And no one assumes this honor on his own initiative, but only when called to it by God, as in fact Aaron was.

For though you should in fact be teachers by this time, you need someone to teach you the beginning elements of God’s utterances. You have gone back to needing milk, not solid food.

For everyone who lives on milk is inexperienced in the message of righteousness, because he is an infant.

For the ground that has soaked up the rain that frequently falls on it and yields useful vegetation for those who tend it receives a blessing from God.

But if it produces thorns and thistles, it is useless and about to be cursed; its fate is to be burned.

And so by persevering, Abraham inherited the promise.

In the same way God wanted to demonstrate more clearly to the heirs of the promise that his purpose was unchangeable, and so he intervened with an oath,

So if perfection had in fact been possible through the Levitical priesthood – for on that basis the people received the law – what further need would there have been for another priest to arise, said to be in the order of Melchizedek and not in Aaron’s order?

a minister in the sanctuary and the true tabernacle that the Lord, not man, set up.

The place where they serve is a sketch and shadow of the heavenly sanctuary, just as Moses was warned by God as he was about to complete the tabernacle. For he says, “See that you make everything according to the design shown to you on the mountain.”

So with these things prepared like this, the priests enter continually into the outer tent as they perform their duties.

They served only for matters of food and drink and various washings; they are external regulations imposed until the new order came.

But now Christ has come as the high priest of the good things to come. He passed through the greater and more perfect tent not made with hands, that is, not of this creation,

And so he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the eternal inheritance he has promised, since he died to set them free from the violations committed under the first covenant.

and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that God has commanded you to keep.”

For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made with hands – the representation of the true sanctuary – but into heaven itself, and he appears now in God’s presence for us.

And let us hold unwaveringly to the hope that we confess, for the one who made the promise is trustworthy.

Someone who rejected the law of Moses was put to death without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.

How much greater punishment do you think that person deserves who has contempt for the Son of God, and profanes the blood of the covenant that made him holy, and insults the Spirit of grace?

At times you were publicly exposed to abuse and afflictions, and at other times you came to share with others who were treated in that way.