More Than Coincidence

“More Than Coincidence”—April 18, 2019

"Then Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last.  And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom." [Mark 15:37-38]

There are coincidences in life, and then there are moments of intentional connection. 

When you have been humming a song all day that has gotten stuck in your head, and then you hear it on the radio later on (presuming you didn’t call in to the station and request it), that is a coincidence.  If you have a song stuck in your head all day because you were playing it over and over again earlier this morning, the logical connection is right there—you were the cause of the connection.

If you work in an office and someone else comes to work wearing the very same outfit as you, that is a coincidence (one that may take you a while to live down, frankly). If you work in a place that requires uniforms, like the prison or parts of the hospital, it’s not a surprise that your coworkers dressed like you today—it’s a statement of official policy.

If your close friend is moving away across the country, and you come home to discover the light bulb in the kitchen ceiling light has gone out, you might mentally connect the two as part of one big conspiracy the universe is attempting in order to ruin your day, but no, it’s a coincidence.  If your close friend is moving away, and in your frustration and sadness, you start throwing things or kick the wall and leave a mark, it’s not a coincidence—it’s your own chosen action that leaves the mark.  In fact, in a way, the scuff mark on the wall from your foot is, in a sense, your color commentary on how you feel about losing your friend.  It’s much more than coincidence—it’s a reflection of how you feel at that moment.

So, what about this scene in the Gospel?  Jesus dies—he breathes his last—and meanwhile the temple curtain is torn in two, from top to bottom.  Is that a coincidence, or is there an intentional connection between the two?

We might want to read it as a coincidence at first—to say, “Look, there must have been something going on with Jesus that made him important; all these strange things happened around him when he died, all these odd coincidences.” Matthew, after all, says that there was an earthquake when Jesus died, too.  And we heard just a few verses earlier that the sky grew dark for three hours when Jesus was on the cross.  We could chalk up the temple curtain to being one of a number of strange coincidences, shrug our shoulders about it, and go on our way without much of a second thought—the way you do when the song you’ve been humming comes on the radio, or the light bulb is out in the kitchen on an already bad day.

But all of that coincidence talk assumes that God is not behind the scenes of this story, giving us a sort of color commentary on what is happening. And we have been taught, over the course of this whole Gospel, that the living God feels free to step out onto the stage to help us understand what is going on—the voice from the heavens, the fulfillments of the prophets’ words, the miracles. These things tell us there more going on than mere coincidence. It’s true that sometimes two random events just happen to align in ways that make us scratch our heads.  But then again, it’s also true that sometimes, like uniforms at work, the commonalities are statements of official policy.

That’s what’s going on here at Jesus’ death.  The tearing of the temple curtain is, you could say, God’s official statement about what is going on in Jesus’ death.  The temple curtain, you might recall, was not a mere window treatment—it was a visual divider in the temple between the “Most Holy Place” in the temple, where God symbolically “dwelt,” and the rest of the temple facility, where people were allowed to come and go.  Only the high priest could enter the temple’s “Most Holy Place,” and even then, only on one day a year—the Day of Atonement—to offer a specific sacrifice.  But other than that, there was an unquestionable boundary between God (behind the curtain) and humanity (the rest of the temple), a dividing line that was not to be crossed, because God is so holy and awesome, and we are so sinful and small.  And just to make sure that the message was not lost on an observer at the Temple, the curtain was embroidered with images of the sun, moon, and stars in the sky—as if to say that there is a universe of difference between a transcendent God and us ordinary humans.

So, now let’s put these facts together.  At Jesus’ death, the curtain of the temple—which divided a holy and infinite God from sinful, finite humans—is torn in two… “from top to bottom.”  One hundred percent ripped in half, and not from ground level up, but from the ceiling down.  Coincidence… or God’s commentary on what is going on?

You almost can’t escape the conclusion—this is God telling us what Jesus’ death is all about: at Jesus’ death, the boundary between God and humans is permanently torn down.  Jesus’ dying on the cross has brought down the wall, has torn the heavens open, in a way that can’t be patched up or stitched together.  Jesus’ death has broken down the divider between a holy God and unholy us, once and for all.  The tearing of the curtain isn’t a coincidence any more than the scuff on the wall from your frustrated kicking is—it is a visual expression of what has happened to you.  God is giving us an object lesson, you could say—that when we could not climb our way “up” across the infinite expanse of the universe to God, God has come “down” to us, tearing apart every obstacle to come to be with us.  For whatever else the cross means, it at least means that.

Knowing that means two things for the day ahead: first, the story of Jesus was not the story of a bunch of interesting but random coincidences—it is the story of God consciously and intentionally speaking to us, with purpose, with direction, with meaning.  And second, it means that there are no lengths God is not willing to go to, no boundaries God will not cross, even to death and back, to come to be with us.  The tearing of the curtain assures us: that is a statement of official, divine, policy.

Lord God, give us eyes to recognize the messages you have sent and are sending, and grant us to trust your fierce love that crosses boundaries to be with us.