# Eli, Eli, Lama Sabachthani

Key Passage: Matthew 27:45-46
Date: June 7, 2024

We are in Matthew chapter 27, and we are going to read just two verses over there as we focus on the cross while leading up to the Lord’s Supper. In Matthew 27, we are going to focus really on nine words that Jesus said when He was on the cross. There are seven utterances typically we call them of Jesus when He is on the cross; this is the fourth of those, so really the middle one right here.

It is amazing how the Bible can pack so much into just a few words. Just incredible. It is an infinite book, from an infinite God. We will never figure it all out. The Bible is so shallow, no one will drown in it, but it is so deep, nobody gets to the bottom of it.

Somebody can preach it all their life in Bible College and all that, and they still have it all figured out. None of us do. Don’t act like you do because we don’t. It is just a wonderful book. It is infinite, and it is an amazing, amazing book that God has given us.

We are in Matthew 27, and we are going to start in verse number 45. Verse number 45.

And the Bible says, “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour.” I always start at 6 a.m., so 6 plus 6—we are talking about noon time here, all right? Now, from the sixth hour, there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour. That would be 3 p.m., so from noon to 3.

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 hast thou forsaken me?” For just a bit, those nine words: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”

I want you to notice the first four words of this utterance. When Jesus starts off, He says, “My God, my God.” During the time of the darkest hour, a time of pain and agony, a time of trial, the sinless Son of God never one time turned against His Father. He was questioning a little bit—He said, “Why”—and let’s understand it; we will talk about that in a minute here. But in the midst of this, He did not turn away, He did not get bitter, He did not get mad. He didn’t say, “Well, full of Christianity,” He didn’t say, “I’m tired of it all.” He said, “I’m in this darkness, got the sin of the world on me.” He did not turn and get mad at the Father. He calls Him “My God. My God.”

It is very interesting. Look over in Psalm 22. It is a wonderful prophecy scripture. In fact, we have taken a whole Lord’s Supper and just went through the cross from Psalm 22 before. It is a great passage of scripture about Jesus on the cross. It is the Old Testament prophecy of Jesus. I want you to notice something about it.

Look at Psalm 22, verse number one right there. Psalm 22, verse number one. He says, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping me? And why from the words of my roaring? O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not. And the night sees it, been dark for three hours, and am not silent, but thou art holy.”

That kind of reminds me of Job, when Job went through the trials and he said, “God, I can’t find you on the north and south and before me and on the east and the west. I can’t find you. Before me, behind me, can’t find you.” But he said, “You know what you are doing. You try me. I will come forth as gold.”

And Jesus, He is going through the toughest of times. In the middle of all, He says, “My God, my God.” And there a little bit more light shined on it. He says, “But thou art holy.” He was not turning on God. He was not bitter and angry at God. He said, “But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel.” I reference that little phrase often in Sunday school. About every Sunday morning we try to have praise times, but it is a little interesting thought. It is a little bit more to it than that. It is in the roughness of times when you praise God, He inhabits that.

Jesus here on the cross in the darkest of hours, He became sin. It is always amazing to be over there where He says, “He who knew no sin became sin for us.” Wow. How could the sinless one, the sinless Son of God, how He could become sin? Just think about that. The sin of mankind is filth and the dirt of it.

Have you ever just dealt with a dirty situation? I mean, just sometimes you have to deal with maybe just the dirt of the world—molestation, different things, and the awful things—and you come out of dealing with that little bit, and you just feel dirty from it all. Can you imagine Jesus? He who knew no sin became sin for us. Wow. He became murder. He became filth. He became robbery, cursing, just the filth of the world. He who knew no sin became sin for us.

But in the middle of all that, when He was taking all the sin of humanity, the eternity past and the present and the future, taking all the sin on Him, and yet He never denounced Christianity. In the middle of all of it, He still said, “My God, my God.” He didn’t turn His back. He didn’t get bitter and mad. He still called Him “My God.”

