Mark 15:33-34

New International Version

The Death of Jesus

33 
At noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. 34 And at
three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema
sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”). [a]

Matthew 27:45-46: "Now from the sixth hour until the ninth hour there was darkness over all the land.  
And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is,  “My
God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
Mark 15:33-34: "Now when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth
hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is
translated, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
THE FOURTH SAYING FROM THE CROSS 
At midday something most dramatic and unusual took place. 
Darkness fell over the land for 3 hours. This represented the terrifying judgement of God.
In this darkness Jesus cried out with a loud voice: 
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (Matthew 27:46) 
This is the 4th and Central Saying. It reveals the heart of his mission, the heart of his work on the cross. Christ
is God but he is also man. Here he speaks from his humanity- My God (the Father), My God (The Holy-
Spirit) He uses 'God' rather than 'Father' because he has lost that intimate fellowship. They'd turned their back
on him.
The saying comes from Psalm 22- a detailed prophecy of the sufferings of a crucified man written long before
crucifixion was even invented. 
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? 
Why are you so far from helping me, 
so far from the words of my screaming (roaring) (Psalm 22:1)
In all the physical, emotional and mental torment of his betrayal by Judas, 6 illegal trials, false
witnesses, mockings, cursings, spitting, sluggings, beatings, scourgings that Jesus had suffered at the hands
of man he was silent (Isa 53:7). All his pain and agony had not caused him to cry out.  
Then when he hung on the cross in extreme pain with his bones pulled apart, where every breath was a torture,
with many around him mocking his humiliation - he still did not cry out in pain. No, not once-not until midday
when the sun was overhead and suddenly darkness fell. Then in that darkness something happened that made
Jesus scream.
What could be so much more terrible that made him scream? In a moment your sins, my sins and the
sins of the whole world were put on him and God the Father and God the Holy-Spirit turned their backs on him.
He had lived a perfect holy life, hating sin-but now the sin of the world was placed on him. Jesus took our place
and bore our sins. He suffered the punishment that we deserved and which justice demanded. He died as a
Sin-Offering and paid the penalty for our sin. The wrath and judgement of God that we deserved now fell upon
him. (Isa 53:6). In the 3 hours of DARKNESS he suffered the equivalent of eternal hell. He had lived in the
fellowship and Presence of God his whole life, even from eternity, but now for the first time he was in darkness,
separated from God's presence and blessing (spiritual death) 
Now he drank fully the cup of God's Wrath upon sin. (John 18:11) 
This is the horror that caused him to scream the words: 
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (Ps 22:1)
Why did it seem like God turned His back on Jesus? 
Because: Thou are HOLY (v3). Since God is holy He can have nothing to do with sin. At that moment: He who
knew no sin was made SIN for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2Cor 5:21). 
So now the full force of God's righteous and holy anger fell on Jesus. 
We cannot imagine the horror he had to suffer. 
 What caused him to scream? It was the only thing that could -your sins, my sins, the sins of every
person who has ever lived. It was anticipating this in Gethsemene that caused him to sweat blood and ask God
to provide another way of bringing our salvation. But there was no other way. He had to drink the bitter cup to
the last drop. I'm so glad he did it! If he didn't pay the penalty for our sin, we'd have to pay the price ourselves. 
This is the ultimate revelation of his PER FECT LOVE for us (1John 4:10).
The 4th SALVATION blessing is PROPITIATION - the basis for every blessing. It is only because of Christ's
atoning sacrifice that God can freely offer us forgiveness and grace, because he fully satisfied God's Justice.
Our greatest need was for someone to take our place, bear the punishment for our sin and set us free from the
Wrath of God upon us. The Saying shows that Jesus bore sin and God's wrath for us, so that now God is free
to forgive and bring us back to Himself and pour out His grace, mercy and blessings upon us. Jesus spoke
these words, showing that he was bearing our spiritual death and separation from God on the cross, in order
that we can be re-united to God and receive His eternal and abundant life. 

