As we sit between Good Friday and Easter Sunday I want you to consider something remarkable. It is most likely that David wrote Psalm 22 around 1000 years before the events of Good Friday. Yet here is some of what David wrote in Psalm.
Psalm 22:1-2 “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest.”
Does this sound familiar?
Matthew 27:45-46 “From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land. About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?”(which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”)
From the cross, Jesus was quoting Psalm 22.
Psalm 22:7-9 “But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by everyone, despised by the people. All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads. “He trusts in the Lord,” they say, “let the Lord rescue him. Let him deliver him, since he delights in him.”
Matthew 27:39-44 “Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads and saying, “You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God!” In the same way the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders mocked him. “He saved others,” they said, “but he can’t save himself! He’s the king of Israel! Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God. Let God rescue him now if he wants him, for he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’ ” In the same way the rebels who were crucified with him also heaped insults on him.”
Psalm 22:14-15 “I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart has turned to wax; it has melted within me. My mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you lay me in the dust of death.”
John 19:28 “Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips.”
Psalm 22:16-18 “Dogs surround me, a pack of villains encircles me; they pierce my hands and my feet. All my bones are on display; people stare and gloat over me. They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment.”
Matthew 27:35 “When they had crucified him, they (the soldiers) divided up his clothes by casting lots.”
It seems to me it would take a great deal more faith to believe that it was possible for someone to write, with exacting detail, how his famous offspring would be executed a thousand years before it happened by chance than it would to take this as another piece of evidence that Jesus was who he said he was. David, through the power of the Holy Spirit, was testifying to the truth of who Jesus was a thousand years before Jesus was born.
If you believe that David was testifying to Jesus, it is safe for your conclusion to be that if Jesus was who David said he was during his death on Friday, we can have some assurance that Jesus was still who David said he was when he rose on Sunday. You might also want to consider that this Psalm is just one of hundreds of Old Testament prophecies. Our faith is not naive, blind, or without foundation. Think about it.
Yours in the Journey,
Pastor Tim