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Happy Sunday, everybody. My name is Jared Severson. If I have not met you before, I'm one of the elders here at Hope Heights, and I'm excited to walk through the Bible with you. This question, what's something insignificant that turned out to be significant? I googled it. First thing that came up was penicillin. I don't know if anybody knows how penicillin was discovered. Without going into too much detail, it was an accidental discovery. Some mold started growing in a petri dish and the bacteria didn't get any closer to it. And so that was a super significant discovery that happened. But I did think of similar to Britta up here. That was the first thing that came to my mind when I thought of this question, was kind of how I met my wife. I was involved in. I went to the University of Minnesota. So did she. We were involved in Campus Crusade for Christ. And my freshman year, her sophomore year, spring retreat came around, and I didn't know anybody. I was in a dorm. I was in Bailey hall, which is on the St. Paul campus. None of the guys that were involved in my Bible study or that I knew in my dorm were going to that retreat. And so I had agreed to go. And so I was going without knowing anybody. Happened to just, you know, get asked, can you go? Can you leave like a few hours earlier? Because the MCs of the retreat need to get up there early to kind of rehearse and practice. And I'm like, sure, whatever. I just need to get a ride there. And happened to get stuck in a car with Natty, who is my wife. And turns out that that ended up being pretty significant that we ended up getting married. We ended up having a family who is now also getting married. And, you know, you just think about how many people are impacted along the way from that just that little chance meeting of getting put into a car with somebody else. Thought about my wife as well, and her kind of story of how she like her faith story as well is that at the University of Minnesota, again, she came across a table during, I don't know if it was orientation week or one of those first weeks of school, and they were offering a chance to win a free bike. And she's like, sure, I'll put my name in this drawing. Put her name in this drawing for a chance for a free bike. And it turned into somebody from Campus Crusade from crew that actually then contacted her and, you know, started kind of walking through the Bible with her. And she now is an employee of Hope. She's downtown Today, but has led our small group ministry, is now in charge of our Leadership Development Institute, and again, has had a lot of, lot of significant impacts on things. And so we're going to kind of dig into that theme a little bit today. And we have this summer been in a series called Cloud of Witnesses, just looking at different people throughout the Bible, kind of highlighting their story on how they ultimately point us to Jesus and Jesus redemptive work. And so we want to, as we go through this series, experience just how kind of extraordinary God is just throughout this kind of redemptive process throughout history and the story of his people. And so last time I was up here this summer, I'd asked my daughter who one of her favorite biblical characters was, and she had said Rahab. And so that's who I talked about last time I was here. And sorry to my boys, but this time I asked my wife, Natty, if she had any favorite characters. And one of the first people that she said was just this very obscure, not highly mentioned character in the Bible named Melchizedek. And so that's who we're going to actually look at today. And we're going to read through kind of as we kind of see who Melchizedek is and how he points us to Jesus. We're going to look at a lot of scripture today. And so there's going to be a lot of verses up here on the board or on the screen if you do have a Bible. We're going to kind of jump around a little bit, but we are going to go through a lot of scripture today. So. So let's get after it. We're going to start in Genesis 14. One thing we need to understand kind of before we get into some of this is this time period in Genesis 14 was very tumultuous at the time. There were a lot of different kings. There weren't kings of large nations at the time, but a lot of these kings of kind of city states. And so these kings always were, it seemed like they were always in constant conflict with each other, just for people and for territory. And so they were often kind of waging war against each other. And as a result of those battles, people would get taken captive, they'd get enslaved. Their land or their territory was kind of taken over. And so in this particular account in Genesis, we have kind of two alliances that started this battle. We had one group, one alliance of four kings that decided they were going to attack this other alliance of five kings. And we get this battle royale that takes place. So we're going to start in chapter 14, verse 11. This is kind of where we're going to pick up the story. So Starting in verse 11, the four kings seized all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah. And all their food. Then they went away. They also carried off Abram's nephew Lot. Abram, who later will become Abraham. Carried off his nephew Lot and his possessions. Since he was living in Sodom. A man who had escaped came and reported this to Abram, the Hebrew. Now, Abram was living near the great trees of Mamre the Amorite, A brother of Eshcol and Aner, who, of all of whom, were allied with Abram. When Abram heard that his relative had been taken