Prophet Priest King

Prophet, Priest, and King When? Where? How? We are told in Scripture that believers are to function as Prophets, Priests, and Kings. Well, might we ask, Where, When and How can I be both a prophet, priest, and king? Where is my kingdom to rule over? When did I become a priest? I have no tabernacle in which to minister. How can I be a king? I have no royal blood flowing through my veins. I have no subjects to rule over. I answer, here is your kingdom. It is not a large kingdom of thousands of subjects and billions of dollars. But your kingdom is your family, and your wife is your queen, and your children are your loyal subjects. It is not the royal families of dukes and duchesses living in ivory palaces that make God’s kingdom great but thousands, and millions of God-fearing families and individuals that make his kingdom an everlasting kingdom. I answer when you became a Prophet A prophet is a Bible believer who teaches from the scripture’s great truths applicable to the daily life of his family. He encourages his wife; he instructs his children in the Way. He gives them wise counsel when the road gets rugged, and they may want to quit their marathon journey. He does as Hebrews 3:13-14, says, “Exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end.” I answer when you became a Priest The moment Jesus shouted from the cross, “It is finished,” the veil covering the entranceway into the holy of Holies was rent in two from top to bottom. From that moment in time to the end of time the way into God’s immediate presence has been open to all who believe. Martin Luther pointed out in his book The Babylonian Captivity of the Church that “all we who are Christians are priests.” As a New Testament believer, you became a priest the moment your sins were washed away through the blood of the cross. Now you may with great confidence enter God’s Holy of Holies. Here all believers may bow where previously only angels and archangels bowed, He is our king of kings, so large petitions before him bring (Hebrews 10:19-20, Cf. II Kings 13:14-19). As a priest, you have the authority to intercede for others, but especially for your family. Do not try to save the world and lose your family. This is your vineyard primarily (Song of Solomon 1:6-b). Christ Jesus has made all who are in Him the priesthood that he always intended his people to be (Exodus 19:1-6). You do not need to call a priest to pray over your family, you are that priest. “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light” (I Peter 2:9). I answer when you became a King. The same moment you were made a prophet, a priest, you were made a King. You became a part of Christ’s family, the royal family of God the moment you said like the Publican who smote his breast, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” That moment, Christ with the sword of his Spirit tapped you on the shoulders and inducted you not into his hall of Fame, but his royal family. “To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen” “And have made us kings and priests to our God; And we shall reign on the earth.” A multitude of kings and kingdoms have all passed away. Ancient Israel had its Solomon, Babylon had its Nebuchadnezzar, Persia had its Xerxes. But they all lay buried in the graveyard of nations. We who pray the Lord’s Prayer wait for that day when we shall rule and reign with Christ whose kingdom shall never end (Matthew 6:9-13). Jesus is the Perfect Example of a Prophet, Priest, and King Every prophet though he be he a Moses, every Priest though he be a Melchizedek, every king though he be a Josiah was an imperfect example of their office. Every believer is a Prophet, Priest, and King, but like them all, we have feet of clay, unruly tongues, and hearts of foolish pride. Jesus alone is the perfect prophet, the perfect priest, the perfect king to follow In Matthew 12:41 we hear Jesus claiming to be the world’s Great Prophet. “The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed, a greater than Jonah is here.” What is so great here is that Jesus is not just claiming to be a prophet only to the Jews, to Israel but far far more. He is claiming to be a prophet to the gentiles, over all the nations of the world. For Jonan was sent as a prophet to the pagan gentiles of the mighty Assyrian Empire. And Nineveh was its world capital. Jesus here is claiming to be greater than Jonah the Prophet to the gentiles. Jesus prophesied Judas betrayal (John 6:70-71), Peters denial (Matthew 26: 31-33), the scattering of his disciples (John 16:31-32), his crucifixion and resurrection (Matthew 16:21), the coming of the Holy Spirit John 16:7), the destruction of the Temple (Matthew 24:12). And most encouraging of all he prophesied his coming again to establish a new heaven and a new earth. “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I will go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.” In Matthew 12:6 we hear Jesus claiming to be the world’s greatest Priest. “In this place there is One greater than the temple.” That was an earth-changing religious bombshell that would shake the religious world to this day. The irony is that all who heard him say it were too spiritually numb to understand it and it is true for most to this day. Of all the thousands of priests from the time of Moses until then and now, Jesus said, I am the greatest Priest that ever lives. Picture in your mind’s eye Jesus standing in