Now, here is the amazing thing about it. Look if you will over in Matthew 16. By the way, keep your finger there in Psalm 22; we will go back to it a little bit later on here. Matthew 16, we can find there several other places in Scripture. But notice that is Matthew 16, and look at verse number 24.

Matthew 16, verse number 24. Then said Jesus unto His disciples, “If any man”—notice that, any man—it does not matter who you are: a preacher, a layman, a Sunday school teacher, or a teenager. Then said Jesus unto His disciples, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.”

If you are going to follow Jesus Christ, if you are going to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, you have got to take up your cross. Now, when you take up a cross, friend, that means you are willing to die. Imagine Jesus, all that has been done to Him, and yet He was willing to just take it. When I have been mistreated, they are not fair to me—you die to that. You die to all the mistreatment. You die to how you feel and the way you wanted to get back, and all these—you die to that. You take up your cross. So it is not fair that I have to go through this. Someone says, “It is not fair that I have got a spouse like this. It is not fair that I have got to go through this trial. It is not fair. I have got this burden. I have got this way to have to carry it all the time.” You die to it. “I am willing to take up my cross. I am willing to die to these feelings and thoughts I have.”

By the middle of all that, Jesus won the greatest victory there ever has been. When you and I are willing to take up our cross, that is what God… God brings right picture, but part of it. When Jesus, He never turned His back. He did not do that. In the awfulest, the darkest of times—you know the devil loves to work in darkness. Imagine those three hours how the demons of hell and Satan himself were just bombarding Jesus. Yet at the end of those three hours, He still said, “My God, my God.” He never turned His back. And God brought a great victory, the greatest victory there ever has been, through that.

Now let’s keep going just these nine words. First part, just briefly: “My God, my God.” Then what is the next word Jesus says over there? “My God, my God, why?” Now let me say this: Jesus was not bitter, and He was not shaking His fist. You just called Him your God twice. Wouldn’t it be clear to everyone—the demons—no, I am not turning my back on my Father. Everybody wants to know, “My God.” But He does say, “Why?”

Can I say there are times when it is wrong for a Christian ever to ask God why? Well, Jesus did. There is nothing wrong with that. If I do it out of bitterness and anger, shaking my fist, there is a problem. If you are going through trials and troubles and just heartbreak, you cannot understand what is going on, and just the heartbreak of it all, there is nothing wrong with this sincere child of God coming to the Father and saying, “Why?” Jesus did that. Why? Sometimes that helps you not to get bitter. I ask them why. Sometimes that is when God can say, “Well, I am trying to get this self-righteousness out of you. I am trying to work this thing through. I have got a reason for that.” I think it is very wise for an individual to come to God and say, “God, why all these things?” It may be that when God right at that moment can say, “This is what I am trying to do in your life.” It is not bad. It is not sinful. That is following Jesus’ pattern. He says very clearly, “Why?”

Jesus had done nothing wrong. You are saying about all the physical pain Jesus is going through. Sometimes we forget the night before when the soldiers came in—God, remember Judas and the kiss of betrayal—and they took Him that night. They took Him over there, and the Jewish people were dealing with Him that night. It was a mockery of a trial. The high priesthood—it never supposed to happen. Father-in-law, Caiaphas, and it is both of them, particularly—oh, just so many things about it was all wrong. And just a mockery of a trial, and they were there. That is when they spit on Him. That is when they buffeted Him. Typically when they buffeted Him, they put a black bag over you, and they just hit you. I believe that is when they slapped Him. “Hey, tell us who did that if you are the Messiah,” on and on. Just that night, they tortured Him all night long. Then the next morning to Pilate. The Jewish people did not have the authority. They did not want to do it to have someone executed, so they took Him to the authorities to Pilate, and back and forth to Pilate. The crown of thorns. We got this crown here, I think we do. There we do. I went the wrong way, amen.