captive. He called out the 318 trained men born in his household. And went in pursuit as far as Dan. During the night, Abram divided his men to attack them. And he routed them, pursuing them as far as Hobah, north of Damascus. He recovered all the goods. And brought back his relative Lot and all his possessions. Together with the women and the other people. After Abram returned from defeating Kadorla. More and the kings allied with him. The king of Sodom came out to meet him in the valley of Shava. That is the king's valley. So Abram, like we said later, will be known as Abraham. Hears that his nephew Lot gets captured. Because he was living in Sodom at the time. So Abram then comes up with this plan. He gets his 318 men from his kind of household, his fighters, his trained fighters. And he goes out to kind of recover what was taken. So Abram had this good strategy. He kind of waited till the night. He ends up routing them, like it says here, defeating the enemy kings. He rescues his nephew Lot, all the other captives and their possessions. Okay, so moving on into verse 18, we see then Melchizedek, King of Salem, Brought out bread and wine. He was priest of God Most High. And he blessed Abram, saying, blessed be Abram, by God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth. And praise be to God Most High, who delivered your enemies into your hand. Then Abram gave him a tenth of everything. So here in verses 18 through 20, we actually meet Melchizedek. We read that Melchizedek is the king of Salem. He greets Abraham, or Abram, Abraham, by showing some hospitality. He brings out bread and wine, helping to celebrate the victory. And we read here also that Melchizedek was a priest of God Most High. And so then Melchizedek shares this priestly blessing with Abram. And then Abram's led to give an offering. Okay, so that's what we know, but that's all we know. All we know about Melchizedek is from verses 18:20, we maybe can start seeing some parallels here, some connections between him and Jesus. He's a king. He shows hospitality by bringing bread and wine to celebrate Abram's victory. Seems like that could possibly be a parallel or a foreshadow to Jesus. And when he tells his disciples to eat and drink, drink. Eat bread and drink wine, kind of in remembrance of his victory over death and sin. And then Melchizedek also then shares this blessing. Blessed be Abram, by God most High, creator of heaven and earth. And praise be to God most High, who delivered your enemies into your hand. So Melchizedek, then. So what he's doing here is he's calling on God to continue working through Abram. And he calls Abram then to give praise to God for the work he's done. So we know Melchizedek's a priest. A priest's role is to act as kind of that intermediary between God and man, to kind of bridge that gap between humanity and kind of the holy God. And so we know that Jesus does that too. But then after that, after this mention of Melchizedek in these three verses, he just kind of disappears. So how does Melchizedek just in three short verses, actually point us to Jesus in the Gospel? Seems like he is just an insignificant character. And these characteristics and those kind of parallels might just be coincidental. It's just a minor event in history that doesn't really bear mentioning again. Right. And that's kind of how it seems, because Melchizedek is not mentioned anymore until we get to Psalm 110. That's the next time that we hear about melchizedek. So Psalm 110 says, the Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. The Lord will extend your mighty scepter from Zion, saying, rule in the midst of your enemies. Your troops will be willing on your day of battle, arrayed in holy splendor. Your young men will come to you like dew from the morning's womb. The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek. The Lord is at your right hand. He will crush kings on the day of his wrath. He will judge the nations, heaping up the dead and crushing the rulers of the whole earth. He will drink from a brook along the way, and so he will lift his head high. So again, this is just really brief. We see just the one mention of Melchizedek right there does seem relatively insignificant. However, if we start actually digging into just those few verses from Genesis 14 and then this from Psalm 110, we find there's actually some extreme significance in who Melchizedek actually was and who he represents. And it's been fun over this last week kind of doing some of that research because, you know, when Nadi mentioned the person of Melchizedek, I know I had heard the name before, but didn't really understand how he can actually point us or how he does actually point us right to Jesus. So let's start kind of digging in and we're going to start here with Psalm 110. So here, David King David is actually prophetically kind of revealing God's word about the coming Messiah. So in verse one, he says the Lord said to my Lord. So that first Lord, there's two lords in there. That first Lord is the term Yahweh. The second my Lord is the Hebrew term Adonai. Both are terms that actually refer to God. But scholars people do agree that in this passage we have the first, the all caps, Lord Yahweh referring to God the Father, and then Adonai, the my Lord is actually referring to God the Son. So James Boice says Adonai refers to an individual greater than the speaker. Here is a case of David citing God's words in which God tells another person who is greater than David to sit at God's right hand until God makes the person's enemies a footstool for the person's feet. This person can