Matt 27:50 “Then Jesus shouted out again, and he released his spirit. At that moment the curtain in the sanctuary of the Temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, rocks split apart, and tombs opened. The bodies of many godly men and women who had died were raised from the dead. They left the cemetery after Jesus’ resurrection, went into the holy city of Jerusalem, and appeared to many people. The Roman officer and the other soldiers at the crucifixion were terrified by the earthquake and all that had happened. They said, “This man truly was the Son of God!”
Here’s the thing, crucifixions happened all the time in Jesus's day. There were a line of crosses along the road, full of dying criminals. It was Rome’s way of deterring crime. So, most people weren’t paying attention to the event that day. That is why God made some strange stuff happen! The sky got dark, there was an earthquake, and godly people were raised to life! So if you missed it visually in the sky, you would have felt the earthquake, and if you missed that you might say, “Hey, there’s uncle Jim, I went to his funeral, and there he is alive and telling people about God.” No one in Jerusalem missed this event. These signs and wonders were the proof that the dying thief had asked for. God made sure no one missed out on the fact that HE WAS AT WORK.
The other thing that was strange that happened just as Jesus died was that the curtain in the temple ripped, “top to bottom”. The curtain here is the divider between the Holy of Holies and the rest of the temple. According to God’s law given to Moses, only the priest could enter the most holy place, and he had to be clean and wearing special clothes. God’s presence was there in a powerful way, to accept their sacrifices. They even had the priest wear bells on his outfit so that they knew he was still alive and walking around and had not angered God and been struck down!
So when the curtain, which was very tall and heavy, ripped in a way that no man could have ripped it, it was God’s way of saying that we all have access to the Holy Presence of God now that Jesus has forgiven our sin.
Hebrews 10:19-23
“And so, dear brothers and sisters, we can boldly enter heaven’s Most Holy Place because of the blood of Jesus. By his death, Jesus opened a new and life-giving way through the curtain into the Most Holy Place. And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God’s house, let us go right into the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trusting him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ’s blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water. Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise.”
This is a beautiful picture of what Jesus was accomplishing on the cross. He made intimacy with the father available to us.
So, DON"T MISS THIS. This Easter God is doing a new thing, teaching us new things as we are battling this virus. He is getting our attention. GOD IS AT WORK HERE. I hope that we all will be able to say, as we see God’s plan unfold in the pages of scripture, and before our eyes in life, “Surely Jesus is the Son of God.”
-Deborah King