Introduction:
The Cross in Psalm (Psalm 22):
- What is the prophecy of the messiah's suffering?
- The messiah will be...
- Mocked and Humiliated
- Pierced
- Forsaken
- The messiah will be...
- How did Jesus fulfill this prophecy on the cross?
- On the cross, Jesus was...
- Mocked and Humiliated
Matthew 27:35 - And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots.
Psalm 22:7-8 - All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads; "He trusts in the LORD; let him jdeliver him; let him rescue him, for he kdelights in him!"
Matthew 27:39-44 - And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, "You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross." So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, "He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he desires him. For he said, 'I am the Son of God.'" And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way.
- Pierced
- Forsaken
- Mocked and Humiliated
- On the cross, Jesus was...
- What does this prophecy mean for us?
- We no longer need to Feel Hopeless
Psalm 22:14-15 - I am spoured out like water, and all my bones are tout of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast; my strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to my jaws; you lay me in the dust of death.
Psalm 22:3-4 - Yet you are holy, enthroned on athe praises of Israel. In you our fathers trusted; they trusted, and you delivered them.
Psalm 22:21 - Save me from the mouth of the lion! You have rescued me from the horns of the wild oxen!
- We no longer need to Fear Rejection
John 6:37 - All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.
Ephesians 3:18-20 - ...may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us...
- We no longer need to Feel Hopeless
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:40-00:45
You can turn your Bibles to Psalm 22. Psalm 22.
00:48-00:49
Or we're gonna watch the video again. Oh no we're not.
00:51-00:58
You know I was thinking this past week that we all have specific things about our future that we would like to know about in advance.
00:58-01:08
Every single one of us is dealing with a very stressful situation right now, and we would like to know how it's going to work out. How it will come to a conclusion.
01:09-01:19
So I want you to imagine I put a TV screen in front of you and I prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that I can show you exactly how that situation will play out.
01:20-01:23
And then I follow up my pitch with the question, are you interested?
01:25-01:27
That'd be a hard opportunity to turn down, wouldn't it?
01:28-01:31
Or I follow up that question with another question.
01:32-01:36
Would you like to see exactly what house will become your forever home?
01:37-01:40
Would you like to see where your career will end up?
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Again, that'd be really nice information to have.
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Or for those of you with young kids, I tell you, this TV can show you exactly what they will look like when they grow up, what they will do, who they will marry, how many kids they would have.
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You go back and forth.
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Do I want this information?
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Do I not want this information?
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But then I round out my pitch with this final question.
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Oh, by the way, this TV can show you exactly how and when you are going to die.
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Are you interested?
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I think all of our interest in knowing the future would suddenly plummet with that question.
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Early on in this sermon series, we established the basic fact that we are all going to die someday, unless our Lord returns before them, which he most certainly can.
02:33-02:40
We all know there's a ticking time clock over our heads and slowly but surely winding down.
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And Jeff mentioned a few weeks ago, we've all even thought about how we will pass on.
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A sudden accident, peacefully in our sleep, or maybe a long illness.
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We're all naturally curious, but we also understand that it's best not to know the precise details of how our lives will come to a close.
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It's much better to be in the dark regarding the nitty gritty particulars of our eventual deaths.
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But Christ wasn't able to enjoy that blissful ignorance as we are able to.
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That wasn't the case for Christ.
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He knew exactly when, where, and how he would die.
03:29-03:32
He knew this in eternity past as it was planned out.
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And this harsh reality was constantly set before him during his earthly life.
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He didn't come to this planet to enjoy some time off or to take a vacation.
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He came to live the perfect life we couldn't live and then to die the death that we deserve to die.
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Jesus came to go to the cross.
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His entire ministry was aimed towards this goal.
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And Jesus knew scripture inside and out.
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He had a total mastery of the Old Testament.
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And throughout the gospels, Jesus would constantly pull out Easter eggs, no pun intended, from the Old Testament to show how they find their fulfillment in his life, his death, and his resurrection.
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And our passage for this evening, Psalm 22, is directly quoted from and alluded to 15 times in the New Testament.
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It so clearly speaks of Jesus' death that the early church called it the fifth gospel or the psalm of the cross.
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And there is so much to unpack here.
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I could talk about this psalm for hours and hours and hours.
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Some of you just got a really panicked look on your face.
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Don't worry, I'm not gonna do that.
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Based on how many kids are here, that probably wouldn't be the best of ideas.
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I'm not gonna cover all these verses in exhaustive detail, but I do want to show you the cross in Psalm 22.
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On this Good Friday, I want us to be powerfully reminded of what our Lord and Savior endured for us.
