Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Good morning and welcome to Dishman Baptist Church.

If I were one given to melodramatics I would preach this sermon this morning without shoes on.

Because, as one commentator wrote, we truly are coming to holy ground this morning.

Before I get any further into that, if you are joining us this morning for the first time we’ve been looking through a category of Psalms known as the Messianic Psalms.

Two weeks ago we looked at Psalm 2 and we saw how pathetically the nations rage, the sovereignty of God, the Son who speaks what His Father has given Him to say and has been enthroned and then how that impacts us here today in Spokane Valley in the 21st Century.

Last week we looked at the 8th Psalm and how that Psalm gave us a picture of the magnificence of God and His magnificent name.

In fact the Psalm starts and ends in the same powerful manner

And what we discovered is that His magnificence is most clearly revealed in the person of His Son Jesus Christ.

But this morning we’ve come to the singular event that splits all of history.

We stand on the very hill of Golgotha and there in the distance a man hangs on a cross.

This Psalm is going to give us a picture of the inner dialogue of Christ as He hangs there.

If this Psalm were portrayed in a movie scene we would see Him hanging and as the opening lines are said we would zoom in for a time, all the way into His eye as a flashback happens which would serve as a prelude, and then back out for the crucifixion itself, then the hope of the resurrection and the promise of ultimate victory at His second coming and finally there is the postlude and what it means for us.

In fact that is our outline for this morning - the prelude, the crucifixion, the resurrection and finally the postlude.

But before we go any further lets open our Bibles and read this most excellent Psalm together.

I know this is a bit unusual but would you stand with me as we read through this most sacred passage of Scripture.

The Prelude

Psalm 22:1-5;

The Psalmist starts off with a phrase we all know - My God, my God why have you abandoned me?

This entire opening line seems off to us.

Almost strange.

God has abandoned one of His own.

How could this be?

Isn’t this the same God who will later say that I will never leave you or forsake you?

Isn’t this the same God that promised the Israelites that He would never leave them?

and then again

The writer to Hebrews would promise his readers

So this is a call of desperation - God where are you?

Why have you left me here like this? It’s almost an accusation - You promised me, You put me here and now You’ve forsaken me?

I cry to You but there is no rest.

And this is where the flashback comes in - as the speaker looks back over the history of the broken nation of Israel and sees that God has always come to their aid.

First he starts with an assertion of God’s holiness.

This is the primary attribute of God’s character from which all else flows.

Charles Spurgeon said it this way

“In holiness God is more clearly seen than in anything else save in the person of Christ Jesus, the Lord, of whose life such holiness is but a repetition.”

It is this attribute that God chose to describe Himself to the Israelites when He was delivering His expectations to them for them to be His representatives on earth

And the speaker rightly recognizes that God is enthroned upon the praises of Israel.

The writing of this psalm would predate the building of the temple in Jerusalem so the picture the writer has in mind is the descent of God upon the tabernacle in the desert.

And this was a great source of trust for the people.

The writer says that they trusted and You rescued them.

They cried to You and were set free; they trusted in You and were not disgraced.

There are echoes here of the Exodus from Egypt - which was the singular formative event in the history of Israel.

Whenever Israel looked back to what God had done for them it always started with the Exodus.

But there are also echoes here from the time of the Judges - that great and tragic story of the apostasy of Israel during that 400 year span from Joshua’s death to the time of Samuel and the eventual request for a king to rule over them as a nation.

Repeatedly throughout that time in Israel’s history the people would repudiate God and His laws and would be persecuted by surrounding nations.

Over and over again they would cry out to God for relief and He would raise up a judge that would rescue them for a time.

Only for them to again turn their backs on Him so much so that the end of the book chronicling this period in Israel tells us

It is so strange now that this man, this speaker, is completely forsaken and forgotten by God.

It is out of God’s character to turn His back on one so comprehensively.

Yet this is the picture that we are given here.

This man is absolutely desperate in his desire for God and yet so utterly destitute in His rejection by God.

The Crucifixion

Psalm 22:6-21a;

And so we are ushered in to the main event described by this Psalm.

This poor wretch has been abandoned by God and he’s also been abandoned by anyone who might have helped Him.

This is truly a pitiful soul.

Even Job had counselors and those who sought to commiserate with him in his grief - as pathetic and ill intentioned as they turned out to be - but this man he is looked at as lower than a worm.

He is viewed as so low that you would step on him with your shoe and not even notice, not even be bothered enough to wipe it off as it will come off as you go.

He is openly mocked.

The abandonment by God is brought even more into stark contrast to the derisive nature of the enemies who have surrounded Him.

They mock him saying that He had relied on the Lord and that if the Lord truly took pleasure in Him that He would rescue Him.

And so He appeals within Himself again.

The Psalmist turns from lament - the woe is me and my situation - to prayer as He calls out once more.

This is what You destined me for God.

You put me here.

You watched over me from birth and cared for me.

Now, in this moment of direst need, don’t be far from me - and yet the answer is silence.

Well, silence from God.

The answer is the animalistic rage of His enemies as they surround Him in His plight.

I’ve been around some bulls in my life.

And they are not nice creatures.

I had a friend once who was stomped by a bull and lost his spleen and half his pancreas.

I’ve been kicked.

They are not kind.

The bulls of Bashan were the fattest and largest cattle produced in all of Israel.

It is to these strong bulls that the psalmist compares his opponents.

It is to lions that roar and maul.

He is so pressed upon that he is being poured out like water and his bones are out of joint.

His organs are melting like wax under the intensity of their attacks.

He says that his strength is failing him and that his tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth.

This man is in the throes of death.

This is not simply a complaint - this is deep seated terror, emotional, physical and mental anguish that is being wrought upon this man.

He feels the dust of death encroaching upon his soul.

As if the bulls and the lions were not enough he is encroached upon by dogs who take his clothing and divide it right in front of him.

It is clear that His enemies have full intention to kill Him.

He makes one last desperate appeal that the Lord would come and save Him from those who were encircling Him - from the dogs, the bulls and the lions who were seeking his life.

And then there is a seeming pause - it’s almost a pregnant pause as if time is frozen just for an instant that seems to last forever...

The Resurrection

Psalm 22:21b-26;

And the Psalmist begins to rejoice.

You answered me!

Just hear the relief, the utter joy in those words.

The God who was silent, the God who had apparently forsaken Him, the God who was distant had come near.

And His instant reaction is ebullient praise.

He can’t help but call out to His brothers and sisters to praise God.

He can’t help but to proclaim the name and the glory of the God who has saved Him from certain annihilation.

He proclaims not only God’s glory but also His faithfulness.

That He does not despise or abhor the oppressed.

That He does indeed listen to those who cry out and seek Him.

And for this reason the Psalmist says that He will praise Him in the assemblies.