Mark 15:33–34

All the mockeries and preparations came first, including perhaps the trial of the two robbers. Then the actual crucifixion began at the third Jewish hour, which Mark alone specifies — that is, our 9 o'clock in the morning on Friday. The supernatural darkness came at the sixth Jewish hour, our noon. And the Lord died at the ninth Jewish hour, our 3 p.m.

Did the darkness cover the whole earth? Hardly, for in part of the world it was already night, so darkness there was not possible. No doubt it covered the whole land, and perhaps the whole Roman world... We know it was not an eclipse of the sun, because it was full moon at that time. It was a supernatural darkness... But what is the meaning of this darkness? It was the outward sign of what passed over Him. He was then the sinner's substitute before a holy and righteous God. God had hidden His face from Him; He was forsaken by God Himself. His cry explains the meaning of the darkness, and the darkness gives us the meaning of His bitter cry.

It was more than human: God caused a witness of that hour that stood out from all before and after. There was darkness; the very world felt it... So here men showed no feeling. They reviled and scoffed at the Son of God, from the chief priests down to the thieves. God answered by veiling all nature in the presence of the death of Him who created all.

At the last stage of this great transaction there is darkness over all the earth. How fitting that it should be so! God and Christ were alone there. This scene had been pictured long before in these words: "No one shall be in the tent of meeting when he enters to make atonement in the Holy Place" (Lev. 16:17). In one sense that darkness stood for the darkness resting on the mind and heart of the nation at that moment, the terrible moral darkness over Israel. Yet God certainly intended to withdraw His Son in that hour. No one was to see what passed between Him and Christ, when the Blessed One bore the judgment of God against sin.

He no longer has to bear the envy, malice, and cruelty of men. Now He bears the penalty of sin, delivered up to death by a holy God... Darkness was over the land. Christ was alone with God, hidden from every eye, when He who knew no sin was made sin... That such a sacrifice was required magnifies the holy nature of God. That such a sacrifice could be given magnifies the love of God. No smaller sacrifice could secure the glory of God or gain the salvation of men.

Those three hours of darkness rolled on — three hours of total eclipse between God and the One on the cross. Then at the ninth hour, three o'clock in the afternoon, came that great, that terrible cry from Him: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He forsook Jesus in that hour, so that He might never forsake you and me. There was darkness for Him that there might be only light for us. He bore the judgment that we might go free.

We have seen the Lord rejected by all men from the highest to the lowest, and forsaken by His disciples. Now we are permitted to hear of His far deeper sufferings when forsaken by God. He no longer bears the envy, malice, and cruelty of men. He now bears the penalty of sin, delivered up to death by a holy God. Into this solemn scene no man can, or shall, intrude. Darkness was over the land. Christ was alone with God, hidden from every eye, when He, who knew no sin, was made sin.

It is as the sin-offering that we see our Lord here. There is the cry of anguish, given no doubt in the very words our blessed Lord used, and not the Hebrew as in Matthew. These are in Aramaic, the everyday language used in Palestine at that time.

For God to forsake a perfectly righteous man in his distress goes against all His ways with men. Yet we know there can be no unrighteousness with God. So we learn from the lips of Christ Himself what happened on this solemn and unique occasion. God was perfectly righteous in forsaking the One who was perfectly righteous. The Lord can say, "But You are holy." So the One whom God forsakes is the One who fully vindicates God.

Others suffered cruel mocking and beatings, chains and prison. Others had nothing, and were afflicted and tormented. But not one was forsaken. While they suffered, grace held them up, the Spirit of God strengthened them, and the felt presence of the Lord cheered them... But here is One who is forsaken. He can say to God, "Why are You so far from helping Me?" He cries to God, and has to say, "You do not hear." Forsaken by God, no help in God, no answer from God.

But was not Jesus holy? Yes. He was as holy in His perfect Manhood as in the glory of the Godhead. He was as holy in His own Person on that cross as when He created the angels. Then why was He forsaken? I answer for myself — it was for me. That which we were, He was made. He became sin — the thing God hates for ever and without limit — so that God's love might reach us in absolute righteousness.

First, His trust is perfect. He does not say Jehovah. That relationship was not in use at that moment, as His relationship with His Father was in Gethsemane. He says, "My God, My God." Whatever the dreadful forsaking was, His perfect faith in God and devotion to God, as the only One He owned, remains absolute and unshaken.

"My God, My God," says Jesus when and because He was forsaken on the cross, made sin and bearing our sins in His own body on the tree. It is the true, simple and strong answer to those who suppose that He had been bearing sin all His life here below... But now the sin charged to Him is gone, because He died for it. As the witness that all was gone, He is raised from the dead. Then He declares that very name — "My Father, and your Father; and My God, and your God."

Those three hours of darkness, those three hours of total eclipse between God and the One on the cross, rolled on. Then at the ninth hour, three o'clock in the afternoon, comes that great, that terrible cry from Him. He forsook Jesus in that hour, so that He might never forsake you and me. There was darkness for Him so that there might be only light for us. He bore the judgment so that we might go free.