And I'll pick up reading with
verse 33, Matthew 27, verse 33. And when they were come unto
a place called Golgotha, that is to say, a place of a skull,
they gave him vinegar to drink, mingled with gall. And when he
had tasted thereof, he would not drink. This was given as a way of sort of helping to deaden
the pain. That's what it was used for. But he would not drink. And they crucified him and parted
his garments, casting lots, that it might be fulfilled, which
was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them,
and upon my vesture did they cast lots. And sitting down, they watched
him there, and set up over his head his accusation written,
This is Jesus, the King of the Jews. There were there two thieves
crucified with him, one on the right hand, and another on the
left. And they that passed by reviled
him, wagging their heads and saying, thou that destroyest
the temple and buildest it in three days, save thyself, if
thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross. And those who may not be familiar
with that verse Our Lord had said, destroy this temple, and
in three days I'll raise it up again. And they thought he was
talking about the beautiful temple there at Jerusalem. But no, later
his disciples understood that he spake of the temple of his
flesh. Destroy it, crucify it, and in
three days I'll raise it up again. He wasn't talking about building
that rock temple again. He was talking about the resurrection.
I'll raise it up. Likewise, also the chief priests
mocking him with the scribes and elders said, he saved others,
himself he cannot save. If he be the king of Israel,
Let him now come down from the cross and we will believe him. He trusted in God. Let him deliver
him now, if he will have him. For he said, I am the son of
God. All the passers by had mocked
and accused. Now the chief priest and the
scribes and the elders are mocking and accusing. And verse 44 says
the thieves also, which were crucified with him, cast the
same in his teeth. Now from the sixth hour, there
was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. 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 has
thou forsaken me? We'll stop the reading there
with verse 46. And the title of our message
today is from verse 46. My God, why? My God, why? The crucifixion. of the Lord Jesus Christ is the
most extraordinary event that ever happened in the history
of this world. Men had suffered and died at
the hands of cruel men before. From the blood of Abel, the first
murder, all the way through the Old Testament. They died wrongful
deaths at the hands of men. But though that was the case,
they were nevertheless sinners. And they had the sentence of
death upon them as fallen sons of Adam. We all do. They had to die sometime, somehow. But this one we've read about
this morning is the Son of God. He is without sin. And all that men could do to
him could not kill him. You see, death is the wages of
sin. He knew no sin. Just as sinful
men like you and I cannot naturally avoid death, This sinless one
could not naturally die. Nothing this world could do to
him could make him die. He could only die by taking somebody
else's sin upon himself in order to die. And that's what he did. The Lord Jesus spake seven times
while hanging on the cross and we read the four gospel accounts
harmonizing these statements in order to enumerate the seven.
First in Luke 23, 34, he said, Father, forgive them for they
know not what they do. He wasn't really praying for
the eternal salvation of every one of these. If he had been,
it would have been done. What he was saying was, Lord,
don't send them to hell for this. This must needs be. Second, he
spake to the repentant thief, Luke 23, 43. Today, shalt thou
be with me in paradise. What good news for that Poor,
dying sinner. Third, in John 19, 26 and 27,
he said, Woman, behold thy son. Talking about John. And then
he turned to John the Beloved and said, Behold thy mother.
And then the fourth statement, the central statement, is here
in our text, verse 46. Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, that
being part Hebrew and part Chaldean. That is to say, interpreted is,
my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And then Filth,
he spake in John 19, 28, that the scripture might be fulfilled.
He said, I thirst. And then sixthly, he spoke in
John 19, 30, when he said, it is finished. Not I am finished,
but it is finished. And then seventh, Luke 23, 46, he said, father into thy hands,
I commend my spirit. So that's the seven times he
spake from the cross. Now I want to take a moment to
look at the timing of these statements. We understand that Christ was
on the cross before he died about six hours from 9 a.m. in the morning until about 3
in the afternoon when he gave up the ghost. He made this last
statement, Father into thy hands I commend my spirit. Six hours. Their day began at
6 a.m. So the sixth hour was noon. And according to verse 45 here,
the sixth hour, there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth
hour. That's three o'clock in the afternoon. And that is a prophecy in the
old Testament. It went black. It went dark at
noon, at midday. And that's a prophecy from the
book of Amos chapter eight. and verse 9, and it shall come
to pass in that day, saith the Lord God, that I will cause the
sun to go down at noon. Well, when else could that have
been talking about? And I will darken the earth in
the clear day. It shall come to pass in that
day. You want to watch that phrase
in the Old Testament at that day. A lot of so-called prophecy
preachers has All this way on out yonder somewhere in the future.
