*INTRO>In 1966, Alfred Hitchcock directed a Cold War era mystery / thriller movie starring Paul Newman and Julie Andrews, a movie entitled, “The Torn Curtain.” The movie was not one of Hitchcock’s better-known films, as few people paid much attention to it.
God understands when much expense has been involved, much time and effort and sacrifice is devoted to a project, only to have it not be given the attention it deserves.
In today’s Scripture text, in the span of only a few verses, we read of several miracles that took place surrounding Jesus’ crucifixion, but many of those go practically unnoticed:
--Total darkness at mid-day until 3:00 p.m.
--An earthquake the moment of Jesus’ death.
--The conversion of the centurion and some of his colleagues.
--The bodies of believers coming back to life and walking the streets of Jerusalem after Jesus’ resurrection.
It’s amazing really, when you think about it.
-->This week marked the 11th anniversary of what has been come to be known as “The Phoenix Lights,” a phenomena that occurred where thousands of residents reported seeing strange lights in the sky, many believing them to be aliens. Others have tried to convince the multitudes that they were some sort of Air Force experimentation.
-->But the point is that we’re still talking about that day.
-->You know full well that if it should ever be totally dark here in Phoenix some day at high noon, and then an earthquake hit amid the total darkness only three hours later, we’d be talking about that day for years after.
-->And yet, these events took place in Jerusalem that day, and only a few days later there was a first century reality of what Hollywood would call the “night of the living dead,” with formerly dead believers suddenly walking around and testifying that Jesus IS the resurrection, and that they too had been resurrected by His power.
There have been sermons preached, books written, and much discussion about the remarkable conversion of the centurion, a man who had witnessed many a crucifixion, but was convinced by all the events accompanying Jesus’ crucifixion, along with the words he heard Jesus speak from the cross that surely Jesus was whom He declared Himself to be...the Son of God.
<>But today I want to focus our attention on the miracle of the torn curtain in the temple, and glean the profoundly important truths that such a remarkable event presents to us and the ways in which it affects our lives today.
I invite you to open your Bibles and turn once again to Matthew, chapter 27.
Today, on the 1978th anniversary of the original Palm Sunday, I want us to focus on this remarkable even that occurred on the 1978th anniversary of Good Friday...the tearing of the temple curtain.
<>Our focus will be surrounding three questions:
--What was the curtain for?
--How was it torn?
--What does the tearing of the curtain mean to us today?
1) WHAT THE CURTAIN WAS...
-->We first hear of the curtain, sometimes called the veil, as Moses was given instructions by God in the wilderness for constructing the tabernacle, the tent of meeting. It is recorded in Ex.36:35 -- "Moreover, (Bezalel) made the veil of blue and purple and scarlet (material), and fine twisted linen; he made it with cherubim, the work of a skillful workman."
-->It was a prominent part of the temple in Jerusalem, just as it had been a prominent part of the sanctuary Moses had built in the wilderness.
-->It was 28 cubits high (about 42 feet).
----The height of the ceiling in this room is approximately 25 feet, so imagine it being half again as high as the ceiling and you’ll get the general picture of how tall this curtain was.
-->And it was 10 cubits wide (about 15 feet).
----The width of the green curtain on the right side of the stage here in the auditorium is about 15 feet, so you can see this was no small curtain.
<>But primarily, its purpose was to serve as a symbol of separation.
--Ex.26:33b -- "...and the veil shall serve for you as a partition between the holy place and the holy of holies."
<>It separated the unholy from the holy.
-->The entire temple area (as you can see by the diagram shown on the screen), was designed as a series of levels of separation.
---*You have the lowest level, the common area known as the Court of the Gentiles, where any person, Jew or Gentile was free to congregate.
---*Then you come up one level to what is called the Court of the Women, where only Jewish persons were allowed.
-----The Court of the Women was where the treasury was, where the early church congregated often at another part of that court, called Solomon’s Porch, and where Jesus and His disciples watched the widow place her last coins into the treasury.
---*The next level was the Court of the Men, sometimes called the Court of Israel, where only Jewish males were allowed.
---*Then the Temple Courtyard, where only priests could assemble, and where the outdoor altar could be seen by all, and where a continual offering of the fat and innards of sacrificial animals was placed, so that there was always a “pleasing aroma” to the nose of God, and a continual reminder of the seriousness of man’s sin.
---*Finally, coming inside the temple building itself, the temple proper was divided into two further sections:
----->The Holy Place was where priests would carry out their duties of interceding in prayer for the people, serving there on a rotating basis, on allotted days. Most Sabbaths the High Priest would serve, but the other days fell to the other priests.
---*But the final level of separation was the Holy of Holies.
