Holy of Holies

Isaiah 6:1-7 "It was in the year King Uzziah died that I saw the Lord. He was sitting on a lofty throne, and the train of his robe filled the Temple. Attending him were mighty seraphim, each having six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. They were calling out to each other, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies! The whole earth is filled with his glory!”
 Their voices shook the Temple to its foundations, and the entire building was filled with smoke. Then I said, “It’s all over! I am doomed, for I am a sinful man. I have filthy lips, and I live among a people with filthy lips. Yet I have seen the King, the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.” Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a burning coal he had taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. He touched my lips with it and said, “See, this coal has touched your lips. Now your guilt is removed, and your sins are forgiven.”"

Our God is a holy God. Set apart; a step above and beyond anything else in the created universe. He is so holy and pure in fact that He cannot even be in the presence of sin. That’s bad news for us since we have all sinned and fallen short of His glory (Romans 3:23).

Before Jesus came, the presence of God dwelt in the Jewish temple in a placed called the Holy of Holies. Only one person could enter that room one day out of the year. He had to be ceremonially clean, and without sin to enter into the Holy of Holies. If he was not, he would drop dead the instance he came into God’s presence. It was an honor of the highest sort to be the person to enter into the glorious Holy Presence of the God of this universe. Only a handful of men for thousands of years had ever gotten that privilege.

And it is in this time that Isaiah saw the Lord. He saw God sitting on His throne with angels around Him, and immediately he knew he was in trouble; for no sinner can be in the presence of God and survive. He realized that his destruction was sealed, for he knew too well that he was a sinner.

But God’s response was not to kill Isaiah, nor did he allow Isaiah to stay in His presence with the stain of sin. Instead God ordered His angel to burn off the sin and guilt from Isaiah with a hot coal. Now his trespasses were gone and he could remain in the presence of God.

Today, we don’t make animal sacrifices and we don’t perform ceremonial cleansing before entering church, but we do worship the same God as Isaiah. Each of us has the privilege to walk into the Holy of Holies and be in the Holy Presence of the God of this universe. This great honor that was so limited before has now been granted to all of us by the blood of Jesus, which works in us in a similar fashion to the burning coal that purged Isaiah, that allowed Him to be in the presence of God. The blood of Jesus sears our sins like a fire burning up the dross of silver (Proverbs 25:4) and makes us qualified candidates to enter into the Holy of Holies.