I took that crown of thorns, and they put it on His head. And more than that, the Bible says they took a reed and they beat it down. Imagine those thorns went into a skull. And put the crown of thorns on Him. Just talking about the physical pain, Jesus went through. And they plucked His beard out. Wow. They took the cat o’ nine tails, you know, the whip—it has got those tails at the end of it, and typically they would weave into there some sharp rocks or makeshift glass or copper, whatnot—and they would take that thing 39 times, particularly: 26 times on the back, 13 on the chest, and they would just take it, wrap around the body, and they would just pull that thing. I always think of like a lion, you know, you think of the claws, and just as it rips, and those just tails would rip through the body of Jesus.

Look over in Psalm 22. I think it speaks to that a little bit. Look at Psalm 22. Look at verse number 17. I think He is speaking really of that and what happened from the cat o’ nine tails. Look at verse number 17.

Verse number 17, He says, “I may tell all my bones: they look and stare upon me.” You say, “What does it mean?” I think it means that they lacerated Him in certain places to the bone, and they could stare at His bones. He was just cut up like a piece of meat. And you can see the bones of Jesus. Talk about the pain. There is the physical pain Jesus went through for you and I on the cross of Calvary.

Look at verse number 16. Verse number 16: “For dogs have compassed me about: the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me. They pierced my hands and my feet.” Fooey on the Jehovah’s Witnesses who say He was just tied. They never drove a nail in His hands. No, no, no. You read your Bible. It is in the New Testament and Old Testament. They pierced His hands and feet. By the way, no mistake either. It was on the cross. Yeah, they pierced. This is the physical pain. Can you imagine when they drove that nail? Boom. To His hand. The physical pain of the cross. All that Jesus is going through.

Look at verse number 14. Verse number 14, Psalm 22, verse number 14: “I am poured out like water.” That is interesting. Many think doctors have studied. Some doctors think that in the garden we began to pray, we began to sweat great drops of blood, and some say He almost died there. Remember, He did not. And they say His heart really was just breaking, and that is when over time your heart kind of just melts, if you will. “I am poured out like water.” Some say that is a reference to that.

“All my bones are out of joint.” Wow. Can you imagine that? Have you ever seen someone—their shoulder or something—have a bone out of joint? Anybody see that? Sports team or something? Well, they are going to try to place it back in right there on the spot. Jesus, all those bones are out of joint. Can you imagine that? The pain. And they are just talking about the physical pain.

He goes on and says, “My heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels.” That is a reference to many think back to the garden. Just about the physical pain Jesus went through. He had done nothing wrong. He did not deserve this punishment. He took on all the physical pain, the emotional pain.

You realize a little before that all His disciples, all His followers, forsook Him at one point and fled. All of them. His most trusted friends, the twelve apostles and the inner three—even Peter. Jesus heard Peter curse and denounce, “I will never know Him.” Blankly, blankly, boy, Jesus, He heard that. Can you imagine the pain? We all think about how Peter saw Jesus look at him and he wept bitterly. Can you imagine how that affected Jesus? Your most trusted followers, even your followers are turning on you. Just imagine the emotional pain. Sometimes you hurt worse on the inside than you do on the outside. I mean, Jesus took all the pain and the mockery and the Jewish people, His own nation. He came into His own, His own received Him not. His people that He loved. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. He pronounced it, but they rejected Him. Imagine the emotional pain of it all. Just the hurting outside and inside. They lied about Him.

Think about the spiritual pain. I mentioned already, but I can only try to imagine how Satan and his demons were on Jesus. Can you imagine that? It is interesting. Jesus, Luke 22:53, let me read it for you. He says, “When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me: but this is your hour, and the power of darkness.” Jesus describes it as the power of darkness. Wow. That was on Him. I think Satan was trying to get Jesus to distrust, not believe in His Father.

