Read the New Testament in 24 Weeks

6 So, let us leave behind the first teachings about Christ. And let us go on to things that are grown up. We must not go back to the beginning again and talk about turning away from doing things that bring death to us. We must not go back again and talk about believing in God. Let us go forward.

² We must not go back to teaching about baptizing people in water, about putting hands on people's heads, about people being raised from death, and about people being judged for ever.

³ If God will let us, we will go on to build on these things.

⁴ Some people had light in their hearts once. They knew the gift from heaven.

⁵ They had the Holy Spirit. They knew the word of God is good and felt the powers of the next world.

⁶ If people who were like that leave their faith in Christ, they cannot come to God again. They themselves nail God's Son up on the cross again. They are holding him up to shame before everyone.

⁷ The ground drinks the water that often rains on it. It makes plants grow for the people who take care of it. And God blesses that ground.

⁸ But if it grows thorns and weeds, it is no good. It will soon be cursed. In the end, it will be burned with fire.

⁹ This is the way we talk. But dear people, we are sure that better things are true about you. Yes, you show all the good ways of people who have been saved from their wrong ways.

¹⁰ God does what is right. He will not forget your work and the love you have shown for him. You have helped God's people and you are still helping them.

¹¹ We want every one of you to try in the same way. Then you will get what you hope for right up to the end.

¹² Do not give up. But be like the people who get what God has promised. They believe God and keep on believing for a long time.

¹³ God made a promise to Abraham. God did not have anyone greater than himself to hear his promise.

¹⁴ So he promised to himself when he said, `I will surely bless you and you will have many children.'

¹⁵ Abraham kept on believing God. And so he got what God had promised him.

¹⁶ When men make a promise, they ask someone to hear it who is greater than they are. When someone great has heard a promise, it stops any quarrel about it.

¹⁷ God made a promise to people. He wanted to show them that he would surely do as he said. So he promised to himself to keep the promise.

¹⁸ These two things cannot be changed and God cannot lie about them. So we can trust him. We have run to him to get what he has promised us.

¹⁹ This promise gives our hearts something to hold on to. It keeps our hearts strong and steady. It will take us into the Holy Place right inside God's house.

²⁰ Jesus has gone there ahead of us. He has been made high priest for ever like Melchizedek.

7 Melchizedek was king of the city of Salem. He was a priest of God who is the greatest of all. Melchizedek met Abraham when Abraham came back from killing some bad kings. And Melchizedek blessed him.

² Abraham divided all that he took away from the kings into ten parts. He gave Melchizedek one part. First, the name Melchizedek means the king who is true and right with God. Then he was king of Salem. That means king of peace.

³ He has no father or mother. The names of the family from which he comes are not written down. It is not written down that he was born or that he died. But, like the Son of God, he stays on being a priest for ever.

⁴ Just think how great he was! Even Abraham, the father of our people, gave him a tenth, one part out of ten, of all he brought back.

⁵ The sons of Levi, who are priests, have the right by law to take a tenth of what the people have. These people are their own brothers. They also are Abraham's children.

⁶ But Melchizedek was not from Levi's family. Yet he took a tenth of what Abraham had. And he blessed Abraham, to whom God made the promise.

⁷ Everyone knows this is true. The person who is blessed is not so great as the person who blesses him.

⁸ Here, priests take their tenth, but they are people who will die one day. But Melchizedek, who took his tenth, never dies. The holy writings say it is so.

⁹ And we say that Levi, the priest who takes the tenth from the people, gave his tenth through Abraham.

¹⁰ He was not yet born when Melchizedek met Abraham.

¹¹ It was while the sons of Levi were priests that the law was made for the people. If those priests were good enough, why would another priest need to come who was like Melchizedek? Why would he not be like Aaron?

¹² If the kind of priest is changed, then the law must be changed also.

¹³ The one we are talking about belonged to another tribe. No man from his tribe ever made sacrifices in God's house.

¹⁴ Everyone knows that our Lord Jesus came from the tribe of Judah. And Moses never said anything about priests coming from that tribe.

¹⁵ You can understand it even better when another priest comes who is like Melchizedek.

¹⁶ He was not made a priest by law. The law said that the priest must come from a certain tribe. But he was made a priest because he has power to live for ever.

¹⁷ This is what the holy writings say about him, `You are a priest for ever, like Melchizedek.'

¹⁸ The old law given to Moses by God was put away. It was weak and no good.

¹⁹ The law did not make anything right. But something better has been brought to us. It is God's promise. And by that promise we come near to God.

²⁰ Also Christ was not made a priest without God's strong promise. The others were made priests without God's strong promise.

²¹ But this man was made priest by God's strong promise. God said to him, `The Lord has made a strong promise, and he will not change it. "You are a priest for ever." '

²² Also because of this, Jesus makes a better agreement with God for people.

²³ The other priests were many, because they died and could not go on with their work.

²⁴ But because Jesus lives forever, he is a priest for ever and no one takes his place.

²⁵ Because of that, he is able to save people for ever, if they come to God by him. He lives for ever to talk to God for them.

²⁶ We needed such a high priest as he is. He is holy. He is good. He has never done any wrong. He has been taken away from among bad people, and taken up higher than the sky.

²⁷ He does not need to make sacrifices every day. The other high priests make sacrifices every day, first for the wrong things they have done, and then for the people. He did it once when he offered himself as the sacrifice.

²⁸ The law makes men high priests, and they are weak. But the word of God's promise came after the law. It makes his Son high priest for ever, and he is all right.