I will tell you this Old Testament, the entire message of the Old
Testament was this. Somebody's coming. Somebody's
coming. And the message of the four gospels
was he's here. And the message of the epistles
is he's coming back. So what's that at that day? More
times than not at that day in the Old Testament is referring
to the coming of Christ. His life, ministry, crucifixion,
death, burial, and resurrection. And so it is here in Amos. Now,
three hours of darkness beginning at noon when the sun should be
the brightest part of the day. It gets dark. It gets dark. Now something was mentioned in
our Bible class this morning, Doc did, about trying to imagine
these occurrences we talked about in the Old Testament. These manifestations
of the power of God. The three Hebrew children and
Daniel and Samson. Try to draw a picture in your
mind of these things. Well, I want to say It's right. It is right. It is needful to
draw a picture in our minds of the crucifixion of Christ on
the cross. Oh, we can't, we can't imagine
anything like what it was, but we ought to, we ought to think
about this. See, that's part of sinful depravity is to be
able to even to read the Bible and not even pay attention to
what you're reading, read right over it. Think about something
else. Get on down there two or three pages and think, what have
I been reading? I hope I'm the only one like that. But it's
pitiful how we are. We're a pitiful shape. But to
imagine, to try to visualize this, the cross. In the first three hours, nine
o'clock till noon, in the three hours of light, Christ suffered from men for
God. He was there in obedience to
the father, but in this three hours of darkness, he suffered
from God for men. It's just the other way around. So try to imagine even in our
lives, say tomorrow or the next day, One day this week, suppose
if everything was just going along normal, nothing out of
the ordinary, and about noon it gets totally dark. Oh, how that would strike fear
in the hearts of all men everywhere. Well, it happened on this day.
It happened. Now, according to the text here,
it is at the end of the darkness, about the ninth hour, Jesus cried
out with a loud voice. Mark that, with a loud voice. It's not like some of this liberal
outfit talks that, oh, he was totally out of strength, and
you're just about gone. He could just barely move. No.
This is right at the end. He cried with a loud voice. He's
very much in control of the situation. He's very alert. with a loud voice, and he makes
this statement, or really it's a question, which is beyond the
comprehension of any of us. My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? This too being fulfillment of
prophecy. Psalm 22.1, that 22nd Psalm begins
with those words. My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? Now, this being the fourth, the
central statement from the cross, one writer said, here we enter
the holy of holies of Christ's suffering. Another writer, F.W. Krumacher
said, the Lord withdrew himself from the eyes of men. behind
the black curtain of appalling night, as behind the thick veil
of the temple. He hung there in the blackness
of midnight. He is in the most holy place.
He stands at the altar. He performs his sacrificial functions. He is the true Aaron and at the
same time the Lamb. It is then and there that he
cries out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? These are not just words imagined
by men. Somebody said no writer of fiction
would have put such an utterance upon the lips of his hero. I
want to tell you the Lord Jesus Christ is God's hero. He's our hero. This is no fiction. This is no false. This is deity
crying out to deity. This is deep calling under deep. Another writer, Russell Bradley
Jones wrote in his little book entitled Gold from Golgotha,
he said one would need to go to hell itself and go there free from the taint
of personal sin and go as the holy son of God to understand
any of this. How true, how true, beyond comprehension. But we know it happened. We know
it's true. We know our Savior on the cross spake these words. So I just want to comment a few
minutes on this. Really, it's a question. Why?
The why of it? First, our Redeemer was on the
cross and we've already said, not for His own sin, He had none,
but for the sins of His people. The sin of his people. Now if he was dying to pay for
the sin of all Adam's race, then not one could possibly go
to hell. Because our sins is the only
thing separating us from God. And if Christ removed that, there's
nothing else separating man from God. Christ was laying down His life
for the sheep, is what He said. He came to save His people from
their sins, is what He said. If He came to save all humanity,
He failed. But Isaiah 42.4 said He shall
not fail. is to accomplish something. He
accomplished what He came to do. Luke 9.31 at the Mount of
Transfiguration. There's a word in there you might
have never noticed when you were reading that. Luke 9.31. Christ
speaks with Moses and Elijah. You know that. And they speak of His decease,
which means His death. The word really is exodus, His
going out. speak of his decease which he
should accomplish at Jerusalem. Did you know the death of our
Lord was not a tragedy? It was not an accident. It was
an accomplishment. He accomplished something. It's not that he died hoping
somebody would believe on him. Oh, no. Oh, no. The same ones
that God the Son died for are the ones that God the Father
gave Him. And they're the same ones that
God the Holy Spirit is going to quicken and call out in this
life. Accomplishment. Accomplishment. Christ was bearing the judgment
of God upon the sins of His people. He's representing us. Now notice
he does not say in this statement, my father, my father. But he says, my God, my God. Now for himself, representing
himself, he could say my father. But he instructed us to pray
our father. Our Father. You see, our praying
is as members of His body, in which we represent the whole
body. It's wrong to pray selfishly. Christ never said for you to
pray, give me this day my daily bread. Forgive me my trespasses. Lead me not into temptation. Deliver me from evil. No, He didn't say that. We're
members of His body. And we're to pray this together
and for each other. Give us our daily bread. Lord, I need you to provide today. Lord, Brother Bobby also needs
you to provide today. Brother Robert also needs you
to provide today. Give us! our daily bread. And the Lord
said, you pray like this, forgive us our trespasses. Lord, I hadn't been perfect.