05:11-05:17
And I also want us to be comforted and encouraged by the eternal blessings that He secured for us.
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So before we continue on, let's go to the Lord and ask for His help.
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Father, we thank you so much for this amazing opportunity that we have to come together as the body of Christ and to look back to what your Son did for us.
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Lord, I pray that we would push aside all distraction.
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I pray that we bring our worries, our anxieties, our struggles to you and lay it at the foot of the cross.
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I pray that you would minister to us, you would encourage us, you would build us up.
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And if there's anyone in this room who doesn't know and love you, I pray that you would draw them unto salvation and they would trust in the Lord Jesus for the very first time.
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We thank you in advance for what you are going to do in the name of Jesus Christ.
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Amen.
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So Psalm 22 is written by King David. Now, you'll notice in a few minutes he's not going through an easy time at this point in his life.
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We aren't given the background information of his suffering, but he is going through the ringer.
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He is crying out to God in pain as he experiences betrayal, opposition, and loneliness.
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David feels abandoned.
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Have you ever been there?
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Have you ever felt that way?
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I know that I have.
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But this psalm isn't just about David's suffering or even your own suffering as you relate to his struggles.
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Ultimately, this psalm is about the suffering of the Messiah, who God promised would come all throughout the pages of the Old Testament to save his people.
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And David's season of trial highlights and foreshadows how this Savior will be treated by the very same people that he came to selflessly serve.
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And for the sake of time, we will zero in on the first 18 verses of this Psalm.
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And after I read this passage, we're gonna ask ourselves three questions, the same three questions we've been asking this entire series.
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What is the prophecy of the Messiah's suffering?
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How did Jesus fulfill this prophecy on the cross?
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And finally, what does this prophecy mean for us?
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So please turn your attention to Psalm 22, verses one through 18.
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My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
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Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning?
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Oh my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest.
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Yet you are holy, thrown on the praises of Israel, and you our fathers trusted.
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They trusted and you delivered them.
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To you they cried and were rescued, "And you they trusted and were not put to shame.
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"But I am a worm and not a man, "scorned by mankind, despised by the people.
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"All who see me mock me.
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"They make mouths at me.
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"They wag their heads.
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"He trusts in the Lord.
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"Let him deliver him.
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"Let him rescue him, for he delights in him.
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"Yet you are he who took me from the womb.
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"You made me trust you at my mother's breast.
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"On you I was cast from my birth, "and from my mother's womb you have been my God.
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"Be not far from me, for trouble is near, "and there is none to help.
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"Many bulls encompass me, "strong bulls of Bashan surround me.
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"They open wide their mouths at me "like a ravening and roaring lion.
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"I am poured out like water, "and all my bones are out of joint.
08:58-09:03
"My heart is like wax, it is melted within my breast.
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"My strength is dried up like a pot shirt, "and my tongue sticks to my jaws.
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"You lay me in the dust of death.
09:11-09:15
"For dogs encompass me, "a company of evil doers encircles me.
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"They have pierced my hands and feet.
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"I can count all my bones.
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"They stare and gloat over me.
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"They divide my garments among them, "and for my clothing, they cast lots." So what is the prophecy of the Messiah's suffering?
09:34-09:41
On your outline, the Messiah will be letter A, mocked and humiliated, mocked and humiliated.
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You know, the Jews eagerly awaited and look forward to their coming Messiah.
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They couldn't wait for his arrival.
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But like the prophets that God sent all throughout Israel's history, this Messiah would not be met with a warm welcome.
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He would not have a long and cushy life.
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We're told in Isaiah 53, verse three, that he is a man of sorrows acquainted with grief.
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He will be hated and mistreated.
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As we just read in this Psalm, he will be scorned, he will be despised, he will be mocked, he will be gloated over.
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Even the clothes on his body will not be safe, they will be cruelly ripped from his body.
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And next, the Messiah will be pierced.
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the Messiah will be pierced.
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We see in this Psalm that this Messiah will be surrounded by a group of evil men who are like wild dogs and they tear into him.
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They have no mercy, they have no compassion.
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They even pierce his hands and his feet, which we'll talk about more in a few minutes.
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And let her see this Messiah will be forsaken.
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He will be forsaken.
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You know, this Psalm kicks off with the worst of the Messiah's pain.
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He will be forsaken by God Himself.
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Wait a minute.
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How is that possible?
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How could someone sent by God possibly be rejected by God?
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Why would God commission this Messiah and then turn his back on him?
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This makes no sense.
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This is totally ridiculous.
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Well, it certainly appears that way to our very puny human brains.
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God's divine plans often seem foolish, but they are actually foolproof.
