Open Concept Faith

Hebrews 9
1-2 Now in that first agreement between God and his people there were rules for worship and there was a sacred tent down here on earth. Inside this place of worship there were two rooms…this part was called the Holy Place. 3 Then there was a curtain, and behind the curtain was a room called the Holy of Holies…6 Well, when all was ready, the priests went in and out of the first room whenever they wanted to, doing their work. 7 But only the high priest went into the inner room, and then only once a year, all alone with blood that he sprinkled on the mercy seat as an offering to God to cover his own mistakes and sins and the mistakes and sins of all the people…9 This has an important lesson for us today…The people had to keep these rules to tide them over until Christ came with God’s new and better way.

Sunday Thoughts:
The design and function of this place of worship, this “sacred tent down here on earth” is more than a description of a place, it’s a picture of us. God certainly had us pegged didn’t he? This earthly-body place of worship has those same two rooms; an outer one and an inner one.

That first system was comfortable, most of the time. The outer room, a Holy place, was maintained to make sure it was possible to get to that inner room with it’s limited access. The inner room was the place where “mistakes and sins” could be dealt with by the right person at the right time and “all alone.”

Faith compartmentalized like that is comfortable for us. We do have a place we can manage the maintenance of that Holy outer room. We call it church. We have someone we call pastor or priest we can depend on doing their best work to make us acceptable to God. But there’s still that curtained-off room where Holy is actually changed into Holiness.

“This has an important lesson for us today.” There is no more need for separate rooms to “tide us over.” No more mere maintenance waiting for the right time to come. No more limited access. No more “all alone.” “Christ came with God’s new and better way,” Open Concept Faith.