---->It was here that the curtain formed the “dividing wall,” the veil of separation, that kept this holiest of all places from the eyes of any person, and restricted the entrance of any person except one, the High Priest, and even he could only enter on one day of the year, the Day of Atonement, or Yom Kippur.
--*The Holy of Holies was deemed to be where the presence of God Himself resided.
----In the tabernacle in the wilderness, behind this curtain is where the ark of the covenant was kept.
----And inside the ark was where the two tablets that God wrote the 10 Commandments upon on Mount Sinai, the rod of Aaron which budded, and a bowl of manna.
----That ark disappeared after the Jews were held captive in Babylonia, hence the mystery and drama of where it might be, and the stuff from which the epic movie, “In Search Of the Lost Ark,” was inspired.
----So the ark was not in the temple in Jerusalem, although there was some sort of altar present for the High Priest to present a blood sacrifice each year for the sins of the people.
<>The design of the temple area and its levels of separation was deliberately ordered by God to reinforce the idea that God is GOD.
--That He is “other” than us. He is holy. He is NOT one of us, He’s so much higher than that.
---ILL>In 1715 King Louis XIV of France died after a reign of 72 years. He had called himself “The Great,” and was the monarch who made famous the statement, “I AM the state!” His court was the most magnificent in Europe, and his funeral was equally spectacular. As his body lay in state in a golden coffin, orders were given that the Cathedral should be very dimly lit, with only a special candle set above his coffin, to dramatize his greatness. At the memorial, thousands waited in hushed silence. Then Bishop Massilon began to speak; slowly reaching down, he snuffed out the candle and said, “Only God is great.”
<>The curtain was a barrier through which even the “common” priest could not pass.
--And yet, the curtain was visible to the clergy as they served inside the Holy Place.
--But no lay person would ever have been allowed to lay eyes on it.
<>So the curtain was the place of the ultimate and final separation because God’s very presence was deemed to be “behind the curtain.”
2) HOW THE CURTAIN WAS TORN.
--Mt.27:51 -- "and behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom;"
<>The curtain was torn in two from the top to the bottom.
-->It didn’t just have a little seam coming undone...it was totally torn in two.
<>And the fact that it was torn FROM THE TOP to the bottom tells us four things:**
--a) God tore the curtain.
---->It was beyond the reach of man...it was over 40 feet high!
----ILL>The Phoenix Suns have recently acquired the services of Shaquille O’Neal. Shaq is 7 feet and 1 inch tall, and has a remarkable wing span, but even Shaq can’t reach up 42 feet to tear a curtain.
---->You see, it wasn’t just a fabric thing, it was a DIVINE EVENT.
--b) Someone was in the Holy Place at the time it was torn, and saw it being torn from top to bottom.
---->Once again it was God’s way of getting the attention of a person where the person normally operates.
---->It is the same idea as when the star in the East was discovered by the Wise Men because God met them at the place of their interest. They were astrologers, so God sent a star to get their attention.
---->This time, God gained the attention of a priest, the priest who was in the Holy Place at the moment of Jesus’ death.
---->And the priest who was “on duty” saw the curtain tearing, saw it tore from the top to bottom, and reported it.
---->It’s quite possible that he could have been one of many priests who came to place his faith in Christ in the days that followed.
--c) The priest who saw it tear was able to “see inside” the Holy of Holies...but didn’t die.
---->That was a clear sign that something had dramatically changed!
---->There was a new relationship between God and man that had now been initiated!
--d) Somebody sewed the curtain back up!
---->We’ll talk more about that in moment.
3) WHAT THE TORN CURTAIN MEANS TO US NOW...
-a) There are no longer any sacrifices required to cleanse us from sin.
--<>The sacrificial system is over.
--Eph.2:14 -- "For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall."
--Heb.10:12.14 -- "but (Jesus), having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God...For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified."
--<>Jesus is our sufficient, once-for-all sacrifice, the Lamb of God, just as John the Baptist identified Him.
---->It’s why we don’t have blood altars set up here in the auditorium...why you weren’t required to bring a lamb with you this morning to have its throat cut and its blood poured out over an altar...because Jesus, the Lamb of God, had His blood spilt FOR us.
--<>The sacrifice God calls us to bring to him now is that we’re to present our bodies as a living sacrifice.
---->Meaning, we’re to surrender our wills, live our lives with the goal of pleasing Him in everything we do.
-b) There no need for a go-between person between us and God.
--<>The era of the formal priesthood is over.
--Eph.2:18 -- "for through Him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father."
--Heb.4:15 -- "For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One Who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin."
--1Tim.2:5 -- "For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus."
--<>Jesus is our only Mediator between us and the Father.
--<>We now have direct access to the Father, through Jesus, our High Priest.
