February 23 -- "A Place for God's Presence"

 Today’s Reading: 2 Chronicles 4

"A Place for God's Presence"

Construction went on for seven years until the Temple, its furniture, its courtyard, and all other articles and decorations connected with it were completed according to plan. Solomon’s Temple (as it has come to be known) was a more permanent form of the Tabernacle (Tent of Meeting) which had been constructed under Moses’ leadership in the wilderness. It would become the new center of worship for the Israelite people.

It would be hard to overemphasize the importance to the Jews and to Judaism of the ceremony, the symbolism and the sacrifices involved in worship at the Temple in Jerusalem.  The Temple was the place where God dwelt among his people.  The Temple was the place where forgiveness for sins was obtained.  The Temple was the heart of what made a Jew a Jew.  The pilgrimage to the Temple at Jerusalem on the Day of Atonement or one of the other festivals was the highlight of the religious year - indeed it would become the highlight of the entire religious life of the Jew. The purpose all along for the building of the Temple was so that God could dwell amongst his people. 

While the Jewish Temple rituals held great weight for the Jewish people, their true meaning truly blossoms under the New Covenant ushered in by Jesus Christ. Each element of physical worship in the Temple served as a prefiguration of a deeper spiritual reality that finds its complete expression in Christ. For over a millennium, the Levitical priests carried out their daily and yearly duties, oblivious to the fact that they were living out a symbolic foreshadowing of the transformative New Covenant established through Jesus' sacrifice.

The purpose all along for the building of the Temple was so that God could dwell amongst his people without them seeing him directly. If the Temple was the place where God dwelt among his people, then one could argue that the entire focus of the Old Covenant worship was to establish a way to be in fellowship with God and to come into his presence.  This, too, is the focus of the New Covenant.

Once the  sacrifice of Jesus’ blood has been applied to us, we can come into the sanctuary - into the very place where God dwells.  As we spend time in quiet prayer, let us in our minds visualize entering into the Holy Place.  What do we find there?  There we find intimacy in our relationship with God. There we obtain forgiveness for our sins. There we find fellowship with our Creator. There we find the purpose for our existence - to dwell with our God.