I. The DARKNESS THAT DESCENDED - a GREAT MYSTERY (45) A. It was a darkness of sympathy. B. It was a darkness of secrecy.
II. The LONELINESS THAT DISTRESSED - a GRAVE MYSTERY (46) A. From out of the loneliness I discern a cry of desolation B. From out of loneliness I deny any cry of distrust.
II. The BLINDNESS THAT DOOMS - a GRIEVOUS MYSTERY (47) A. Blind to the Scriptures B. Blind to the Saviour C. Blind to their sin
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Martin Luther, the great theologian and reformer of the sixteenth century, once sat down in his study to consider the question found in our text. For hours he sat perfectly still as he meditated on the text. Finally, after many long hours, Luther stood up from his chair, and he was heard to say, “God forsaking God! No man can understand that.” While we might not be able to understand it, we can certainly marvel at it. While we might not be able to understand it, we can certainly learn some poignant lessons from it.
Though there is much about the wondrous work of the cross that we understand, there is much that I am confident can be only be fully understood by the Father and His Son.
As the Son of God is suffering in humiliation and agony, it suddenly become midnight at midday. From the midst of that dark noon, a cry came out from the Man on the center. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
These words mark the climax of the sufferings of the very Son of God. The soldiers have cruelly mocked Him; they have arrayed Him with the crown of thorns; they have scourged and buffeted Him; they even went so far as to spit upon Him and pluck off his hair. In response to all that He suffered at the hands of men, not a single cry escaped from his lips. However, as the concentrated wrath of heaven descends upon him, He cries, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"
These are words are full of deepest mystery. Yes, this cry of the suffering Saviour is deeply mysterious!
Three mystery are wrapped up in this statement of the cross.
I. The DARKNESS THAT DESCENDED - a GREAT MYSTERY (45)
Here was a darkness at noon time. Here was a darkness not caused by the absence of the sun which is the occasion of our night. Here was a darkness in the presence of the sun!
Here is a strange paradox – “the Light of the world” (John 8:12) was suspended in darkness! This is a mysterious development. Something was happening in that dark three hours that cannot be fully explained this side of heaven. There in that darkness Jesus cried, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
A. It was a darkness of sympathy.
The Creator was dying on the cross, and all of creation was suffering with the Creator.
When the first Adam sinned he affected all of creation. When the second Adam died, He also affected creation.
Man took thorns (the result of the first Adam’s sin) and made a crown and placed them on Christ’s head as they mocked him. Those crown of thorns were symbolic of what Jesus did. He took our sins to the cross. He bore them in His body on the cross.
Creation wrapped darkness around the Creator when He died for our sins.
B. It was a darkness of secrecy.
For three hours, the midday sky was black as the darkest night. In those moments, the God of the Universe turned His back on His only begotten Son. While we do not understand all that is contained in this forsaking, we do know this – it has to do with sin.
In 2 Corinthians 5:21 it says, “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”
In Isaiah 53:6, the prophet says, “All we like sheep have gone astray…… and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.”
On that Roman cross, the sinless Lord Jesus bore on His shoulders the sin of the entire human race.
In those three hours Jesus was accomplishing a great work that He alone could accomplish. On the Day of Atonement, the high priest went beyond the veil alone. He carried on that transaction with God alone.
During the three hours of darkness, Jesus was carrying on an eternal transaction with His Father.
It is not till after the darkness that Jesus cried, “It is finished.”
II. The LONELINESS THAT DISTRESSED - a GRAVE MYSTERY (46)
Oh .. the pain that I detect in these words. There's no sadder word than the word "forsaken."
The Saviour gradually moved into loneliness during His final hours on earth. He went with His 12 apostles into the upper room. Judas later betrayed, and only 11 were with Him. He took the 11 to the Garden of Gethsemane; three entered into the garden with Him, and they went to sleep! Then Peter and John went into the courtyard, where Peter denied Him. And then the Bible tells us that they all forsook Him and fled. He was left alone!
Men forsook Him, but the Father was with Him. Jesus had said in John 8:29, "And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone.” In John 16:32 Jesus said, "Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is nowcome, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me." But now he forsaken of the Father.
The very word, "forsaken" is one of the most tragic words in all human speech. What misfortune is conjured up by this word - a man forsaken of his friends, a wife forsaken by her husband, a child forsaken by its parents! But a creature forsaken by its Creator, a man forsaken of God -O this is the most horrible of all.
David said, "I have never seen the righteous forsaken," but here we behold the Righteous One forsaken.
A. From the voice out of the darkness I discern a cry of desolation!
Look at the word "forsaken." It was used to describe a ship that had been abandoned. Here is a deserted Savior…. a deserted Son! He was all alone!
The word “forsaken” is very strong. It means to abandon, to desert, to disown, and to turn away from.
He went through darkness that I might have light.
When Jesus was baptized, God the Father declared from heaven, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." The same Son that brought pleasure to God the Father in the Jordan River faces punishment from God the Father on the hill called Calvary!
"Why would God the Father forsake God the Son?" Simply put it is because of what God the Son became!
He is forsaken of the Father so that we might never be forsaken of the Father.
