The Darkest, Yet Brightest Day – Robert H. Ireland

The following excerpt is from Chapter IV of Robert H. Ireland’s Light from Calvary: The Seven Last Words of Jesus, first published in 1873 and out this summer in a Banner edition.

And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying,
Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted,
My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me? — Mark 15:34.

It was the darkest, yet the brightest, day the world ever saw!

Never was such a deed of darkness as the crucifixion of the Lord of glory—never was such a sufferer as the Son of God when he hung upon the accursed tree. Never such dismal hours as when there was darkness, not only over all the land, but darkness in the soul of the Father’s well-beloved, when a veil was drawn between, and the light of Heaven’s love was all eclipsed. Who can realise the depth of suffering, and the agony of desertion, that drew forth the cry, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ It was the darkest day the world ever saw!

But how the brightest?

Ah, the brightest! because there shone forth, in fullest manifestation, the love of God to a lost and ruined world.

It was dark to Jesus that it might be bright to us. The Father forsook him that we might not be forsaken to all eternity. From the shame of Jesus we get our glory; from his sufferings we get salvation; from his wounds we get our healing; from the wrath on him we get our peace; by his death we live!

If in the scene of the crucifixion this be the darkest part in the dark picture, then from it there may shine to us the brightest light. In that Father’s frown we may see a smile, in the forsaken one believers may see themselves brought nigh; and as they hear from their Saviour’s lips the awful words, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ they may also hear a God of love declaring to every ransomed one, to every soul that believes in Jesus, ‘I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee, to all eternity’ (Heb. 13:5). In viewing this strange and solemn scene, the abandonment or desertion of Jesus, I note—

I. The nature of it.

And here we require to bear in mind the mystery of the person of the sufferer.

He who hangs on the cross, and exclaims, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ is the Son of God and the Son of man! Mysterious union this of natures, the divine and human in one person; ‘Great is the mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh’ (1 Tim. 3:16), the Son of God assuming human nature, and in that nature obeying, suffering, and dying on the cross. The world sees in him, and his murderers see in him, only a despised Nazarene. But, ah! within that man there is a holy human soul, and beneath the garb of humanity is the Son of God—‘We beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth’ (John 1:14).

And although it was only in his humanity that he could suffer, for the divinity cannot suffer—he only that hath immortality cannot die—yet between these two natures there is a marvellous and indescribable union, so that when it is asked, Who is this on Calvary? the answer is, It is the Son of God, it is the Son of man, it is our divine Redeemer, who yet, as you see, is bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh!

Now when Jesus cried upon the cross, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ he meant not that anything was affecting the union between the divine and human natures. Such a union having been formed, the eternal Son having taken our nature into personal union with himself, nothing can dissolve, nothing can disturb, this union; and it was as the God-man Redeemer that he cried, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’

Neither are we to suppose that when Jesus uttered this mournful cry, the love of the Father towards him had ceased or abated in the slightest degree. The Father loves the Son, and he cannot cease to love him. His love is eternal as himself, unchangeable as his own divine nature; and had it been possible for the love of the Father to the Son to have increased, I believe it would have been when ‘he took the form of a servant’ (Phil. 2:7), when he stooped so low as to become a man, and ‘became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross’ (Phil. 2:8). Yea, Jesus himself tells us, ‘Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again’ (John 10:17).

Neither are we to imagine that when this cry was uttered, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ there was a withdrawal of the support which the Divinity had ever given to the suffering Saviour. God had said, Go, my Son, and I will hold thy hand; and even when Jesus was forsaken on the cross, God could say, ‘Behold my servant whom I uphold’ (Isa. 42:1), with respect to the actual support which was given even then, and without which there never had been a suffering and victorious Saviour.

What, then, was this awful desertion?

There is in it a depth of gloom and horror which it is difficult, aye, impossible, for the human mind to fathom and fully comprehend. God withdraws from Jesus the light of his countenance, the comfortable sense of his love and his complacency in him. He makes him to feel the whole weight of wrath lying upon him as the sinner’s substitute and surety; and whereas the weight of this wrath is only completely felt when God’s absence is felt—when one is made to know the horror of being alone—in God’s universe without God— when the light of heaven is altogether eclipsed, and when one stands as forgotten, cast off, forsaken, Jesus is made to feel it thus, and so to utter the doleful cry, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me!’

