“By this time it was about noon, and darkness fell across the whole land until three o’clock. The light from the sun was gone. And suddenly, the curtain in the sanctuary of the Temple was torn down the middle. Then Jesus shouted, “Father, I entrust my spirit into your hands!” And with those words he breathed his last.”

-Luke 23:44-46 (NLT)

“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.” -Hebrews 10:19-22 (NLT)

Darkness shuttered all of creation when Jesus, Son of God and Son of Man, exhaled his last breath. Up to that point, Jesus had suffered unimaginable pain-- physically, spiritually, and emotionally. He was mocked and brutally beaten until His back lay in strips of flesh and He could barely stand. In His extreme weakness, He was forced to carry a crossbar of wood through the city to the execution site. There soldiers nailed Jesus’s hands to the crossbar and hoisted him onto an upright stake. While He hung bleeding and gasping for breath, onlookers shouted abuse, further humiliating Him. Jesus, crying out in grief, feeling utterly abandoned by His Father and friends, finally succumbed to death.

As this brutal scene unfolded, something miraculous happened. A curtain in the Temple was torn in two. This wasn’t an ordinary curtain. It was the veil that separated the Ark of the Covenant, where God resided (the Most Holy Place), from the outer room of the Temple (the Holy Place). (Exodus 26:31-37) Only the high priest was allowed to enter the Most Holy Place once a year to offer sacrifices for sins. (Leviticus 16:2; Hebrews 9:7) The high priest had to repeat the same rituals each year to perpetually restore peace and fellowship between the people and God.

When Jesus willingly gave His life on the cross, the Holy of Holies was exposed. Jesus became the High Priest who entered the Most Holy Place on our behalf, offering His flesh as the final sacrifice. No longer must we stand outside the sanctuary, separated from God, waiting to be cleansed. Through Jesus’s torn body, we are washed clean of sin forever. Our suffering Savior fulfilled God’s plan of redemption for all of humanity, for all time. Because of Jesus, we can boldly approach God’s throne, blanketed in the blood of the Lamb. We can eternally abide in God’s presence, unveiled and unashamed.

 

For Further Reflection:

We are invited into God’s presence “with sincere hearts fully trusting Him” because Jesus’s blood has cleansed our “guilty consciences.” Knowing that the veil has been torn and God has given us direct access to Him and forgiveness through the blood of Jesus, are there still areas of guilt and shame that you need to lay down at His feet?

Father, thank you for Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross, that He bore my sins in His broken body to ransom my heart from guilt and shame. I praise You for opening a new and living way into Your presence through Jesus’s death and resurrection.