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Chapter 27
81
between the third and sixth hour, that is, between nine and twelve
o’clock. In the afternoon He died. This was the hour of the evening
[1109]
sacrifice. Then the veil of the temple, that which hid God’s glory
from the view of the congregation of Israel, was rent in twain from
top to bottom.
Through Christ the hidden glory of the holy of holies was to
stand revealed. He had suffered death for every man, and by this
offering the sons of men were to become the sons of God. With
open face, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, believers in
Christ were to be changed into the same image, from glory to glory.
The mercy seat, upon which the glory of God rested in the holiest
of all, is opened to all who accept Christ as the propitiation for sin,
and through its medium, they are brought into fellowship with God.
The veil is rent, the partition walls broken down, the handwriting of
ordinances canceled. By virtue of His blood the enmity is abolished.
Through faith in Christ Jew and Gentile may partake of the living
bread (
Letter 230, 1907
).
(
Matthew 26:65
;
Daniel 5:5, 25-28
;
Hebrews 10:19, 20
.) Is-
rael a Nation Unchurched
—In Christ the shadow reached its sub-
stance, the type its antitype. Well might Caiaphas rend his clothes
in horror for himself and for the nation; for they were separating
themselves from God, and were fast becoming a people unchurched
by Jehovah. Surely the candlestick was being removed out of its
place.
It was not the hand of the priest that rent from top to bottom the
gorgeous veil that divided the holy from the most holy place. It was
the hand of God. When Christ cried out, “It is finished,” the Holy
Watcher that was an unseen guest at Belshazzar’s feast pronounced
the Jewish nation to be a nation unchurched. The same hand that
traced on the wall the characters that recorded Belshazzar’s doom
and the end of the Babylonian kingdom, rent the veil of the temple
from top to bottom, opening a new and living way for all, high and
low, rich and poor, Jew and Gentile. From henceforth people might
come to God without priest or ruler (
Manuscript 101, 1897
).
(
Hebrews 6:19
;
8:6, 7
;
Hebrews 10:19, 20
.) God’s Presence
Withdrawn From Earthly Sanctuary
—By the rending of the veil
of the temple, God said, I can no longer reveal My presence in the
most holy place. A new and living Way, before which there hangs