As I finish up reading in Matthew this week I have been most blessed and encouraged to see the Lord’s love triumph upon the wretched yet wondrous cross. Today I’m participating in Aliens & Pilgrims Something Brief, Something True with this thought:
“Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Matt. 27:45-46
The Son of God—who was eternally with God in perfect harmony and fellowship—now the Lamb of God. These verses show the perfect, spotless Lamb bearing the sin of the world (ours, not his) in one blow. Here he is swallowing down to the last drop the cup of the wrath of God (wrath we deserved, not he). My sin transferred to him in exchange for his righteousness. As he bore my transgressions, he was forsaken, separated from his Father, because God cannot be in fellowship with sin. It was this forsaking which he dreaded, this absence of the presence of God. Not the scourging, not the torturous suffering of the cross. How awful separation from God must be to have our Lord agonize so that he sweat drops of blood in anguish over its anticipation, and to cry out so loudly as he experienced it. Yet he bore the agony of this separation for a moment, so all of us who would believe would not have to bear it for eternity. He did it in love and for our sake. What a wonderful Saviour!
The Light for My Path 