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We cannot fully grasp the wisdom and ways of God on our own.
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Thankfully, we have the Word of God which tells us the truth and fills in the blanks that we cannot figure out on our own.
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So let's move to the New Testament to gather greater clarity on this suffering and forsaken Messiah as we answer our second question this evening.
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How did Jesus fulfill this prophecy on the cross?
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On the cross, Jesus was mocked and humiliated.
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Jesus was mocked and humiliated.
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2,000 years ago, crucifixion was by far the most degrading and humiliating death imaginable.
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It was a death that was reserved for the lowest of the low, thieves, murderers, extremists, and traitors.
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It served as an example to every single person who witnessed it.
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Watch out and get in line or this will happen to you.
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Those who were condemned to crucifixion were publicly stripped down and left to die with no dignity or privacy whatsoever.
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We're told in Psalm 22, 18, that they divide my garments among them and for my clothing, they cast lots.
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And we see this prophecy become reality in all four of the gospel accounts of Jesus' crucifixion.
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Listen to how Matthew describes it.
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And when they had crucified Jesus, They divided his garments among them by casting lots.
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And John even tells us in his gospel that this casting of lots occurred to fulfill the prophecy of Psalm 22.
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Imagine Jesus having to watch as soldiers gamble over the clothes they ripped from his body.
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You know, it was customary in those days to give the clothes of the crucified to their family.
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But Jesus and his mother aren't even given this common courtesy.
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And Jesus wasn't even allowed to die in silence as he is maliciously taunted by those in the crowd.
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As I reread Psalm 22, verses 7 through 8, and then read Matthew 27, verses 39 through 44, pay close attention to how closely these two accounts line up.
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"All who see me mock me.
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"They make mouths at me, they wag their heads.
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"He trusts in the Lord.
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"Let him deliver him.
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"Let him rescue him, for he delights in him." Now listen how closely this lines up to Matthew.
14:34-14:43
And those who pass by Jesus derided him, wagging their heads and saying, "You who destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, "save yourself.
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"If you're the son of God, come down from the cross." So also the chief priests, the scribes and elders mocked him saying, "He saved others, he cannot save himself.
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"He is the King of Israel.
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"Let him come down now from the cross "and we will believe in him.
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"He trusts in God, let God deliver him now "if he desires him, for he said, 'I am the son of God.' "And the robbers who were crucified with him "also reviled him in the same way." This is shameful and disgusting.
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They are cursing God himself.
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They are mocking their creator.
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And it always blows me away that Jesus didn't just call down fire from heaven to disintegrate all these people into a fine powder.
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But that's not what he does, is it?
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How does he respond instead?
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He says, "Father, forgive them, "for they know not what they do." That is a level of humility and selfless love that is beyond comprehension.
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Jesus willingly subjected himself to the worst shame and dishonor imaginable.
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But he continually responded with grace and gentleness every single step along the way.
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On the cross, Jesus was pierced.
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Jesus was pierced.
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Now let's focus a bit more on the details of the crucifixion itself.
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Jesus was laid out upon the cross, had metal spikes driven through his body, and then he was raised up to suffocate.
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And this lines up with what David says in Psalm 22, 16, "They have pierced my hands and my feet." Do you know what is astounding about this prophecy?
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It was written hundreds of years before the Romans even invented crucifixion.
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The Holy Spirit inspired these words and use David's suffering to predict the worst instrument of human death and the exact method of Jesus' execution.
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I wanna point our attention to something that blew my mind as I studied this past week in verse six.
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I wanna show you how it ties in to Jesus being pierced on the cross.
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In verse six, David says, "But I am a worm and not a man." You know, as kids, many of us stepped on a lot of worms.
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We'd pick worms off the sidewalk and throw them as far as we possibly could, or at least I did, maybe none of you did.
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I mean, think about it.
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Some of you are fishermen, and you actually put a fish on a hook and feed it to a fish.
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Do you ever feel bad about that?
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Does that keep you awake at night?
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I don't think so.
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A lot of us had to actually dissect worms in middle school and high school.
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I have to say that never made me feel bad at all.
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Why don't we feel bad about that?
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Because worms appear to be the lowest form of human life.
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They're gross, they're slimy, and they're easy to kick around.
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Now, David isn't saying that he's literally a worm.
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He is saying his enemies are treating him like a lowly worm that they want to stomp on.
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But there's actually a much deeper meaning here that further draws our attention to Christ's suffering.
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In the Hebrew, the word for worm is toloth.
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It can also be translated as crimson or scarlet.
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That's a bit weird, right?
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Why is this one word used to communicate two things that seem so disconnected?