I imagine just a mental battle going on. You know, the battle is in your mind. Jesus understood. He has been through all that. I imagine the battle in His mind, hanging for three hours in darkness and all the sin of mankind being on Him. And why was it dark? I do not understand everything about it. I tend to think that God Almighty the Father said when my Son, my only begotten Son, has all the sin of humanity on Him, I do not even want my Son to shine on my only begotten Son because of the darkness and the sin that is put on Him. In three hours, can you imagine the mental agony? Jesus battling you. But in the midst of it all, Jesus says, “You are still my God!” He says, “My God, my God.” But He does say, “Why?”

Now that leads to the last part of it. And by the way, in the middle of your battles, your tough times of the Christian life, your cross, you sometimes just cry, “Why, God?” I do not think you are sinning. If you do it out of a bitter, wrong attitude, yes, but if you are just sincere, “God, I do not understand it. Why?” In a sincere question, “God, why?” I want you to bring good out of it. It is all right. Jesus did that.

But then it leads to the last part of those nine words. He says, “Why? Why hast thou forsaken me?” Those are amazing words. It almost seems wrong to say them if we were not repeating Jesus. But that is what Jesus said: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” I think maybe the hardest part, the most tragic part of the cross.

When He went through all the physical pain and then all the sin of humanity, the dirt and the filth placed on Him, and the three hours of just bombardment on Jesus. And the sad thing is, the so amazingly tough thing, in the middle of the darkest hour, God the Father, because of our sin on Jesus, turns His back. And Jesus is crying out, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” It does not seem right, but it is biblical, my friend, that He says, “Thou forsakest me. I am alone,” if you will. Jesus was bearing the sin of humanity on Him, and “Thou forsakest me. I am alone.”

Here is an amazing thing: As far as Scripture tells us at this point, God the Father does not answer. You know, often the teacher is silent during the test. That is the fourth utterance: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” The next, fifth utterance was, “I thirst”—Jesus showing His humanity. The sixth was a wonderful one: “It is finished.” And then the seventh, very interesting, the last one, the number of completion, the seventh one. And Jesus—the devil never got Him. He never distrusted His Father, even though He was saying, “Why have you forsaken me?” In the middle of all that, Jesus says, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.”

He trusted His Father. It reminds me so much of Job when he said, “I can’t find you. I go forward, you are not there. Backwards, I can’t find you.” Your son—“When I am tried, I come forth as gold.” He knows what He is doing. Jesus in His toughest of times, and God, “I can’t even feel your presence, you have forsaken me because of the sin of humanity.” Don’t mean—and yet in the midst of all that, He said, “Hey, Father, I trust you, and into thy hands I commend my spirit.” What an example to us. We do not understand what is going on around us, what the troubles and trials are. I am just going to trust You. Wow.

Then let me say this: Jesus went through that time when forsaken so you and I never will have to. Is it now? I wonder why Jesus said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” Jesus said, “I know that feels like it. I went through that tragedy. I went through the toughest part, total fellowship with my Father, and yet during that time it was separated. And I went through that so you never, ever, ever have to go through that. You will never be forsaken.” Jesus says, “I will never leave you, never forsake you.”

Now we owe everything to Jesus. In your darkest of hours, He will never step aside. You might not feel His presence, but, friend, you can rest on it: He is there. He is a very present help in time of trouble. He is always there. You might not hear His voice. You might not understand it for the moment, but, friend, I promise you, He is right there in the middle of the fire with you.

Jesus went through that so you never will have to. You will never be alone. You will never be forgotten about. You say, “People forgot about me and the hurt, and nobody knows about it.” Oh, somebody knows about it. You will never be forsaken. Jesus took the forsaken so you never will have to experience it. The worst trial, and yet you will not be alone. He will be right there with you.

