Good Friday Meditation- Part 4

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
-Mark 15:34


Who can fathom what is taking place here? The eternal tapestry of the Trinity is being torn as Jesus “becomes sin for us,” taking the weight of humanity’s rebellion. “He Himself bore our sins in His body,” Peter tells us. And the sight of the sins of all redeemed humanity on His Son caused the Father to turn away in disgust and fury.

Here at the cross, Jesus did not just bear our sin; He bore the wrath of God that was directed at our sin. All of God’s holy anger at our lies, our lust, our anger, our envy, our murderous strife, our God-ignoring, self-exalting ways was focused on Jesus in those hours. “It was the will of the LORD to crush Him,” Isaiah observed seven hundred years earlier. The crushing blow that should have fallen on us—and will fall on all who do not fly to the cross for refuge—fell on Jesus that dark afternoon.

On the cross, the infinite and eternal Son of God bore the infinite and eternal punishment that our sins deserve. Hell broke into the present and consumed Jesus. Here we hear the cry of the damned, the cry that should have been ours: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” This cry was on Jesus’ lips so that it would never be on ours.


EXTEND THE LESSON
Read or listen to the song, “How Deep the Father’s Love For Us”
Read the poem, “Satisfied” by Brendan Beale (http://blog.dailyverseonline.org/2009/04/satisfied.html)