Do You Feel God Has Forsaken You?

Yet you are enthroned as the Holy One;

   you are the one Israel praises. 

In you our ancestors put their trust;

   they trusted and you delivered them. 

To you they cried out and were saved;

   in you they trusted and were not put to shame.

Psalms 22:3-5 (NIV)

Since I was in college I try to read the Psalms on a daily basis to help myself remember the attributes of God. After getting married and having kids I try to share the verse and attribute with my family at dinner. A couple of nights ago I read verses one and two of Psalm 22 and my youngest son remarked, "That's what Jesus said." So we got to talk about Jesus dying on the cross to save us from our sins. 

Verses three through five remind us that even in the midst of what seems like a cataclysmically awful situation, God is enthroned. Whatever David was going through when he wrote this he felt like God had forsaken him. Yet he reminds himself that even in the worst of circumstances God is enthroned. 

Christ was being crucified while he said this. He was about to breathe his last breath.  To his disciples, the leaders of the people and the Romans it looked like that would be the end of the so-called Messiah. But, Christ knew the end from the beginning and that his death meant our salvation and redemption. The enemy thought he had won, that he had stopped God's plan to redeem the world. He was wrong. Instead of death Christ became the sacrifice and God showed his power by raising Christ from the dead. 

Doesn't Paul teach us that dying to self and living for Christ is at the heart of the Christian life (see Romans 6 and Philippians 3)? Maybe you feel a part of your life dying. Perhaps you are in a situation where you see no way out. Or your circumstances put you in a place where you feel forsaken, even by God. I know how that feels. More importantly Christ knows how that seems and feels. The truth and good news is that he is still God and sits enthroned as the Holy One. He is interceding on our behalf. I don't know what he is going to do ,or how he will do it,  I just know he said if we trust in him we will be delivered, saved and not disappointed. 

Father, we cry out to you! Hear our prayers and deliver us. we trust in you and you alone! Praise be to you in us today.