Mark 15:33-39
33 And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. 34 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Jesus cried out, “MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?” This was a cry of a son losing his father because of the sins he bore that day. Jesus cried out MY God. His relationship was God became different that day. And the answer to Jesus’ question was because of the sins that we have committed. He had to pay the penalty of our sin. The reason was us – we broke the fellowship of the Father and the Son because Jesus took our sin.
It was at the backdrop of utter darkness in mid-afternoon that all these things came to be. It was the supernatural darkness that the people experienced when Jesus breathed his last. The day man murdered Jesus; there was darkness. Doesn’t this remind us of a life lived without Christ? It is a world of no hope and covenant.
35 And some of the bystanders hearing it said, “Behold, he is calling Elijah.”36 And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink, saying, “Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down.” 37 And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. 38 And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. 39 And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”
The curtain (thick as a wall) being torn in two from top to bottom was God saying, “this death is the ends all sacrifice. I am the ultimate sacrifice. You can now enter my presence because I have paid for your sins – past, present, future. The partition and the walls have been demolished. We now have access to God. Even the Roman centurion became convinced that Jesus was the Son of God when all this happen right before his eyes.
Imagine the image God left us with. The torn curtain, a death Messiah on the cross, a Roman centurion saying indeed this was the Son of God. All powerful images that make us excited about the faith we profess. And yet it does not end there. The resurrection has not yet happened at this point.