Matthew 27:46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God… Christ took not the desert of punishment upon Him (from any fault in Himself), He took whatsoever was penal upon Him, but not culpable. As He was our surety, so He everyway discharged our debt, being bound over to all judgments and punishments for us. (R. Sibbs.) I. WHAT WAS CHRIST'S DESERTION? I shall for more distinctness, handle it negatively and affirmatively. First — Negatively. 1. It was not a desertion in appearance and conceit only, but real. We often mistake God's dispensations. God may be out of sight and yet we not out of mind. When the dam is abroad for meat the young brood in the nest is not forsaken. The children cry as if the mother were totally gone when she is employed about necessary business for their welfare (Isaiah 49:14, 15). So we think that we are cut off when God is about to help and deliver us (Psalm 31:22). Surely when our affections towards God are seen by mourning for His absence, He is not wholly gone; His room is kept warm for Him till He come again. We mistake God's dispensations when we judge that a forsaking which is but an emptying us of all carnal dependence (Psalm 94:18, 19). He is near many times when we think Him afar off; as Christ was to His disciples when their eyes were withheld that they knew Him not, but thought Him yet lying in the grave (St. Luke 24:16). But this cannot be imagined of Christ, who could not be mistaken. If He complained of desertion, surely He felt it. II. THOUGH IT WERE REAL, THE DESERTION MUST BE UNDERSTOOD SO AS MAY STAND WITH THE DIGNITY OF HIS PERSON AND OFFICE. Therefore — (1) There was no separation of the Father from the Son; this would make a change in the unity of the Divine essence (St. John 10:30). This eternal union of the Father and Son always remained. (2) There was no dissolution of the union of the two natures in the person of Christ, for the human nature which was once assumed was never after dismissed or laid aside. III. The love of God to Him ceased not. We read (St. John 3:35). IV. His personal holiness was not abated or lessened. The Lord Jesus was "full of grace and truth" (St. John 1:4). Neither His nature nor His office could permit an abatement of holiness (Hebrews 7:26). The Son of God might fall into misery, which is a natural evil, and so become the object of pity, not of blame; but not into sin, which is a moral evil, a blot and a blemish. V. God's assistance and sustaining grace was not wholly withdrawn, for the Lord saith of Him (Isaiah 42:1). The power, presence, and providence of God was ever with Him, to sustain Him in His difficult enterprise.Secondly — Positively. I. GOD'S DESERTION OF US OR ANY CREATURE MAY BE UNDERSTOOD WITH A RESPECT TO HIS COMMUNICATING HIMSELF TO US. We have a twofold apprehension of God — as a holy and happy being: and when He doth communicate Himself to any reasonable creature it is either in a way of holiness or in a way of happiness. These two have such a respect to one another, that He never gives felicity and glory without holiness (Hebrews 12:14). And a holy creature can never be utterly and finally miserable. He may sometimes give holiness without happiness, as when for a while He leaveth the sanctified whom He will try and exercise under the cross — or in a state of sorrow and affliction. Now apply this to Christ. It is blasphemy to say that Christ lost any degree of His holiness, for He was always pure and holy, and that most perfectly and exactly. Therefore He was deserted only as to His felicity, and that but for a short time. II. THE FELICITY OF CHRIST MAY BE CONSIDERED EITHER AS TO HIS OUTWARD AND BODILY ESTATE, OR ELSE TO HIS INWARD MAN OR THE ESTATE OF HIS SOUL. (1) Some say His desertion was nothing else but His being left to the will and power of His enemies to crucify Him, and that He was then deserted when His Divine nature suspended the exercise of His omnipotency so far as to deliver up His body to a reproachful death. (a) Why should Christ complain of that so bitterly, which He did so readily and willingly undergo, and might so easily have prevented. (b) If we look merely to bodily pains and sufferings certainly others have endured as much if not more; as the thieves that were crucified with Him lived longer in their torments, and the good thief did not complain that he was forsaken of God. (c) It would follow that every holy man that is persecuted and left to the will of his enemies, might be said to be forsaken of God, which is contrary to Paul's holy boasting (2 Corinthians 4:9). (d) This desertion was a punishment one part or degree of the abasement of the Son of God, and so belongeth to the whole nature that was to be abased, not only to His body, but His soul (Isaiah 