I love a good mysterious movie. A movie where you don’t fully understand the plot or the characters until it reaches the climax. A movie that keeps you guessing until the very end. One in particular that I very much enjoyed was The Murder on the Orient Express, a film that is based on a novel of the same name written by Agatha Christie. As you can imagine, the story focuses on the murder of a man on a train, and the great Belgian detective Hercule Poirot investigates the crime and interviews numerous train passengers with mysterious backgrounds. If you’ve never read the book or watched the movie, I won’t spoil it for you, but the climax of the story when Poirot solves the murder is thrilling!
The Bible has its share of mysterious characters. People that pop in and pop out of the storyline that we know very little about. Men and women that seem so unlikely that we at times wonder if they even really existed. One of the most mysterious characters in all the Bible is a man named Melchizedek, a king who lived during the time of Abraham.
We meet Melchizedek shortly after Abraham (who was known as Abram at the time) rescued his nephew Lot, who had been captured by an alliance of enemy kings. Abraham returns from his victory, and Melchizedek offers some sustenance—
“And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine. (He was priest of God Most High.)” Genesis 14:18, ESV
We learn a few things about this mysterious man here. 1) His name is Melchizedek, which means “king of righteousness.” In this culture, names were very significant and often descriptors of who a person was or who they would one day become. So, we can assume this means that Melchizedek was a righteous leader. 2) Melchizedek is the king of a place called Salem. Some scholars believe that “Salem” is possibly short for Jerusalem and that Melchizedek was the king of the city before Israel even became a nation (Psalm 76:2). It’s also worth noting that “Salem” is a variant of the Hebrew word “shalom,” which means “peace.” Not only is Melchizedek a king of righteousness, he’s also the king of Peace. 3) King Melchizedek was also a priest, which was not necessarily uncommon in the ancient world. And 4) He served God Most High.
If you know anything about the history of God’s people, you’ll know that out of all the people in the ancient world, God chose Abraham to be the father of Israel, the nation of God. If this is the case, how can it be that Melchizedek is a believer in God, let alone a priest for God? Could this really be the same God that Abraham worshipped? The narrative goes on to say,
“And [Melchizedek] blessed him and said, ‘Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand!’ And Abram gave him a tenth of everything.” Genesis 14:19
It seems pretty clear that Melchizedek indeed worships and serves the God of Abraham, the God who spoke the entire universe into existence and who continues to have sovereign control over everything on earth and in heaven. Abraham must have thought so, too, because he gives a tithe (which literally means a tenth) to Melchizedek.
And that’s it. Those two verses contain the only information we have about the mysterious Melchizedek. We only hear about Melchizedek one other time in the Old Testament in a psalm penned by another king—David.
“The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, ‘You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.’” Psalm 110:4
Who is the Lord talking about in this verse? Psalm 110 (which is the most quoted psalm in the New Testament) is a Messianic psalm, which means it’s talking about Jesus. And the book of Hebrews actually confirms this connection (Hebrews 5:9-10, 6:20, 7:17). Melchizedek was a type of Christ, which means he is a foreshadowing of Jesus. How so?
Melchizedek points forward to Christ in both his actions and his identity. As we’ve already discussed, Melchizedek was a mysterious man we don’t know a lot about, and the author of Hebrews agrees. He writes,
“He is without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but resembling the Son of God he continues a priest forever.” Hebrews 7:3
Some have taken this verse to mean that Melchizedek was not a real person and that his appearance in Genesis was actually a Christophany (an appearance of the preincarnate Christ). However, others argue that this verse is simply saying that there are no records of Melchizedek’s birth, family, or death. Because of this, Melchizedek technically never stopped being a priest, since there’s no record of his death or end of priestly duties. Similarly, Jesus is our eternal high priest, who continually serves the Father and never stops interceding for us (Hebrews 5:5-8, John 6:38, Romans 8:34). Melchizedek offered Abraham bread and wine to satiate his physical hunger, and Jesus offers us the bread of His body and the wine of His blood to satisfy our spiritual hunger (Matthew 26:26-28).
Finally, as mentioned above, Melchizedek was a king of righteousness and peace. Like Melchizedek, Jesus is our King who rules in righteousness and governs in peace. He is the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6), and He is coming again soon to lead angel armies and war against the evil one (Revelation 19:11-16). When He comes, He will not just offer bread and wine, but He will host an entire feast to celebrate His marriage of the Church, His Bride. And everyone on earth will give praise to Him—
“Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready;” Revelation 19:6b-7
