I didn't know this about Gill.
And I wouldn't call that orthodox Christianity, if that's what he believed.
Much love!
Forsaken
- Thread starter John Caldwell
- Start date
-
Welcome to Christian Forums, a Christian Forum that recognizes that all Christians are a work in progress.
You will need to register to be able to join in fellowship with Christians all over the world.
We hope to see you as a part of our community soon and God Bless!
And I wouldn't call that orthodox Christianity, if that's what he believed.
Much love!
Acts 2:23
"this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death."
I believe this is literal because of how Peter treats their guilt. They were not innocent of Christ's death, but acted in ignorance. At the same time Christ's life was not taken from Him but he lay down His life. There is no contradiction or doubkethink.
Were it not God's will the Jews could not have killed Him.
The way I see it is that it was the predetermined will of God that Christ die. And Christ lay down his own life in submission to the will of the Father even unto death. And the mode of this death was via the hands of wicked men.
Last edited:
"Yet Michael the archangel by whom is meant, not a created angel, but an eternal one, the Lord Jesus Christ; as appears from his name Michael, which signifies, "who is as God": and who is as God, or like unto him, but the Son of God, who is equal with God? and from his character as the archangel, or Prince of angels, for Christ is the head of all principality and power " (Gill's commentary on Jude).
I also do not believe it orthodox Christianity. It is something I would call a heresy. But I do not think John Gill himself was a heretic although this position of his is heresy.
Likewise, the idea God separated from Jesus is heresy. That does not mean I believe Steve a heretic. God can make him stand despite his erroneous theories.
Last edited:
You are the one promoting heresy by DENYING this fact. You are calling the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit liars. And you have been doing this in post after post and thread after thread, as though Satan is egging you on to deny Bible truth and to pervert and undermine the Gospel. But the Light will always overcome the Darkness, and you will be held accountable.
Had the Father not forsaken the Son during those three dark hours, we would not have had those words from Christ recorded for all time. And even the Critical Text agrees with the Received Text in this instance:
CRITICAL TEXT
Nestle Greek New Testament 1904
περὶ δὲ τὴν ἐνάτην ὥραν ἀνεβόησεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς φωνῇ μεγάλῃ λέγων Ἡλεὶ Ἡλεὶ λεμὰ σαβαχθανεί; τοῦτ’ ἔστιν Θεέ μου θεέ μου, ἵνα τί με ἐγκατέλιπες [Note: the words have been corrupted slightly, but the modern translations did not follow those changes]
RECEIVED TEXT
Stephanus Textus Receptus 1550
περὶ δὲ τὴν ἐννάτην ὥραν ἀνεβόησεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς φωνῇ μεγάλῃ λέγων, Ηλι ηλι λαμὰ σαβαχθανι τοῦτ' ἔστιν Θεέ μου θεέ μου ἱνατί με ἐγκατέλιπες
MODERN BIBLE VERSIONS
English Revised Version (RV of 1881)
And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
New American Standard Bible
About the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, "ELI, ELI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?" that is, "MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?" [Note: words capitalized because they are quoted from the Old Testament]
KING JAMES BIBLE
King James Bible
And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
There are some enemies of the truth right here on this forum who have been trying to twist the meaning of forsaken to make it mean
the opposite of what Christ said (while actually quoting Psalm 22:1 which was placed there prophetically about 1000 years before the crucifixion). But the liars cannot have their way since the concordances and lexicons will not allow the truth to be perverted.
Matthew 27:46
Strong's Concordance
sabachthani: you have forsaken me
Original Word: σαβαχθανί
Part of Speech: Aramaic Transliterated Word (Indeclinable); Hebrew
Transliteration: sabachthani
Phonetic Spelling: (sab-akh-than-ee')
Definition: you have forsaken me
Usage: thou hast forsaken me.
Thayer's Greek Lexicon
STRONGS NT 4518: σαβαχθάνι
σαβαχθάνι, σαβαχθανει T Tr WH (see WH's Appendix, p. 155, and under the word εἰ, ἰ), σαβακθανι Lachmann (in Matt. only) (שְׁבַקתַּנִי, from the Chaldean שְׁבַק), thou hast forsaken me: Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34 (from Psalm 21:2 (), for the Hebrew עֲזַבְתַּנִי, which is so rendered also by the Chaldee paraphrast). (See Kautzsch, Gram. d. Biblical-Aram. (Leipzig 1884), p. 11.)