only be a divine Messiah who is Jesus Christ. So David prophesying about Jesus, this is a prophetic message about Jesus here in this psalm says that Jesus is a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek. This alone definitely shows that there's something significant about those three verses that we saw in Genesis. There's something more significant in the character of Melchizedek than it maybe seems on first glance. And so the more I studied Melchizedek this week, you know, the more I came to that realization about how God actually takes maybe things that are insignificant right away and just weave story after story together in such a cohesive and intricate way. And this person, Melchizedek shows how maybe we won't see that on first observation, but everything in the Bible from Genesis all the way to the New Testament and to Jesus hundreds and hundreds of years later is part of God's ultimate plan. And it just intertwines so sweetly together. So Aside from these three verses in Genesis and then the one verse here in Psalm 110, Melchizedek doesn't get mentioned again until the book of Hebrews in the New Testament. So Hebrews then actually helps us to explain how maybe this seemingly insignificant character really does have a significant role in pointing us directly to the person of Jesus. So we are now going to jump way ahead to Hebrews chapter seven. So Hebrews chapter seven starts off by saying this. Melchizedek was king of Salem and a priest of God most High. He met Abraham returning from the defeat of the kings and blessed him, and Abraham gave him a tenth of everything. So this is just giving us a reminder about those three Genesis verses. So we know that Melchizedek was a king, he was a priest, he gave a blessing, and then Abraham responded by giving him a tithe. So first of all, I want to direct the attention to the fact that Melchizedek here is both a king and a priest. Those roles were almost never given to the same person. So it suggests that there's something. There's kind of an elevated and maybe unique position that Melchizedek holds. So under God's law, which the law that was given to Moses, those roles were always separated. Now, I know the law hadn't been given to Moses yet, but again, we see how those roles were separated. And so the law required priests that come from the tribe of Levi and specifically descended from the line of Aaron. But Levites could not be king. So even though this in Genesis, that was a time before the law actually had been handed down, it was very unusual that someone would ever hold both of those roles. Verse two finishes by saying, first the name Melchizedek means king of righteousness. Then also King of Salem means king of peace. Now, names were super important in biblical times. You see all throughout the Bible genealogies where this was the father of this person. And you just see those genealogies all the time. A name gave a person kind of their sense of purpose and their sense of meaning. And so Melchizedek's name here means the king of righteousness. Salem, as we see here, means peace. So being the king of Salem, Melchizedek was also the king of peace. And so this was an interesting kind of connection. If we look at this, if we go back to Genesis and we think about this battle that was taking place between this alliance of five kings and this alliance of four kings. There was a city that was mentioned in that, that never took place in that actually battle or in that actual battle, and that was the city of Salem. So the city of Salem actually led up to its kind of peaceful name being the City of Peace. And the ancient city of Salem later becomes Jerusalem. And so there's a lot of connections here that can be made between righteousness and peace. Jesus is the ultimate king of righteousness. Jesus was called the son of David. David was the king of Jerusalem. Jesus was also called the Prince of Peace. And so Melchizedek here it seems to be that Melchizedek is foreshadowing Jesus. We know that Jesus is the only one who lived a completely sinless and truly righteous life. We can only experience kind of that real peace through Jesus. Righteousness kind of departed on us through Jesus sacrificed for us on the cross. And only through true righteousness do we experience true peace in our lives. And so it's interesting kind of seeing those connections coming from the person of Melchizedek. Verse 3. Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, resembling the Son of God, he remains a priest forever. So Melchizedek just showed up in Genesis. There wasn't a mention of his parents. He wasn't listed in any genealogy record in any of the records in the Bible, like we see all over those Old and New Testaments. So we don't know anything about his birth or death. Now, it doesn't mean that Melchizedek literally had no parents or lifespan, but rather the. The connection or the genealogy is just. There is no genealogy that's mentioned in the Bible. So in a culture that was highly focused on family and focused on, you know, where you came from, we can just make an educated guess that Melchizedek's kind of power and his genealogy doesn't come from other humans, that it comes directly from God. And so we don't know for sure, but it helps emphasize kind of his everlasting priesthood. There's no record of his death. There's no record of who succeeded him or how he got appointed to those roles of, you know, king and priest. So in this sense, Melchizedek is foreshadowing Jesus. Melchizedek resembles Jesus as a high priest or as other versions of the Bible translate, or this one right here resembling