My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?
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We’ve seen how the Psalms proclaim Christ. These songs show the interplay of four main players:
1) God
2) The Ideal King (Christ)
3) Those who trust in Him
4) The wicked
Some of these songs are the words of God to His King (His Christ). Some of them are the people’s words to God about the King. Some of them are comparisons of the wicked and the true King. And so many of them, like Psalm 22, are the words of the King to God.
David was well aware that it was the Lord’s words that were on his lips as he wrote such Psalms (2 Samuel 23:2). He was voicing the prayers of the Ideal King – the Messiah.
And incredibly, these prayers take in a whole range of emotions – from joy to anger to utter despair. So when Christ was born into our situation – full of joy, anger, despair etc – He uses these prayers that He had prepared for Himself and takes them on His human lips. He enters into the fullness of our predicament. He sings all our songs
And that includes even this one:
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? (Psalm 22:1; Mark 15:34)
Jesus cries out His own Psalm 22 while on the cross. This thousand year old prayer had been prepared for this very occasion and now Jesus prays it to a black and silent heaven.
Could it be that the Lord of heaven has so descended into our plight that He experiences godforsakenness?
Well if we’re reluctant to affirm that, we are doubting the fullness of Christ’s identification with us. Yes, He is fully God – the eternal Son of the Father. But He also became fully human – our Brother, bone of our bones and flesh of our flesh.
And since He enters our situation, who can deny that our experience of life is indeed “godforsakenness”?
One of the most keenly felt aspects of our humanity is our godlessness. Where is He? How can He feel so remote when “in him we live, and move, and have our being” (Acts 17:28)? How can we be so estranged from the Source of our life? Why does God seem so far off?
Jesus enters into all of that. And not just the feeling of godforsakenness. On the cross, He enters our alienation from God due to our sins. He doesn’t have a bungee cord wrapped around Him, descending only so far but no further. No, He plumbs the depths. The Lord of heaven endures hell.
Which means Christianity has a very surprising response to that age old question: “Where is God when it hurts?”
The Christian can say, “I know a God who asked that question Himself!”
Therefore the experience of hurt can never disprove this God. He has been the godforsaken God. He has so identified with you in your plight that He has asked that question with you and for you.
And if God takes even godforsakenness to Himself, then there simply is no situation in which we need to despair. Because Christ was godforsaken, we need never be. Even the most profound experiences of abandonment can be a participation in the suffering of Christ – and therefore an experience of the deepest divine fellowship!
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Hi Glen!
I’m glad you wrote this. James White, author of “The Forgotten Trinity” was on a radio interview program once, I called in and brought up this event, and he said, Oh, well, Jesus was just quoting a psalm. I was pretty disappointed. The entire psalm is prophetic, and He was “just quoting” it? Maybe White is right, there was not a top down schism in GOD (between Father and Son) like the rend in the veil of the temple, but in some sense there was truth in what Jesus said. Father turned His face away from His Son. In some sense, where there had been eternal fellowship between Father and Son, for an infinitessimal moment of eternity, there was an infinite (I read ‘eternal’) separation between Father and Son. That is how much Jesus loves us. That is how much Father loves us. What do you think?
Hey Duane,
Thanks for commenting. Yes it’s got to be both-and. Jesus is quoting the Psalm indeed. But what is the Psalm saying?!
My first ever blog post was on this very topic – how do you relate the cry of dereliction to the eternal fellowship of the Father and Son:
http://christthetruth.wordpress.com/2007/11/13/hello-world/
The answer is probably in the resurrection. There Jesus is declared with power to be Son of God (Rom 1:4). But the resurrection depends on the cross (in fact Hebrews says that it was through the blood that Jesus was brought back from the dead, Heb 13:20). So the eternal communion of Father and Son in the Spirit is a communion of cross-and-resurrection love where the Persons ever lose their lives in and for each other only to find them again.
Sort of thing. Happy to chat further :)
…All of which means – Yes, there is a real and earth-shattering (even heaven-shattering) chasm opened up at the cross. Yet it was more than crossed in the resurrection.
Yes. Right. I liked your blog referenced above too. What more can I add? Our salvation, tearing down the wall of sin between man and Creator, cost Jesus exactly what He gave.
Anyhow, thanks Glen!
Must now sleep,
[...] Jesus cried out “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” it implied more than this single cry of dereliction. Before chapter divisions were [...]
[...] Jesus cried out “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” He was referencing the whole of Psalm 22. Before chapter divisions were inserted into the [...]
[...] death and beyond is due to the intimate guidance of the LORD. This Psalm is a counterfoil to the cry of godforsakenness we heard on Sunday. Here the Messiah declares that everything that happens to Him – up to, [...]
[...] death and beyond is due to the intimate guidance of the LORD. This Psalm is a counterfoil to the cry of godforsakenness we heard two days ago. The Messiah declares that his experiences – up to, including, and beyond [...]