Psalm 22:1
Strong's Concordance
azab: self
Original Word: עָזַב
Part of Speech: Verb
Transliteration: azab
Phonetic Spelling: (aw-zab')
Definition: to leave, forsake, loose
Brown-Driver-Briggs
I. עָזַב213 verb leave, forsake, loose (Late Hebrew id.(rare); Arabic
e. of God's forsaking, abandoning men: Deuteronomy 31:17;Isaiah 42:16; Isaiah 49:14; Isaiah 54:7; 2Chronicles 12:5; Ezra 9:9; Psalm 9:11; Psalm 22:2 8t. Psalms; + בְּיַד Nehemiah 9:28;Psalm 37:33; Psalm 16:10 thou wilt not abandon my soul לִשְׁאוֺל; of temporary abandonment 2 Chronicles 32:31 (+ infinitive of purpose); etc. (34 t. in all); + Jeremiah 12:7 (׳יabandoning his house).
[Note: The reference should be to Ps 22:1]
Last edited:
Amen.Hi John,
Good post.
"The faithfulness of God is the topic of Psalm 22, and all through Scripture it is demonstrated in God's own character."
"We know He will be faithful to us because He has demonstrated this faithfulness in Christ." <--- And, all I can say is, wow and thank you Lord! His faithfulness is exciting, just to rest and, wonder how He will once again, do the "impossible" I refuse to worry or wonder how or what I can do as it's out of our control anyhow)...
How glad we should all be that His character NEVER changes, we should totally desire to trust in Him and His promises because He is fully faithful.
Jesus was 100% human and 100% God (even though He lowered Himself...)
Can we see that when Jesus said on the cross, "Father, why has thou forsaken me", it was His humanity, just like sweating, as drops of blood in the garden when He asked The Father to take the cup from Him if there be any other way...He dealt with much fear within His human form.
So, God NEVER separated Himself from Christ, (if you've seen Jesus, you have seen the Father, they are one and the same). God separated Himself from human sin we have all nailed His body to the cross, sin put Jesus on the cross but, His Father NEVER forsook Him. Seems clear to me, anyhow
Scripture tells us a few things about God and how the righteous will fare. God will never abandon or forsake the righteous (as Psalm 22 demonstrates). God will never condemn the righteous. The righteous one is Christ and it is in Him that we find righteousness. On the cross Christ was forsaken to suffer and die (not forsaken in the sense he was abandoned by God but in the sense he was forsaken to suffer and die). The fact that God never abandoned Christ is how we know that when we are forsaken to suffer and die God is there and will not abandon us.
It was by Christ's knowledge of the Father's faithfulness, that He would never abandon Him, that Christ obediently lay down His life (see Psalm 22, not excerpts but the whole thing).
There was a time the idea that a Christian believed "forsaken" indicated divine abandonment in that God abandoned Christ in His "hour of need" was considered a straw-man argument. When Penal Substitution Theory was first articulated in the Reformation it was considered that Christ paid our price by suffering in Hell (literally) for three days. As time went on this was revised to Christ suffering a type of hell by God withdrawing from Him for three hours. But the newer heresy is no less anti-Christian (perhaps more so, in fact) than the original.
If anything, these types of discussions have taught me that Christians believe all kinds of unbiblical myths and theories. But it is Christ that saves and He can make these people stand despite their humanistic approaches, despite their mythologies, despite their traditions, and despite their theories. Our salvation is in Him, not religious philosophy.
The pitiful part is that when people believe God abandoned Christ they are blinded to the truths their error obscures.
"It was by Christ's knowledge of the Father's faithfulness, that He would never abandon Him, that Christ obediently lay down His life (see Psalm 22, not excerpts but the whole thing)."
For sure! He knew He would be always with The Father and would one day lay His life down, of His own volition. Love the faithfulness of God
"The pitiful part is that when people believe God abandoned Christ they are blinded to the truths their error obscures."
We can sometimes make our own obstacle courses. And, so unnecessarily so!
Sorry, Nancy, but you are denying the plain meaning of the Scripture.So, God NEVER separated Himself from Christ, (if you've seen Jesus, you have seen the Father, they are one and the same). God separated Himself from human sin we have all nailed His body to the cross, sin put Jesus on the cross but, His Father NEVER forsook Him. Seems clear to me, anyhow
Last edited:
I pass over your snide, patronizing comments and cut to the chase.
God is holy, utterly holy and therefore He will not look upon sin. God is just and therefore judges sin wherever it is found. But God is love as well: He delights in mercy, and so His infinite wisdom devised a way whereby justice might be satisfied and mercy left free to flow out to guilty sinners. This was the way of substitution, the just suffering for the unjust.
Now it is an abomination to God for the innocent to be condemned, and therefore the very Son of God, God Himself in the Person of Jesus Christ was the one selected to be the substitute for no other would suffice.The prophet Nahum asked, 'Who can stand before His indignation? And who can endure the fierceness of His anger?' (Nahum 1:6). The answer is our Lord Jesus Christ. He alone, the sinless One, could bear the curse and rise a victor above it. He alone could endure the righteous fury of God against sin and yet magnify the law and make it honourable. Thus it is that we see boundless love, inflexible justice and omnipotent power working together to make possible the salvation of those who believe.
