My God, My God, Why Have You Forsaken Me? A Sermon by Elise Beatrice Inspired by the Lord Jesus Christ on 18 December 2024 for Easter. Transcript I woke up early in the morning, escaping from my spiritual oppressors. I went straight to the only One I know, and down on my knees, I prayed, "Declare me innocent, my Lord, restore me, invade the darkness that continuously tries to force itself upon me. Why do they still come after me even if they know I will never surrender to them? I'm Yours forever, Lord. Haven't they understood by now?" I praised God, thanking Him and begging Him to declare me innocent, without knowing He would direct me to Psalm 43. Then, I took my Bible, opened it, and the first few lines hit me. The exact words I spoke to the Lord were nowpresented before, and I understood why. Because the true servants of the Lord go through all these kinds of things, and they understand each other, they feel the same way to the point that they may even sound the same. I was Amazed, so I read the words that were now presented before me. Psalm 43 "1 Declare me innocent, O God! Defend me against these ungodly people. Rescue me from these unjust liars. 2 For You are God, my only place of safety. Why have you tossed me aside? Why must I wander around in grief, oppressed by my enemies? 3 Send out Your light and your truth; let them guide me. Let them lead me to your holy mountain, to the place where you live. 4 There I will go to the altar of God, to God—the source of all my joy. I will praise you with my harp, O God, my God! 5 Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God! I will praise Him again—my Savior and my God!" This prayer is for every devoted child of God. Every dedicated servant of the Lord has prayed this prayer in their suffering. We go through things beyond our comprehension, horrible things thrown upon us by the ungodly. Every true child of God relates to another and feels their touching prayer in times of trouble. Why have you tossed me aside? Why must I wander around in grief? Yes, as devoted servants of the Lord, we go through things beyond our comprehension; we may not understand the Lord's will at that moment. We may not feel His great presence immediately when we reach out to Him. For this, we may say, "Lord, where are You? Why have You tossed me aside?" But the truth is, the Lord did not toss us aside. So, when we're experiencing heavy oppression and agonising pain, let us remember the Lord is the One who promised us He will never leave us nor forsake us. [Deuteronomy 31:8] We are in the battle between good and evil, and we may say to the Lord, "Lord, look … stop this evil, stop these demons, stop them, now!" [Ephesians 6:12] But when we're saying to the Lord to stop them and say 'NOW!' And are waiting for Him to stop them now, we somehow can be unrealistic because we must understand that we are in the battle, and until the battle ends, the war does not stop. Just like we can take one illness to the doctor, and after that illness is cured, another one begins, a trial can begin, and after the Lord helps us overcome it, another one starts, and so forth, for that's life, the nature of the world we live in, filled with evil. We are every day in the battle, and we must fight everyday, knowing that the Lord is with us, fighting with us. And even the Lord won't stop that war when it is not yet the time to stop it. [2 Peter 3:9] And while we don't know this, we tend to think that God has abandoned us, that God has tossed us aside. But the truth is, we are in the battle, and that battle is not like a physical battle that goes on for a short period of time and then it ends. We are in the long life battle, and only the Lord Jesus will come again to stop that war. But until that day comes, we're still in that war. So we must not think that God has abandoned us because God never abandons His people; He continuously says so. He never abandons those who put their trust in Him. And we may say words like that continuously, "God, where are You? God, have You not seen me suffering here? God, why have You tossed me aside? Why have You abandoned me?" When God Almighty promised Lord Jesus would come and save us from our sins, many people in their sufferings began to cry out, "Why have You - Lord, why have You abandoned me? Why have You tossed me aside? Why, why do You let this enemy oppress me?" But God has not forgotten them; He has not tossed them aside. But the Lord is right there with us and moving with us until the day we will see Him ourselves. Many who were there saw the Lord on the Cross, and the Lord said, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?" [Psalm 22] But Father God did not forsake our Lord; the Lord meant something else. What He was saying to us was, "You have been calling Me, you have been saying, 'Why have You forsaken Me? Why have You abandoned me? My God, My God, why have You tossed me aside? Lord, where are You? Lord, why am I alone? Lord, where are You? Lord, why have You let me be heavily oppressed?' And now I am here, saying these same words you have said to Me, "Why have you forsaken Me? Why have you tossed Me aside? I am here to rescue you. So when you were calling Me, I was hearing you. I was with you. And now I am here before your eyes, and you don't recognise Me. Now that I am here, you are rejecting Me. You are helping the same oppressors to nail Me on the Cross. But I came to be with you. I came to shine my light so that you can see. I have always been with you because you have put your trust in Me. And even in those moments that you said, 'My God, why have You tossed me aside?' I have never tossed you aside. I will never leave you nor forsake you. Just listen to Me, and fight, fight. Don't think I have abandoned you. Just endure and persevere in the fight. It will end. I will come, I will come