We're going to observe the Lord's
table tonight, and I'm going to attempt to preach on the revelation
of the mystery. The psalmist said in Psalm 73,
verse 22, so foolish was I and ignorant. I was as a beast before
thee. And that's the way I feel about
trying to deal with the subject I want to preach on this morning. The cry from the darkness where the Lord said, my God,
my God, why have you forsaken me? The six hour is new. The sun was at its zenith, and Christ the Lord had already
been on that cross for three hours, bearing untold physical,
emotional, and spiritual pain. He had a nervous system just
like you and I, and the physical pain he was enduring cannot be
imagined. There's no point in me trying
to describe it. The emotional pain, people were
mocking him and making fun of him and enjoying seeing him nailed
to a cross. It was a sporting event, and
they were spectators. And all of a sudden, it became dark. Can you imagine that? The sun was darkened. Darkness covered the earth. This was not a solar eclipse.
This was God turning the lights off. Can you imagine how terrifying
that must have been? These people who were mocking
him and making fun of him and enjoying his death, all of a
sudden at noon, darkness. I mean, there wasn't any light. You couldn't see anything. And during that time, between
12 noon and 3 p.m., we don't read of anybody saying anything. I suppose the people who had
been mocking Christ were now scared to death. I can't imagine
that, no light at all. And we don't hear where the Lord
said anything during this three hour time of darkness. And darkness is a symbol of judgment. Cast them into outer darkness
where there should be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And right about 3 p.m., there was a cry that came from
the darkness. Eli, Eli, Lama Sabathini, my
God, my God. Why hast thou forsaken me? During those three hours of silence,
unseen things were happening at this time between him and
his father. Unseen. This was God's judgment against
sin. And the son of God was made to
cry, my God, my God, why has thou forsaken me? And this is the middle of the
seven sayings of the Savior from the cross. He made seven statements,
seven being the number of perfection. The first statement was Father,
forgive them. They know not what they do. Christ,
the intercessor. Whoever he prayed for, you can
write this down. They were forgiven. This was
not some kind of generic desire. This was his. request to his
father. And his father always answered
his request. Father, forgive them. They know
not what they do. The second statement was after
the thief said, Lord, remember me when you come in your kingdom.
He said today, thou shalt be with me in paradise. Christ the King. His third statement was woman,
behold thy son. And then he looked at John and
said, behold thy mother. Mary was not the mother of God. He doesn't have a mother. He's the self-existent one. But Jesus of Nazareth had a mother
to let us know he was a real man with a mother. The son of God was also the son
of Mary. And the name he gave himself
more than any other name during his earthly ministry was the
son of man. You read that so often in the
scripture. The fourth statement was, my God, my God, why have
you forsaken me? We'll get back to that in a moment.
His fifth statement, I thirst. This speaks of his sufferings. I thirst. This is more than his
physical thirst, although no doubt he was physically thirsty.
But when he was cut off from his father, he said, oh, I thirst. His sixth statement. It is finished. As soon as I think about that,
I feel tension leave my body. It is finished. He said in John 17, four in his
great high priestly prayer, I finished the work thou gave us me to do. What this lets us know is he
is the redeemer and whoever he died for, they are redeemed and
their salvation is finished. finished. And his last statement was, Father,
into thy hands, I commend my spirit. And this is Christ, the
believer. He never stopped trusting his
father, even when he was forsaken. He never stopped trusting his
father. He said, though he slay me, yet
will I trust him. And that is precisely what he
did. Now, this middle statement. My God, my God, why have you
forsaken me? Is the ground of all the other
states. Father, forgive them. There's
one reason they'll be forgiven. Because he was forsaken as the
sinner substitute. That's the only reason for the
forgiveness of sin. He's not going to forgive you
because you're sorry or because you asked for it or because you
promise you won't commit that sin anymore. Forgiveness is for
one reason. He was forsaken as the sinner
substitute. Today thou shall be with me in
paradise. There's only one reason for that.
Because he was forsaken. That's why I'll be in heaven.
