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One of our desires at BASIC is to be relevant and connect you with content that is going to best help you as you serve your campus and ministry context! In an effort to bring in fresh perspective and new ideas, we have asked a few student leaders and advisors to share their voice! We’ll get to hear from one of them each month. This week, we have the honor of hearing from Emily Baker.
Hey there, I’m Emily Baker! I’m a former student of SUNY Cortland, where I served for three semesters as the Worship Leader for our BASIC Chapter. I got to experience all of the joys of being a part of college ministry including seeing our group grow and watching the Lord radically change some of my best friends lives! I am now the Worship Director at a church in Cortland called Believers’ Chapel Cortland, and am getting to witness God do amazing things in the city.
God’s presence is everything. The closer I grow towards Him, the more I realize that understanding what it means to be in His presence is so incredibly important. As a worship leader I have found some people have never been taught what it means to be in the presence of God. They have never been taught why it is an amazing privilege to be able to enter the presence of our Creator.
When I look at the Bible, I find that one of my favorite moments in history happened right after Jesus died as he was hanging on the cross. Matthew 27:50-54 displays this moment:
50 And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit. 51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split 52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people. 54 When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, “Surely he was the Son of God!”
The part I’d like to focus on is verse 51 when the veil inside the temple was torn in two. In the days before Jesus there was a temple built to house the presence of God. Within the temple there was a massive veil that separated the Holy of Holies⏤the room where the presence of God resided⏤and the rest of the temple. This veil symbolized the separation of man from God’s presence because of how he had turned from the ways of God to pursue ways of his own. Only high priests were allowed into the Holy of Holies once a year on behalf of all of Israel to atone for their sins.
So, what is so significant about this veil being torn at the very moment of Jesus’ death? The veil being torn proclaims the radical reality that Jesus’ sacrifice, his body being bloodied and torn, was a sufficient sacrifice for the wrong we have done. With the veil torn, every single one of us now has unlimited, twenty-four-seven, VIP access to the presence, the love, the forgiveness, the mercy, the peace, the freedom, the joy, and the grace that is found only in Him.
[Tweet “Every single one of us now has unlimited, twenty-four-seven, VIP access to the presence”]
With this amazing truth in mind, I believe that God is calling us higher. If we’re being honest, life can be a little crazy. In one moment, you may be having the best season of your life. Maybe you encountered God at BASICCON, your grades are amazing, and your friendships are incredible. Then all of the sudden life throws you a curve ball; you don’t pass that one final that you spent hours studying for, someone cuts you off and you said some words under your breath that you shouldn’t have, your car breaks down when there’s no money in your bank account. Maybe you even find yourself skipping out on Bible reading because busyness has consumed your mind.
Within a moment our circumstances can completely change our countenance. We forget about the encounter we had with Him at BASICON because we lose sight of Him. We live in a world that wants nothing to do with Jesus and are constantly bombarded with it’s opinions and behaviors. If we’re not careful, we can easily find ourselves in the same patterns and mindset that we were in before.
[Tweet ” Within a moment our circumstances can completely change our countenance.”]
But see, Jesus paid the highest price a man could pay, and I don’t think He paid it for us to remain the same. I don’t think He died so we could keep walking in anger, and frustration, lust, and anxiety, pride, and depression. You know what I think He paid for?
I think He paid for us to step behind the veil. I think He paid for us to hold unswervingly to the hope He’s given us, being untouched by whatever the world tries to throw our way. I think He paid for us to walk in the world shining bright His character, being cleansed from the character of the world. I think He paid for us to draw near to Him sincerely and get truly intimate, so that we can find freedom from all of the junk that tries to creep into our lives.
[Tweet “He paid for us to step behind the veil.”]
He is waiting; He is there; He is available to us through Jesus. It’s time to go deep with Him; to boldly enter into His presence, yielding to His skillful hands, allowing Him to change us and mold us to look more like Him. Will you discover what it is to be in the presence?
19 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.
Hebrews 10:19-23
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