the Son of God. He's made like the Son of God. Theologian. Again, as we think about how this just three short verses don't seem like much because there's not really a mention of it. Later on, we can learn a lot from just this person of Melchizedek as he foreshadows Jesus. And so theologian Charles Spurgeon, when referring to Melchizedek, said, we see but little of him, but we see nothing little in him. And so it's especially true if we think of that. It's especially true as we continue kind of digging in here about how Melchizedek is like Jesus and then points us directly to who Jesus is. So continuing on, just think of how great he was, even the patriarch Abraham. So he, being Melchizedek, even the patriarch Abraham gave him a tenth of the plunder. Now, the law requires the descendants of Levi, who became priests to collect a tenth from the people, that is, from their fellow Israelites, even though they are also descended from Abraham. This man, however, did not trace his descent from Levi, yet he collected a tenth from Abraham and blessed him who had the promises. And without doubt, the lesser is blessed by the greater. In the one case, the 10th is collected by people who die, but in the other case, by him who is declared to be living. One might even say that Levi, who collects the 10th, paid the 10th through Abraham, because when Melchizedek met Abraham, Levi was still in the body of his ancestor. So these verses kind of highlight the superiority of Melchizedek over Abraham and over the priesthood that eventually comes out of the tribe of Levi when the law gets handed down to the Jewish people. So the priesthood that God set up to be the mediators between his people and himself, Melchizedek has some sort of superiority over that. So Abraham, who becomes the father of this great Jewish nation, gives Melchizedek a tenth of all he had, which recognizes and acknowledges Melchizedek's authority, his status, his position. So this does predate any kind of tithing requirement, which is really kind of cool that even though there was no law about this, Abraham didn't have to do this. Abraham chose to bless him with that or give that a tenth of everything that he had to Melchizedek. And so despite that there wasn't any requirement he did that. It's not just an Old Testament law. Giving is not just an Old Testament law. It demonstrates respect. In addition, here we can make an argument that Hebrews, or in Hebrews here, is that all those who descended from Abraham, including priests, including those from the tribe of Levi, were also inferior to Melchizedek. So figuratively, kind of like it says here in verses 9 and 10, figuratively the priests who descended from Abraham, Aaron and Levi had DNA that was with Abraham during this interaction with Melchizedek. And so people would tithe to those future priests who in turn figuratively gave a tithe to Melchizedek. And so again, that also illustrates this kind of subordinate position that Abraham has to Melchizedek illustrates that he was a greater priest than the Levites would ever be. So the next group of verses in Hebrews go on to show us then, how Melchizedek actually points us to Jesus and how Jesus is actually even a greater high priest. Verse 11. If perfection could have been attained through the Levitical priesthood, and indeed the law given to the people established that priesthood, why was there still need for another priest to come, one in the order of Melchizedek, not in the order of Aaron? For when the priesthood is changed, the law must be changed also. So the priesthood that was set up in the order of Aaron didn't make things perfect. Sacrifices that the priests had to make on behalf of the people never put an end to sin. It highlighted the need for this new kind of this new order, this new way to do things where someone could actually and complete so people's sin could actually be atoned for. And so if perfection could have been attained through the law that was handed down to Moses and through this kind of Levitical priesthood, there wouldn't have been another need or a new need for a new priest to come, like it says there in verse 11 in the order of Melchizedek. Again, we kind of see that callback to Psalm110. And so we've seen that mentioned. We wouldn't have needed a new way of doing something if that atonement for those sins, if those high priests in some way could have gotten rid of sin and death continuing on here. He of whom these things are said belonged to a different tribe. And no one from that tribe has ever served at the altar. For it's clear that our Lord descended from Judah. In regard to that tribe, Moses said nothing about priests. Again, kind of going back to the genealogy here. But according to the law, Jesus could not have been a priest. He was descended from the line of Judah, not from the line of Levi and Aaron. That was the wrong tribe. So under that Mosaic law, God commanded that only certain people from that line of Aaron could complete those priestly duties. So if Jesus were to become a high priest, it had to be a different way. It had to be a different order. And that's where kind of that order of Melchizedek Kind of comes in. It had to be under different principles. There had to be a new way of doing something. And what we have said is even more clear if another priest like Melchizedek appears, one who has become a priest not on the basis of a regulation as to his ancestry, but on the basis of the power of an indestructible life. For it is declared, you are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek. So this new priesthood is not based on law, not