who, in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death, and was heard because of His godly fear, (8) though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered.  (9) And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him

The author of the letter to the Hebrews is unknown but there is enough evidence in the letter to tell us that the author was steeped in the Old Testament  and had a Jewish viewpoint.  The letter was written to probably a small group of Christian Hebrews and likely written before the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 AD.  The audience for this letter was evidently undergoing some persecution by fellow Hebrews – it is clear that persecution of early Christian believers was becoming severe in the Roman Empire and the Hebrew Christians may have been tempted to revert to Judaism to avoid suffering to come.   So this letter was written to tell these committed Christian Hebrews to remain steadfast in their faith and to argue to those yet unbelieving Jews that in Christ the world has the fulfillment of the Old Testament.  That Christ, true God and true man, was the perfect sacrifice yielding eternal salvation.

Christ Jesus is the once and for all time high priest  for man – He is superior to the Old Testament high priest in all ways.  He was true man and is true God.  As  true man Christ can identify with man, having been tempted by sin, yet He was perfect man as He was without sin.  Even though Jesus as sacrifice was God’s predetermined plan, Scripture tells us how He wrestled in agony over the prospect of His death.  And not just of death on a cross, but the terrible agony of His coming separation from the Father as the Christ became sin for us.  I had often wondered at the story of the agony of Christ in the garden of Gethsemane and finally realized that the most terrible suffering that He could barely endure was this coming separation from God.  Of all that is written about Jesus being true God and true man the story of this agony convinces me that He was indeed just what He said He was:  the Son of God, made man.  This was the ultimate sacrifice and the perfect gift made by the perfect man.

In the Old Testament, the human high priests were to mediate between men and God.   In the Jewish point of view, God is absolute majesty and absolute holiness.  If man were to see God, man would die.  In the Jewish world of the Old Testament no Jew was free to enter into the Holy of Holies to meet directly with God.  Even the high pries was allowed in there on one day a year – the Day of Atonement.  All Jews were aware that they needed a mediator between themselves and God.

If men were not sinners – separated from a holy God – there would be no need for a mediator.  Jesus Christ was seen as the ultimate high priest and mediator between God and man.  Because His was the perfect and acceptable sacrifice it never has to be repeated.  Once and for all time we have been made right with God through the free gift of our perfect high priest.