The prophet Habakkuk said that God is, “…of purer eyes than to behold evil “(1:13). Collected and concentrated at Calvary were not just the individual sins of one man, but the total sins of all men, and they were placed upon Christ.
Knowing my own life, and my own sin, not to mention the rest of humanity, the question is not, so much, why did God turn away, but rather, how could He not? Why did God forsake His Son? It was at the sight of sin; my sin and yours that was placed upon His Son.
B. From the voice out of darkness, I deny any cry of distrust.
The Lord’s cry was one of agony but not apostasy.
It was a cry of distress but not of distrust. God the Father had withdrawn from Him, but mark how his soul still cleaves to God. His faith triumphed by laying hold of God even amid the darkness. "My God" He says, "My God,” whom is infinite and everlasting strength; I lean on thee, now.
In the moment of most intense suffering, the living Word sought comfort in the written Word. He quotes Psalm 22 :1. The Son of God quoted the Word of God in the time of His distress.
Where will you turn when life falls apart? Our Lord turned to the Word, and left us an example of how important it is to have a Biblical foundation.
The man whose faith is weak may talk about God, but the believing one will say, “My God.” If you faith fizzles in the dark it was flawed from the beginning.
When all visible and sensible comforts had disappeared, to the invisible support and refuge of his faith did the Saviour betake himself. He turned to the Scriptures!
The very point his enemies sought to make against him was his faith in God. They taunted him with his trust in God - if he really trusted in the Lord, the Lord would deliver him. However, the Saviour continued trusting though there was no deliverance, trusted though forsaken for a season!
Job had said of God, "Though he slay me yet will I trust him," and though the wrath of God against sin rested upon Christ, still He trusted.
O, what an example has the Saviour left us! It is comparatively easy to trust God while the sun is shining; the test comes when all is dark.
We must have faith to live by - true faith - if we would have faith to die by.
III. The BLINDNESS THAT DOOMS - a GRIEVOUS MYSTERY (47)
There were many people-the soldiers and others - before the cross. They heard His cry, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" However, they were blind.
Notice what they said in verse 47. Many of the reproaches cast upon the Word of God come from gross misunderstanding. Divine truths are often corrupted by ignorance of the scripture. Far too many hear what they want to hear or pervert what they do hear.
The Saviour’s language was doubtless understood; but some Jews who were present took occasion from it still further to deride him. It was a common opinion among the Jews, that Elias, that is, Elijah, was personally to appear just before te Messiah, and to assist him in entering upon His office. There being some similarity in the words employed by Jesus to the word Elias, some, who were present, misunderstood them and said that the Saviour was calling for Elias to rescue him from His present unhappy state.
2 Corinthians 4:4 “In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.”
The Tactic of the Devil
The desire of the devil is to veil or blind the lost person to their need for the gospel. He desires to keep them blinded all the way to HELL! He is constantly on the job!
The Target of the Devil
The target of the devil is the mind of the unbeliever .He desires to veil or blind their mind so that they cannot see their need of God’s salvation!
A. Blind to the Scriptures
He wasn't calling for Elijah. He was quoting Psalm 22:1. If these people had not been blind to the Scriptures, they would have recognized Psalm 22:1.
Jesus even said from the cross, “They know not what they do.” Ignorance did not excuse what they did, because they had the Word of God that prophesied of Him if they had only believed it.
B. Blind to the Saviour
Being blind to the Scriptures made them blind to the Saviour. Before them was the very Messiah, the redeemer of Israel.
The people before the cross missed God's purpose in the crucifixion of Christ. It's hard to imagine, but they mocked Christ during the darkness that covered the land. You would think they would have considered that darkness more carefully. When they heard Jesus cry, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me," they should have realized that Jesus was bearing their sin. However, they ignored the darkness and mocked Jesus.
Jesus was dying as their substitute! He was forsaken that they might be forgiven, and they were blind to it!
C. Blind to their sin
Their sin was being placed on the sinless son of God, and they failed to recognize it. How many fail today to recognize whose sin Jesus was dying for.
The story is told of a man who was in a meeting where one of God’s fine preachers was preaching in London, England. In the last service of the meeting this man didn’t come to the Lord, but he came under terrible conviction.
The meeting was over and the preacher was leaving. This man under conviction ran down to the train station and said, “O preacher, I need to get saved and I need your help.”
The preacher hurriedly said, “I have to get on this train to make my next engagement. So go home and read Isaiah 53:6. Go in at the first ALL and come out at the last ALL, and you can get saved.”
The sinner went home and read those words: “ALL we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us ALL.” The poor sinner said to himself, “Go in at the first all, which says we are all sinners-- and come out at the last all--which says the Lord has laid on Jesus the iniquity of us all. That means my sins are atoned for with the precious blood of Jesus Christ!”
1 Peter 2:24 –“Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree…”
How is it that millions of people seem oblivious to the danger of impending judgment and the certainty of Hell? It is simply due to spiritual blindness.
Conclusion:
Where sin had brought men, love brought the Saviour.
In 1839, Charles Wesley penned the words:
And can it be that I should gain,
An interest in the Savior’s blood,
Died He for me? Who caused His pain,
For me? Who Him to death pursued,
Amazing Love! How can it be,
That Thou, my God, should die for me?
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