Psalm 22 -- For ME?

“For ME!”  That’s what my commentary says should follow every line of the first 21 verses of this chapter, for it describes Christ’s thoughts and feelings and agonies while on the cross in intimate detail, hundreds of years before it all happened.  Crucifixion hadn’t even been invented as a method of death when these words were penned, but now we can see with perfect 20/20 hindsight that it’s all there.

It starts with Jesus’ fourth statement from the cross (“My God, My God, WHY have You forsaken Me?”) and includes His seventh statement (“It is finished.”)

The timing is amazing, too.  David was on the throne.  I wonder if people back then read this psalm and wondered what in the WORLD it was about!  Yet God and Jesus, being fully divine and at that moment together in heaven before the Incarnation, being timeless and eternal and unbound by time, had already experienced the entire event of the crucifixion in the future.  At the very same moment for them, they were watching as Adam contemplated the forbidden fruit.  All humanity hung in the balance.  God had already made provision for Adam’s sin before he’d ever sinned!  He loved us that much! 

And as Max Lucado described in the sidebar, Jesus didn’t simply banish our sins.  He took them out Himself by placing them upon Himself, carrying our load away for eternity.

For a moment, God’s holiness  and righteousness and justice required that He turn His back on His own Son, refusing to rescue Him, so that He could carry our sins away in death.  But since Jesus was perfect and had never sinned, God likewise couldn’t leave Him in the grave.  That’s why He brought Him back to life.

It’s all far above our ability to comprehend, for our love is far less than His.  All we can do is marvel at the mercy and grace and love God showed for us in all of this.

Father, all this for me?  WHY?  I’m full of sin, yet You love me anyway and want me with You for eternity!  Such love!  Such love!

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford