Just for You and Me

Just for You and Me

Matthew 27:50-51 “And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. “

I heard a passionate Gospel message today. The speaker was the leader of a wonderful Christian “People Recycling Centre” where  good men and women are taken from the gutter, restored and healed, then placed back into society where God intended them to be. The preacher’s text for the day was Matthew 27:45-56 and it focussed on the fact that Jesus died for you and for me – and all that that means for us both now and for eternity. However, it was not what the preacher said that got to me so much as what he didn’t actually focus on at all – the torn veil.

In the temple of Jesus time, the veil was what separated the presence of God from everything. It was a curtain that covered the entrance to the Holy of Holies – a place that only one man, the high priest, could go on just one single day every year. That day was the Jewish Day of Atonement. Even on that one day, the high priest had to be as ritually clean as it was possible for any human to be. Even so, such was the reverence and awe of God that the High priest could be struck dead by God for presenting himself irreverently or unclean. This was because he went in to the place where God was present and it was also the place where the ark of the covenant was housed. Such was the fear of entering that the high priest had a rope tied about him so that, in the event of him being struck dead, the other priests could drag him out again and no-one else would have to risk entering in order to rescue his body. Nobody but the high priest was allowed to even look in there, let alone enter.

The veil covered this entrance. The veil was from floor to ceiling. It was about four to six inches thick. It weighed probably in excess of a ton or 2200 pounds. It was vast and impenetrable.

At the moment Jesus died, this huge, heavy curtain was ripped, torn, rent from top to bottom into two pieces. Why? Symbolically, it served to indicate that we could come into God’s presence because at Calvary, Jesus made atonement for us and made us clean in God’s sight so that we could enter into His presence.

This is a phenomenal and extraordinary move by God to allow us into His presence; a place where very very few had ever been before Calvary. Although He has always wanted a close and personal relationship with each one of us, until Jesus came along and paid the price for us, none could come so close to God as to enter into His presence. Jesus made the way for allowing us this privilege and God wants that none of us should miss the opportunity – any time we want to and almost just like the high priests of old but without the legal requirements.

The thing that makes this so special and personal for me is that Jesus did it just for you and me, just for us. I love getting into His presence, either publicly or privately. I love to be still with Him and listen as He speaks to me.

What a privilege to know that God wants this relationship with me and has actually made a way for it to be possible. Oh Hallelujah \o/