Welcome once again to the Daily Devotionals of Bally Baptist Church. Thank you for taking time to join with us this Monday morning for a short time around the Word of God. Over these past weeks I've been looking at some questions that have been asked in Scripture. This morning I want to look at another question, perhaps the most profound of all the questions in Scripture. and we find it in Matthew chapter 27 and I want to read verses 45 and 46. It says, Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land, on to the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Ila, ila, lama sabachthani, that is to say, My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me? And that's the question I want us to consider this morning, the question from the cross. Our Lord Jesus Christ cried out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Perhaps the most profound of all the questions in scripture, a mystery we'll never understand, never understand fully until that day is revealed to us in the great eternity. But I want us to look at it this morning just for a brief time because in it I see comfort for the child of God. Great comfort for you and me this morning as we look at this question that the Saviour cried out to the Father in those dark hours of Calvary. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? There's comfort in the eternal. level and there's comfort in the temporal level. And the cross work of Christ there I can in my mind divide it into into two sections. There's the third hour to the sixth hour when in broad daylight as it were before the gaze of all the people the Lamb of God was taken and nailed to the cross. There we can see man's wrath against the lovely Son of God. There we can see the hatred of mankind, the hatred of even the religious rulers of the day, their hatred against the lovely Son of God. And they take him and they strip him and they nail him to the cross. And he's suspended between heaven and earth by nails and hands and feet. And they taunt him and they've placed a crown of thorns upon his head and his blood flows freely. and they taunt him, and they ready kill him, they mock him. And you see there the extent of the wrath of man against the lovely Son of God. But then, from the sixth to the ninth hour, a deep darkness covers the land. It tells us When we go back to the book of Exodus in chapter 10, it tells us there of one of the ten plagues that were in Egypt as God liberated his people. And one of the plagues was a plague of darkness. And it says there that the darkness was a darkness that may be felt. Such deep a darkness from God. And the force of the word that's used for darkness here, when it says darkness covered the land, is the same sense. That this is a darkness from God. It is God, it's not an eclipse of the sun or anything else. It's a full moon, so therefore there's no eclipse. It's the eclipse of God. As God veils from human view the glare of mankind, as He deals in its entirety, as He deals with my sin, with your sin, in His Son on Calvary's cross. And such is the weight of God's wrath against the sins of man that our lovely Saviour cries out, my God, my God, Why hast thou forsaken me? You know, dear child of God, here's the comfort. God dealt that day with your sin and with mine in a way that for all eternity it will never be held to our account. In Isaiah's 53rd chapter, that lovely chapter of the suffering servant, says that surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken of God and afflicted. It says he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, The chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his stripes we're healed. And that day on Calvary's cross, our Lord Jesus Christ bore our sins in their entirety. They are taken away, never to be remembered against us anymore forever. Our punishment the wrath of God against them, our punishment, everything that we deserve for our sin, everything that you deserve for your sin. Christ took it upon himself that day at Calvary, and I don't know how, but the mystery of God is there covered in darkness. But one day in eternity we'll understand it. But God dealt entirely with my sin. Oh, what a comfort it is to know that my sin O the bliss of this glorious thought, my sin, not in part but the whole, was nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord, O my soul. In Israel on the Day of Atonement, there was two goats brought to the high priest. One was slain. And the blood was taken in to the Holy of Holies, and it was placed there upon the horns of the altar, or of the holy seat of the Ark. And the other goat, the high priest came out and he laid his hands upon the head of the other goat, And laying his hands on the head of it he confessed the sins of the nation. Laying symbolically their sins upon the goat. And then a fit man took that goat and it says he was to take it to a land not inhabited. And that description, not inhabited, can be translated as a land of separation. And it told Israelites that their sins had been dealt with by the death of the first goat, and they had been removed from God's record. by the death or by the banishment as it were of the scapegoat. Our brother Trevor spoke about it the other week. And you see our Lord Jesus Christ was both the slain lamb and the slain goat and he took away our sins and they're never to be remembered against us anymore forever. So what a glorious truth we have in the great day of atonement there. And what a great eternal comfort we have to know that our sins and our iniquities have been dealt with on Calvary's cross, never to be remembered against us anymore, forever. But not only is there eternal comfort in the cry or in the question, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? But I can see in it a temporal comfort or a comfort for today. The Psalmist David in Psalm 22 He opens the psalm with this cry, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Now the Spirit of God makes that psalm a prophetic psalm, and as you read down through that psalm, you can see Calvary depicted. Now not that David probably was aware of that as he wrote the psalm, but the Spirit of God, as the Word of God says, that these men spoke as the Spirit moved them. And so David wrote this psalm referring to himself. David was a man who knew much trouble. He was a man after God's own heart, but he knew much trouble in his life. He was hunted by Saul for years, his life in danger. He even knew rebellion in his own family when Absalom turned against him. And he knew much trouble. And in the midst of some of these troubles, we don't know exactly what one it was, but he cries out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? It seemed to David that here he was, a man after God's own heart, anointed of God to be king of Israel, and now God has forsaken him. and he cries out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? But as you read down through the psalm, you come to a place of comfort, and then you come to a place of victory. Job, Job that great man of God, a man who walked well before God, a man who was perfect in his ways, knows great distress in his life. He loses his wealth, he loses his family, He loses his health. We talked about it briefly last week. And even in the midst of all this, all these problems, we find that Job says, though he slay me, yet will I trust him. And you see, Spurgeon, as he speaks of this, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? makes a point, and it's a very good point. He said, our Saviour didn't cry, God, God, why hast thou forsaken me? He cries, my God, my God. Even in the midst of it all, our Saviour still knew that God was his Father. And you know, dear child of God, even in the midst of all our troubles, we can still cry out, my God, my God. We can cry to him and even though it might seem to our heart that he has forsaken us, that he has forgotten us, remember that promise which I think I probably have quoted almost every week as I spoke. He says, I'll never leave you. nor forsake you. And dear child of God, I don't care how deep your trouble, how deep your sorrow was this morning, you can still cry out, my God, my God, he has not forsaken me. He says, I'll never leave thee, nor I'll never forsake thee. There's great comfort in the cry. And you know, after that cry, as our Lord dies upon the cross, his last statement is this, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. Dear child of God, no matter what your trouble is, he's still your Father God. Let us pray together. Heavenly Father, we thank you today for Calvary. We thank you for that great work of redemption. Oh Father, help us even today in times of distress, in times of worry, in times of care. And even though we may in despair cry out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Oh, help us to realise that you'll never leave us nor forsake us. that you're still our God and you're still our Father who is in heaven. Bless us throughout this day. Draw graciously near to those who mourn and to those who suffer pain. Father, I pray that this day they might know the hand of God upon them for blessing. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.