Where a relationship with God starts

It’s interesting to me that when God starts talking about the making of the tabernacle, he doesn’t start with the tent itself.  Rather, he starts with what’s inside. 

And the very first thing he starts describing is the ark of the covenant.

Two things strike me about the ark. 

First, what was in it, namely the Testimony (the ten commandments) God had given Moses. 

It let the people know what kind of God he was and what it meant to holy as God is holy.

That’s something that everyone needs to understand as they come to God:  that he is holy. 

And that if we are to have a relationship with him, we need to be holy too.

But on the ark was something they called the “mercy seat” or the “atonement cover.” 

However you call it, it shows us another key thing about our relationship with God. 

While God is holy, and he calls us to be holy, we are not holy. 

We all fall short of his God’s perfection. 

As Romans 3:23 says,

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

And because of that, when we approach God, we need God’s mercy. 

Put simply, mercy means that God doesn’t punish us as we deserve for our sin. 

But in order for God to show us mercy, atonement for our sin had to be made. 

Atonement basically means “covering,” that is, a covering of our sin. 

In the Old Testament, it was the blood of bulls that acted as a covering for the sin of the people. And it was only by bringing that blood, that the high priest could enter the Most Holy Place where the ark was. 

But then Jesus came and shed his blood on the cross, and now it is his blood that covers our sin so that we may come before God.

In Hebrews 9:22, it says that “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” 

Why?  Because blood represents life. (Leviticus 17:11)

The blood of Jesus represents his offering his own innocent life to take the punishment for our guilty lives.

And so in the ark of the covenant we find two key things about our relationship with God. 

First, God is holy, and we need to be holy too in order to have a relationship with him. 

And second, because we are not holy, we needed someone to atone for our sin. That person was Jesus, who took the punishment for our sin on the cross. 

But because Jesus was innocent of all sin, God raised him up from the dead, and now he offers us life through his Son.

Until we understand these two things, we can never have a relationship with God. 

Embracing those truths is where our relationship with God starts. 

How about you? Have you started your relationship with God?