These words were spoken from the cross to God to reveal that flowing out from the cross GODWARD, was a
propitiation, satisfying God's Justice and appeasing His anger upon sin. 
This in turn freed Him to pour out His abundant mercy and life upon mankind. Thus this central saying reveals
the central aspect of the work of the cross- which by satisfying God's Righteousness, provides the basis for
every blessing of God.
Jesus bore the sin of the whole world so that forgiveness and salvation is available to all through Christ. 
Now it's up to each individual to accept or reject God's offer of Mercy.
To the believer the propitiatory sacrifice of Christ is the basis for receiving all of God's grace, and results in a
life of gratitude to God, lived to please and glorify Him.
To the unbeliever it is a warning - that if God did not spare his Son when your sin was upon him, then He will
not spare you in the judgement if your sin is still upon you, as it surely will be, if you have rejected the
forgiveness and salvation from sin provided through Christ's atoning sacrifice
 A Study of Mark 15:33-34
It was in the beginning of our Lord’s earthly ministry that John the Baptist pointed to Jesus as He stood at
the Jordan River and said, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John
1:29).
Literally, John said, “Behold the Lamb of God, who is bearing the sin of the world.” That is, John identified
Him not simply as the One who would in the future bear, but as the One who was presently bearing, our
sins.
He bore the sins of His people, of His church, His whole life long—from His conception in Mary’s womb,
until the giving up of His life on the cross. He carried them upon Himself into the three hours of darkness
upon the cross, during which time He earned a full pardon for all of those sins by suffering the just,
horrible, and full penalty that the sins of His people deserved.
In certain places, the sin-bearing of Jesus Christ came to a heightened expression. In Gethsemane, the
garden where, in the hours before the cross, all the suffering that was necessary to remove those sins
was presented to Him in the figure of a cup handed to Him by His Father, and where He prayed three
times, “If it be possible, let this cup pass from Me, nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou
wilt” (Matthew 26:39).
The sins came upon Him markedly upon Golgotha when they crucified Him, and especially when He was
crushed in the jaws of death and poured out His own blood as a sacrifice for the sins of God’s children.
As we follow the account of our Lord’s crucifixion and death upon Calvary, we notice that at twelve noon a
marked change came over the cross. Up to twelve noon the Scriptures emphasize what men do to Him.
There was His trial during the night, the mockery, the crucifixion. And then, as they crucified Him at nine
o’clock in the morning, for the next three hours there is nothing but the jeering, taunting contempt at the
hands of men.
But at twelve noon there is a change — a change from what man does to what God does. For a veil of
darkness is cast over the cross. And from twelve noon until 3 p.m. all men are silent. God came to the
cross to speak a word of justice, a word of judgment, and a word of wrath. And it was at the end of those
three hours of darkness that God’s eternal Son in the flesh pierced the darkness with the cry: “My God,
my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34).
We want to approach to those words, those unfathomable words of the Lord on the cross. As we
approach those words today, we hear God’s Word, “Take off the shoes from your feet, for the ground
on which you stand is holy ground” (Exodus 3:5).
On the one hand, we are drawn to try to understand that cry. We will be taken, then, to the very heart of
the heart of the gospel, to the soul of the soul of the gospel. If we seek our life by faith in Jesus Christ, we
cannot but be drawn to the glory and to the majesty of those words.
And, on the other hand, we feel driven back by the mystery of God forsaken by God. We can only stand in
shame, as we consider those words, about how horrible our sin must be. We can only stand in
uncomprehending and amazing awe of how gracious God is, that He gave His own Son to eternal death
for us.
We read in Mark 15:33 , “And when the sixth hour (that is, twelve noon) was come, there was
darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.”
As I said, the Holy Spirit is directing our attention now to a change in focus that began at a certain time —
from noon until 3 p.m. a thick darkness fell upon the cross of Calvary. As I said, our Lord was crucified at
nine o’clock in the morning. For the first three hours, light shone upon the cross and Jesus could be seen
hanging crucified. The foot of the cross is very busy with clamor and jeering and ridicule and scorn. But
then, when the sun was at its zenith, shedding its brightest rays, when its light and warmth were at its
peak, a thick, horrible darkness fell over all the land and over everyone. No matter how drunken in
unbelief, no matter how stupefied in contempt for the Christ — everyone knew that something unusual,
something frightening was happening. And there was silence around the cross. Not a word was spoken.
Mouths were shut. For God spoke by sending a darkness darker than a hundred midnights.
What caused it?
Was it an eclipse of the sun?
No. No eclipse lasts for three hours, nor plunges the earth into immediate darkness. God did this. God
gathered up all the light of the earth and put His hand in front of the sun and closed the mouth of men.
