Truths taught by the Rending of the Veil.
I. If you look into the account of the arrangements and furniture of the Jewish Temple, you will find that there were two veils: the one at the entrance into the holy place; the other between the holy place or the sanctuary, and the holy of holies. The second veil is always considered to have been that which was rent in twain at the death of our Lord; so that the first thing done through the rending was the throwing open that heretofore invisible and inaccessible place, the holy of holies. As the rent rocks and open graves proclaimed Christ victorious in death, so may the riven veil have declared that He had won for Himself an access into heavenly places, there to perpetuate the work which had been wrought out on Calvary.
II. And there are other intimations which may, perhaps, have been conveyed by the occurrence in question. It is possible, for example, that the abolition of the Mosaic economy was hereby figuratively taught. Christ had come to destroy the law, but only that He might substitute for it a better covenant.
III. The rent veil signifies that through Christ alone we have access to the Father, and that supplies of heavenly things may be expected to descend. The privilege of prayer, the privilege of intercourse with our heavenly Father, has been procured for us exclusively by Christ.
IV. Neither was it only the privilege of access to God while we yet dwell on the earth, which was set forth under the figure of the rent veil of the Temple. I read higher things; I see a title to a heavenly inheritance. It is like an opening in the firmament, through which the eye of faith may gaze on the diadem and the palm which are in store for the faithful. What was to occur after death and the resurrection? The rent veil gives the answer. As the opened graves published the great truth of the abolition of death, so did the riven veil publish that of our being begotten again to an "inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away." The veil is rent to show that the Mediator hath made for Himself a passage into heaven, but in nothing does He act for Himself alone. We rose with Him; we ascended with Him; and therefore is the rending of the veil as much a pledge of our admission as of His, who by the efficiency of His sacrifice provided for our not only being sons of God, but joint-heirs with Himself.
H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit,No. 1,500.
The veil of the Temple was the curtain separating the holy place from the most holy; for Solomon's Temple, as the Tabernacle of Moses before it, was divided into two several parts or rooms, both holy, but one holier than the other. The veil or curtain itself was made of blue, purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen of cunning work; it was adorned with images of cherubim, and was hung on four pillars, of some precious wood overlaid with gold.
I. What now is the veil, so drawn across as to separate the two kingdoms of God from one another, yet such as to give hope that it may be one day entirely withdrawn, and the two made altogether one? St. Paul tells us in one word that the veil is the blessed body of our Lord Jesus Christ. For, says the Apostle, He hath provided for us a new and living way through the veil, that is, His flesh. The miraculous rending of the veil at the moment of the death of the Son of God, was a token of the rending of our Lord's blessed body, by the nails and spear, and of the violent parting of His soul and body for a while.
II. As the veil concealed from the eyes of the worshippers the most holy place made with hands, which was but a figure of the true, so the body of our Lord and Saviour was a kind of veil or shadow drawn over His most high Godhead, the open presence of which is that which makes heaven.
III. The veil being rent signifies pardon, through Christ's sacrificed body, for sins past; but it also signifies communion with Him, through the same body in time to come. The flesh of Jesus, then, His glorified body, offered by Himself as High Priest, is a new and living way, through which believers, baptized persons, drawing near from time to time, may with reverent boldness enter into the holy places; they are invited, exhorted, encouraged, to do so. The mystery of the spiritual or Divine life of a Christian, taught us by the figure of the veil of the Temple, is this: that the only true happiness is partaking of the Divine Nature, as St. Peter calls it communion with God in the person of His Son; that the way to this Divine communion is communicating with Him, being made members of Him, as man, the Man Christ Jesus; and this must be through His blessed body, and this again through His Holy Sacrament.
Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times,"vol. viii., p. 76.
References: Mark 15:37; Mark 15:38. J. Keble, Sermons for Holy Week,p. 139. Mark 15:38. T. M. Herbert, Sketches of Sermons,p. 106. Mark 15:39-47. H. M. Luckock, Footprints of the Son of Man,p. 376. Mark 15:42. W. H. Jellie, Christian World Pulpit,vol. vi., p. 285; Clergyman's Magazine,vol. xx., p. 141.