Stephen—oh, Steve—what about that first deacon? Just a spirit-filled man of God, just a wonderful servant of God. He is preaching, doing the will of God for his life. He is just an amazing pillar of the early church, Stephen, one of those first deacons. Boy, they did not like that. Boy, they got in fury. They just, just—and they began to, remember, they began to kill him, murder him. And pick up big old boulders and just throw them on Steve, and Steve is just bleeding out. And there, in the toughest of times, there, in the worst of trials, let me read for you what Scripture says. Acts 7, verse number 55: “But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, he was not forsaken.” And he was dying, being martyred, he was not forsaken. He was full of the Holy Ghost. “He looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of God, Jesus standing on the right hand of God.” This morning we talked about He is sitting on the right hand of the throne of God. You say, “He is standing here. Why is that?” I believe Jesus says, “Hey, Stephen, I understand what you are going through. I have been through it. I am He that was dead and alive again. I have been through that. And I want to just stand up and welcome you home, Stephen.” I have been through what you are going through.

The next verse he says right there, and said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God.” The worst times, you will never be forsaken. Never will.

And Steve, during his toughest of times, he was full of the Holy Ghost. I have told this story—I was not planning on it, but it is such a wonderful, amazing story. But they say sometimes in the first century, in the torture of Christians, they would put them on a rack and just stretch their bones and their body and pull them out of joint to cause pain as they would just stretch them. I say a time or two the soldiers would come to let them off that just mechanism to cause pain. When they would come, the Christians would say, “I do not want to get off.” I said, “What? You do not want to get off?” And they said, “No, no, no. Just keep me on there.” And the pain—the soldiers said, “Maybe the pain has just made them go crazy.” I mean, there is middle now. They have got issues now, you know. “Take her to the psych ward,” you know. But the Christian said, “No, it was when I was there in the midst of that pain, I felt the presence of God like I have never felt. It was so amazing. I would be glad to go through the pain to have the presence of God like that in my life.”

You know why they could experience that? Because Jesus, He went through the forsaking. You will never have to go through that. He will never forsake you. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” He went through that so you will never go through that.

You might experience the feeling of that—Job did—but you will never be alone. Three Hebrew boys—Nebuchadnezzar, they would not bow. “No, we are not going to bow.” Boy, he got mad, you know. “Nobody disobeys me.” Well, those three Hebrew boys disobeyed you, you know. “Heat up the furnace seven times hotter than it is supposed to be.” “Give me another chance.” They said, “We do not have another chance. We are not going to bow.” And if I am in that fire, you know the story. Oh, Nebuchadnezzar, I think there must have been some kind of glass, you know, because those special ops to them in there, they got killed, you know. And Nebuchadnezzar was able to look down in there some way, and maybe looking through some kind of glass. I am not sure looking down there. Nebuchadnezzar, “Did we throw three of them down there?” “Yeah.” Nebuchadnezzar said, “Hey, come over here. My eyes. I have got a problem. My eyes have been bothering me a little bit here. Come on. You look down. Do you see what I see?” They said, “I see it too. There are not three guys, there are four of them down there, and the fourth is like unto the Son of God.” That was Jesus, friend. You will never—you will never experience being forsaken by God because Jesus experienced it for you. “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” Jesus experienced that for you and I.

Praise the Lord. “I thirst.” “It is finished.” “Into thy hands, I commend my spirit.” Would you bow your heads and close your eyes, please? I am not sure what all God wanted us to focus on that for. And maybe you are battling bitterness. Maybe you are battling distrusting what God is doing in your life. Maybe just the darkest of hours. I want God to bring a victory through it. Would you just spend some time saying, “Father, I yield to what You are doing in my life”? There is a great time there in an invitation unless it gets clean. You know, the Lord’s Supper, He says, “Let us examine ourselves.” Let us just get clean before Him. Would you do that? Would you do—let us stand. People are already coming. The altar is open. If you need to come, you come. You come.

Father, thank You. Thank You for Your word. Thank You for all that You did for us, giving Your Son. Thank You, Jesus, for shedding Your blood, going through the forsaking. Thank You for the promise You told us: You will never forsake us. Bless these few minutes. Father, we want to honor You and remember as we ought. Bless the sacred time, Lord’s Supper. Well, thank You, Lord, for what You do. Jesus, then we pray. Amen.

Original File: Pastor Paul Chisgar - Eli, Eli, Lama Sabachthani - - Sunday PM 03172024