You know you have the Word hidden in your heart when you are being murdered and you groan Scripture. It wasn’t because Jesus was the Word made flesh that He quoted Scripture on the Cross. He wasn’t being wise, knowing that people would one day read about that moment, He was in pain and the only adequate expression of what He was feeling was from the Psalms. He had to learn the Scriptures just like we have to. For the first 12 years of His life He went to Hebrew school where He memorized the whole Old Testament, just like everyone else His age (of which there weren’t many because of the mass infanticide when He was younger). The overflow of His heart was Psalm 22.
What an appropriate Psalm! He is quoted as only saying the first phrase of verse one, in which He claims His own Father as His God. That is strange, a little. Worshiping His Father as God, but all men have gods, His was His Father. God worshiping God seems strange, but Jesus was the Firstfruit of a harvest of a New Creation Race of men. This Race will worship their Father. He was modeling what we would do, worship the Father as adopted children. Everything Jesus did was a How-To lesson for our Race.
Walking through Psalm 22, we see that David captured the situation’s emotions perfectly for Jesus. Jesus was up all the night before with no rest (verse2). The only praises for God to be enthroned on (verse 3) were the mocking sign on the Cross which read “King of the Jews”, so Jesus was firmly “enthroned” on what would one day be the focus of so much praise for Him to ride upon. In verse 4 and 5, David talks about how their fathers had trusted the Lord and not been disappointed, and as Jesus hung there all His hope had to hang on the goodness and faithfulness of Jehovah for it would be the Father who would raise Him from the grave in three days. Reading Paul’s letters to various churches, it is unmistakable that it was the Spirit and the Father who raised Jesus from the dead, He did not raise Himself up. We, too, will not raise ourselves, They will.
Verses six through eight are obviously perfectly fulfilled in the crucifixion. And verses nine and ten are profound comments on the incarnation. But verses 11 through eighteen seem like a poem that Jesus could have written while in Sheol for those three days (or wherever He was and whatever He was doing). From His thirst in verse fifteen to His hands and feet being pierced in verse sixteen, it would be wise to read this psalm every time you consider the crucifixion and suffering of the Messiah. It is astounding.
Eternal treasures are found in the remaining verses of the psalm, but one pops of the page – the fear of the Lord. Though books and libraries could not adequately explain this delightful Spirit (Isaiah 11:3), it is critical that we get anointed by the fear of the Lord. “You who fear the Lord, praise Him.” It is not a fear that grips us and makes us unable to function, but is a motivating fear that demands a response. We worship Him not out of fear that we would be squashed if we withhold our praise, but we worship Him because we know what He is capable of yet did not do. Accepting the gift of salvation is an act of the fear of the Lord. It is God’s wrath that we are saved from, yet it is God’s love and mercy that saved us from His own wrath. He isn’t schizophrenic, He is just.
It is, after all, very foolish to not take protection from the most powerful Being in existence. We who fear the Lord are not yellow, we are wise. It is the foolish who think that they are able to function apart from the Blood of the only worthy sacrificial offering. He presented His body as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable and we benefit from it.
*My God, My God, thank You for not forsaking us but showed us faithfulness. Amen*
