Torn in two, from top to bottom

So, I just got done reading Don Miller's Searching for God Knows What. It was awesome. One of my favorite parts was the Children of Chernobyl chapter. It gave me a little taste of God's broken heart at the scene of the fall.  The entire book really makes you re-look at scripture and realize that God is a person; not exactly human, certainly not falliable, but he's also not a system or a chart. This, in mixture with a thousand other little thoughts I've had lately has caused me to be even more excited by something I already thought was awesome.

This thing is what happened the moment that Christ died. Matthew 27:51 says, "At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks split."

This is crazy, obvously, because we're talking about a 70 or so foot high tapestry, and, seemingly on it's own, it is ripped in half, from the top.

Even cooler, is what it represents. The curtain separated the outer room, where men tried to get right with God, from the holy of holies, where God dwelled on earth. It represented the fact that there was separation; that men could not enter the presence of God. Christ's work on the cross didn't just remove the curtain; it destroyed it.

But what I've been thinking about lately is how unnessecary it was to actually rip the curtain. We would have been redemed with out the symbolism. Why did it happen?

The answer I've come up with is that God is passionate. He had been waiting for ages, literally, albeit with perfect patience, and finally it was time; at last He got to dwell in the people he loves, no more separation. I imagine that He was so filled with joy in that moment that, like a football player's touchdown dance, he couldn't resist actually ripping the veil in half.



The mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints, to them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
                                      --Colossians 1:26-27