Please forgive me for thinking everybody else ought to be perfect.
Forgive us all, Lord, our trespasses. Lead us not into temptation. Deliver us from evil. And we pray, Our Father, Our
Father. And so were Christ representing
Himself here, He could have said, My Father. But with our sins
upon Him, He says, My God, My God. In the first of those seven sayings
we mentioned a few moments ago, it's Father. Father, forgive
them. For they know not what they do.
In the last of the seven sayings, it's Father, into thy hands I
commend my spirit. But in this fourth saying, it's
not Father. It's God. My God. He's hanging there in our stead. He's not suffering. as the sinless
Son of God in His deity, but He is suffering as the vilest
of the vile, the lowest of the low. He is suffering for the
likes of you and I. One writer said God was dealing
with His Son not as a loving and merciful Father dealing with
His child, but as an offended and righteous judge. with an
evildoer. God regards His Son as the greatest
sinner to be found under the sun on this day. And He discharges upon Him the
punishment, the full weight of His wrath for the sins of His
people. In Isaiah 53, that tremendous
chapter, so vividly describing the crucifixion, written, pinned
down more than 700 years before Christ died. Of course, it's
the word of God. He knew it just as well then
as he did when it happened. He knows it now. Calvary is just
as fresh in the mind of God today as it was 2,000 years ago when
it happened. But Isaiah, the prophet, makes it clear that
Christ's suffering is not for himself, but for his own. Verses 4 and 5, surely he hath
borne our griefs. and carried our sorrows. Yet
we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he
was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. And the chastisement of our peace
was upon him. And with his stripes, we are
healed. Oh, how blessed, how blessed. You've heard the healing preachers,
a lot of them like to make this physical healing. And they'll
quote this, by his stripes we're healed, by his stripes we are
healed. Well, you see, God does heal
physically as he wills. We know that. Many of us have
experienced that. But this is not physical healing
he's talking about here. He's talking about spiritual
healing. He does not say he was wounded for your backache. He was bruised for your arthritis. That's not what it says. It says he was wounded for our transgressions,
our sins. And he was bruised for our iniquities. our sins. And by His stripes, by His suffering,
our sins are gone. We are healed. Now, next, His
suffering in our stead must involve being forsaken of God. The Father never would forsake
the Son. in the Son's own person and perfection. But as our representative, hanging there in the character
of such as we are, God must forsake him. And Christ could not truly
represent us otherwise, because it's only there, it's
only there in the darkness of God's forsakenness that He reaches
to our low estate. You want to know what your low
estate is by nature? Alienation. God forsaken. Unless He in mercy and grace
comes to your heart and quickens you, makes you alive in Him. Forsaken. Forsaken is the saddest word
in any language. And to be forsaken of God is
the worst condition imaginable. The term implies three things.
To leave or abandon. To leave down. Beaten down, defeated, defenseless. And third, to leave in. That
is, locked into that condition of abandonment. Locked into defeat
and helplessness. And until the Spirit of God comes
your way, that's where you are. That's where this dark world
is today. Christ our Redeemer, from the
eons of eternity past, in full and precious fellowship with
the Father, a fellowship never, never before broken. Every thought of His mind had
been God's mind. Every move He made, every step
He took, every word He spake, had been God's will, but now
forsaken. Dr. B.H. Carroll, noted Baptist
theologian, said, on the cross, our savior died the spiritual
death, which is alienation from God, forsaken, forsaken. Another writer said this is called
the cry of dereliction. The word suggests a derelict
ship, abandoned, forsaken. A derelict ship is one that has
no captain. It has no crew. It has no compass. It has no cargo. It's abandoned.