53:10). (2) As to the felicity of His inward estate, the state of His soul. Christ carried about His heaven with Him, and never wanted sensible consolation, spiritual suavity, the comfortable effects of the Divine presence, till now they were withdrawn that He might be capable of suffering the whole punishments of sins. 1. I will show how this sort of desertion is — Possible. The union of the two natures remaining; for us the Divine nature gave up the body to death, so the soul to desertion. Christ, as God, is the fountain of life (Psalm 36:9). And yet Christ could die. The Divinity remained united to the flesh, and yet the flesh might die; so it remained united to the soul, and yet the soul might want comfort. There is a partial, temporal desertion, when God for a moment hideth His face from His people (Isaiah 54:7). This is so far from being contrary to the dignity of Christ's nature that it is "necessary to His office for many reasons. 2. That it is grievous. This was an incomparable loss to Christ. (1) Partly because it was more natural to Him to enjoy that comfort and solace than it can be to any creature. To put out a candle is no great matter, but to have the sun eclipsed, which is the fountain of light, that sets the world a wondering. (2) Partly because He had more to lose than we have. The greater the enjoyment, the greater the loss or want. We lose drops, He an ocean. (3) Partly because he knew how to value the comfort of the union, having a pure understanding and heavenly affections. God's children count one clay in His presence better than a thousand (Psalm 84:10). One glimpse of His love more than all the world (Psalm 4:7). (4) Partly because He had so near an interest and relation to God (Proverbs 8:30). (5) Partly from the nature of Christ's desertion. It was penal. There was nothing in Christ's person to occasion a desertion, but "much in His office; so He was to give body for body and soul for soul. And this was a part of the satisfaction. He was beloved as a son, forsaken as our Mediator and Surety. Why was Christ forsaken? Answer. With respect to the office which He had taken upon Himself. This desertion of Christ carrieth a suitableness and respect to our sin, our punishment, and our blessedness. 1. Our sin. Christ is forsaken to satisfy and make amends for our wilful desertion of God (James 2:13). Now we that forsook God deserved to be forsaken by God, therefore what we had merited by our sins, Christ endured as our Mediator. It is strange to consider what small things draw us off from God. This is the first degeneracy and disease of mankind that a trifle will prompt us to forsake God, as a little thing will make a stone run down hill; it is its natural motion. 2. It carries a full respect to the punishment appointed for sin (Galatians 3:13). It is true the accidentals of punishment Christ suffered not. As — (1) To the place, He was not in hell. It was not necessary that Christ should descend to the hell of the damned. One that is bound as a surety for another, needs not go into prison provided that he pay the debts. (2) For the time of continuance. The damned must bear the wrath of God to all eternity, because they can never satisfy the justice of God. Therefore they must lie by it world without end. Christ hath made an infinite satisfaction in a finite time. lie bore the wrath of God in a few hours, which would overwhelm the creature. Christ did not bear the eternity of wrath, but only the extremity of it; intensive, not extensive. The eternity of the punishment ariseth from the weakness of the creature, who cannot overcome this evil and get out of it. (3) There is another thing unavoidably attending the pains of the second death in reprobates, and that is desperation, an utter hopelessness of any good (Hebrews 10:27). 3. With respect to our blessedness, which is to live with God for ever in heaven. Christ was forsaken that there might be no longer any separation between us and God.Application: 1. How different are they from the Spirit of Christ that can brook God's absence without any remorse or complaint? 2. It informeth us of the grievousness of sin. It is no easy matter to reconcile sinners to God, it cost Christ a life of sorrows, and afterwards a painful and accursed death, and in that death, loss of actual comfort, and an amazing sense of the wrath of God. 3. The greatness of our obligation to Christ, who omitted no kind of sufferings which might conduce to the expiation of sin. 4. The infiniteness of God's mercy, who appointed such a degree of Christ's sufferings — as in it He gives us the greatest ground of hope to invite us the more to submit to His terms. (T. Manton.) Parallel Verses KJV: 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? |
    |