He was never left thus alone before. Forsaken by all others, we never saw him forsaken by his Father; but now he is emphatically the forsaken one, hanging between earth and heaven, as if owned by neither—‘Cast out from earth as a curse, and not yet received to blessing in heaven.’ Heaven and earth and hell all against him! Once we hear him crying, ‘Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say?’ (John 12:27), but from heaven there comes a voice to comfort him; and though all around is dark, when he looks up, there is light in heaven and love in the Father’s eye. We hear him in Gethsemane pouring forth strong cries and tears, and agonising as the bloody sweat falls on the ground, and the prayer ascends, ‘Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me’ (Matt. 26:39), but there is an open ear in heaven to hear that prayer, and a swift messenger wings his way to comfort and strengthen the suffering one. But at the dark hour when he hung on the cross there was no voice from heaven, no messenger—aye, no light, darkness over all the earth, and deeper darkness in the Messiah’s soul.

Behold on the cross the forsaken one!

II. The reason of the abandonment or desertion of Jesus.

Why is it so? Why has the God of love forsaken his beloved Son? How many an adopted child of God has died in peace, enjoying on his deathbed the light and love of Heaven, and singing on earth the song of the New Jerusalem! How many a martyr has expired triumphantly amid the flames, and rejoiced in the presence and support of the God he loved! It was with them the season of sweetest, richest consolation. Underneath and around they felt the everlasting arms, and they saw with faith’s clear eye the face of God, and had poured into their souls celestial light; and why—oh! why is the well-beloved, the only-begotten, the dearest Son expiring in the thickest darkness, feeling nought but the Father’s frown?

In the explanation of the mystery we have the gospel of the grace of God. In the suffering Jesus we see the sinner’s substitute and surety. Out of love to souls God delivered him up to the death of the cross, and he suffered our punishment while he ‘bore our sins in his own body on the tree’ (1 Pet. 2:24). We have forsaken God; we have left our Father’s home, like the poor, wandering prodigal; and the fruit of the sinner’s sin in forsaking God is that God forsakes him. Thus by sin we are cut off from God—from his favour, from his love, from his blessing, from all communion with him. And if you ask for the darkest picture of a forsaken sinner, of one reaping the bitter fruits of departure from his God, I point to the place of woe where there is ‘wailing and gnashing of teeth’ (Matt. 13:50). On the lost in hell lies the wrath of God, and who can tell the horror of falling thus into the hands of an angry God? But with this felt wrath and curse, there is the awful sense of God’s eternal absence.

Ah! they are banished ones; they have heard the sentence, ‘Depart from me, ye cursed!’ (Matt. 25:41). Nevermore shall ye see my face, never feel my favour, never know my smile, but down, deep down in the dark prison-house shall be your eternal home! Thou hast forsaken me! is the eternal shriek of a lost soul. Thou hast forsaken me, I am left alone! I am undone, for ever undone; for thou art absent, save in thine awful presence as a God of wrath and a God of terror, looking on me with thine eternal frown!

Jesus is the banished one in your room and stead, O believing sinner! When he was forsaken on the cross, this was part of his suffering for you. He must taste the bitterest ingredient in the cup of wrath. He must drink of that cup to the very dregs; and as we deserved to be cast off, abandoned, forsaken to all eternity, see on the cross the banished one, the Son of God in darkness, gloom, and woe. Behold on the cross the forsaken one!

III. The suffering in the abandonment or desertion of Jesus.

Intense must have been the agony of soul when Jesus uttered such a cry. Why is it so? was a question never asked before by him. ‘He was led as a lamb to the slaughter; and as a sheep before his shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth’ (Isa. 53:7). All the cruelties of his enemies, all the unkindness of his friends, drew forth no sorrow, no complaint at all equal in intensity to this. Here is the bitterest portion of the cup of wrath, here is the sharpest wound of the sword of justice. And he who opened not his month like a lamb, now roars like a lion, as that word means which we have in Psalm 22, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?’

To realise at all the intensity of the suffering of Jesus at this awful hour, you have to bear in mind that this is but the consummation of the sufferings of his life. He was ‘a man of sorrows’ (Isa. 53:3) all his days—‘Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head’ (Luke 9:58). One disciple has denied him; another has betrayed him; and when he was led away to the high priest’s house, they all forsook him and fled. His enemies have been treating him as the vilest malefactor; and amid shame and mocking and cruel violence, they have hurried him away to Golgotha. There is one shout which comes from a united rabble—‘Away with him, away with him! crucify him, crucify him!’ (Luke 23:18, 21). He is weary and worn with suffering. It has told on his very countenance, which is ‘more marred than that of any man’ (Isa. 52:14); and when little more than thirty, men take him for fifty; and at last, when stretched on the cross, and looking at his emaciated frame, he exclaims, ‘I can tell’ (I can count) ‘all my bones!’ (Psa. 22:17).