How extensive was this darkness?
We read in Mark 15:33, “there was darkness over the whole land.” Luke tells us that it was over the
whole earth. And the word that is used by Mark can be translated, and is properly translated, earth. It was
over the whole earth. Midnight fell upon the earth as God came to visit His Son with all the holy wrath that
the sins of His people deserved. No camera could shine through that. This could never be portrayed. This
is God, now, in a moment of time, coming to His own Son to bring to our sins what they deserved.
What does that darkness mean?
The answer of the Bible is clear and undisputed. Darkness is a symbol of the judgment and the wrath of
God. We remember the ninth plague that fell upon Egypt before God brought Israel out of the land of
Egypt and poured His judgments upon Egypt’s gods and upon Pharaoh. We read in Exodus 10:21, “And
the Lord said unto Moses, Stretch out thine hand toward heaven that there may be darkness over
the land of Egypt, even a darkness which may be felt.”
It was a thick darkness, a darkness that no candle’s light could penetrate. Men would sit down in fear and
in dread. So the darkness that now descends upon Calvary is the darkness of God coming in His
judgment against sin. Jesus Himself made that plain when He characterized hell, the place of God’s wrath
and judgment on sin, as a place of “outer darkness.”
He said that the children of the world would be “cast into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and
gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12).
And the apostle Peter also describes hell as the place where the impenitent receive eternal darkness,
which is reserved forever for those who reject the gospel.
The darkness on Calvary, therefore, represented God’s judgments that were now being unleashed and
poured out in their full measure. God’s holy fury (for God is holy and righteous), which banishes sin to
outer darkness, this fury is going to be placed upon Him who hangs upon the cross in the stead of and in
the place of all those who were given to Him by His Father’s eternal grace of election.
The Lord knew that this was to happen to Him. In the Psalms He had spoken: “The sorrows of death
compassed me, and the pains of hell gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow” (Psalm 116:3).
Again, “All thy waves and billows are gone over me.” (Psalm 42:7).
The darkness of our hell, the darkness of what was owed by us, the judgments that deservedly were our
own would then be transferred completely to the Lord, the head of the church.
It was out of that darkness, near the end of a period of three hours, that there arose the loud cry of our
Lord that rent the silence around the cross. We read, “And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud
voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34).
Again the Holy Spirit emphasizes the time. It was at the ninth hour, that is, at the end of the three-hour
period of pitch darkness, the tail end, in the last moments, so that shortly after His cry the darkness is
lifted from Calvary and the light returns.
There have been three hours of silence, three hours when the boasting and blasphemous swagger of
men had been silenced. Men had their mouths shut before the holy God and they only groped in fear.
During those three hours, eternity’s darkness had fallen upon our Lord Jesus Christ.
What was done during those three hours?
A veil is drawn over our eyes. We cannot see this with our eyes. This cannot be portrayed.
But it brought Him to cry out, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
We are told that He cried out with a loud voice. It was not a muffled moan of a man on the brink of death.
It was not something that He whispered hoarsely to those who were nearby so that you would have to
bend your ear to hear what He had to say. No, it was a loud voice. We get the word “mega” and
“megaphone” from the Greek word that is used. “Mega,” tons, big. It was a loud voice, filling all of
Golgotha, filling the whole land around Him. In fact, this voice fills heaven and earth. Our Lord Jesus has
now hung upon the cross for six hours, bleeding, in the agony of the body, and now, for three hours, in
the unfathomable agony of soul. He has borne the unbearable. He has swallowed up the eternal hell of
God’s children. At the end, after a silence of three hours during which each person cowered and was
silent, Jesus marshalls tremendous physical strength, and His cry rends the air. It was spoken in a
language that all would know: “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani.” “My God, My God, why hast Thou
forsaken Me?”
What was that cry?
It was not a cry of despair.
He does not say, “Oh God, oh God,” but “My God, My God.” Whatever it meant, it was spoken by the
Lord in the confidence and in the faith that God was His God — “My God, My God.”
It was a cry of amazement, of the experience of abandonment — why, to what purpose have you
forsaken Me, have you abandoned Me?
His cry was directed to His God and it was asked in amazement, “Why have you abandoned, forsaken
Me?”
What does that mean?
We cannot fathom those words. We must bow in repentance and in thanks — repentance of our sin and
thanks for God’s grace.
But let me tell you a few things about what it does not mean.
It does not mean that our Lord complained in unbelief, that He asked, “Why hast Thou given Me over to
this treatment of men? Why have you let men do this to Me?” He is not asking that.
He knew the answer to that!
