Why Have You Forsaken Me?

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 find no rest." -the words of a broken man.

The excerpt, of course, is the first two verses of Psalm 22. Recently, God put it on my heart to study this psalm.

At a prayer meeting one time, I heard a woman pray, "God, we're not supposed to cry. You hate it when we cry. You command us to rejoice!"

God commands us to rejoice?! If so, what does "rejoicing" look like? Is "rejoicing" walking around forcing a happy smile when inside we feel miserable and want to bawl our eyes out? Many people I know think that. When I heard that woman pray that, my heart broke. I got angry! Who told her that lie?! It was like she was saying that God is this gestapo that comes to you as you're bawling your eyes out and says, "Rejoice! What's wrong with you?! Suck it up, buttercup!" And yes, I know what Philippians 4:4 says, but is it actually just a command?

We can think it is! When we go to church we almost can feel guilty about showing our true emotions sometimes. I've felt this way especially in ministry.
People walk up to me and ask, "Hey Steve, how's it going?"
First words out of my mouth: "Good!" I force a smile at them.

There were times when I said that and I felt horrible! I had a sleepless night, a stressful week, a stubborn student in ministry not listening to me, financial woes, car problems, the list has gone on. Why didn't I just tell them?! I would have times of prayer with God in the midst of times like this: "Dear God, thank you for today..." when in reality I was not feeling that! So why didn't I tell Him that?! WHY?!

YES trials can mold us and shape us and YES God can use them, but sometimes what we forget is that GOD is NOT just LORD, but our LOVING FATHER! You know what His tone is in saying the words, "Rejoice in the Lord always, again I say rejoice?" It is this: He gently puts His hand on our shoulder, looks at us with the most compassionate eyes imaginable as we are bitter and weeping and says, "I'm your Dad, I love you, and I'll get you through this. Rejoice!"

I'm not going to lie, but when I think about that, it brings tears to my eyes.

Because we've all had times in our lives when we've felt horrible! David WAS feeling horrible as he was writing this and yet it is in the Bible as one of the most popular psalms. One of the main examples, of course was that through the poetic imagery he was using, he was describing Jesus on the cross. When he wrote the words, "they have pierced my hands and feet" (v. 16), historically speaking crucifixion wasn't even invented yet as a form of execution. So what does that mean?

God used this broken man, that's what it means. David was just expressing his heart to God, but GOD was using HIM to explain to the WORLD that ultimately THIS WILL BE JESUS.

Jesus,
the God of the universe who became a man.
A broken man of sorrows,
bearing the wrath we deserve.
He
was
forsaken.
David felt forsaken,
Jesus was forsaken.
We feel forsaken,
Jesus was forsaken.

And because of that, in Christ we are NEVER forsaken. Toward the end of that psalm, David's tone changed to words of PURE PRAISE to God. We are supposed to praise and rejoice in God, yes! If I sounded like I was contradicting myself, I was not. We are supposed to and He does command it, BUT God at the same time allows us to come to Him as real people! We can come broken, bitter, and weeping and God does not condemn us, but embraces us as a loving Father embraces His son who just fell off a bike and is crying over a scraped knee. I don't know about you, but that God deserves to be rejoiced over.

So let's come to Him!