On the cross, both Matthew and Mark record Jesus as crying out, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” In fact, these are the only words those 2 gospels record Jesus saying from the cross.
Think about that. The longest and the shortest accounts of Jesus’ life look at Jesus hanging from the cross on that First Friday, and they bring it all together with one word: abandonment.
This day we call “good” is, at its core, about a separation in the relationship of the Son and the Father — a community that goes back through all time, past time, into the reaches of the eternal relationship of love between Father, Son, & Spirit. And when Matthew and Mark summarize what Jesus is experiencing on the cross, they choose to point to a cleaving that cuts to the very core of the identity of God. A great and humbling mystery, encapsulated in Jesus’ words of abandonment that could perhaps be translated: My God, my God, why have You left me in the lurch?
These words of Jesus come directly from Psalm 22. Its words, attributed to David, have been cried out countless times since David’s era — by millions also seeking God in their time of distress. And in one phrase — the opening words of Psalm 22 — Jesus takes on himself all the words of the Psalm, and all of the human condition.
At the same time, John, in his gospel, is the only one to record Jesus saying, “It is finished.” All of the separation and abandonment and sin spoken of in Psalm 22 have been taken on completely by Jesus on the cross. Finally. For in Jesus, all the Powers of Darkness truly are finished.
Jesus’ words in John are also able to take us back to Psalm 22, where its last words read:
They will proclaim his righteousness,
declaring to a people yet unborn:
He has done it! (Ps 22.31, NIV)
Where Matthew & Mark use the first words of Psalm 22 to point to Jesus taking on our separation and isolation, John hints at the Psalm’s final words to remind us that Jesus has completed the work of God on the cross. The righteousness of God is what takes on our abandonment, and what completes the work of reconciliation.
Fleming Rutledge calls the Righteousness of God “an active, invading power” (italics hers) — where the crucifixion is “the definitive apocalyptic engagement with the forces of the enemy, at the frontier of the ages where Jesus’ self-abandonment was the ultimate weapon.”
This self-abandonment leads to our inclusion — reconciliation between God, people, and all of creation. And because of Jesus’ abandonment, all of this is accomplished. On the day I write this: Good Friday.
In a series on John 18 & 19, I recently gave a message focused on the words, “It is finished.” Listen at the link above.
