Thursday, May 1, 2014

Curtain

I've been in a few earthquakes, minor temblors really. My most memorable was a couple of weeks after my daughter was born.  We were living in San Francisco at the time and I was working down town at a bank. When the building I was in began to shake, a woman screamed and dove under her desk.  It was a fairly sharp jolt.  My wife remembers she was feeding our daughter and at first felt dizzy, attributing it to her recent birth experience. She realized it was an earthquake when the building we lived in started to moan. The shaking grew to an alarming level followed by sirens rushing around the streets. Thankfully there was no damage.

It was not my first nor my last earthquake, after all, I live in California. In all the minor temblors I've experienced, there is one thing I have never seen, a torn curtain caused solely by the quake. Granted, I've never lived through a major event but I doubt a torn curtain would come as a direct result of an earthquake. Perhaps falling debris could tear a curtain but it is more likely a curtain would fall rather than tear.

We've recently celebrated Easter and there is one detail about those days I've rarely heard mentioned, the tearing of the curtain separating the Holy of Holies in the temple from top to bottom.

Imagine you are one of the priests who'd schemed to have an itinerate, backwater rabbi who'd caused you nothing but trouble handed over to Rome for crucifixtion. You are finally rid of the man who'd been making blasphemous claims about himself, shocking and scandalous claims that were a deep afront to your piety.  For some time all the ruling class of priests of which you belong had tried unsuccessfully to trap this man. Finally the deed had been done; he'd been arrested, tried and handed over to the Romans for crucifixtion where, as far as you knew, he hung outside of Jerusalem. You'd had moments of unease and doubts but Caiaphas had finally convinced you it was necessary for one man to die for the good of many.

Now you are tired, emotionally and mentally spent but relief of ridding yourself of the troublesome rabbi eludes you. You want to move on as if his life and words never existed but the evidence of his miracles offers a troubling counterpoint to your belief he was a fraud, or worse, empowered by demonic activity.

All of these thoughts swirl about you as the day turns more ominous. Darkness descends making it night time in the middle of the day. An earthquake strikes and the city is gripped by fear. Somewhere deep inside you dread arises as you realize this is no coincidence. "Surely that man is still hanging on the cross? No one dies a merciful death there and it has only been a few hours since the cross had been erected.", you think.

Word races through the priestly circles and finds your ear, the unthinkable has happened.  The palm-thick curtain separating the Holy of Holies has been rent in two, top to bottom. It's as if someone rent the curtain with their bare hands but the thickness of the veil dismisses that possibility. No earthquake alone could have produced such an event.  You are stunned and can only think of the man on the cross, the one you helped put there.

So here we are, some 2000+ years later with this oft overlooked fact in the Easter story. We understand the significance of the torn curtain eventhough the religious elite of Jesus' day did not. We are now free to enter boldly into the Holy of Holies, and while I still believe an exercise of awe, wonder and reverence are appropriate postures, there is now the possibility of relationship with God.  I also believe there is a release outward from this Holy place as well. It is an outward flow of wonder, light, joy and mystery that invites us deeper to Him.  His presence is sent outward for those seeking John 10:10 life.

Incarnational living is offered for those who will believe, love and obey the itinerate carpenter-rabbi who caused so much consternation and disruption among the religious ruling class.

But what of the curtain? I do wonder if we, in our attempt at codifying this life with Jesus into a set of rules and regulations, are not attempting to re-sew the torn curtain? How dare we attempt such a thing when the torn curtain and all it represents was accomplished at the cost of a flayed back, crown of thorns and nails in flesh! How dare we!