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“search the scriptures” John 5:39
And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?’ that is to say,‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ Matt. 27. 46.
The first and the last of the sayings of Christ on the cross were addressed to God His Father; the fourth was a heart-rending cry to God. The passers-by had mocked Him, saying, ‘He trusted in God’, and, although spoken in mockery, the words were true. Amidst all His suffering, His trust in God was unshaken. As we consider these sacred words, uttered in the untold agony of Calvary, we feel like Moses did long ago; we stand on holy ground and are compelled to ‘turn aside, and see this great sight’, Exod. 3. 3.
This saying is found in only two of the Gospels, Matthew and Mark; the other sayings are recorded, three by Luke and three by John. By His words from the cross, the Lord fulfilled the scriptures, but this is the only saying which He quoted directly from the Old Testament, Ps. 22. 1.
It is the only saying of the seven that asks a question, and the only one recorded for us in the language in which the Lord spoke, followed by the translation, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ David wrote the psalm, but he never knew what it was to be forsaken by God. The psalm is messianic and speaks of Christ.
There was no other. When the soldiers had platted a crown of thorns, ‘they put it upon his head’, Matt. 27. 29. Thorns were the consequence of the fall and the emblem of the curse. He alone was fitted to be the sin bearer, because the sacrifice on God’s altar must be without blemish. He was the lamb foreordained before the foundation of the world: He alone was the unblemished Lamb of God.
No other man on earth could be our Saviour; all alike are defiled by sin and thereby disqualified. No angel in heaven could accomplish this great work, for angels do not die and could not meet the penalty of God’s law, cp. Ezek. 18. 20.
‘No angel could His place have taken,
Highest of the high tho’ he.
There on the cross, despised, forsaken,
Was one of the Godhead three’.
James M. Gray, 1851-1935
The plea of Psalm 22 verse 11 is, ‘Be not far from me; for trouble is near; for there is none to help’. God’s holiness demands that He must be separate from evil of every kind. Verse 3 says, ‘But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel’. This is expressed again in Habakkuk, 1. 13. When the Lord Jesus bore our sins on the cross, God, who is intrinsically holy, was separated from Him by an infinite, immeasurable distance.
The account of the Day of Atonement in Leviticus chapter 16 records how Aaron the High Priest confessed the iniquities, transgressions, and sins of the people on the head of the scapegoat, which was then led away by a fit man into a land not inhabited and set free. The name scapegoat comes from the Hebrew word azazel, which is translated as ‘the goat that departs’. How wonderful it is for the Christian to remember that our sins are removed from us by an immeasurable distance, Ps. 103. 12.
Darkness covered the whole land from the sixth hour until the ninth hour, see Mark 15. 33. The words of the prophet were fulfilled, Ps. 88. 18. Doubtless, the darkness added to the loneliness of the Saviour on the centre cross. The prophet Amos spoke of a day of judgement that is still future, but his words can doubtless be applied to the darkness that surrounded the cross, ‘And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord God, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day … and I will make it as the mourning of an only son’, Amos 8. 9, 10. We remember that the one who was impaled on the cross and suffered in the darkness of Calvary was God’s only Son, John 3. 16.
It was midnight at midday. At Mount Sinai, where Moses was given the Law, written with the finger of God on tables of stone, there was darkness that covered the mountain. ‘And the people stood afar off, and Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where God was’, Exod. 20. 21. In the darkness of Calvary, the Son of God suffered the penalty for a broken law, ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us’, Gal. 3. 13.
Psalm 22 verse 2 speaks of His cry in ‘the daytime … and in the night season’, referring to the period of three hours from the third to the sixth hour, and the hours of darkness from the sixth to the ninth hour. The darkness was not due to an eclipse of the sun, nor can it be explained by astronomy or science.
How amazing that the one who suffered in darkness on the cross for our salvation said on two occasions, ‘I am the light of the world’, John 8. 12; 9. 5. He endured the darkness so that believers might share in ‘the inheritance of the saints in light’, Col. 1. 12.
‘Well might the sun, in darkness, hide,
And shut his glories in,
When Christ, the mighty Maker, died,
For His own creatures’ sin’.
