I grew up going to church and Sunday School every week, so I tend to be amazed when I hear about something "crazy" in the Bible that I never ever picked up on before.
I am reading a book ("Once Upon A Tree") and the author mentioned Jesus' crucifixion and the curtain in the temple being torn in half, the earth shaking, and the sky turning black. He then went on to mention dead people coming out of their graves and walking the earth again.
I had to stop and re-read that a couple of times. I don't know about you, but I NEVER heard about that last part before. At first I thought I had read it incorrectly and he was referring to the end times or maybe even back to Lazarus.
I grabbed my Bible and started searching the gospels for the account of Jesus' death and lo and behold I found it. It's only mentioned in the book of Matthew but there it was(Mt 27:51-53 for those of you keeping score at home).
"At that moment the curtain of the temples was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks split. The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs, and after Jesus' resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many people."
How did I never hear about this before? Who were the holy people? What did they do? How long did they run around before they dropped dead again? Yeah, I know the focus isn't the dead people but about Christ on the cross, but I definitely want more information on THIS. It's just so bizarre to me!
Has anyone else also been deprived of this story growing up? I definitely think I would have remembered something like this, but for some reason I never picked up on it before. I know sometimes you'll be reading the Bible and pick up on something you never noticed before and you'll get a revelation of sorts. But why is the topic of dead people walking around jumping out at me now?
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