Nor is He asking the question because He does not know the reason. His words, “My God, My God, why
hast Thou forsaken Me?” are words that He is taking directly from Psalm 22:1.
And in Psalm 22:3 the answer is given.
Why does God forsake Him?
“But thou art holy in thy ways.” He knew that He stood as the substitute of God’s people and that God,
in His holiness, was now to bring to those people the wrath that their sins deserved. Only, God would
bring that wrath not to them, but to their representative. And Jesus knew He was their representative.
Still more. It does not mean that the Father, the first person of the Trinity, left the Son, the second person
of the Trinity, or that the Father was in any way displeased with Him. The Lord could say, “My Father
loveth Me because I lay down My life for the sheep.”
The Father loved the Son!
What does it mean?
It means this, that God, in eternal love for His people, had taken the hot coals of the holy judgment that
our sins deserved and placed them upon His beloved Son and gave His Son to suffer what we would
deserve in an eternity of the darkness of hell. The cup that the Lord saw in Gethsemane, a cup that was
forged by the holiness of God as it reacts against and consumes the sins of which we are guilty — that
cup He has now willingly taken and He has drunk it all.
It pleased the Lord to bring this to Him (Isaiah 53). Voluntarily our Lord has entered into this darkness for
us. In love for us, the Father had placed it all upon Him. God the Father took the judgment, which would
consume us eternally in hell, and poured it all into the soul of His Son. A darkness deeper than a hundred
midnights has been brought to Calvary.
And Jesus now has endured that darkness for us!
Let us allow the Scriptures, then, simply to explain the mystery to us.
“For he (that is, God) hath made him (that is, His Son in the flesh) to be sin for us, who knew no sin;
that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”
(II Corinthians 5:21)
“Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written,
Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.”
(Galatians 3:13)
The One whose delight it was to commune with the Father is now made to suffer all that it means to be
cast out by a holy God into the darkness of eternal hell.
The darkness that He deserved?
Oh no!
The darkness that we deserved. God had placed upon His Son the judgment that the elect of God
deserved in order that they would not bear that judgment but be made righteous in Him.
I know why He was abandoned of God.
Do you?
No, I cannot comprehend, I cannot at all fathom the depth of what is being revealed to us.
Jesus abandoned by His God!
In a sense I am glad that I will never comprehend the depth of that. But I do know why this had to be.
Do you know why?
The answer is this: So that I might never be forsaken of God.
We do not leave the cross shaking our heads in confusion asking, “Now what was that all about?” We do
not leave the cross as those who are leaving the movie The Passion of the Christ with some type of
emotional response to terrible brutality shown to a man, and somehow resolve that in the light of that
brutality we should live a different life.
No. That is not how the grace of God causes you to leave the cross!
As the cross is brought to you in the way that God intends it to be brought — through the Word and by the
preaching of the gospel — we leave the cross knowing exactly what has taken place. And we know why.
God has abandoned His Son, God has poured darkness down into the soul of His own Son on Calvary.
Why?
So that His children, whom He has chosen merely of grace from eternity, might have the light of life and
never be forsaken of Him. So that you and I, as the children of God, might have the light of eternal life.
That is the mystery of the grace and the love of God. The mystery is this: how awful is my sin! How deep,
how terrible, is the sin of which I am guilty.
How inexcusable it is!
And how incomprehensible and how glorious is the grace and love of God!
For He was forsaken in our place, so that we might never be forsaken. He was abandoned in order that
we might never be abandoned. As He cries out with a loud voice upon Calvary’s cross, all of God’s
children, who are brought to faith and repentance by the grace of the Spirit, now know that they shall not
be forsaken of God, that God will not deal with them as their sin would deserve, for He has done that to
His own Son.
At the foot of the cross, let us hear the gospel.
Why?
Why was Jesus forsaken of His God in the darkness of Golgotha?
God says the answer is this: Because I made Him to be a curse for you so that you, a curse-deserving
sinner, may go free.
I placed Him in the place of My people, of those whom I have chosen freely of grace so that they should
not be abandoned in the darkness of their hell, but that they might have the light of eternal life.
That is the gospel. It is entirely of God. It is entirely of His grace.
Do you hear it?
Do you hear it as a result of the work of the Holy Spirit in your heart of hearts?
Then bow in worship and be lost in praise and marvel.
And then go down to your house — no matter the way that you take, no matter the trials that God is
pleased to bring now into your life, no matter the difficulties, the tears, and the sorrows — go down to your
house with just one thing in your heart: I will never be forsaken of God.
By Carl Haak
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 Why Have You Forsaken Me?”
Mark 15:33, 34
(One Lord: So Great a Salvation)
April 14th, 2019
 
