Empowering the Priesthood
“Thank you so much for your teaching, pastor. It was very helpful.”
“Pastor?” I usually begin my correction after a long day of training. Generally, in Asia, this is meant as a term of respect for their guest who just spent all day equipping them and challenging them from the Word to obey, follow, and love Jesus more. But I will not let that slide, because I have a crucial point to make about who they are.
“I am not a pastor. In fact, I am an engineer by training. But I am a royal priest! And this is an extremely honorable position given to me by the Lord.”
This is the drum I beat any time someone mistakenly calls me “pastor,” because, for the longest time, I didn’t know who Christ had made me to be. Now I do, and it is a glorious truth. In a previous post, I mentioned how impactful it was to learn that the Great Commission could be completed. The job was doable, and that was good news! Just as impactful, if not more so, was learning that God had made me (or re-made me) just for this, and He has done the same thing for every believer.
Who are we?
What is our identity? In the Word of God, our Father defines it. He tells us who we are, and He spells it out very clearly for us so that we can walk in it.
In 1 Peter 1:1-2, the apostle Peter writes to believers in “Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia.” This is a list of regions in modern-day Turkey. The letter is written to normal, everyday believers undergoing persecution, and its definitions and principles are still applicable to believers everywhere today. Moving on to verses 4-5, “As you come to him, the living Stone…you also, like living stones are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” Jesus is the living Stone, the Rock of Ages, and we are like Him on a smaller scale as living stones. We are being built together, not independent of each other, into a house to be a holy priesthood. This is a beautiful mixed metaphor. Linking in the book of Hebrews, Christ is our great High Priest, and we on a smaller scale are priests in a priesthood.
We can be especially sure that believers are being described, defined, and addressed because of phrases like “the one who trusts in him,” and “Now to you who believe.” Given the context, it is good to apply these same definitions and descriptions to us today, which brings us to verse 9:
“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.”
Congratulations! You have just been given a promotion! You are no longer just a believer or simply a believer. You are a royal priest! It is a kingly office, and it is a holy office. And you have been made a priest with many brothers and sisters.
This is not the only place where God talks about us like this. In Revelation 5:9-10, we see that Jesus has purchased people from every tribe and language and people and nation. He “made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God and they will reign on the earth.” In this amazing passage, we start to see some simple truths applicable to believers anywhere in the world. We have a King, and that makes us part of His Kingdom. We are to serve our God, and that makes us priests. In the restoration of the original mandate given in Genesis 1, God intends for believers to reign on the earth.
Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17-6:2 that if anyone is in Christ, he is a “new creation.” Also, God reconciled us believers to Himself and “gave us the ministry of reconciliation … and He has committed to us the message of reconciliation.” It isn’t a question of whether we get these things. We have a ministry and a message. The only question is what we do with them. Do we pursue it faithfully regardless of our day job, or do we shirk the responsibility? Are we good stewards of the ministry and message, or are we poor stewards of them? Not only this, but God describes us here as “ambassadors” through whom He makes appeals to the lost. And if that isn’t enough, we are also called His co-workers. What a title! What an identity He has given to us!
The job description
From the moment of our salvation, we have been given this new, incredible job. What does it entail? Again, the Word is not lacking an answer.
Think about what a priest does. What might come to mind are images of the Old Testament temple workers and a word often mentioned in that context. For me, the first word that comes to mind is “sacrifice,” as the priests of Israel would sacrifice an animal to make atonement for the people’s sins. Let’s deal with a potentially lingering question about new covenant sacrifice.
Jesus sacrificed for the sins of the people “once for all when he offered himself” (Heb. 7:27). Unlike the other priests who “again and again” offer sacrifices “that can never take away sins,” Jesus “offered for all time one sacrifice for sins” and then “sat down at the right hand of God” (Heb. 10:11-12). If all this is true about the totality of Jesus’s sacrifice, then are we, as priests, to be involved in any sort of sacrifice? Surprisingly yes, as there is a different kind of sacrifice not geared toward atoning for people’s sins.
“Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name. And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.” – Hebrews 13:15-16
In this passage, God shows us three sacrifices that He still expects from us:
Sacrifice of Praise – Our lips should openly profess His name. We should be devoted to praising God in our words, singing, and thanking God the Father for everything (Eph. 5:18-20).
Sacrifice of Doing Good – We must combine our faith with action.
Sacrifice of Sharing with Others – We must be generous.
These sacrifices please God, and we can continue to lead in sacrifice and worship as New Testament priests.
Additionally, in Romans 15:16, Paul describes proclaiming the Gospel of God to the Gentiles as a “priestly duty.”
