Entering Holy Places

Text: Hebrews 10:15-25

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

            Go walking through a place like Arlington Cemetery or Gettysburg Battlefield and you’re struck with a sense of gravity. The place has a weight to it. People tend to speak in quieter tones, or not speak at all. There’s a stillness to it, as if everyone instinctually knows not to violate the sanctity of it, as if it’s set apart from all the other spaces where our everyday conversations and activities take place. This is but an echo of something that we’ve lost, in large part—a sense of the sacred. We recognize, on some deep level, that certain places, people, items, even certain times, have a weight to them. They’re different from the regular places, people, items, and times that we usually interact with. This recognition, even if it’s not conscious, is a sense of the holy—those things that are set apart for a higher, greater purpose; consecrated in some way—whether it’s by the events that happened there or the tasks they’re appointed for.

            And, casual culture that we live in, this makes us uncomfortable. We feel a little like an invader in these places. We don’t really enjoy having our regular, everyday behaviors edited and curtailed, even when we know that it’s appropriate to do so. Why? Because we know that it’s good to connect with the sacred, with the holy, with those things that are bigger and purer than us; but we also know that there’s something in the way, there’s something inside us that creates an obstacle to this connection. It’s too great, it’s too grandiose, it’s too heavy for us to bear.

            It’s always been this way. Ever since our first parents, Adam and Eve, had to leave God’s presence in the Garden of Eden, humanity has been at the same time drawn by the desire to reconnect with holiness and pushed away by that uncomfortable feeling that we don’t belong with it. And that’s accurate, in every way. God Himself is the source of holiness. He’s the One who is set apart from creation, utterly different than anything we encounter in this world. He is the source of life, and we long to connect with Him as that. We need it. And yet, fallen humanity cannot bear to be in that holy presence. There’s something in the way, and it’s of our own doing. It’s sin. It’s uncleanness—from our own thoughts, words, and deeds; and from those things that have been done to us that make us feel polluted. It’s the weakness of our frail fallen flesh that can’t bear to stand in the bright, perfectly pure and glorious presence of God. As God Himself has told us, no one may see Him and live. Perfect holiness would consume us like fire. So we’re stuck in this simultaneous attraction and repulsion. We’re moths flying toward a flame, always fluttering away from it again because it’s too much for us to handle without being burned.

            So God established a solution. He would veil Himself, hide Himself behind holy places, people, items, and times so that His people could approach Him. He provided a single place—the tabernacle, and later the temple—where people could go to enter His presence and reconnect to His holiness. He instituted priests and their rounds of sacrifice to remove the obstacles of sin and uncleanness so that they could receive His blessings and stand in His presence. God said, “Here I am, in this specific place, with these specific things to purify you, for you to receive holiness, grace, forgiveness, and life.” While He is everywhere—He is God, after all—He promised to be there for that singular purpose. He promised these specific things so that His people would have confidence to enter the holy places to find union with their God.

            So for centuries that’s what God’s people had. But the Lord had even greater plans. For while the temple was good and the priesthood did their tasks as appointed, it was still a shadow of things to come. The Lord would not be satisfied with the limits of what these finite things could do. The sacrifice of goats and bulls was a token of an even greater sacrifice that would be unlimited in scope, a more perfect sacrifice. So when the time was right, God directed all things as He desired. He sent His Son, born of woman, born under the Law, to redeem those under the Law. He would be the perfect completion of all that had been foreshadowed and promised before. He would be the infinite fulfillment of what had been given previously. So on the night when He was betrayed, Jesus took bread and said, “Take, eat; this is My body, given for you.” It is as if He said, “I have come to replace the Passover lamb, which is sacrificed this night. I became man, and all that I do and suffer is for your good. As a pledge of this, I give you my body to eat.” Then, in the same way, He took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you; this cup is the new testament in My blood, which is shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” It is as if He said, “I have had mercy on you by taking into Myself all your sins and iniquities. I give Myself into death, shedding my blood to obtain grace and forgiveness of sins, and to comfort and establish the new testament, in which give forgiveness and everlasting salvation—not just for this time or that sin—but for all time and all sins. As a pledge of this, I give you My blood to drink.” By taking on flesh and blood, being born among us, walking through this world with His creatures, He said in a greater way than before, “Here I am, in my body and blood, for you to receive holiness, grace, forgiveness, and life.” Yes, He is everywhere—He is God, after all—but He promises to be here, in the Lord’s Supper, for that singular purpose. He has given us this specific gift—His Holy Supper—so that His people can enter the holy places and find Communion with our God.

            There remains no more temple, no gift of price, no sacrifice by priests. As shadows fade before the sun, the day of sacrifice is done; the day of grace is ours. Our holy God is with us in this holy place, present here in this way that He is present nowhere else in all creation, for your eternal good. Therefore, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain, that is, through His flesh, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water in Holy Baptism. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.

            We have not gathered for a funeral for Jesus this Holy Week. But we have come to see how God has reconnected us to Himself in the sacrifice of Jesus’ body and blood on the cross. It all happened exactly as He planned it, as it had been foreshadowed, prophesied, and promised for ages. We see the fullness of it unfolding tonight, tomorrow, Saturday night, and Sunday morning. We experience the weight of holiness as we see Jesus accomplishing everything for our salvation and eternal life. Receive His holiness, grace, forgiveness, life, and peace now. In the name of the Jesus, the Crucified One. Amen.