 
I. To Forsake
 
The word “forsake” is not one most of us use in our everyday conversations.
We're more likely to use synonyms like abandoned or deserted, or related
words like disowned or desolate. For example, we don't say, “I just noticed a
forsaken vehicle on at the end of the street.” No, we say, “I just noticed an
abandoned vehicle...”. We're more likely to talk about a a husband whose wife
deserted him, rather than a husband whose wife forsook him.
 
But forsake is word used all throughout the Bible. Deuteronomy 31 is a good
example of this. In verses 6 and 8 of that chapter, we hear Moses
encouraging God's people toward faith and faithfulness because Yahweh “will
not leave you or forsake you.” But when the reader gets to verse 16, we hear
God anticipating the people's inevitable faithlessness: “they will forsake me
and break my covenant”. This leads directly to the chilling reality of the very
next verse, verse 17: “Then my anger will be kindled against them in that day,
and I will forsake them and hide my face from them...”.
 
In fact, when the Bible uses words like forsake and forsaken, they are far more
likely to refer to people forsaking God and his word and his ways, than the
other way around. As Zechariah the priest would later tell the people,
“Because you have forsaken the LORD, he has forsaken you.”
 
In light of this possibility, David would later pray: hide not your face from me. Turn
not your servant away in anger, O you who have been my help. Cast me not off;
forsake me not, O God of my salvation. (Psalm 27:9)
 
Keep that word and those ideas in mind as we look together this morning at
Mark 15.
 
 
II. The Passage: "Forgive Them" (23:34)
 
You may recall that this month we're thinking together about what I'm calling
the “passion prayers” of Jesus. These are four statements that Jesus, while
hanging on the cross, directed toward God his Father. Last week, we talked
about Jesus' powerful please for his persecutors in Luke 23:34... “Father,
forgiven them. For they know not what they do.”
 
This morning, we are looking at Christ's passion prayer in verse 34 of Mark
15. Let's pick up the account in verse 33. We read this about the crucified
Jesus...
 
And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the
ninth hour. [34] And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema
sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  (Mark
15:33–34)
So as you can see in verse 34, unlike the first prayer, this passion prayer is
not a plea for pardon. It's a cry of confusion... of anguish... of grief. But what
exactly does it mean? Well, to better understand this cry of Christ, I'd like you
to think about three aspects of this passage: first, I'd like us to consider the
scene of his cry. Second, I'd like us to think about the source of Christ's cry.
And finally, third, I'd like us to meditate on the severity of his cry. But to
begin...
 
 
1. The Scene of His Cry (v. 33)
 
Verse 25 records that it was the third hour of the day when they crucified
Jesus. That was the Roman way of saying 9:00 in the morning. So based on
that, verse 33 indicates we are now three hours into the slow execution of
Christ. But verse 33 also takes us another three hours beyond that by
describing what took place from noon to 3:00pm on that Friday of Passover.
What does that verse tell us? We read... there was darkness over the whole land.
 
That was the setting for the cry of Jesus in verse 34. And we know there was
nothing light about that cry. And the afternoon sky over Jerusalem was just as
gloomy. In his Gospel, Luke describes these taking place “while the sun's light
failed” (Luke 23:45).
 
Now, beyond these simple statements, we know nothing else about this
darkness. But a passage like Amos 8:9, 10 reminds us that darkness was often
understood as a harbinger of judgment: “And on that day,” declares the Lord GOD,
“I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight. I will turn
your feasts into mourning and all your songs into lamentation...”.
 