In summary of our duties, we as priests should worship God with all our hearts, do good works from a position of gratitude, be generous, and share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the nations.
Permission
At the end of a church service in America, you might semi-regularly hear of an opportunity to learn more about baptism through a class. Typically, one pastor or church leader explains to a classroom-sized group what baptism means or symbolizes and then takes questions. From there, people have a chance to sign up for a church function, whereby the church officially offers baptism by select leaders at a future date. Now, I love to cheer and celebrate with newly baptized believers as they share what God has done in their lives. And, while churches that do this get a lot of things right, I do think there is something amiss: It feels like the priesthood is getting robbed! There are layers of permission barriers between the priesthood and this ordinance that Jesus entrusted to them.
Although churches mean well when they explain the meaning of baptism, check for honest confessions of faith, and have a process for baptizing new believers, the royal priests in that church doubt whether they can understand baptism, explain baptism, and give baptism. The church would do much better to equip many people with a few verses and a few simple questions so that when they lead people to Christ, they can tell their new disciples, “Look! There is water.”
In addition, a similar argument can be made for the Lord’s Supper to be given back to the priesthood as a priestly ordinance, since by it we “proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes” (1 Cor. 11:26).
In the Great Commission, Jesus issued a command with all authority to not only go and make disciples but also to baptize them and teach them to obey everything He commanded. When a new disciple believes, they should get baptized and take the Lord’s Supper, as those are both commands. Multiplication is built into the Great Commission as “go” and “make disciples” are also commands. When the new disciple leads another person to Christ, they should give them baptism and give them the Lord’s Supper, as those are entailed in the commands. In this way, disciples make disciples, and priests make priests. You might even say that discipleship is the same thing as training the priesthood.
Consider this: Is the Great Commission for every believer? It either is or it isn’t. If it is, then why do we need permission from anybody else when the one Person with all authority already told us what to do?
There are multiple examples in the New Testament of believers operating with this kind of freedom in their identity as priests to make new disciples and start new churches.
In Acts 8:4-8, Philip leads Samaritans to Christ. The apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria accepted the Word of God and went to see for themselves (8:14). Who gave Philip permission to preach the Gospel among the Samaritans? On this, Scripture is silent, but it might be assumed that nobody did. In fact, the only thing mentioned is that, before Saul’s persecution, Philip had the role of waiting on tables rather than preaching (6:2,5). Hypothetically, there could have been a quick conversation with the Twelve after the great persecution broke out but before they scattered (8:1), but it seems Philip already knew what to do. He was clearly a man guided by and listening to the Holy Spirit.
In Acts 11:19 another church started from the same persecution following Stephen’s martyrdom. Men from Cyprus and Cyrene went to Antioch and spoke to Greeks in addition to the Jews, and the Antioch church was born (11:19-21). Who told them to do that? When Barnabas arrived, glad and encouraging others, who told him it was okay to bring Saul from Tarsus to Antioch to help lead the church there (11:25-26)?
In Colossians 1:7-9, Paul speaks to another church in Asia that he simply heard about after Epaphras told them about the Gospel of God’s grace. The text implies that Paul did not direct Epaphras to start a church in Colossae, but more likely, Epaphras took a grassroots initiative to evangelize the lost people there and start a church among them. Epaphras had the freedom of the royal priest too.
Do you have this kind of freedom, authority, and identity? Do you feel like it? If not, it could be permission barriers stemming from tradition that are stopping you. We have to hold up our traditions in the light of the Word and hold on to what is good. Don’t take my word for it. Study this topic in the New Testament with a faithful brother or sister and a leader in your life and process it with them.
Conclusion
Often, when my wife and I tell people about what we are doing, they say things like, “Oh, I could never do that! Not like you!” Other times people say that they can tell we are gifted in evangelism. The truth is that they could do this. They are Jesus’s royal priests just like us. The truth is that neither of us is gifted in evangelism. We’ve just had mentors to show us how to share the Gospel with lots of practice and accountability. The truth is that the Great Commission is not a calling for a few, but a command for every believer from our Lord.
When we realized that we were Christ’s royal priests, it was something we couldn’t unsee. We can’t stop obeying Christ in this way. We can’t go back. There is too much joy to be had.
Editor’s Note: If you want to further explore empowering the priest, check out a new Sent Ones Podcast: Unleash the Priest. It contains real conversations with pastors and church leaders about releasing their priests from the pews to make disciples in their neighborhoods and the nations.
These resources were used generally to prepare this article:
https://www.crossway.org/articles/10-things-you-should-know-about-priesthood-in-the-bible/
https://www.gotquestions.org/difference-priests-Levites.html
All Scripture references are from the NIV.