Psalm 22, Jesus's Cry of Forsakenness, and the Triune Life

If Jesus is in the Trinity, how should hear Christ's cry of dereliction?

Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

— Matthew 27.45-46

Fill in the blanks:

If I say, “The Lord is my shepherd...”

You say___________.

If I say, “Yea though I walk in the valley of the shadow of death...”

What do you say next?

“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and______”

And what?

If I say, “Just a small town girl/Livin' in a lonely world/She took the midnight train going _______”

You know to say, “…anywhere” before moving on to sing about a city boy and singer in a smokey bar.

Almost everyone knows the Twenty-Third Psalm by heart. It’s like “Don’t Stop Believin” by Journey. You hear it everywhere— certainly almost every time someone dies. So what would Matthew have us make of this line from Psalm 22 when Jesus dies, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

Does Jesus stop believing on the cross?

But Jesus is in the Trinity.

Even on the cross, especially on the cross, Jesus is in the Trinity.

Jesus is truly God and truly Human, without division or mixture, without— we should remember during Holy Week— an off switch for either of his two natures.

Even on Golgotha he still is God.

Does Christ’s cry of dereliction suggest that Jesus believes God has abandoned him?

Again, Jesus is in the Trinity.

God just is the relationship between the Father and this Son in their Spirit.

There is no other God but this relation.

Thus, there can be no God who abandons this Son.

Nor can there be a Son who would believe the Father would abandon him.

Quite simply, a Son who would believe the Father has forsaken him would mean something far more troubling; namely, the true God does not exist.

What then do make of Christ’s cry of dereliction?