Because he was forsaken. He became a man for this. To be forsaken as the sinners
substitute. When he was thirsting, this is
why he was thirsting. He was forsaken by His Father. When He said, it is finished,
the reason it was finished was because He was forsaken and completely
satisfied the justice of God against sin. And when He said,
Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit, He completely trusted
His Father through all of this. My God, my God. At this time, he did not call
him father. Why? A forsaken soul cannot address
him as father. My God, my God. Why have you forsaken me? Now, forsaken. Forsaken. You and I don't know anything
about this. You may have felt it before, but not like this. My God, my God, why have you
forsaken me? Forsaken, this is not a type
or a shadow. This is reality. He was abandoned. He was forsaken. This is what
happens to damned souls. They're forsaken by God. Now,
I don't know what all hell is, obviously, but I know this, in
hell, men and women, are forsaken by God. And you know this forsaking that
he experienced? Damn souls who are forsaken don't
love God. They have no love for God. They
have no love for Christ, nothing but hatred. But this one who
was forsaken loved his father. And he experienced the fullness
of damnation. Real and unspeakably horrific. Real wrath against real sin. Felt reality of the wrath of
a holy God against sin. He's drinking the content of
that cup the father gave him to drink. The sins of his people. That's what was in that cup.
The sins. Of his people and the damnation
they deserve. Full sense. Felt sense. Of the abandonment. That my sin. Deserves. He who knew no sin
was made to know sin intimately. He was made sin. He literally bore the sins of
all of the elect. I'm getting to where I can't
stand to hear somebody say he bore the sins of everybody who
would believe or everybody. No, he bore the sins of the elect. Let me be real plain about that.
But he bore our sins in his own body. He bore our sins in his own body
on the tree and he was abandoned. Now that does not mean that his
father stopped loving him at that time. He didn't go from love to hatred.
God never changes. God's immutable. As far as that
goes, the Lord said in John chapter 10, verse 17, therefore doth
my father love me because I lay down my life. There was never
a time when the father loved him more than when he was completely
forsaken and abandoned by God. The withness. The withness. In the beginning was the word
and the word was with God. And the word was God. The divine witness at this time
was broken. And he no longer had his father's
presence, his father's favor, nothing but his father's awful
frown and hatred of sin. You know, I'm glad that this
was in the darkness. Because there's no way I can
enter into this. And it's a mercy, the Lord has left this in the
darkness. Martin Luther said, God forsaking
God. No man can understand that. And
you and I cannot understand it. We can believe by the grace of
God. We won't even believe if God
didn't give us the grace, but we can believe by his grace and
we can understand why we're not forsaken through this cry. Now, what do we see? What do we see? There's some
things we see and see clearly. And the Lord crying out, my God,
my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And here's the first thing
I said. This is how God sees sin. This is how holy God sees sin. Even if it's on His only begotten
and well-beloved Son, He kills Him because God is just and He's
of two pure eyes to behold iniquity. And we see from this cry of the
Lord Jesus from the cross how God sees sin. There's no such thing as a little
sin, is there? Sin is an infinite evil committed
against an infinite God. And this is how God sees sin. And this is nothing less than
what I really deserve to be forsaken. to be abandoned
of God. This is what I deserve. I understand
what Peter meant when he saw for the first time who the Lord
really is. And he said. Depart from me. I am a sinful man. Oh Lord. Peter was saying you don't want
to have anything to do with somebody like me. I am a sinful man. When the Lord cried, my God,
my God, why have you forsaken me? This was said that the scripture
might be fulfilled. You remember that great psalm
of the cross, Psalm 22? He gives the details of the cross
and the events surrounding it in that psalm a thousand years
before it took place. But David begins that psalm with
this cry. My God. My God, why have you
forsaken me? David felt as though the Lord
had forsaken him, and that's the way he felt when he was saying
that. But did the Lord forsake him? No. No. But he forsook Christ. And when
he said, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? It was
not because he didn't know. He goes on in that Psalm to say,
but thou art holy. That's why he was forsaken. When he made this cry, my God,
my God, why have you forsaken me? Once again, I speak what I don't understand,
but I know is so. The father didn't look at his
son and say, I know you're not really guilty of this. And I'm
punishing you for somebody else's sin. When he was forsaken, he no longer
had the blessed communion with God, the spirit, the third person
of the blessed Trinity that he'd enjoyed nonstop. He didn't have his people saying,
we know you're doing this for us and we thank you for it. We're
so grateful. No, they were in hiding. And
get this, when the Lord Jesus Christ was suffering on the cross,
not one time did he think, these are not my sins. He didn't think I know these
are my people's sins. He said, my iniquities have gone
over my head as a heavy burden. They're too heavy for me. You
see, my sin. Literally. Not figuratively. Not changing ledger sheets. My
sin became his. And God forsook him. You see, God wouldn't punish somebody
for somebody else's sins. I can't be punished for your
sins. It wouldn't be just. When God punished Christ, my
sin truly became His sin. In the opening chapter of the
New Testament, we have these words in Matthew 121, thou shalt
call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins. And that is exactly what he did. When he cried, my God, my God,
why have you forsaken me? This is how he did it. By being made sin. He did what no other man could
do. He made satisfaction for sin. Hebrews 1.3 says, when he had
by himself purged, made purification, put away, washed away our sins,
and that's what was going on when he cried, my God, my God,
why have you forsaken me? When he by himself purged our
sins, he sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high.