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Well, because they're actually connected.
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As I studied for this message, I learned that there was actually a creature called the crimson or scarlet worm.
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And people in the ancient world would actually use this worm to dye clothes red.
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But to get the dye, you actually had to crush the worm.
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And once it was crushed, it would produce a red fluid that marked, that stained every single thing that it touched.
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I also learned that when this worm gave birth, it would attach itself to a tree trunk and firmly stick to the wood as these grubs were born.
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And then once these grubs were born, the mother would die and this red fluid would pour out upon the tree and it would mark its children.
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You know, it's things like this that show me how glorious the word of God is every single day.
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Like the crimson worm, Jesus had to die.
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He had to be crushed and pierced in order for his blood to pour out upon the cross.
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Like the crimson worm, he laid down his own life to give life to others.
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But this new life isn't just a short life cycle like with those gross grubs They only live for a few short months.
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This life that Jesus gave lasts forever and ever and ever.
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And his blood wasn't used for something as trivial as dying a t-shirt or a pair of pants.
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His blood was poured out to wash us clean of all of our sinful stains and to mark us as his people for all of eternity.
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Next on your outline, on the cross, Jesus was forsaken.
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Jesus was forsaken.
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You know, on Good Friday, we tend to focus on the physical torture of the cross, which was certainly horrible and beyond description.
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Our word for excruciating literally means from or out of the cross, which tells you how much physical pain Jesus had to endure.
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But this was not the worst part of Jesus' death.
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And it's not even the focus of scripture.
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The worst part by far was the rejection that Jesus had to experience from the Father as divine wrath for sin was poured out upon him.
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Remember how David kicks off Psalm 22.
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My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
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And in Matthew 27, verse 46, and in Mark chapter 15, verse 34, Jesus echoed these same words very soon before he breathed his last breath and yielded his life over to death.
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My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
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This is the only time in all the gospels where Jesus doesn't personally address God the Father as his Father.
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He simply addresses him as God.
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There is anguish in this cry.
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There is pain as the Father turns his back on the Son.
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There is a dark sense of isolation that we cannot even begin to relate to.
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You know, many of us experience separation anxiety as kids.
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I know that I did.
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Maybe you experienced it with your parents, your grandparents, or some other guardian that you had.
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My wife and I are dealing with my son's own battle with separation anxiety.
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Sometimes I'll just try to go to the bathroom, go to the basement or the garage, and Sam will say, "Dad, where are you going?
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"Are you gonna leave me?" And sometimes I'll turn it back on him and say, "Are you gonna leave me?" And that makes him laugh, and it kind of calms him down a bit.
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Other times, I sit down with him, I explained, "Sam, your mom and I "are not gonna leave you by yourself.
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"You'll always be with someone who cares about you, "whether it's a grandma or someone at church." And to be honest, I'm almost driven to tears at times when Sam looks in my eyes and he asks me that question that I hate to be asked, "Dad, are you gonna leave me?" It pains me to think that my son worries there's a possibility that I would just walk out of the house and leave him defend for himself.
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He is my son and I would never forsake him.
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But God the Father willingly chose to do what I could never do with my own son.
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The Father had to forsake Jesus as he bore the wrath that I deserve for my sin.
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And as Jesus cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He wasn't just suffering from a bout of separation anxiety.
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That was unjustifiable or overreactive.
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He was experiencing genuine separation anguish.
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To be clear, I'm not saying that Jesus stopped being God in this moment, or that the Trinity ceased being the Trinity.
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That is not the case whatsoever.
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Jesus has an eternal relationship with the Father, that had no beginning and it will have no end.
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There was never a time when the father and the son didn't have this intimate fellowship, except for on the cross as Jesus, the sinless son of God became sin.
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And this short separation of fellowship felt like an eternity, as Jesus had to experience the horrors of hell so that he could open the doors of heaven.
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And the pain of separation and being forsaken totally eclipsed the momentary pain of being mocked and pierced to a cross.
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So we've answered the first two questions of what is the prophecy of the Messiah's suffering?
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How did Jesus fulfill this prophecy on the cross?
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Let's wrap up by hitting a bit closer to home.
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What does this prophecy mean for us?
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What does this prophecy mean for us?
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At the bottom of your outline, letter A, we no longer need to feel hopeless.
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We no longer need to feel hopeless.
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As you've already seen, And this Psalm is filled with pain, sadness, and torment.
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And in verses 14 through 15, David honestly lays out how he feels at this time.
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He says, "I am poured out like water.
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All my bones are out of joint.
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My heart is like wax.
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It is melted within my breast.
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My strength is dried up like a pot shirt.
