prophet; He was also the High Priest, who would pour out His blood upon the heavenly tabernacle for our atonement. It happened in the spirit just as God had planned it the day He sent Moses down to bring Aaron back up on the Mount. Moses and Aaron were a typology of Jesus.

If God is this meticulous, and He is able to plan situations that far in advance and they be fulfilled in perfection, then this tells us that He can take care of us when it seems like we're at our wits' end. God is in control, whether men want to admit it or not. We can help Him be in control of every area of our lives, if we will only submit ourselves to His will. Today, if you feel overwhelmed because your life is in turmoil, begin to cast all your care on Him and watch as He moves those mountains out of your way.

Give It To God,
Pastor Asa Dockery