At the cross, all our iniquities were laid upon Christ and therefore Divine judgement fell upon Him. There was no way to transfer sin without transferring its penalty. Therefore both sin and its punishment were transferred to the Lord Jesus. He was making propitiation, and propitiation is wholly Godwards. The claims of God's holiness and the satisfaction of His justice both had to be met. So our Lord's blood was not only shed for us; it was also shed for God (Ephesians 5:2).
The death of Christ was a death of the curse (Galatians 3:13). The 'curse' is alienation, separation from God 'Depart from Me......' Matthew 7:23; Matthew 25:41; cf. Genesis 3:34; Genesis 4:16). The curse is exile from the presence and glory of God (2 Thessalonians 1:9). This is foreshadowed by a number of O.T. types. The carcass of the bull for the Yom Kippur (Leviticus 16:27) after its blood had been sprinkled on the mercy seat was carried outside the camp where it was burned. Outside the camp was outside of the presence of God, as with the lepers in Leviticus 13:46. The leper in the O.T. was a typification of sin. Likewise the Lord Jesus suffered 'outside the gate' (Hebrews 13:11-12).
At the crucifixion of our Lord, there was supernatural darkness over the land for three hours. There is only one explanation for it: that in that darkness, Christ had yaken the place of lost and guilty sinners; that He was in the place of sin-bearing, enduring the judgement and the punishment due to the people whom the Father had given Him to redeem. He who knew no sin was made sin for us. God is light, and the darkness is the natural sign of Him turning away. Our Lord was left alone with the sinner's sin. In hell, it seems that there will be a two-fold misery: the pain of sense and the pain of loss, of separation from God; so upon our Lord Jesus there came the outpoured wrath of God and the withdrawal of His presence and fellowship. His great cry, which we are discussing, was uttered so that we might know what transpired there.
But now, the believer can say in the words of Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ." He was my substitute; God reckoned me to be one with Him. His punishment, His death was mine. He was pierced for my transgressions; He was crushed for my iniquities, and by His wounds I am healed. Sin was not pushed away, but put away. This is the basis of our salvation and there is no other. Our sins have been borne by Christ; they have been punished in Christ; God's righteous anger against me on account of my sin is propitiated, His claims against me fully met, His justice satisfied. Christ was forsaken by God for a short time that we might enjoy His presence forever. He entered that terrible darkness that His people might walk in the light of God's favour. He drank the cup of God's wrath that I might drink the cup of joy and salvation. He was forsaken that I might be forgiven.
You misunderstand. My comments are not snide. I legitimately believe your ideas are wrong. Likewise I do not think your position that I am wrong to be snideness on your part.
When we disagree (even when we disagree strongly) we need to do so as Christians, as adults, and with honesty. This means we are Christian enough to interact in a "Christ-like" manner, grown up enough to accept when other people disagree, and honest enough to state our disagreements as disagreements rather than character issues.
I believe your ideas here are the result of building theory upon theory. Yeats imagery is applicable - "Turning and turning in the widening gyre the falcon cannot hear the falconer; things fall apart; the centre cannot hold".
In other words, I believe by the time your Theory reaches the point where redemption is expressed in terms of God abandoning Christ it is already a erroneous theory carried away by vain philosophies.
This does not mean I believe you a bad person, or even less a Christian (something I have no way of knowing). It means I believe the theory you have just provided is myth interwoven into Scripture and is, in its conclusions, a corrupt replacement for the truth. Things have fallen apart as they drifted too far from the Source.
Last edited:
This is an egregious non sequitur. We would expect God not to forsake a righteous, sinless Person, but how does that help sinners? It doesn't! 'For You are not a God who takes pleasure in wickedness, nor shall evil dwell with You........You hate all workers of iniquity........' but '....You, O LORD will bless the righteous; with favour You will surround him as a shield (Psalm 5:4-5, 12). The natural course of events would be for Christ to be blessed and for sinners to be shut out from the presence of God.
So if God did not forsake Christ, how would that help us? We are not righteous, we have not lived lives of perfect obedience to God's will; we are still due to be told, "Depart from me, you workers of iniquity!" It is precisely because Christ has suffered, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God, that we have hope. 'He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement that brought us peace was upon Him.....and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.' And part of the bruising, that chastisement that was due to us, was separation from God, and that is why Christ had to suffer it, that is why it was prophesied that He should suffer it, that is why He Himself tells us that He did suffer it, and that is why we who have trusted in Christ for salvation will never have to suffer it.