the middle of the Temple with hands lifted saying to the hundreds / thousands in the temple, “I am greater than all the beautiful stones that make up your temple. I am greater than the brazen altar where you priests offer up sacrifices twice a day, every day, for the sins of the nation. I am greater than the altar of incense in the holy place. And most shocking of all greater than the ark of the covenant covered with gold in the Holy of Holies. I am a priest like Melchizedek and the only priest that can take away sin forever, not just cover it over temporarily with blood of a lamb but wash it away forever. There fell 1500 years of religious tradition crashing to the ground. In Matthew 12: 42 we hear Jesus proclaiming to be the world’s greatest King. “The queen of the South will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed, a greater than Solomon is here.” Israel was at the zenith of its power under King Solomon. Israel was the envy and rival of the nations that surrounded her. And yet Jesus who was born in a barn in Bethlehem, wrapped in swaddling clothes, laid in a feeding trough, son of a carpenter, having no permanent place to lay his head for the last three-and-a-half years of his life and his greatest earthly possession was a seamless robe, was claiming to be Greater than Solomon. He was either a liar, a lunatic or truly the greatest king that ever lived. There is no middle ground here. Jesus showed that he was king over the fish of the sea when he told Peter to go fishing to pay his back taxes and Peter pulled up a trophy fish with a gold coin in its mouth (Matthew 17:27; Luke 5: 1-11). Jesus showed that he was king over the animal world when he rode upon a colt that no man had ever ridden. He rode it through the noisy, cheering crowd of Jerusalem. Where it neither stumbled nor disobeyed his commands (Matthew 21:1-5; Mark 11:2). Jesus showed that he was king over the fowl of the air when commanded the crowing of the rooster after Peter denied him (Matthew 26:34; 74-75). Jesus showed he was king over the underworld of demons when in a synagogue he demanded a screaming demon to come out of a demon possessed man and exorcised it immediately Mark 1: 23-27). Jesus showed that he was king over the spiritual world of death when he raised Lazarus from the dead who had been in his tomb for four days (John 11:43-44). The strength of a kingdom, a nation is built upon the moral fiber of its God-fearing individual families. The strength of each family rests on the shoulders of the prophet, the priest and king of that family. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link and a kingdom, a nation, a family is only as strong as its individual godly parents Psalm 33:12-22 reminds us. “Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people He has chosen as His own inheritance. The LORD looks from heaven; He sees all the sons of men. From the place of His dwelling, He looks on all the inhabitants of the earth; He fashions their hearts individually; He considers all their works. No king is saved by the multitude of an army; A mighty man is not delivered by great strength. A horse is a vain hope for safety; Neither shall it deliver any by its great strength. Behold, the eye of the LORD is on those who fear Him, On those who hope in His mercy, to deliver their soul from death, and to keep them alive in famine. Our soul waits for the LORD; He is our help and our shield. For our heart shall rejoice in Him Because we have trusted in His holy name. Let Your mercy, O LORD, be upon us, Just as we hope in You.” Again, God does not just bless nations. he blesses families and individuals in that family that serve him; And through them a nation is blessed. God lifted his blessing from the nation of Israel and sent them into seventy years of captivity and in 70 AD scattered them amongst the nations of the earth, because individual people and families stopped obeying his commands (Cf. Psalm 81:11-16). That is why the family is always under attack. Unseen enemies which are the most dangerous are always trying to destroy their moral foundation. The devil does not want you as an adult to be the prophet priest or king in your family domain. He wants to rule there, and it is up to you to be a Joshua and claim your inheritance. As a prophet priest and king, he has no power over you. He cannot strip you of your offices, nor court-martial you out of your high calling. You must lay the axe to the root of the tree that says the government, Big Brother, the public school, the psychiatrist are then prophet, priest, and king over your home. The government does not own your children. Before Israel entered into the Promise Land to become a new nation their leader Joshua said to them, “ And if it seems evil to you to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD” (Joshua 24:15). Every parent’s first moral responsibility is to train and lead their children in the ways of the lord While every believer is a Prophet, Priest, and King, Jesus Christ alone is the ultimate Prophet, Priest, and King. He is the one that brings us God’s Word (Prophet). He only stands as our advocate before the Father (Priest), His law only orders our lives (King). Let every Christian home have its family altar and let every father be the prophet, priest, and king at that altar. Let him lead in prayer, word, and example. A family altar can alter a family. Fifteen minutes a day is not too much to ask!