again, and I will end the fight. But until then, you may have a few bruises, you may stumble a bit, but I will be there to pick you up, given that you keep on listening to Me because if you think wrong, it will lead you astray." [Hebrews 12:1-2] And, as we can see in Psalm 43, when the servant of the Lord put his mind in the right place and put His eyes on the Lord, he began to feel the Lord's presence again, he began to see the hope straight ahead in the future. He began to feel the joy, the peace. This is what happens when we begin to see the hope, to remember that the Lord is there. We say, "Yes, send out Your Light and Your Truth and let them guide me, let them lead me to Your Holy Mountain. Because that is where life is beautiful, to the place where You live, Lord, for where You live, I am safe there. I'm happy there, I'm loved there. I have no attack, no evil oppressing me." So, give me that hope; remind me of that hope because when things are painful, we must be careful; otherwise, our enemy, the spiritual oppressor, will continuously press us down, wants us to be negative, wants us to think of things that God did not do. But then, when we remember suddenly what the Lord is doing, the presence of God is with us. We realise that God is there, and straight away, we see ourselves with Him; we see ourselves in His Holy Mountain where all sufferings end, where there is an Altar of God, the source of all the joy. And we praise Him, "O God, our God, we praise You!" Because this servant of the Lord has remembered the Lord, he has now understood that the Lord is with him. And then, he said, 'But why was discouraged? Why was I even saying that You have tossed me aside? I will put my hope in God. Why have I forgotten that my God is with me? I will praise Him again. I will stop moaning, I will stop grumbling, I will stop thinking that my God has forsaken me, and I will be encouraged by knowing that He is with me, and I will put my hope in Him more and more, and my heart will not be sad anymore. I will praise Him again; yes, instead of crying out thinking that He left me, I will praise Him. I will take that strength to praise Him instead, my Saviour and my God, for He is indeed with me; He has not tossed me aside. And it was wrong of me to think He did that. 'So now that I know, "I'm sorry, Lord, I'm sorry, Lord. I will think of You; I will praise You. I will love You, and I will endure and persevere. And I will wait for You to Come Again so You can take me to Your Holy Mountain, where I will be safe forever, where we will be safe forever. Those who put their trust in You will be safe.' Yes, while we're here on this earth, it is the time of oppression; it is the time of war, spiritual war, and we must all be equipped and fight and endure and persevere, knowing that the One True God is by our side. He died for us. It is finished! He has done it. Let's remain in His Love, in His light, no matter what! And we will someday be in His beautiful Heaven! And we will say to Him, 'My God, my God, thank You for taking me to this place, to this beautiful place, for making a place for me in Your Father's House! My days of suffering have ended, thanks to You, my Lord. Thank You, my Lord Jesus. Amen!' My God, My God, Why Have You Forsaken Me? To explain why the Lord Jesus cried out on the Cross, ‘My God, My God, Why Have you Forsaken Me?’ Some say this: “Jesus took our sins, and God the Father could not look at His Son with all our sins.” “Jesus took our sins, and God the Father could not look at His sins because He hates sins.” Please Note: God, the Son, took our sins upon Himself on the Cross, and if God the Father had to turn His face away from His Son because of our sins, it would be like turning away from Himself. God does not turn away from Himself; God does not abandon Himself. For when the Lord Jesus was carrying our sins on the Cross, Father God was carrying them, too. When He was flogged, Father God was flogged, too. Every pain He felt, Father felt it. When He wept, Father wept, too, for they are One, and what One feels, the other One also feels it. The Holy Bible does not say that the Father turned His face away from His Son on the Cross. When the Scripture says in Isaiah 53 that He was “despised and rejected,” it does not mean that God, the Father, rejected His Son or turned His face away from Him because of our sins, but we, humans, His own people, despised and rejected Him. John 1:11, “He came to His own, but His own did not receive Him.” Father God hates sins and hides His face away from anyone who refuses to repent and renounce their wrong ways. Still, our sins were not His Son Jesus’s sins, and the Lord Jesus was not on the Cross as a sinner but as The Saviour, the beautiful sacrificial Lamb, for He had no sin. The Lord was sinless and Holy even when He took our sins on the Cross out of love for us and His Father. So His Father would still look at Him on the Cross and help Him through it, for they were suffering together for us since The Lord and His Father are One. The Father is God; His Son is God; His Holy Spirit is God. Therefore, God does not turn away from Himself. God does not abandon Himself. The same way the Lord Jesus never abandons His faithful servants and true children when they go through trials of any kind for Him and suffer persecution because of the devil’s evilness thrown upon them, the same way Father God did not abandon His sinless Son Jesus on the Cross, who did His Father’s perfect will by laying down His life for the sheep and paying for our ransom. So, what did the Lord Jesus mean when on the Cross He cried out, “My God, My God, Why Have You Forsaken Me?” Watch the Video on YouTube to understand why: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNI5od8_eLg May The Lord Jesus’ peace and understanding bless you. Elise Beatrice