A Kingdom of Priests
The Role
Before the Law was given from Mount Sinai,1 God positioned his people, telling them exactly who and what they were—a kingdom of priests.
Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.
– Exodus 19:5-6a, ESV
The position and role of a priest is special. The priest serves as an intermediary between God and humanity. Therefore a “kingdom of priests” would function in that same manner. It was the role of Israel to stand as that intermediary, representing God to all humanity. It was a high and holy calling.
The Refusal
Rather than respond to and function within that calling, Israel repeatedly refused to walk in God’s holiness, chasing after the offerings of the godless world around them. Their lives were not consecrated to God, and their witness became offensive rather than compelling. As a result, God said of them, “I spread out my hands all the day to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices.”2
God’s love for the Jews has not waned. It brings to mind Jesus, God incarnate, weeping over Jerusalem at their rejection of him.3 He longed to gather them in his arms as a mother hen gathers her chicks under her wings4 but, instead, holds his arms wide to a stubborn and obstinate people.
The Church
Where Israel was once a kingdom of priests for Yahweh, that identity now applies to the church. We are that kingdom of priests with the same high and holy calling to represent God to a lost and dying world.
As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him—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.
– 1 Peter 2:4-5, NIV-1983
The church, the body of Christ, the born again are now the kingdom of God, a kingdom of priests, a holy nation. With that, we are given both privileges and responsibilities. We are to proclaim the excellencies of our King!
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
– 1 Peter 2:9-10, ESV
This is an astonishingly high calling, and one we dare not take lightly. We have been made holy, adopted as royalty, and given a priestly mission. Pastor Warren Weirsbe put it so eloquently, “In the Old Testament period, God’s people had a priesthood; but today, God’s people are a priesthood.5
As priests, with Jesus as our great high priest,6 we come before the throne of grace with boldness,7 something that would cost us our heads in the Medo-Persian empire,8 the Babylonian empire. Whereas cultures of men prohibit entering the presence of the king, the culture of God invites us to do that very thing.
Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
– Hebrews 4:16, ESV
Our Lives as Priests
We read above that because we are a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, we are to offer up “spiritual sacrifices” to God through Christ.9 The apostle Paul is even more specific, saying that we are a spiritual sacrifice to God.
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
– Luke 10:29, ESV
As that living sacrifice, we refuse to conform to the world’s standards, passions, lusts, and obsessions. Instead, as representatives of gospel of a holy God to an unholy world,10 we offer sacrifices of praise, goodness, and sharing.
Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name. Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.
– Hebrews 13:15-16, ESV
Singular but not Sequestered
Just last week I had in a conversation with a gentleman who openly and boldly stated his love for Jesus, yet in that same conversation told me, “I haven’t been to church in over ten years.” I gently challenged him to rethink that, stating that he needs the body and the body needs him.
We must resist the western tendency toward individualism, and reorient our thinking toward body life. The fact that each of us, as a priest of God, has access to the throne of heaven, should not result in a move of spiritual isolation. We are priests together serving one great high priest. We minister in the same spiritual tabernacle.
As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.”
Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.
– 1 Corinthians 12:20-21, 27, ESV
Even current-generation music in church focuses so heavily on self that I find much of it difficult to sing. It just feels “icky” to me. There is an elevation of personal experience over body life resulting in loneliness while in a crowd. Rather than a singular pursuit toward God, our role as priests in the body is to be ministers of one another.
Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace.
– 1 Peter 4:8-10, ESV
Each of us needs the body, and the body needs us.
1. Exodus 20
2. Isaiah 65:2 (also Romans 10:21)
3. Luke 19:41-44
4. Matthew 23:37
5. Wiersbe, W. W. (1996). The Bible exposition commentary (Vol. 2, p. 401). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.
6. Hebrews 4:14-5, 7:26-28
7. Hebrews 4:16, 10:19-22
8. Esther 4:11
9. 1 Peter 2:5
10. Romans 15:16
