So he measured the area on all four sides. It had a wall around it, five hundred cubits long and five hundred cubits wide, to separate the holy from the common.
Ezekiel 42:20 (NIV)
We talk a lot in our culture about the “haves” and “have nots.” With a presidential election gearing up, we’re going to have plenty more inundation of pundits and politicos barking and bantering about social equality, racial equality, financial equality, and gender equality. I believe the never ending struggle within to place ourselves above others, to suppress others, and to criticize and belittle those who look, think, act, and believe differently is evidence of what took place in the Garden of Eden. It is first and foremost a spiritual problem.
Religion also has its share of “haves” and “have nots.” The reality is that organized religion has proven over history to illustrate the very thing it says it’s trying to resolve. The sin problem manifests itself acutely in the very people and institutions who try to address it. We see a hint of the issue in today’s chapter.
The temple was arranged, by design, with areas for the “holy” and the “common” or “unholy.” Over time this separation of the “holy” from the “unholy” created social strata which resulted in all sorts of social issues. The Jews of Jesus’ day were notorious for taking on a mantel of holiness which publicly covered the darkness in their souls, and placing themselves above others. Jesus reserved his hottest, most righteous anger for the most religious people:
“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You keep meticulous account books, tithing on every nickel and dime you get, but on the meat of God’s Law, things like fairness and compassion and commitment—the absolute basics!—you carelessly take it or leave it. Careful bookkeeping is commendable, but the basics are required. Do you have any idea how silly you look, writing a life story that’s wrong from start to finish, nitpicking over commas and semicolons?
“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You burnish the surface of your cups and bowls so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides are maggoty with your greed and gluttony. Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides, and then the gleaming surface will mean something.
“You’re hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You’re like manicured grave plots, grass clipped and the flowers bright, but six feet down it’s all rotting bones and worm-eaten flesh. People look at you and think you’re saints, but beneath the skin you’re total frauds.” Matthew 23:23-28 (MSG)
It was this problem that Jesus’ came to address. The parable of the Good Samaritan is core to what Jesus was about, which is to actually, tangibly love those who think, speak, look, act, and believe differently. To love even those who hate you and consider you their enemy. To place others ahead of ourselves.
In the Hebrew temple was a giant curtain that hid the “holy of holies” from the “holy place.” It was a place where only the high priest was allowed and only on certain occasions. Three of four of Jesus’ biographers (Matthew the tax collector, John Mark, and Dr. Luke) record that when Jesus died on the cross that curtain in the temple split right down the middle. No more separation. No more religious “haves” and “have nots.” Jesus came to be the sacrificial lamb, to pay the penalty for our sin, so that holiness would be available to anyone who wants it – not based on what we do or don’t do, say or don’t say, think or don’t think, but based on Jesus simply making it available as an undeserved gift.
It is what we do with that gift, or rather what it does in us, that makes the difference.
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The glory of the Lord entered the temple through the gate facing east.