Now this is the eternal purpose of God. being fulfilled. He's the lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. I can't get over thinking about
this. The cross of the Lord Jesus Christ
was not God's response to us to clean up our mess. Our mess was for the cross. for
the glory of the cross, for the majesty of the cross. This is
God's eternal purpose being fulfilled. And do you know that there is
nothing that magnifies the attributes of God like God forsaking God? I want you to think about that.
How his justice is magnified. He won't let sin go by even on
His only begotten Son. How His righteousness is magnified. How His power is magnified to
put away sin, to die in the first place. How His sovereignty is
magnified. This is His purpose being done.
The cross. The cross. My God, my God, why hast Thou
forsaken me? Here's another thing that I know
is so I don't understand. I just believe. This is his love
for his church. His bride. His bride. Husbands. Love your wives as
Christ also loved the church and gave himself that he might sanctify it and
clean it. The Lord looked at his bride and said, I'm going
to pay their debts. They become mine so that they
might be one with me. My God, my God, why have you
forsaken me? So he could say this to us. I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. Doesn't matter what you've done.
Doesn't matter what you're guilty of. I will never leave thee,
nor forsake thee. The Lord will not forsake his
people. because he was forsaken as the
sinner substitute. Now, this is a true story. A
missionary had been trying to communicate the gospel to people
who had a very limited vocabulary, and he was trying to see if they
understood what he tried to teach them or preach to them. And a
woman made this statement. And I believe that this is so
profound. She said, he die or me die. He died, me no die. That's the gospel. He dies or me dies. He died. He was forsaken by God. Me no die. He that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all,
how shall he not? What could possibly prevent him
from freely giving us all things? Who's to lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies. Who
is he that can condemn? It's Christ that died. Yea, rather, that's risen again. He's even at the right hand of
God. Because he was forsaken, completely forsaken, I'm saved. And that's the only reason. Now
somebody may think, I see. I see what you're saying. But
how can I know if he did what he did for me? Don't you want to know that? I see him being forsaken. I see the beauty of it. I see
the justice of it. I see the righteousness of it.
I see the glory of it. I see the truthfulness of it.
I see the honor of God and the glory of God in this. I see those
things, but how can I know if He did this for me? How can I be sure that He did
this for me? Turn to Romans chapter 5. Verse six. For when we. Here's who he did for. This way. We. The same way that Paul spoke
of when he said we know. That all things work together
for good. We know they may not, but we
do. We did. when we were yet without strength, without spiritual strength. Not weak, but without strength,
without the power to do good. without the power to sin not. When we were yet without strength
in due time, according to the time. You know, I love the way
you read in the scriptures where they would try to murder the
Lord. His time was not yet. His time was not yet. And I love when the Lord said,
Father, the hour has come. The time he came to die for. For when we were yet without
strength in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. Now, there are two descriptions
given of that person that Jesus Christ, the Lord, died for. Without strength. Without strength. You have absolutely
nothing to bring to the table. Not a thing. Without strength. Without ability. Without anything. Without strength and ungodliness. ungodly. You know, an ungodly
person is an evil person, a sinful person. Now, who did Christ die
for? Those without strength and those
who are ungodly. Now, listen to me. If that describes
you, he was forsaken. He was abandoned by God. But he did something that nobody
else could do. He made complete satisfaction
in that. God is now, listen to me please,
may I, me listen to me. God's satisfied with me. He's plumb satisfied. Just as satisfied as he is with
his son, which he demonstrated when he raised him from the dead.
Complete satisfaction. Don't look to yourself for anything. Boy, it's dumb, isn't it? To look to yourself for something?
God is completely satisfied with him. He was completely forsaken
because he was completely made sin, and everybody he died for
is completely made the righteousness of God in him. And that cry from the darkness,
my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? That's why I'm never
going to hear him say anything but this. I will never leave
thee nor forsake thee. Let's pray. Lord, we. We don't even know what to say,
except we give thanks. And Lord, we confess. That the sun. Is everything. In salvation. in your sight and in our sight,
and we give thanks. In Christ's name we pray, amen.