Does the Outside Match the Inside?

Exodus 29-30:10

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In this passage we are told of the ceremony and the sacrifices and the offerings that are to accompany Aaron’s ordination into the Priesthood.  The instructions for sanctifying the alter and the tabernacle also included ceremony and specific instructions for the seven day ceremony, as well as what Aaron and his sons were to do every day at the beginning of each day.  So many things, so much stuff, all this was needed to stand before a Holy God so the High Priest and the helpers would not get wiped out.  The work involved, the animals, the noise, the smells the time needed to insure the presence of a Holy God would not wipe out the sinful men standing before Him.  All this was “covering” to cover sin and sinful people even though those sinful folks were the Favored ones. 

Today, the Great Sacrificial Lamb was slain for us so the work, the arduous work of keeping pure, on the outside, while staying dirty on the inside, does not have to be done day in and day out.  Our covering, our Cloak, is the Son Of God’s blood which we are seen through.  The work we must now do is accept the Son and allow the Holy Spirit, by act of our will and yielding ourselves to the Spirit, to do the Cleansing on the inside, through Love.  It all begins with meeting our Sacrificial Lamb at the cross, allowing His shed blood to pour over us as a cover, and then getting up and going out into the world filed on the inside with the Holy Spirit who continuously cleans repairs, restores and sanctifies.

When Jesus uttered these words,

Matthew 23:25-29 NLT  "What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are filthy--full of greed and self-indulgence!  (26)  You blind Pharisee! First wash the inside of the cup and the dish, and then the outside will become clean, too.  (27)  "What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs--beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people's bones and all sorts of impurity.  (28)  Outwardly you look like righteous people, but inwardly your hearts are filled with hypocrisy and lawlessness.  (29)  "What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you build tombs for the prophets your ancestors killed, and you decorate the monuments of the godly people your ancestors destroyed …”

He wasn’t insulting them; He was telling them their true state.  The laws they followed, the offerings and sacrifices made in the Temple, the sacrificial meals they partook of, if they were of the priestly order, only cleaned the outside, it only kept their cloaks, their covering clean.  Inside was vile, putrid, and smelly. I have been reading that passage wrong for years.  I too will be vile, putrid and smelly if I don’t allow the Holy Spirit inside of me to do the work of cleansing the inside of the Temple, my body.