This imagery of course would have pointed the Hebrews back to the Exodus
and God's judgments against Egypt, one of which was darkness (Exodus 10).
 
So, I don't think it's a stretch to say that the scene here is one set in terms of
divine judgment. God's displeasure evident in the sky above seems to point us
to God's displeasure with what is happening on the earth below. Keep that in
mind as we also consider...
 
 
2. The Source of His Cry (v. 34)
 
In talking about the “source” of Christ's cry, I'm thinking about the fact that
these words are actually a quotation from the OT. Just as Jesus did with the
devil in the wilderness at the beginning of his ministry, just as he did
throughout his ministry with both his followers and foes, so now he does again
here at the very end, with his final breath: he quotes Scripture. God's en-
scriptur-ated words give voice to God's en-fleshed Word, as he hangs dying
on the cross.
 
What verse is Jesus quoting in verse 34? He's quoting from a psalm of David,
Psalm 22. David cries out in verse 1 of that psalm... My God, my God, why you
forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning . His
lament continues in verse 2: O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by
night, but I find no rest.
 
What's interesting about this psalm is that we find traces of it all throughout
the Gospel accounts of Christ's crucifixion. For example, listen to Psalm
22:7, 8...
David writes, All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me ; they wag their
heads; “He trust in the LORD; let him deliver him; let him rescue him, for he delights in
him.  This of course is very similar to what we read in verses 29-32 of Mark 15.
 
Psalm 22:18, They divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast
lots. Again, that reminds us of what we read in verse 24 of Mark 15.
 
Psalm 22:16, For dogs encompass me; a company of evildoers encircles me; they have
pierced my hands and feet.” I don't think I need to explain the connection there.
 
Why is all this important? Because the cry of Jesus is just one more reminder
that the man suffering here is the Messiah of Israel, the son of David, who
assured his followers, after his resurrection: “everything written about me in
the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” (Luke
24:44) Thus, that just as David's words a thousand years earlier point us to the
coming Christ and the suffering Christ, we can rest assured that whatever is
happening here, it is part of God's plan; God's purposes.
 
And that idea drives us to consider, lastly...
 
 
3. The Severity of His Cry (v. 34)
 
Listen again to Mark 15, verse 34...
 
And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice  [in Aramaic], “Eloi, Eloi, lema
sabach-thani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
 
Even if you knew nothing about why Jesus uttered this statement, there are
several clues here that point us to the severity of the cry. First, we read “Jesus
cried with a loud voice”. This was no careless whisper or passionless
proposition. Jesus is CRYING out with a LOUD voice. The way he speaks
points us to the severity of what's spoken.
 
Second, as we've already discovered, Jesus is using Psalm 22 to give voice
to what he feels. That psalm describes the severe suffering of God's anointed.
 
Third, the way Jesus addresses God here points us to the severity of his cry.
In all the places where the Gospels preserve the prayers of Jesus, God is
addressed as “Father” every time. That's 19 times in 10 passages. The cry of
Christ recorded in Mark 15:34 is the only exception; this is the only time Jesus
did not call out to God as “Father”.
 
So what do we make of this? Why would Jesus cry out like this? Why would
he believe that God had forsaken him; that God had abandoned him; that God
had deserted him?
 
Well, to understand this, the first thing we need to understand, to whatever
extent we can, the relationship between Jesus and God the Father. In John's
Gospel we discover that relationship existed before the man Jesus existed:
 
No one has ever seen God; the only God [or “the only Son”], who is at the Father's side,
he has made him known. (John 1:18)
Jesus would later pray in light of that eternally existing relationship:
 
“... Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the
world existed... Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with
me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before
the foundation of the world.” (John 17:5, 24)
 
Given that relationship, it's no wonder that the 12-yr-old Jesus asks his
worried parents, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in
my Father's house?” (Luke 2:49)
 
And this ongoing relationship was evident throughout Jesus' ministry:
 
“The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hands.”  (John 3:35)
 
“All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son
except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son...”  (Matthew 11:27)
 
“For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing.”  (John 5:20)
 
And just before his crucifixion, Jesus prayed for us in light of that special
relationship:
 
“...Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be
one, even as we are one... so that they world may know you sent me and loved them
even as you loved me... O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you,
I know you... that the love with which you loved me may be in them, and I in
them.” (John 17:11, 23, 26)
 
Think about all that for a moment. Can you imagine that kind of connection
and closeness and commitment; the kind of intimacy, the kind of bond, the
kind of everlasting love between the Father and the Son? Even our most
precious and powerful examples of human connection are only a slight
shadow of this divine relationship.
 