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And my tongue sticks to my jaws.
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You lay me in the dust of death." David feels completely empty and poured out.
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Melted like a ball of wax in the beating sun.
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Like a broken piece of clay that is tossed aside and discarded.
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He is thirsty and spent.
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He just feels like he's just consigned to the dust of death.
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But David is not hopeless and defeated.
26:49-26:53
David hopes in the Lord as he experiences great sorrow.
26:54-26:55
Listen again to verses three through four.
26:56-26:59
"Yet you are holy and thrown on the praises of Israel.
26:59-27:22
And you our fathers trusted, they trusted and you delivered them." And he writes later in the Psalm, "I will tell of your name to my brothers in the midst of the congregation, I will praise you." Even though life seems to be falling apart around him, David decides to trust in and worship the Lord.
27:25-27:28
I know that many of you in this room are not in a great place.
27:30-27:37
On the outside, it may seem like you're doing great, but on the inside, you're anything but great.
27:38-27:44
The flames of trial, discouragement, and exhaustion seem to be getting more intense with each passing day.
27:45-27:48
You feel helpless and hopeless.
27:50-27:55
But in this Psalm, David is hopeful despite his suffering.
27:56-27:57
But we can do him one better.
27:58-28:08
If you were a true follower of Christ, a true born again believer, you can have hope because of your Messiah's suffering.
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You must find hope in the undeniable reality that Jesus fulfilled all the promises of this Psalm and guarantees your salvation.
28:20-28:24
Think back to all we've studied over the course of this series.
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You are covered by the precious blood of Jesus Christ.
28:29-28:37
All of your sins, past, present, and future have been forgiven, paid for, and remembered no more.
28:37-28:41
You have been gifted with the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ.
28:42-28:45
He has purchased your eternal salvation.
28:45-28:47
He has defeated death.
28:47-28:50
And now your name is written in heaven.
28:51-29:01
You have an unshakable hope that can never be destroyed, no matter how hard the earthquakes of life try to rock you.
29:02-29:09
Everything can be taken from you, except for what Christ has given to you.
29:10-29:16
Everything can be taken from you, except for what Christ has given to you.
29:19-29:23
Finally, what does this prophecy mean for us?
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We no longer need to fear rejection.
29:28-29:31
We no longer need to fear rejection.
29:35-29:41
And I know in this room, There are men and women who do not know and love Jesus Christ.
29:43-29:49
And as of right now, the road of your life is leading to separation from God in hell.
29:50-29:54
That's the bad news, but I have good news for you.
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That doesn't have to be your future.
29:58-30:05
Jesus was crucified outside the gates of Jerusalem so that you could be drawn near into his loving presence.
30:05-30:08
He was mocked so that you could be approved.
30:09-30:13
He was pierced and forsaken so that you could be embraced.
30:14-30:20
Stop ignoring, stop pushing away the free offer of salvation in Jesus Christ.
30:21-30:28
Submit to him as your savior and your Lord, and you'll never ever have to fear rejection again.
30:31-30:35
I love this promise from Christ in John 6:37.
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All the Father gives me will come to me.
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And whoever comes to me, I will never cast out.
30:45-30:49
Whoever comes to me, I will never cast out.
30:49-30:59
If you turn away from your sin and turn towards Jesus Christ, you will be given eternal friendship with God.
31:01-31:12
The others of you in this room are genuine believers, genuine Christians, but you still wrestle with believing that God rejects you.
31:13-31:18
You still struggle with believing that God could possibly love someone like you.
31:20-31:23
I know that I struggle with that at times.
31:25-31:31
And I recently came across this quote that really convicted me and encouraged me at the same time.
31:31-31:42
The greatest sorrow and burden you can lay on the Father, the greatest unkindness you can do to him is not to believe that he loves you.
31:45-31:53
When we struggle with believing that God truly loves us, we're actually calling God a liar and Christ an insufficient Savior.
31:55-31:59
We act as if the sacrifice of Christ means nothing.
32:01-32:06
God the Father sacrificed what was most precious to him to adopt you into his family.
32:07-32:14
God the Son sacrificed everything to make you his brother, to make you his sister.
32:16-32:20
May we never cave into the lie that God withholds himself from us.
32:21-32:30
May we never ever even entertain the thought that God wants nothing to do with us that he doesn't love us.
32:32-32:50
Pray along with the apostle Paul, that you may have strength to comprehend with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
Small Group Discussion
Read Psalm 22
What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
What causes you to feel hopeless at times? How can you fight against this feeling with the Word of God?
Do you ever wrestle with truly believing that God loves you? Why or why not?
Breakout
Pray for one another.