based on your family. It's based purely on that indestructible, everlasting life. Only the Messiah, who David again was prophesying about back in Psalm 110, only the Messiah, a priest according to the order of Melchizedek, could be our true intermediary with God the Father. It could never be a priest according to the order of Aaron. None of them had an endless life. All of them served limited times, limited terms as priests based on their own lifespan. Jesus showed that he was superior when he triumphed over death, when he was raised from the dead. So Jesus priesthood is unchangeable, it's eternal. And it makes him and him alone able to save completely and atone for the sin of all those who come to God through him. Excuse me. Sticking with that idea, we continue on. The former regulation is set aside because it was weak and useless, for the law made nothing perfect. And a better hope is introduced by which we draw near to God. So the law gives us knowledge. The law was a good thing, gives us knowledge of what God's holy standard is, what God expects of us. However, it only points out what we've done wrong. Law diagnoses our sin problem, but it doesn't give us a cure. It does not provide the power to defeat sin and death in our lives. The fact that there's now a new order, we can draw directly to God. We can draw near to God, directly to him, through the life of Jesus. So if we think about the story of Jesus, kind of death and resurrection, remember when Jesus died, the curtain of the temple was torn in two. That curtain separated the holy of holiest places from the rest of everything. And that curtain being torn in two, signified that people now had direct access to God. So wasn't just people having direct access to the high priest, then who would go into the holy of holies and perform sacrifices and, you know, pray to God and, you know, try to atone for sins. Now people could go directly to God, and that was only because death couldn't hold Jesus down. That's the better hope. The law doesn't give us a better hope. God's grace through Jesus draws us near to God in a way that the law can't. It's because we have a better. There's a better priesthood and we have a better high priest. That curtain is torn in our lives, and our hope is Jesus, not the law of Moses or not the ability to keep that law. Verse 20. And it was not without an oath. Others became priests without any oath. But he became a priest with an oath when God said to him, the Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever. Because of this oath, Jesus has become the guarantor of a better covenant. So again we see a callback to Psalm 110. Jesus is established as our high priest with an oath. You are a priest. That was God. The oath was God saying, you are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. So an oath is defined as a promise that was made before God signified, kind of a binding commitment between God and humanity. So other priests of the order of Aaron were appointed not by that oath, not by that promise that God made, but by heredity, wasn't based on their character or who they were. Okay, it wasn't based on any of those promises. But that's not so with Jesus and the priestly order of Melchizedek. God here makes a binding commitment to us. And that started way back in the Psalms with David's prophetic message. So in verse 22 here we see the term covenant, okay, that language is used, actually, which is. It's closer to kind of a last will. Like you would write your will so that, you know, if something were to happen to you, you kind of guarantee that things happen with your, you know, your finances, your families, you know, all that sort of stuff. God's given Jesus as that guarantee, as that covenant for everlasting life. And so we inherit Jesus under the law. There was no guarantee on our side of the covenant. People always failed under it. But because we know that Jesus lived a perfect, a sinless life, he died and he was resurrected. He has that everlasting life, that indestructible life. We have a new way of life in the order again, calling back in the order of Melchizedek. So it's completely dependent on what Jesus did, not on what we do. Praise God for that. Hebrews 7 continues saying, now, there have been many of these priests since death prevented them from continuing office. But because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore he's able to save completely those who come to God through Him because he always lives to intercede for them. So Jesus is our permanent high priest. We don't need to worry about a bad priest replacing him, because he's our high priest forever. He can save forever and forever. He can intercede and be that intermediary for us and on our behalf. And that's unchanging. In the NIV translation here it says that Jesus completely saves. In the King James version, it actually says saves to the uttermost. This was kind of a cool quote, but Billy Sunday, he was an old baseball player who turned preacher, he actually said that God saved him from the guttermost. Turns out he was a big drunk and he often felt like he was in the gutter. And so that's why he used that. But that's kind of a cool way to think of it, that no matter the sin, Jesus can save us. He can save us from everything, from the guttermost, from the uttermost. He completely saves. All we have to do is just come to him. God provided the way to salvation through Jesus. Not us trying to do the right thing, not us putting our sin and our shame and our guilt on somebody else and hoping that they can go do it, another human, they can go do it. But doing that