What is your favorite verse in the Bible? Why does that particular one stick in your head? Sometimes we choose a verse because it’s tied to a certain time or part of our life. Others stand out because they describe an important truth about God. My favorite covers both, but more importantly, it sews together humanity’s entire story as written by the Lord God himself. In chapter 27, verse 51 of his gospel, Matthew writes…

My church has asked me to teach the women’s class on Sunday mornings, and I am thrilled to share the joy God’s Word stirs within me with others who cherish it as well. I am particularly excited to share my passion for reading Scripture as a unified whole. My goal is to show the extraordinary depth the Old Testament gives to the New Testament, and how the New Testament illuminates the Old. Matthew 27:51 is a perfect example of the inseparability of the Old Testament and the New. If you believe, as some liberal scholars do, that the Hebrew Scriptures are irrelevant to Christianity, what would Matthew 27:51, arguably the climax of Creation’s story, mean to you? First of all, what curtain? And what does it separate that it would be so important that it tore as the Son of God exhaled his dying breath? (See my The Day the Curtain Tore). This simple event, recorded by Matthew and Mark, holds enormous significance, which you will all but miss if you don’t know and treasure your Old Testament.

For me, one simple word links the torn temple veil back to Genesis, then from Exodus through Malachi, and onward into Matthew and all the way through Revelation: dwell. Exodus, Ezekiel, and Revelation use the word explicitly, though the concept of God with us, of Immanuel, is a golden thread woven throughout the Word. In Ezekiel 37:27, God himself says to Israel, “My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” Jump to the final pages of your Bible and you will find the same words in Revelation 21:3: “And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.’” Ezekiel records the words of God to Israel, but Revelation calls to believers from all the tribes and tongues of the world.

The exact words of Ezekiel 37:27 and Revelation 21:3 do not occur in Genesis, but it’s easy to see the same concept beginning in, well, “in the beginning.” Genesis 3:8 says, “And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.” Most of the time, when people preach or teach or read Genesis chapter three, they focus on the disobedience and shame of Adam and Eve. In church, I too have heard much about the final words of 3:8, but not about the first: when God formed Adam from the dust, he chose to walk with him, to dwell with him, in his Creation.

Recently, while studying the book of Matthew, I was surprised to find that the word “Immanuel” occurs in only three verses of the Bible, one of which is a quote of another. Because Matthew gives his Greek-speaking readers a translation of “Immanuel” when he quotes Isaiah in the first chapter of his Gospel, this title is clearly significant. Jesus, Immanuel, is God with us – dwelling on earth in flesh and Spirit. God may have blocked the way back into Eden when mankind first sinned, but he never abandoned us. He walked and talked with Abraham, wrestled with Jacob, and condescended to live among sinners in a square room behind a curtain. He sent his Son to again walk with his people, and his Spirit took up residence in our hearts. And those who claim Jesus as their Savior live with the glorious promise that in the end, we will walk with God in the cool of the day in New Jerusalem.

Despite the awesome power of Jesus’ words as recorded in the gospels, it is the book of Exodus that makes the rending of the temple curtain almost audible. Though God has been in our midst from the moment he breathed life into dust, he has been behind a veil since Adam fell. Whether it was with cherubim’s flaming swords, dark clouds on Mount Sinai, or a beautifully worked curtain, such is his mercy that he protected his people from the lethality of his holiness. But at the climax of history, at the hour appointed by the Father, the Triune God worked merciful justice, and so we are saved. Jesus, in his birth, ministry, death, and resurrection opened the Hebrew Scriptures to those with ears to hear. The early Church – Jews and Gentiles alike – searched the Scriptures joyfully, for, as Jesus said, “…if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me.” (John 5:46)

As I begin to write lesson outlines and steep myself in the words of God, my goal is to beckon others to fall in love with the Holy Scriptures all over again. The beauty of God’s words grows all the more breathtaking as we discover how perfectly he wove all the strands of history together into one shining tapestry.

Those of us in America have the exceptional privilege of opening and studying our Bibles without fear for our safety or our lives, and we have the Spirit to guide us in the process. The curtain has torn, the way is open – take advantage and rejoice always, for the Holy One of Israel himself dwells within us!

“And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” -Matthew 28:20b