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Hebrews 5: 1-10
Brothers and sisters:
Every high priest is taken from among men
and made their representative before God,
to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.
He is able to deal patiently with the ignorant and erring,
for he himself is beset by weakness
and so, for this reason, must make sin offerings for himself
as well as for the people.
No one takes this honor upon himself
but only when called by God,
just as Aaron was.
In the same way,
it was not Christ who glorified himself in becoming high priest,
but rather the one who said to him:
You are my Son:
this day I have begotten you;
just as he says in another place,
You are a priest forever
according to the order of Melchizedek.
In the days when he was in the Flesh,
he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears
to the one who was able to save him from death,
and he was heard because of his reverence.
Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered;
and when he was made perfect,
he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.
The Word of the Lord.
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These are some of the most honest, humbling words I’ve read about priesthood in scripture. In our first reading from the Letter to the Hebrews it is written:
“Every high priest is taken from among men and made their representative before God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. He is able to deal patiently with the ignorant and erring, because he himself is beset by weakness.”
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He himself is beset by weakness.
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Before a priest is ordained, he makes three promises: prayer, celibacy, and obedience. Some also make the promise of life-long poverty.
Why don’t priests promise something easily achievable? Or something requiring less sacrifice?
Each of our promises are sown into the fields of human weakness, and that’s precisely the point.
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One of the first lessons learned in the spiritual life is that we cannot become holy – or pleasing to God – on our own. We depend upon the Lord.
By God’s grace, every priest can live out his promises faithfully, even joyfully.
And by extension, every Christian can live a joyful life pleasing to God. We can live as devoted spouses, generous servants, faithful friends, and holy intercessors, even as we are beset by weakness.
Faith is not trusting in what we can do on our own; it’s trusting that we can do all things, even what seems impossible, through Christ who strengthens us.
This is the transformative power Jesus is speaking about in today’s Gospel – pouring new wine into fresh wineskins.
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“He himself is beset by weakness.”
Today, let’s pray for all priests, especially those who struggle, that God’s grace, often dispensed through friends, would sustain their ministry. And let’s pray for one another, that each of us would be stretched into the saint God created us to be.
Not by any effort of our own, but by the power of Him who has loved us and given himself for us.
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Image credits: (1) Diocese of Westminster (2) Freepic (3) Lewis Center for Church Leadership