So if that's true, what in the world could so drastically affect that connection
that it would drive Jesus to cry out as he did, “My God, my God, why have you
forsaken me?”
 
To make any sense of this severity, we need to go back to what the OT
revealed about God forsaking those who forsake him and his covenant. That's
the foundation for understanding the cry of Jesus. Using the language of
Deuteronomy 31 and Psalm 27, I think we can say that God has hidden his
face from Jesus. But why? Has Jesus forsaken God and God's covenant?
Absolutely not. Paul would later explain what caused this cry...
 
Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us...  (Galatians
3:13)
 
He put it this way in another letter: For our sake he made him to be sin who knew
no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.  (II Corinthians 5:21)
 
Jesus never forsook God, ever. But you have. I have. All of us have.
Therefore, in a way we cannot fully understand, as Jesus hung there on that
cross, he carried our curse, he shouldered our shame, he bore our sins to
such a degree that communion with the Father became condemnation from
the Father. Relational warmth was replaced with fiery wrath.
III. What Sin Does
 
Brothers and sisters, as the hymn writer expressed: What wondrous love is this,
O my soul, O my soul... What wondrous love is this, that caused the Lord of bliss, to
bear the dreadful curse, for my soul, for my soul.
 
As we talked about last time, these passion prayers of Jesus are ultimately so
powerful because of what they tell us about the One who prayed them. And
doesn't what we've seen this morning simply deepen what we celebrated in
the last lesson: the heart of Jesus? How exactly does it do this? Our
understanding and appreciation of the heart of Jesus is deepened as we
understand the severity of the suffering of Jesus. No, not simply his physical
suffering. And no, not just his spiritual suffering, as we might normally think
about it.
 
Yes, to suffer the full fury of God's righteous wrath is unimaginable. But in
doing so, to be cut off from the reassuring warmth of that connection, that
closeness, that commitment that He always knew? This morning, I hope all of
us can stretch and strain our hearts and minds in an attempt to grasp
something of that horrific loss that Jesus experienced.
 
You see, it's critical that your heart and my heart by undone by the heart of
Jesus. But it's also critical that you and I am undone by the horrific nature of
sin. Friends, this is what sin does. Brothers and sisters, this is what sin does.
It comes between us and God. It hurts and hinders that relationship. You may
not like dealing with the consequences of your sin, or someone else's sin. We
may not like what we see doing to our world. But the true evil of evil is
precisely what this cry of Jesus point us to: sin severs; sin stifles; sin
separates our connection with the God who made us. That is ultimately why
we are called to... forsake sin. Isaiah 55:7...
 
...Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return
to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will
abundantly pardon.
 
Look, I can't explain to you exactly what Jesus was feeling, or exactly how his
relationship with God was affected when he became the sin-bearer. I think
that will always be, to some extent, a mystery. But I can hear, and you can
hear, his cry. We can hear the anguish, the grief, the confusion, the searching,
the brokenness. And based on God's word, we know why he cried out.
Brothers and sisters, friends, we may not be able to fully grasp everything that
Jesus was experiencing, but we can grasp, we can lay hold of, we can cling to
both the One who cried out, and to the prize he obtained for us.
 
On the cross, in spite of the fact he suffered for our sins, Jesus endured the
loss of that eternal closeness with the Father in order that we might taste that
very thing. Do you treasure the divine connection, the divine closeness, the
divine commitment Jesus died to give you? And do you hate what stifles and
severs that? This morning, some of you are separated from God because of
that God rejecting, me-centered heart. Others of you have trusted Christ and
don't have to worry about being severed. But you are still allowing sin to do
what it does: to stifle your relationship with God.
 
For all of us, this morning is the morning to confess that sin to God, to
acknowledge how poisonous it is, to accept that, because of it, we have no
hope apart from the One who took the curse for us. This morning is the
morning to cry out along with Jesus, “my God”. Let's pray, turning to God in a
spirit of confession, but also confidence in the work of Jesus.