I am the way

It was about twelve o’clock when the sun stopped shining and darkness covered the whole country until three o’clock; and the curtain hanging in the Temple was torn in two. Jesus cried out in a loud voice, ‘Father! In your hands I place my spirit!’ He said this and died. (verses 44-46)

Read Luke 23: 44-46

The Temple was the meeting place between God and his people. But because God was the holy one, and because even his chosen people were sinful beings, there remained degrees of separation between God and the people. The people who were furthest from the throne of God were the Gentiles. Next were the Jewish women, then the Jewish men. Next were the Levites and then the priests. Only the high priest could dare to enter through the curtain into the Holy of Holies, and then only once a year.

But now the curtain has been ripped in two. There is no barrier between God and his people. Divisions between men and women, Jew and Gentile have been tom down as well.

But this has happened only because the innocent one, Jesus Christ, gave up his spirit. It is by way of his death that we have access to the almighty God. It is now in Christ – and only in him – that God comes to meet with us.

Lord Jesus Christ, thank you that by your death you have removed the barriers between others and me and between the Father and me. Amen.

by Greg Graham, in ‘Guidance for each Day’ (LCA, Openbook, 2002)

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