with Jesus turning to Jesus and giving him our shame and our suffering and our sin and letting him take it to an interceding for us. William Newell says our blessed Lord is interceding for us, but he is in no sense appeasing God. All that God's holy being and righteous government could demand was once for all, completely and forever satisfied at the cross. I love that quote. In Jesus there is complete security in salvation. He guarantees it. He just said it there in Hebrews that it's guaranteed. Jesus lives to intercede and to pray for us. Hopefully that's an encouragement, especially when we feel like possibly giving up, when sin just becomes too much. Jesus intercession on our behalf is not just a matter of trying to calm an angry God because we've done things wrong and God wants to destroy us. And oh, we don't want that to happen. It means that Jesus continually is representing us before God the Father as our intermediary so that we can draw nearer and nearer, closer and closer to him. And we're always going to be defended from the enemy's attacks and lies. That's what that means. And then Hebrews 7 concludes by saying, such a high priest truly meets our needs. One who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners exalted above the heavens. Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all, when he offered himself for the law appoints as high priests men in all their weakness. But the oath which came after the law appointed the Son who has been made perfect forever. No other priests have the characteristics of Jesus. Jesus is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, meaning not sharing in our sin, not sharing in that sinful nature that we're born into. And he's exalted above the heavens. So Jesus is superior to any earthly priest. Priests have always been people with weaknesses. Jesus didn't have those weaknesses. He didn't need to offer up sacrifices for his own sin first, which priests normally did, and then offer sacrifices for us. And that's what makes Jesus unique. So priests bring sacrifices offered on the altar, but Jesus was both the priest and the sacrifice. And that's the best sacrifice brought to God the Father by the best priest. He willingly gave himself up because he was the perfect high priest. He was able to offer himself up as the perfect sacrifice for our sin. And that happened once for all. So we had Abraham, who God promised would be made into a great nation. Abraham was promised that he would have descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. Abraham was called a friend of God, which not many people have that distinction in the Bible. This Abraham actually met Melchizedek. And Abraham recognized Melchizedek as somebody greater than himself, someone who ruled as king and connected him to God as a priest. Abraham recognized Melchizedek as greater than himself, so much so that Abraham actually gave Melchizedek a tenth of everything he had. So Abraham was thankful for his victory and therefore made that offering. However, Melchizedek couldn't actually save Abraham or us from sin and death. So Abraham needed a savior, just like we did. And that's how Melchizedek then points us directly to Jesus. We needed something better. Melchizedek foreshadowed a better covenant, a better way of doing things. And so those constant sacrifices were never going to be enough for our sins. The priesthood that we need then is in the order of Melchizedek. One that doesn't have a beginning, it doesn't have an end. We can't work harder, we can't do better, we can't sacrifice more to ever actually overcome sin and death. We'd never be able to claim the righteousness it takes to face a holy God and a just God, we needed a high priest and intermediary greater than ourselves. One with no beginning, no end, one that's eternal, one that's perfect, one that can truly connect us to our holy and just God. And it required only one true sacrifice, through the death and resurrection of our king and high priest, Jesus. So way back in Genesis, God was already foreshadowing what his kind of redemptive plan would be. And that's so cool when you look at it that way back in just chapter 14, way back at the beginning of the Bible and kind of that early history, God was already planning Jesus and how Jesus was going to save. This last week, I was fortunate to attend the El Salvador trip with many of you. I went on this trip with my daughter. She was one of the people that went along with this. This was a trip that was challenging in a lot of ways it was challenging, as those of you who went can attest, mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually. I think a lot of times we're faced with those challenges and it can seem like things don't matter. We might feel like we're not important, that we're just standing there looking out at this vast ocean, thinking about how small we are, or maybe just one little grain of sand on this beach of endless sand, this endless beach. I hope none of us get to thinking, get stuck thinking that we're insignificant. We saw here in the Bible how just this, in three verses, this person that was mentioned didn't hear anything about him before, Melchizedek before, we didn't hear anything about him after. But this super insignificant, seemingly insignificant character had a profound impact on pointing Abraham, King David and all of us to our Messiah, our Savior, Jesus. And so a significantly kind of insignificant thing like letting little Kevin here spray you with a fan and a water bottle, or hanging out with kids at a school on their holiday, or even handing out candy and toothbrushes. I