It is bound for no port, and thus it has no meaning. Forsaken. Forsaken. David of old said,
I've never seen the righteous forsaken. He was this day. He was this day. Then this one on the cross, though
without sin, representing his sinful people. It involves being
forsaken of God, which means condemnation. Condemnation. John Calvin said, our Redeemer
endured the torments of the damned. Psalm 116.3, the pains of hell
get hold of me. Psalm 1610, for thou wilt not
leave my soul in hell. And don't misunderstand, the
hell referred to there is not flames of fire. Unimaginable as this is to us,
it was worse than flames of fire. It was the hell of separation
from God, condemned by The one you had been in perfect fellowship
with for eternity. Forsaken, condemned, alienated
completely. The songwriter had it right in
that particular stanza of the old song, 99. But none of the
ransomed ever knew how deep were the waters crossed,
nor how dark was the night. that the Lord passed through,
there he found his sheep that was lost. He went to the very
bottom of the deep valley of God-forsakenness and condemnation. Where you and I ought to be is
where he went for us. He joined Shadrach, Meshach,
and Abednego in the fire, the fiery furnace, Nebuchadnezzar's
furnace. But no one joined him in God's
furnace. He said, I trod the winepress
alone. The fury of the wrath of almighty
God is poured out upon him. You remember at his baptism,
Matthew chapter 3, the heavens opened and God spake these words,
this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. Again, at the
end of his ministry, at the Mount of Transfiguration, Matthew 17,
Luke 9, Mark 9, again the heavens opened and the voice spake, This
is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. But not this day, not this day. Instead of the brightness of
midnight, it was the darkness of midnight. When he was born, though it was
night, The scripture says, the glory of the Lord shone round
about. It lit up at midnight, but when
he died, though it was daylight, the darkness of night fell. He
who knew no sin was made sin for us. And then the final thought,
the why of it all. That was the question. My God,
why? Why must it be this way? Turn with me to Psalm 22 for
the answer. Psalm 22. Psalm 22 is a vivid description
of Christ's sufferings. often called the Psalm of the
Crucifixion. And we referred already to verse
1. Same words as our text. My God,
my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Some liberals say, concerning
these same words on the cross, that Jesus was just about out
of it, and in some subconsciousness, He managed to mutter these words
from this psalm that he'd learned in his childhood. Well, now to
me, that's blasphemous. He never learned this in his
childhood. Honey, he's the lamb slain from the foundation of
the world. He's not subconscious. He's not
muttering. He's very alert. We already referred to this.
cried with a loud voice these words. Psalm 22 is the prophecy. Matthew 27 is the fulfillment.
But why? Here's the reason. Psalm 22.
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so
far from helping me and from the words of my roaring? This is the Psalmist David. And
he's crying to the Lord over a troubled time in his own life.
But at the same time, by divine inspiration, the Holy Ghost is
pinning this down about the Son of God on the cross. See? Why is my cry to no avail? Verse
3 gives the answer. But thou art holy. That answers every question.
That answers every misunderstanding about God that we can possibly
have. Thou art holy. Thou art holy. Lord, we don't understand many
things, but Thou art holy. Why would He forsake His beloved
Son on the cross? Because in His beloved Son on
the cross, He saw you and He saw me. That's why. But thou art holy. He couldn't
just stop it and say it's enough and remain holy. Oh no. His infinite
holiness, His justice, demanded the full payment. Why? Because we are full sinners. That's why. His holiness and justice demanded
the ultimate sentence. Why? For we are the ultimate
sinners. That's why. Almighty God saw from eternity
Not just that you might fall in the gutter occasionally. No,
no. He saw your very existence, a
gutter of filth and uncleanness and deserving the full judgment
of God. That's why it's poured out on
his son. God is holy. We are unholy and Christ died
for us. One final thought, I read about
our country's involvement in the First World War. And the writer I was reading
said, our soldiers went out singing in spite of the danger they faced.
They knew there would be casualties, but the prize would be worth
the price." Think about that. The prize would be worth the
price. They were marching out to usher
in a new day. And then he said this, they were
fighting a war to end war. Of course we know now a hundred
years later Such was not the case. It did not end war. But concerning our Redeemer on
the cross, I thought about this. That's exactly what He did for His people. For God's charge against us,
He fought a war to end war. and made peace, exhausting God's
wrath against His people. And when He exhausted the wrath
of God against His people, He said this, it is finished. I fought the war that ended war. And there is therefore now new
condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. We are now accepted
in the Beloved. We are now, Colossians 1.22,
holy, unblameable, and unreprovable in God's sight. The wrath of
God not gone from all humanity. John
3.36 says the wrath of God abideth on unbelievers, even now. But for God's children, there's
no more wrath. No more wrath. My God, why? And Paul said for his great love,
wherewith he loved us. That's why. That's why. Thank you for your attention.
Stand with me again. We're so happy that you came
out today. Brave the cold. I've given you
what the Lord put on my heart and I trust it will live and
we will meditate on these things of our Lord's suffering. The
price he paid for our redemption.