(REFLECTIONS ON EZEKIEL 41:1-26)
3 Then he went into the inner sanctuary and measured the jambs of the entrance; each was two cubits wide. The entrance was six cubits wide, and the projecting walls on each side of it were seven cubits wide. 4 And he measured the length of the inner sanctuary; it was twenty cubits, and its width was twenty cubits across the end of the main hall. He said to me, “This is the Most Holy Place.”
The Most Holy Place or often also referred to as the Holy of Holies, is the sacred room that contained the Ark of the Covenant. On top of the Ark of the Covenant were two cherubim or angels that formed a royal throne for the glory of the Lord. Only the high priest of Israel could enter the Most Holy Place once a year on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) to make sacrifices for his own sin and the sins of the people.
That the Most Holy Place is in this vision of the eternal temple, gives us hope that although the Lord’s glory left the temple earlier in Ezekiel, there is a hope of a mighty and eternal return. The end of the story isn’t a new temple without a place for God’s glory, and so we can live with anticipation that no matter how broken and hopeless this world is, that there remains a space and a time for the glory of the Lord to again dwell in the midst of His people.
Hold on to hope is what the Spirit is reminding us this morning. Hold on to hope, because our hope is not in the world, but in God.
In the Book of Exodus 26, we read about a curtain that separated the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place
31 “Make a curtain of blue, purple and scarlet yarn and finely twisted linen, with cherubim woven into it by a skilled worker. 32 Hang it with gold hooks on four posts of acacia wood overlaid with gold and standing on four silver bases. 33 Hang the curtain from the clasps and place the ark of the covenant law behind the curtain. The curtain will separate the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place.
The curtain symbolized the gap that existed between an unholy people and a holy God. Even in today’s Scripture, Ezekiel could not enter the Most Holy Place, but it is was the angel, the man whose appearance was like bronze, that entered and measured the inner sanctuary saying to Ezekiel, “This is the Most Holy Place.”
What appears to be missing however, is the curtain separating the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place. How could the curtain be missing? It is because the hope of Israel and the hope for the church no longer requires a barrier between God and His people. How is this possible?
This is because after Jesus Christ gave up His spirit, we are told in Matthew 27 that “at that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.” The barrier between God and His creation is no longer present through the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus Christ. A curtain no longer needs to separate the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place and we as His people can freely enter into the presence and glory of God.
Let us hold on to hope because “This is the Most Holy Place,” says the angel of the Lord.
Pastor Michael Lu
Enduring Word Bible Commentary: Ezekiel 41
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