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My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest. (Psalm 22:1-2)

I will declare your name to my people; in the assembly I will praise you. You who fear the Lord, praise him! All you descendants of Jacob, honor him! Revere him, all you descendants of Israel! For he has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help. (Psalm 22:22-24)

Many of us hear and immediately recognize the opening words of this Psalm as the words of Jesus from the cross.  But before they were Jesus’ words, they were Israel’s.  Psalm 22 was a prayer regularly read or sung in worship that had been sincerely prayed by many who felt abandoned and afflicted by God. 

In his death on the cross then, Jesus is not only shouting out his own experience of forsakenness, but is also identifying himself with the forsaken: with all those who have prayed this prayer to God—from the time of its writing right up to the present day.  For, as the book of Hebrews tells us, “we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses…” 

Many of our lives will include moments when we feel forsaken by our God.  When a loved one dies, for instance, or when a painful situation rips through our family.  And of course there are many others in our world on the margins who may feel that forsakenness far more often.

The existence of this prayer of forsakenness and the identification of Jesus with it tells us that it is a perfectly faithful expression of faith to ask God why he’s absent and why he has abandoned us in those times when it feels like he has.  We don’t have to keep a stiff upper lip or grin and bear it.  We can be honest and raw with God.  He’s big enough to handle our hurt.

We know that to be true because of watching Jesus’ own suffering.  The Father did not ultimately abandon Jesus to the grave.  But rather vindicated him, raised him from the grave to new life: a new life that we will share in also.

Psalm 22 takes a similar turn.  Mid-way through, a declaration of praise rings through the despair.  Why?  Because God does not and has not ultimately scorned the suffering of the afflicted one.  God has not ultimately hidden his face, but instead has turned, listened, and delivered. 

Jesus himself is the promise that the prayer of forsakenness never goes unheard.  He comes to us to minister to us still today, finding us wherever we may be and saying: “I hear you, I understand, and I am here.”