Jesus is our High-priest
1What I mean is that we have a High-priest who went to sit down at the most important place next to the throne of the Great_King in heaven. 2He is doing the work of a priest in the temple in heaven, the true tent of the Lord. It was the Lord who built this temple, not people.
3God chooses every high-priest to sacrifice_offerings and gifts, and our High-priest, Jesus, also had to sacrifice something. 4The High-priest in heaven would not have been a Priest if He was on earth, because here on earth there are many priests who sacrifice_offerings and gifts as the laws of Moses say. 5They do their work as priests at the temple and that temple looks like the temple in heaven. When Moses was ready to build the tent of the Lord, God told him what he had to do. God said: ‘Look carefully and make everything exactly as I have shown you on the mountain.’
6But now God has chosen this High-priest, Jesus, and anointed Him to do the work of a priest and his work is more important than the work of the priests on earth. It is because Jesus is the Mediator of a better covenant. God gave the new covenant to his people when He promised to give them something better. 7There had to be a 2nd covenant, because the first covenant did not do everything that it had to do. 8Because God was not pleased with his people, He said:
‘There will come a time
when I will make a new covenant
with the Israelites
and the people of Judah.
9This covenant will not be
like the covenant that I made
with their forefathers.
I made that covenant with them
on the day that I took their hand
to bring them out of the land of Egypt.
But they have broken my covenant,
and that is why I have thrown them away,’ says the Lord.
10‘The new covenant
that I will make with the Israelites
will be like this,’
says the Lord:
‘I will put my laws inside them
and I will write my laws on their hearts.
I will be their God and they will be my people.
11They will no longer teach each other
and say: “You must know the Lord.”
Because the unimportant people
and the important people will all know Me.
12I will forgive the things
that they have done wrong and
I will forget their sins.’
13God talked about a new covenant, so He said that the first covenant was now the old covenant. When something gets old and becomes useless, it soon disappears.
