If the YouTube video above is not available, here are two other ways to view:
Short Clip
He Touched
The Temple
Matthew 27:51 Then, behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom; (NKJV)
Old Testament worship was centered at the Tabernacle and then the Temple. A Divinely designed liturgy was carried on for 1,500 nearly unbroken years in the way Moses was told by God to do it on Mt. Sinai.
The epicenter of that worship was the Holy Place in Jerusalem’s Herodian Temple: in the front half of it stood the Altar of Incense, the Golden Lampstand, and the Table of Showbread; and the room was divided by a curtain. This curtain was actually a finely woven rug: 4 inches thick, 60 feet high and 40 feet wide.
Massive and towering, this curtain barrier expressed one clear message: STAY OUT. No natural light ever penetrated its dark depths. Even the light of the ever-burning lamp stands never reached behind the veil.
In better times the Shekinah Glory of the Presence of God made the Holiest of Holies behind the veil brighter than noonday. In all of Israel’s history probably no more than 50 men had ever gone into the holy of holies: only the High Priest; and then only once a year.
When that day came for the High Priest to pass behind that veil. He was wearing bells on the hem of his garment to let the other priests know he was still alive as he was inside; garbed carefully in the God directed robes and priestly garments. With trembling hands cradling a basin of blood, veiled by a cloud of smoking incense burning in a pot he carried – the High Priest would enter.
Sprinkling the blood on that mercy seat on behalf of all the people of God and hastening out. Why? The only purpose of the Veil was to keep people out of the Holy Presence of God. God was saying I AM HOLY. YOU ARE NOT. STAY OUT!
On the day Christ died can you imagine the scene those officiating priests must have beheld? They came in to trim the lamps, pour a handful of incense over the fire on the altar, and change the bread on the Table. Then perhaps at that very moment, Christ touched the Veil.
With an unearthly sound that massive curtain was violently torn from top to bottom. Aghast, as for the first time in nearly 1,500 years, common priests looked upon the ark and the mercy seat and God’s throne of grace and mercy.
God was now declaring: anyone who wishes may come in now, you are welcome anytime. As He tells us in Hebrews 4:16:
Let us, therefore, come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (NKJV)
Aren’t you glad we live on this side of Calvary?
So Jesus on the Cross as the “Light of the World” first reached up and touched the Sun, and then as the “Greatest High Priest” reached over and touched the Temple, and then as the “Creator of the Universe” at the end of v. 51:
He Touched
The Earth