---->We don’t have to go through a priest, a saint, through Mary, no hierarchy of humans at all.
---->It is a concept, a theological doctrine known as the priesthood of the believer.
---->It means that every one of us who is a believer is also a priest.
---->Every believer can come boldly to the throne of God.
-c) There is now no function whatsoever of a temple building.
--<>The formal temple era is also over.
--1Cor.6:19 -- "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?"
-->There are folks who, for the last decade or more, have been preparing stones, preparing to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem in anticipation of the prophecy of its being rebuilt during the Great Tribulation.
-->They’ve gone to great lengths to be able to erect the building in a short amount of time...in fact, according to Scripture it will be rebuilt during the first 3 1/2 years of the Tribulation.
-->But the question is not whether or not it will be rebuilt, but the question is WHY?
----If those who are so fascinated by the temple would simply heed what God was doing through the tearing of the curtain, they would understand that the sacrificial system and even the function of the temple itself was done away with at the point of Jesus’ sacrificial atonement for our sins.
--<>The truth is that our bodies, meaning the bodies of believers, are now the temples in which God resides.
---Yes, some of our “temples” are fashioned with patios or bigger porches than others, but nonetheless we are indeed temples.
---Go ahead, and look at your neighbor and tell him / her, “Hey, you look a lot like a temple to me!”
--->It is a concept that Jesus had already referred to concerning His own body when He told His disciples while walking around on the Temple grounds that if someone to destroy THIS temple (meaning His own body) He would restore it in only three days.
--->It was, in fact, what the crowd was mocking Him about at the cross.
---Look at v.39-40 in Matthew 27, just a few verses earlier than where we already read this morning: "and those passing by were hurling abuse at Him, wagging their heads and saying, ’You who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save Yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross!’”
-d) God has now invited us to come to know Him personally.
--Heb.4:16 -- Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.
-->You see, at the moment of Jesus’ death, and the tearing of the curtain, God the Father invited us and still invites us into the Holy of Holies, into His very presence, made possible by the acceptable sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf.
--<>And knowing Jesus personally brings the greatest joy, the greatest contentment possible in our lives down here.
---It’s why the apostle Paul could say that his single goal, his one desire was to know Jesus, the power of His resurrection, the fellowship of His sufferings, and to be conformed to His death.
----And that’s saying a lot, because the apostle Paul “had it all...” status, popularity, position, education, on the fast track to success.
----But he considered all that he had known before to be like dung compared to knowing Jesus.
BRINGING IT HOME...
<>Someone sewed the curtain back up!
-->That means that whomever sewed it back up chose not to heed the message God was sending.
----Even today, hundreds gather every day at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, wailing over the loss of the temple.
----They cry for the peace of Jerusalem, and for the Messiah to come and establish His kingdom.
----At the same time others, as we mentioned earlier, are busy working out details for rebuilding the temple.
----However, if they would heed the message God sent by tearing the curtain, their wailing would be turned to joy, and they could celebrate the intimacy with God that the torn curtain provides us.
Question #1 (of 2) to ask yourself this morning:
->Am I listening to what God is saying to me?
---Am I mindful that He’s talking to me?
---Am I aware that He’s trying to break through to my heart?
->It also means that whomever sewed the curtain back up refused to enter into the New Covenant...he / she rejected the Good News.
---Even today, some reject Jesus’ sacrifice, and try to “get to God” in their OWN way, by their OWN plan.
---ILL>Years ago a cake mix company put together a cake mix that was a big flop. The instructions said all you had to do was add water and bake. The company couldn’t understand why it didn’t sell, until their research discovered that the buying public felt uneasy about a mix that required only water. Apparently they thought it was too easy. So the company altered the formula and changed the directions to call for adding and egg to the mix in addition to the water. The idea worked and sales jumped dramatically.
---You see, that’s how some people react to God’s plan of salvation. To them it sounds too easy and too simple to be true, even though the Bible tells us that we are saved by grace through faith, and that it is the gift of God, not of works. They feel that there is something more they must do, something they must add to God’s “recipe” for salvation. They think they must perform good works to gain God’s favor and “earn” eternal life.
----But unlike the cake mix manufacturer, God has not changed His “formula” to make salvation more marketable. The gospel must be free of works, even though it may sound too easy.
Question #2 to ask yourself this morning:
->Have I accepted Jesus’ payment for me?
---Have I entered into the new covenant with Jesus?
<>You see, God’s plan for our salvation is just ONE PLAN: Accept Jesus.
-->Whoever calls upon His name is saved.
<>There is no other way, there is no Plan B.
-->Jesus is our sacrifice, our Savior, and our cause for celebration.
<>The temple curtain was torn by God...and He invites you to come into His presence.
WILL YOU?
