Why Have You Abandoned Me?
March 7
Matthew presents his account of Jesus’ crucifixion in chapter 27. In verse 46, Matthew records Jesus quoting from the Hebrew/Aramaic text of Psalm 22:1, asking God why He has abandoned Him. Hanging on the cross, Jesus now feels the wrath of God being poured out on Him—the God whom Habakkuk tells us cannot look on sin. (Habakkuk 1:13) Jesus knows His Father has turned His back on Him.
“My God, My God, why have You abandoned Me?”
Notice that Jesus didn’t ask, “My Father, why have You abandoned Me?” Neither did He ask, “My LORD, why have You abandoned Me?” Nor did Jesus use the Greek for “Abba, Abba, why have You abandoned Me?” (Abba is a term of endearment, similar to Daddy.)
Instead, Jesus cried out to God using the formal name of God: El. El is short for Elohim, the Name God employs to introduce Himself in Genesis 1:1. El/Elohim is the majestic creator, Who is completely separate from His creation. Instead of crying out to a close, covenant-making/ covenant-keeping Yahweh (LORD), He cries out to the majestic Creator who is “out there.”
Compared to other names by which God has revealed Himself in the Old Testament, Jesus’ choice of God’s name El is shocking. In crying out “El, El, why have you abandoned Me?” Jesus acknowledges that for the first time in eternity past that His relationship with His Father is severed, separated, abandoned.
Application
Billy Foote wrote in the worship song “You are My King (Amazing Love),” I’m forgiven because You were forsaken. I’m accepted; You were condemned.” Only because Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was forsaken/abandoned by His Father can we be forgiven and accepted by Him. Only by having a personal relationship with God—made possible by the substitutional suffering and death of Jesus—can we obtain a right standing (justified) before the holy, majestic Creator.
But to be justified before our holy Creator, we must turn—“repent,” the Bible says—from all of our efforts to justify ourselves before Him. We come to our holy Creator on His terms, relying on Jesus’ payment for our sin-debt…
• A debt we could never pay
• A debt we received because of the High Treason committed by our spiritual forefather, Adam
• A debt not only passed down to us, but earned by our own sin of High Treason (Romans 3:23)
In every nation and culture, High Treason is universally condemned to death. (1 Corinthians 15:22; Hebrews 9:22; Leviticus 17:11)
That treason incurred a debt so heinous that it demanded the full weight of God’s wrath. That wrath could only be atoned for by the perfect life, sacrificial death, and holy blood of God’s Only Son crying out on the cross, “My God! Why have you tuned your back on Me?” But, as John 3:16 reminds us, God so loved the world that He gave His Only Son to do this very thing!
We must see then, with clear eyes and sound mind, our dire situation before God—our incalculable sin-debt—before we can ever fully appreciate the inestimable cost of Jesus’ broken body and spilled blood. Praise be to God for His indescribable gift! (1 Corinthians 15:22)
“May I never get over the fact that God saved a wretched sinner like me.”
Voddie Baucham
© Copyright 2026 Craig Beaman