“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest” (Psalm 22:1,2).
The Feelings. Who of us hasn’t felt like David? Maybe even prayed his words. What occasioned them we don’t know; but we know it was no abbreviated anguish or shallow sorrow. Day and night. Abandoned by his God. Far from David’s groaning, far from saving him. Silent while his war raged. Why? Like David, we too haven’t understood why our God is gone when we need him most. But even “forsaken”, we’ve remembered who he is and what he’s done before.
The Fight.“Yet you are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel. In you our fathers trusted, and you delivered them. To you they cried and were rescued, in you they trusted and were not put to shame” (Psalm 22:3-5). That memory, though, only sharpens the contrast between them and us and deepens our darkness.
“But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people. All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads; ‘He trusts in the LORD; let him deliver him, for he delights in him!’ (Psalm 22:7,8). Whatever the cause of David’s suffering, mockers deepened it. “What’s wrong with your faith, David? I thought the Lord loved you. Why doesn’t he save you now?” Mockery like that is hard to bear when it comes from enemies, worse from friends, worse still when it erupts in our own mind.
“Yet you are he who took me from the womb; you made me trust you at my mother’s breasts. On you was I cast from my birth, and from my mother’s womb you have been my God. Be not far from me, for trouble is near and there is none to help” (Psalm 22:9-11). David knew God, not just from Torah lessons, but from personal care. And that moved him to pray, “God, come close to me again in my lonely time of trouble.”
See what’s happening here, this back and forth? David feels God-forsaken when he most needs God. But he’s still fighting. In verses 1 and 2 he voices his why-complaints. But in verses 3-5 he fights back by remembering who God is and what he’s done for his people in the past. In verses 6-8 he’s drowning in mockery. But in verses 9-11 he’s recalling God’s personal care and again pleading for his help. The battle continues as weak David describes how his strong enemies are closing in on him.
“Many bulls encompass me; strong bulls of Bashan surround me; they open wide their mouths at me, like a ravening and roaring lion. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast; my strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongues sticks to my jaws; you lay me in the dust of death. For dogs encompass me; a company of evildoers encircles me; they have pierced my hands and feet–I can count all my bones–they stare and gloat over me; they divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots” (Psalm 22:12-18). In his book, King and Messiah, A. Bentzen says this psalm “is not a description of an illness (as if David were dying from an agonizing disease), but of an execution.” It’s as if “the cosmic powers of this present darkness” (Ephesians 6:12) are crucifying this faithful man. Still, David claws back with a final, desperate plea.
“But you, O LORD, do not be far off! O you my help, come quickly to my aid! Deliver my soul from the sword, my precious life from the power of the dog! Save me from the mouth of the lion!” (Psalm 22:19-21a.)
The Fallout. What will the Lord do? Will he now come quickly to help his servant? Will he charge out and rout David’s enemies? Or will he remain far off and leave David in the dust of death? What will he do for us? Will the fallout from our pleading be a miracle? Or will our tomorrows find us still “forsaken”?
The Finale. Not yet, for two reasons. One, length. Longer will be too long for this post. (I could have omitted quoting the psalm. I chose not to because God’s words are more important than mine about them.) Two, life. Though David answers our questions in the rest of the psalm (and the New Testament answers them in unexpected and almost too-wonderful-to-be-true ways), we forget (or want to ignore the fact) that the Lord sometimes lays his beloved people alone in “the dust of death.” In the first half of this psalm we’re reminded that the life of faith is a fight. And sometimes we’re found losing the battle. Not because our faith is weak or we’re not sending money to some false-Messiah-TV-evangelist. But because we live in a God-rebelling, God-cursed world in bodies that are dying with a nature still infected by sin. More of us than we like to admit are asking, “Where is God when we need him?”
Next time we’ll find out where. And stand amazed at his mercy.
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