“Behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from the top to the bottom. The earth quaked and the rocks were split.”    Matthew 27:51

The Lord Jesus cried out with a loud voice, and laid down His life in payment for the sins of His people. It was all over. The soldiers standing around heard and saw Him die and realised that this was no ordinary man and no ordinary death. The were terrified. The very rocks split in pieces and the ground convulsed and great ravines appeared in the earth. 

Who was this man? It seems God in heaven is reacting to His death. The natural creation groans and is being torn apart by this giving up of the Spirit of Jesus, the king of the Jews. God has given everything to bring valueless, immoral, spiritless beings to spiritual life. The angels in heaven gasp in amazement. They cannot fathom the limitless depths of this sacrificial love. 

The accomplishment was eternal. The complete payment for sin, for all the people of God, forever. The people held in the darkness of the lower world, are set free, such is the power of this deed. The deadness of the physical succumbs to the rampant life of the spiritual. Saints of old times are walking around and exhibit the absolute power of Christ over sin, death and hell. We are redeemed already, and every child of God will be brought into the kingdom.

So the physical earth, which will one day pass away forever, is deeply disturbed. The land is rent and the lower depths are revealed. The presence of God, barred to all human life, is now split open to reveal the reality of the holy of Holies and the open entrance into God’s holy presence through the death of that one man on the cross. 

The veil is no more. We see God with unfettered eyes, and behold His glory.

“But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord, the Spirit.”    2 Corinthians 3:18

Now we can see God in the pages of His holy Word and it changes us to be like Him. We change from glory to glory as we see the one we love and desire to be like Him. This is the power of God. This is the work of the Holy Spirit and the inheritance of every child of God. 

The rending of the ground and the rending of the veil, are our freedom bonds being broken forever. We stand in liberty before the throne of God, forgiven, changed and with the power of God within us. What a day that was and will forever be to all those who repent and believe.