know that was kind of an odd combination, giving them candy and toothpaste and toothbrushes. It was an interesting gift, or going on just a quick little mission or vision trip, whatever you want to call it. Those can feel like relatively insignificant things, and we can feel insignificant in doing them. But in God's wisdom and plan, he can use us in all those little moments to have huge impacts in pointing others to Jesus. So we have the opportunity of overflowing into the lives of others out of that love and our faith that we have and that hope that we have from our greater high priest who has made A way for us to draw near to God. In this picture, this young lady that I circled here, this is Sophia. This is the niece of Pastor Renee, who. Who's the pastor of our sister church here in Heights, Prima Glacia. He led us on our trip. He was from El Salvador originally. And so Sophia had spent time with our group all week. Our final night in El Salvador, she professed her faith, her saving faith in Jesus. I know that Pastor Renee, his wife, his family had been praying for her for a long time, but there was something about hanging out with the group and just interacting and participating and reaching out to others throughout the week that just gave her that spiritual push to help her make a huge decision, that she wanted to trust Jesus for forgiveness and for hope and for ultimate life. And what maybe seemed like significant events along the week or conversations that we maybe had, to us was part of God's plan to lead her to Jesus and give her life. And I'm not saying that me or anybody else in our group necessarily had that specific conversation. We'll probably never know. But just being part of that was something that, again, just helped her to realize her need for Jesus. It's an amazing thing to be part of when you can have that story and see how people's lives are impacted or they can be impacted through the things that we do. Just this week, I moved my daughter up to college up in Morehead. As we were driving up there, I heard a song called Preach by Ryan Stevenson. I had never heard the song before. Some of you might know it, but the main lyric simply states, I want my life to preach. Every breath, every beat, I want my life to preach. Because our hope and faith in the saving grace of Jesus, we have that opportunity to let our lives preach to others and play a significant role in God's redemptive story. So we can offer ourselves all of who God made us to be, to preach with words and actions. About who? Our perfect high priest, who gives us his righteousness and his peace and gives us eternal forgiveness, life and love. Praise God. We can preach with our lives. I'm going to invite Jordan up so we can respond to the gospel. A couple questions for our reflection today. Is Jesus your king, your high priest and savior, like Melchizedek had those multiple, those dual roles for Abraham? Does Jesus have those roles in our lives? Do we look to him for that instead of Jesus? What might you be looking to for redemption? If we're trying to get salvation, if we're trying to draw nearer to God through living a perfect Life, having the perfect relationship, whatever it might be. Are those things actually what we're trying to use to save us? Or are we just looking to Jesus, who resembles Jesus to you, who's somebody that you can look to to say, yes, your life is preaching to me. You are doing things that are pointing me to Jesus. You know, you can go to that person. Who can you go to that will then again kind of direct you to Jesus? And then who can you share your life with? Who can you point to Jesus? Like Melchizedek kind of directly points to that person of Jesus as king and as High priest, you know, who can you kind of share your life with and point to Jesus? So here at Hope Heights, we do respond in these four ways. Here at the bottom, we're going to be singing three songs in response to the good news that Jesus loves us no matter what. During those songs, out in the hallway, through each door, there's communion tables with crackers and juice. We take communion, we eat the cracker, drink the juice in remembrance of Jesus death, his life, and in thanks for all that he's done for his victory. Just like Melchizedek brought out bread and wine to celebrate Abram's victory, we take communion to celebrate Jesus victory for us. And you don't need to be a member here at Heights or anywhere. We just ask that you are a follower of Jesus. And then there will be a couple people by each door that have yellow lanyards that would love to pray for you. Please ask them. You don't have to have any specific prayer requests. Just ask them for prayer and they would love to pray for you. And then lastly, we know that giving is an important part of our worship and recognize that it helps. It's thanking God for his authority and provision in our lives. And so there's a little black box over on that communion table if you feel led to that or you can always give online. So would you please pray with me before we continue our worship? Jesus, our hope is in you, firm and secure anchor for our souls. You're a great high priest that's entered the holy of holies on our behalf as the perfect sacrifice. We have forgiveness and eternal life and hope only through the grace and mercy that you showed on your cross. Thank you that you've redeemed your people and that we can be counted free from sin and death. Thank you that we get to play a part in your redemptive story. May our hearts prayers and songs give you the glory that only you deserve. In your name we pray Jesus. Amen.