See him now on the cross. That cry, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ was uttered when he seemed given over to the malice of his cruel foes. For a time, the chains that bind and restrain the spirits of darkness are loosened, and they rage and riot around that cross. See their cruel and malicious enmity as cherished in the breasts and exhibited in the words and deeds of the savage murderers. No taunts are spared, no act of cruelty is wanting; it seems to be their aim to sport with the agonising Saviour. Do you not think you see them dividing his garments when they have nailed him to the cross, and sitting down to watch him there? But they cannot rest: it is too mild a death to allow him to expire without an addition of suffering inflicted by the hands that have nailed him to the tree. They pass and repass, and mock and revile and blaspheme, ‘wagging their heads, and saying, If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross: he saved others, himself he cannot save’ (Matt. 27:35, 36, 39, 40, and Mark 15:29-32).

And then, who can tell how fierce that conflict was, unseen by man, with the powers of darkness! The prince of this world comes to meet the Prince of Peace; Golgotha is the battlefield, and on the cross is the end of the awful conflict. But who can tell how fierce it was, when with the powers of darkness it was the last struggle to defeat the purposes of God, and ruin the souls of men!

At this awful hour, when deserted by friends, and insulted and wounded by enemies, and wrestling with the prince of darkness for a world of sinners—at this awful hour the Father leaves him, hides the light of his countenance, and lets fall the full and to us inconceivable impression of the wrath due to the sinners for whom he dies. He makes our iniquities to meet on him, and forsakes him!

Can we at all comprehend the agony, the gloom, of these three awful hours? Wrapt in darkness deeper far than that which covered the earth (for that was but the symbol and the image of the internal darkening of the sufferer’s soul), he agonises under the hiding of his Father’s countenance; his holy soul is filled with woe; and under the pressure of the suffering, which our words fail to describe, and our minds scarce can comprehend, he cries, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’

Behold on the cross the forsaken one!

IV. The fruit of the abandonment or desertion of Jesus.

I have said that the crucifixion day was the darkest, yet the brightest, the world ever saw.

It is now, it will be to all eternity, the darkest day to some, the brightest day to others. To the lost in hell it stands out in awful horror as the darkest day in the world’s history. To the saved in heaven it stands forth in lofty grandeur as the brightest day. The cross has a dark and a bright side. From it comes terror. From it comes consolation. By the same awful scenes it proclaims wrath and peace; and in them we read of damnation and salvation, of hell and heaven.

Look at the dark side first. In that forsaken one, in the abandonment of Jesus, you see a picture of hell. You see your merited curse. You see God’s righteous wrath and holy indignation against sin. You see that the time is coming when all the impenitent and unbelieving shall be eternally cast away, forgotten, forsaken, lost. When you see in the cross of Christ and in the agonies of the forsaken Jesus a picture of sin’s deserts, you learn that God is in earnest when he tells you what must be the bitter fruit and the eternal wages of sin. It is no mere threat. It is no empty declaration of vengeance that will never be realised. ‘If they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?’ (Luke 23:31). In the abandonment of Jesus we hear the sentence ringing, ‘Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels!’ (Matt. 25:41). And if any of us are lost, verily the fruit of Christ’s abandonment will be the aggravation of our misery, the increase of our doom; and the bitterest ingredient in the cup of wrath will be the never-ceasing thought that hell might have been escaped, that we had the offer made us of the merits of the sufferings of Jesus the forsaken one. ‘How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?’ (Heb. 2:3).

Look now at the bright side of the cross.

What mercy and love and grace are to be seen in the face of Jesus Christ as he hangs on Calvary as the forsaken one! What hope for you, O anxious, trembling, yet believing souls! Jesus is forsaken that you may be received as returning prodigals to the Father’s bosom and the Father’s love, and never be forsaken to all eternity. Ye may come and lay your sins by faith on the head of the forsaken one. Ye may look on him as standing in your room and stead when the pains of hell gat hold upon him, and the Father’s face was hid. What a mystery is here! What a dark, deep, gloomy gulf this seems—the desertion of Jesus on the cross—but come and bring all your sins and sorrows and fears and distresses, and bury them in this unfathomable gulf, and take peace and consolation in the thought that Jesus was the forsaken one for you, that the Father’s answer to the Saviour’s piercing cry, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me,’ is his word of peace to the believing soul, ‘I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee’ (Heb. 13:5).

Is it not strange, the darkest hour
That ever dawned on sinful earth,
Should touch the heart with softer power
For comfort than an angel’s mirth!