Forsaken for us

About the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” – which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  Matthew 27:46

Forsaken.  It means to be departed from … left behind … left alone … completely abandoned.

I shudder at the thought of an existence with no God.  Even amid the most horrible atrocities of this age, God is still present.  Can we even begin to imagine his absence?  We cannot.

So we hear Jesus’ cry and ask, Why did he suffer abandonment by his Father?

Simply this: so we wouldn’t have to.

When God moved Adam into Eden, he warned him not to “eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”  Everything God created was good; in its entirety, his creation was very good.  That’s what he wanted for us.  And he warned Adam that, were he to pursue knowing both good and evil, he would die.  He would be separated from God.  As we painfully know, that became his lot and ours.

But God’s heart is not for separation; his passion is for life and re-birth – his Spirit living in us, and us reunited with him.  On the night in which he was betrayed, Jesus asked his Father to remove the chasm between us and him, and to restore the oneness we once had.  For those who would believe, he prayed, “May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.  I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me” (John 17:21-23).

Did you catch that?  As the Father indwells the Son, so the Son indwells those who entrust their lives to him.  Jesus doesn’t separate us from him; he reunites us with him.  He does not condemn a good people; he saves a sinful people.  We are separated no more!

And we carry with us this message of peace.  The price has been paid for all.  Ours is simply to believe.  And rejoice!

[Messianic in nature, Psalm 22 is quoted in the New Testament more than any other Psalm.  Jesus himself spoke from it as he suffered separation for us.  Click here to read Psalm 22.]

Psalm 22

Prayer is Crying

The amazing Bible is set apart from any other book for many reasons, one of them being fulfilled prophecy. In this psalm alone, hundreds of years before the Romans came to power, David prophesied that the Jewish Messiah would be crucified. The details he included are incredible. Check this out for yourself:

Prophecy                                                                     Fulfillment

Messiah would be forsaken (verse 1)                           Matthew 27:46

Messiah would cry out in darkness (verse 6-8)             Matthew 27:45-46

Messiah would be mocked (verse 6-8)                         Matthew 27:39-40, 43-44

Messiah would be “poured out like water”                    John 19:34

(verse 14)

Messiah would be thirsty (verse 15)                            John 19:28

Messiah would be crucified by non-Jews                     Matthew 27:27-31, 35-36

“dogs” (verse 16)

Messiah’s executioners would gamble for                    Matthew 27:35

His robe (verse 18)

Jesus cried out to the Father, just as we do. His pain was real as ours is. God allowed him to go through intense agony for a far greater cause, as he does with us. The difference is that the pain of Jesus was to save us…......wait, isn’t that the reason for ours as well? Are not the burdens and struggles we face similar to those of our savior? God waits for us to cry out to Him as Jesus did. He longs for us to seek his love and mercy through all our trials, so go ahead and cry out to Jesus! He's "been there, done that." He understands.

Read/Listen to Psalm 22

Listen to Cry Out To Jesus by Third Day

Psalm 22:12-21

"But you, LORD, do not be far from me. 

You are my strength; come quickly to help me. 

Deliver me from the sword, 

my precious life from the power of the dogs. 

Rescue me from the mouth of the lions; 

save me from the horns of the wild oxen." (Psalm 22:19-21)

Our lives are filled with many seasons (Ecclesiastes 3).  There are times when we face sickness and even death; times when a new life brings joy and happiness, then too there are the periods when we search for meaning and rejoice in peace and serenity.  Seasons can change from day to day, just as life does.

Whatever the stage we find ourselves, God is there with us.  My journal is filled with pleas to Him to keep me close.  I know I don't need to beg Him to stay close to me - that is where He always is.  But, sometimes I will stray or merely move away, out of earshot.  It is those times I must ask God to keep me close to Him.

The line above which is in bold (emphasis by this writer) is a prayer I keep tucked in my heart and use daily.  

You are my strength; come quickly to help me. A day doesn't go by when I don't need His help.  What season do you find yourself residing in today?

Read Psalm 22 text here.

Listen to Psalm 22 here.