#4: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me”
Matthew 27:45-49 - Victory Fellowship
March 14, 2021 - Rev. Roderick Grabski
4th Sunday in Lent
I. INTRODUCTION:
a. We pay keen attention to the words people say just before they die.
b. Jesus spoke seven times during the closing moments on the Cross. Before the darkness overwhelmed them, Jesus spoke three times. While the darkness hung, He spoke once. And after the darkness had passed, He spoke three more times.
c. The seven utterances of Jesus from the cross reveal God’s answer to our basic needs. Jesus spoke words on the Cross that are worthy of our study because of who, where, and why they were spoken - and what they mean.
d. Here we find deep expressions of our Savior in His time of terrible agony right as He paid the price of our redemption.
e. Jesus’ statements are taken from the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John - but assembled into what was probably their chronological as they were uttered. Jesus was consistent in His life and in His message until the end. Let us briefly reflect on the seven last words of Jesus before He died on the cross:
1. "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do."
2. "This day you will be with me in Paradise."
3. "Woman, behold your son…Here is your mother"
4. "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"
5. "I thirst."
6. "It is finished."
7. "Into your hands I commit my spirit."
f. Each week, for the next few weeks leading up to Resurrection Sunday, we will examine one of the statements Jesus made.
II. “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
a. This is the only expression of Jesus in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark. Both Gospels relate that it was in the ninth hour, after three hours of darkness that Jesus cried out this fourth word. The ninth hour was three o’clock in Palestine. One is struck by the anguished tone of this expression compared to the first three words of Jesus. This cry is from the painful heart of the human Jesus who felt deserted by His Father. Jesus feels separated from his Father.
b. In the darkest hours of his suffering, Jesus cried out the opening words of Psalm 22. And although much has been suggested regarding the meaning of this phrase, it was quite apparent the agony Christ felt as he expressed separation from God. Here we see the Father turning away from the Son as Jesus bore the full weight of our sin. There is a depth of feeling in this cry from the heart, made with an intensity matched only by the darkness which had draped itself over the terrible spectacle. It’s symbolic that the sun couldn’t shine upon such a scene as the crucifixion of its Creator.
c. The darkness lasted three hours. All the sin of the world, the awful legacy of the fall of mankind was laid upon Jesus.
d. "He who knew no sin was made to be sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him" (2 Corinthians 5:21).
e. Only the night before, Jesus had told his disciples that in his hour of trial they would all desert him but he said, "Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me" (John 16:32). But now at the climax of his passion, at the moment of making atonement for our sin it was necessary that even his Father should stand aside. Jesus had to bear the sin of the world alone - literally. God forsaken, He who was made sin for us was feeling the punishment of the sinner, being separated from God. How Jesus felt as his loud cry broke the dreadful silence of that moment of destiny we cannot know. Never before had he stood alone, forsaken by God his Father.
f. Although he was forsaken he never ceased to be his Father’s well-beloved Son, for he was carrying out his Father’s will and purpose in becoming our atonement for sin.
III. This Word from the Cross points us to the cost of the atonement made. It’s something we must never lose sight of. All during His ministry Jesus had known what it meant to be forsaken.
a. Early on, the members of His own family forsook Him. Nazareth, His home town, had forsaken Him. The nation He came to save forsook Him. But in every such instance He could always steal away to the fellowship of His Heavenly Father. But now, even God turns from Him.
b. Don’t lose the relevance here - because we are sinners we are destined to be forsaken of God forever.
c. The good news is this - Jesus offered to pay our sin penalty on the Cross!
d. The Scriptures say, “The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:6). Jesus was bearing the wages of our sins and therefore He had to be actually forsaken of God so that we don’t have to be forsaken of God forever.
e. If that doesn’t bring a Glory Halleluiah, I don’t know what will.
PRAYER
SONG: Glory Bound
