Where Is The Ark?

Whenever Moses went into the Tabernacle to speak with the LORD, he heard the voice speaking to him from between the two cherubim above the Ark’s cover—the place of atonement—that rests on the Ark of the Covenant. The LORD spoke to him from there. [Numbers 7.89]

It seems to have all started for Moses with a burning bush. That is where God first spoke to Moses. And then, through a progression of events, here we see God now speaking to Moses from between the cherubim covering the place of atonement (the Mercy Seat) of the Ark of the Covenant.

I used the word "progression" in the paragraph above that perhaps should have been "digression." As the Law became more established. the place where God spoke to man became more limited.

This digression of communication with God continued even further to the point that the Ark of the Covenant became lost to history with no one even knowing where it went.

Fast forward to Jesus on the Cross:

Then Jesus shouted out again, and he released his spirit. At that moment the curtain in the sanctuary of the Temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, rocks split apart, and tombs opened. The bodies of many godly men and women who had died were raised from the dead. [Matthew 27:50-52]

Interestingly enough, when the curtain in the Temple was torn from top to bottom at Jesus' death, the Ark of the Covenant was not in the Most Holy Place. It was no where to be found. That curtain veiled only the past memory of the Ark of the Covenant.

And yet, at the onset of John the Baptist's story, we see his father, Zechariah burning incense in the Temple Holy Place (the sanctuary outside the Most Holy Place that would have housed the Ark had it  been present).

The implications of all this are more than I can comprehend. However, I see clearly that these recorded facts reveal how religion works: Religion becomes established and God leaves. However, when God returns, He comes back in the door through which He left - religion/the Temple. It started with Zechariah's experience and consummated with Jesus' death on the Cross which yielded a torn curtain in the Temple.

It strikes me that the torn curtain accomplished many things. One of those would have been to confirm to all that the Ark of the Covenant was not there (whether they 'believed it was there or not'). While many focus on the fact that this development made the Most Holy Place accessible to man, few consider that the world then, once again, became open range for God to meet with man! No longer is man required to go to God - so God can come to man wherever man is! 

The fact that the curtain was torn from top to bottom indicates that this was not the doing of man, but of God. In other words, God initiated it. Jeremiah 3.16-18 discusses, the Ark will not be missed. This is because God's "chair" would become the hearts of men. As Jerusalem is representative of the nation of Israel, so a repentant man's heart is representative of the Kingdom of God - man's heart became the throne from which God rules.

Wow.

Father, help me to consider all that is said here and remain mindful that You have chosen not to live in a Temple made with human hands, but in the hearts of repentant people. Thank You!