If you did not know the rest of the story, you would
wonder why they call it “Good Friday”.
The Son of God is on a cross, and sin and death seem poised for the
ultimate victory. Even Jesus’ words on
the cross seem to foreshadow defeat, “my God, my God, why have you forsaken
me?” It begs the question, has God
really forsaken us?
One of the beautiful things about the psalms is
their ability to express multiple emotions, almost simultaneously. After all, how many of us are entirely happy,
or entirely sad. I have been to a number
of wakes in my time as a minister, and one thing I have found is even in those
moments of deepest loss there is laughter to be heard. That’s why the psalm that Jesus references
while hanging on the cross, Psalm 22, is so appropriate. It weaves together lament and praise in such
a way to reflect the situation that Jesus is in.
Psalm 22 is an accurate reflection of both intense
sorrow and pain, and also praise. The
first, and largest, is lament. There are
actually more lament psalms than any other type. James L. Mays would say that, “their
abundance in the Psalter is an eloquent witness of the way in which Old
Testament piety bound the tribulations of mortal life to faith in God as
savior.” Often, like us, they simply ask
the question, “why?” In asking that
question, the lament psalms disclose our humanity. The vulnerability, mortality, anguishes, and
questioning of the laments is part of the universal human experience. The laments take on a personal aspect,
conveying the ways which our troubles affect us. In this particular psalm, we read of tears
building up inside of the psalmist until they spilled out, forming a strong
connection between emotional and the physical distress. There is also a social aspect to the
laments. Our troubles do not just affect
ourselves; they affect our relationships with others. Too often our problems become their problems,
whether they ask for that burden or not.
Sometimes it’s not that our problems affect others, sometimes others are
the problem. In Psalm 22 we read of a metaphorical
description using animals as predators.
Our enemies circle us sometimes, and we begin to feel an awful lot like
prey. Both the psalmist and those who
watch him are expecting his death. It
forms another connection to Jesus on the cross, as he looks down at those who
put him there knowing that they are just waiting for him to take his last
breath. Finally, there is a theological
aspect to lament. How do our troubles affect the way we see God? “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
is a question uttered not into a vacuum.
In his book The Trouble with Being
Born, Emil Cioran writes that, “A cry means something only in a created
universe. If there is no creator, what
is the good of calling attention to yourself?”
So then the problem is not the absence or non-existence of God, but the
reconciling of the present experience of sorrow, grief, and pain to the
existence of a loving God. What are we
to do when our present experience of pain comes into conflict with who we
believe God to be?
I spoke earlier of the way the psalms in general,
and Psalm 22 in particular, weave together lament and praise. The smaller, and yet decidedly final words of
Psalm 22 are words of praise. The act of
praise brings the psalmist from isolation to community. The thanksgiving toward God we see (vv.
22-26) spills over into communal worship (vv. 27-31). Deliverance, and even the hope for
deliverance, is a motivating force for our acts of worship. Those acts of worship are shown to be
something universal, something that transcends time to include the living (v.
27), the dead (v. 29), and all future generations (vv. 30-31). As we struggle to come to grips with this idea
of praise so close on the heels of lament, the words of Mays are again
helpful:
“The psalm tells us that the resurrection does not
cancel the cross; it validates and reveals it as the central moment of God’s
reign. The resurrected one is the
crucified Jesus. Faith is not relieved
of mortality and suffering. Anguish and
death in faith are rather transfigured by their absorption into the coming
reign of God.”
The existence of God does not alleviate suffering. Rather, it insures that suffering can at most
win the battle, but never win the war.
Consider the case of Jesus, our Lord.
If we truly follow him, then surely there will be times in our life
where psalms of lament frame our existence.
The cry of Psalm 22:1, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
becomes Jesus cry on the cross (Mark 15:34; Matthew 27:46). The social ostracism of Psalm 22:7, “All who
see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads;” is fulfilled in
Jesus crucifixion (Matthew 27:39-40; Luke 23:35-36). There are other connections between Psalm 22
and Jesus suffering, but I want to draw your attention to what I believe should
be the defining link. The psalmist would
write in Psalm 22:22, “I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of
the congregation I will praise you.”
Notice how the author of Hebrews uses that part of the praise portion of
the psalm to express Jesus triumph over death.
“For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom
all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of
their salvation perfect through suffering. For he who sanctifies and those who
are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them
brothers, saying, ‘I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the
congregation I will sing your praise.’” - Hebrews 2:10-12
Jesus identifies with those, before and after him,
who speak the words of this psalm in their own moments of crisis. Jesus engages God in dialogue at the lowest
moment of his life not because he feels abandoned, but because through it all
and despite it all, he knows God is
there. Because we know that Jesus experienced Psalm
22, suffering changes for us not empirically, but experientially. We do not experience less suffering because
of Jesus, we experience suffering differently.
Jesus suffering results in an invitation to the entire world, not to run
from the cross, but to pick it up knowing that like the words of lament in
Psalm 22, death will not have the final say.
I leave you with Paul’s words to the Romans, words which are
underwritten by the hope we find in Jesus death, burial, and resurrection.
“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor
angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor
height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate
us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” - Romans 8:38-39
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