Isaac Watts, 1674-1748
In Psalm 28, David wrote, ‘Unto thee will I cry, O Lord my rock; be not silent to me’, v. 1. When the Lord Jesus was on the cross, heaven was silent. During His earthly ministry, He said in prayer to His Father, ‘And I knew that thou hearest me always’, John 11. 42. But now His cry is unanswered, ‘O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not’, Ps. 22. 2, and there was silence from His third saying at the sixth hour until the final four sayings were uttered in succession at the ninth hour.
His silence was the fulfilment of Isaiah chapter 53 verse 7, ‘He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter … so he openeth not his mouth’. He endured all the mocking and taunting, the cruelty of the soldiers, and the crude, vulgar insults of the crowd with never a word - ‘Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again’, 1 Pet. 2. 23; but at the ninth hour He cried with a loud voice to heaven, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’
The word forsaken is one of the most tragic words in human language. David, who wrote Psalm 22, also wrote, ‘I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread’, Ps. 37. 25 - not even when the children of Israel ignored the commandment of the Lord and made a golden calf. And, worst of all, they attributed to the calf their deliverance from Egypt. As Nehemiah recounted their history, he could speak of a God who was ‘ready to pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and forsookest them not’, Neh. 9. 17. He continued to guide them and provided manna from heaven to sustain them for forty years.
In spite of the many failures of its inhabitants, the city of Jerusalem, the citadel of the Jews, was preserved. In Isaiah chapter 62 verse 12 it is called ‘A city not forsaken’, and in Psalm 48 verse 2, ‘the city of the great King’. Yet the Messiah, the great king, was crucified outside its city wall, where He was forsaken. He was forsaken by His disciples, though Peter vowed to be with Him even to death, and the other disciples all said likewise, Matt. 26. 35. In Gethsemane, when the arresting party approached through the darkness with their lanterns, torches, and weapons, ‘Then all the disciples forsook him, and fled’, v. 56. He was denied by Peter, betrayed by Judas, and forsaken by all. Even those who had received healing and blessing from His hand were nowhere to be found. ‘I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none’, Ps. 69. 20.
All through His earthly life He had enjoyed unbroken fellowship with His Father in heaven. He said, ‘And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him’, John 8. 29. But now He is forsaken by God, abandoned by earth and heaven. The same scripture that asks the question supplies the answer, ‘Why hast thou forsaken me?’ - ‘But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel’, Ps. 22. 1, 3.
‘Yea, once, Immanuel’s orphaned cry
His universe hath shaken,
It went up single, echoless, “My God, I am forsaken!”
It went up from the holy lips amid His lost creation,
That, of the lost, no son should use those words of desolation’.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, 1806-1861
A multitude of angels announced His coming into the world, an angel ministered to Him in the wilderness temptation, an angel came to strengthen Him in the Garden of Gethsemane; they watched over His body in the tomb and appeared to those who came there after His resurrection. Angels stood by at the ascension and spoke of His return to the wondering disciples.
But we do not read of angels being at the cross; He was alone. Some of those who stood by the cross misunderstood His words, and said, ‘This man calleth for Elias’ (Elijah). The rest said, ‘let us see whether Elias will come to save him’, Matt. 27. 47, 49. Little did they know that He was the one who had said, ‘Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?’ Matt. 26. 53. He had no need to call for Elijah.
This period of time was unique in all of eternity. He had hitherto experienced unbroken fellowship with God, but now His cry is, ‘Why hast Thou forsaken me?’ After Martin Luther had spent many hours in solitude contemplating this text, it is recorded that he said, ‘God forsaken by God - who can understand it?’ It was surely the most bitter ingredient in the cup which the Father had given Him to drink. He was forsaken so that we might be forgiven; He suffered dereliction for our deliverance; He was alienated from God so that we might be reconciled to God; His abandonment was for our atonement.
The lesson that we learn from this central cry from the cross is of the uncompromising holiness of our God. Such is His abhorrence of sin in every form that He ‘spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all’, Rom. 8. 32. Therefore, the challenge goes out to every believer, ‘Because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy’, 1 Pet. 1. 16.
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