A holy priesthood

 

Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.  – 1 Peter 2.4-5

 

Nearly every religion in society has a priesthood of some sort. Most of them have someone who stands between the people and their sense of deity. Someone must represent their gods to man and someone must intercede with them to their gods.

 

The Old Testament had a priesthood accountable for all the nation’s interaction with God. The priests interfered for the people. They made the sacrifices. They talked to God. The people were reliant on the priests.

 

Even some church organisations try to make people reliant on priesthood to intercede for them on God’s behalf and to forgive their sins. These priests mediate on God’s behalf.

 

But here we are told that as part of God’s family we are all part of the holy priesthood. We need no mediator for we only need one, Jesus Christ. Every believer has equal access to the throne room of God and we can pray with total assurance and confidence that He will hear us. As a loving Father God welcomes us into His presence.

 

God is there for me anytime I need Him. I can go directly to the Lord in prayer and He will hear me. It is up to me to do my part in maintaining a proper relationship with God. I can’t put that off on anyone else.

 

Thank God that there is no need for a priesthood man up of fallible men. Thank God I can confidently approach God because Jesus, my High Priest, has done the work of providing that access.