Your comments are both snide and patronizing. You have described my beliefs as heresy although you know perfectly well that they are mainstream teachings, and then, to try to avoid being censored by the mods, you add the non sequitur that I am not a heretic. Insinuation rules where courage fails.
Well I count it a privilege to be called a heretic for the cause of Christ by the likes of you, so carry on.
We need to be clear: 'Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes [My life] from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. This command I have from My Father' (John 10:17-18). No one took the life of the Lord Jesus; He laid it down at the command of the Father, to whom He had made Himself subject (Philippians 2:8). Herod, Pilate and the others acted according to their several wills and were culpable, but they were doing what the Triune God had already decided should be done (Acts of the Apostles 4:27-28).
Yes. God withheld deliverance from suffering and death yet God delivered Christ through suffering and death.
That is a lesson we can all apply to our lives. When forsaken to suffer we should be able to have peace knowing that God is there, will never abandon us, and will deliver us through our suffering. This is the difference I have witnessed sever times in the suffering of Christian friends (who have had cancer) and those without Christ. We can know we are not abandoned because Christ was never abandoned. God may not deliver us from suffering , but He will deliver us through it.
I need to be clear as well. I absolutely agree that no one took Christ's life from Him but He lay it down willingly. I also believe He died at the hands of wicked men. I do not see this as a contradiction at all.
Where we need to be clear, IMHO, is that Christ's death was not suicide. He did not kill himself. He lay down his life. The "wicked men" who killed Him did not "take His life from Him" but Christ laid down His life willingly.
There is a redemptive reason Christ died at the hands of wicked men. I believe this is Christ had to become a curse for us, to share in our infirmities. To die under the weight of the law of sin and death in order to free us from its chains.
Are you serious? I have answered this exact question at least five times.
Christ had to share in our infirmities. He was forsaken to suffer and die for us. Not abandoned by God but also not delivered from suffering so that He who had no sin would die in obedience to God for us to deliver us from its bondage.
Scripture tells us this helped us by qualifying Christ as our High Priest, Mediator, Redeemer, and Savior.
That, IMHO, is the meaning of the passage as evidenced by the fact that the immediate audience took Christ's words not to be a question but to be a cry if deliverance.
And rightly so.
Anytime (everytime) someone argues "plain meaning of Scripture" you know they are arguing from a baseless position (it is a fallacy).
@marks
You made an interesting statement (one that I also affirm) in your reference to Jesus’ words "ELI, ELI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?". You said that it means "MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?" because we need to allow Scripture to interpret Scripture. I agree.
But at the same time are you not being a little inconsistent in rejecting the question as a cry for deliverance as it in the next verse (Matt. 27:47) it is confirmed as a cry for deliverance (with the next three verses having the audience contemplating to whom He was appealing)?
John
You made an interesting statement (one that I also affirm) in your reference to Jesus’ words "ELI, ELI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?". You said that it means "MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?" because we need to allow Scripture to interpret Scripture. I agree.
But at the same time are you not being a little inconsistent in rejecting the question as a cry for deliverance as it in the next verse (Matt. 27:47) it is confirmed as a cry for deliverance (with the next three verses having the audience contemplating to whom He was appealing)?
John
I think that something is being overlooked here. Jesus took on the LIKENESS of sinful flesh. He was NOT sinful. So in like fashion Jesus also got baptized...in order to fulfill ALL righteousness...even though He didn't need to. Jesus did the things He did with us in mind...not Himself. That may seem difficult for we who are still so self-centered.
So then on the cross Jesus took our abuses on Himself and cried out in the LIKENESS of abandonment in order to fulfill all righteousness..IOW He took on OUR reaction ...a reaction that is from a lack of connection to God. Jesus never panicked or felt sorry for Himself. WE do that.
And I also want to point out that Jesus put 2 verses together into one when He cried out in the Hebrew Eli Eli Lamah Sabachthani. No one does that in a panic or distress. The genius of God is to do what no man could ever consider doing. It is for us to then ponder the meaning.
God was upping the ante.
Combining Psalm 22 and Genesis 22 is pure genius. The thought of being forsaken was more what went through Isaac's mind than what Jesus was feeling.
So then on the cross Jesus took our abuses on Himself and cried out in the LIKENESS of abandonment in order to fulfill all righteousness..IOW He took on OUR reaction ...a reaction that is from a lack of connection to God. Jesus never panicked or felt sorry for Himself. WE do that.
And I also want to point out that Jesus put 2 verses together into one when He cried out in the Hebrew Eli Eli Lamah Sabachthani. No one does that in a panic or distress. The genius of God is to do what no man could ever consider doing. It is for us to then ponder the meaning.
God was upping the ante.
Combining Psalm 22 and Genesis 22 is pure genius. The thought of being forsaken was more what went through Isaac's mind than what Jesus was feeling.
Last edited:
Similar threads
