My God, My God, Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me

I've told this story before. . . but sometimes we like to tell stories again. I shared this at the 5:00 Good Friday Service Yesterday, and Mary shared her poem and drawing.  Blessings.

I grew up in a small town Lutheran church in Iowa. My father was always the choir director and he sang solos throughout the year as well. Holy week was always busy.

Growing up, almost every year for Good Friday service he chose the Theodore Dubois cantata, The Seven Last Words of Christ. Similar to Easter’s Tenebrae service, there is one song for each of the seven last words of Christ.  I knew each of the seven the movements by heart and I’d sing along in my mind, listening to his voice, the choir and the other soloists. It was a tradition. A family tradition. A community tradition. After I grew up I didn’t hear the cantata for many, many years.

Then, seven years ago on Palm Sunday, my dad gathered several small town Tipton, Iowa church choirs together, to put on a big musical production of the cantata. There were Catholics, Methodists and Lutherans.  It was his vision. This was to be a multi-denominational community event. He was to conduct this huge choir and he rented a black tux just for the occasion.

The kids and Bill and I drove down from Minnesota, on that Palm Sunday, to see my dad, my sister, my uncles, my cousins, and the church choirs of Tipton, Iowa sing those wonderful, terrible, seven last words of Christ. It was a family event. It was a community event.

When it came time for the fourth word, the local high school choir director took over the conducting baton and my dad stepped up to the microphone to sing the baritone solo. He sang that fourth movement--God. . . my. . . father. . . God. . . my father. . . why. . . has thou. . . forsaken. . . me.  He sang. We listened.

As it turned out, those were the last words I ever heard my dad sing in public.

When the cantata was over, my mom had a big reception back at the house, because, well, that’s what she does. Everybody came. It had been such a spiritually moving and beautiful production, we needed the afterglow.

My dad shook a couple hands and gave a couple hugs but then, immediately fell fast asleep in his chair, still in his tuxedo.

We knew he was tired. We knew something was wrong. But, we didn’t know, he had stage-four pancreatic cancer.

We didn’t know it until that next Thursday, Maundy Thursday, when the doctor called he and my mom into the office for those other, terrible, terrible last words. Terminal. Cancer.

Although my dad never uttered those words “why me,” this irony of that last song he sang was never lost on the rest of us. God, my father, why hast thou forsaken me? He died less than five months later.

Bad things happen to good people. Everyday. That’s for sure. We all know someone. Multiple someones.

Some of us, like me, once upon a time, believed that if we were good, really good. . . if we were obedient, really obedient, nothing bad would ever happen to us. God would protect us. My dad was very good. My dad was very obedient. It wasn’t fair.

When you think like that, it’s easy to feel forsaken, when the bad thing happens. And sooner or later, the bad thing will happen.

Bad things happen to good people. Sometimes it feels like bad things always happen to good people. We wonder how can God let these things happen? How can he forsake us like this? How can he let these cancers, these earthquakes, these terrorist attacks happen? We pray for protection. We pray for a miracle. But we don’t always get it. Even Jesus didn’t get it.

I guess Jesus is the best proof that bad things happen to good people. God let his own son cry out and die and never came forth with the miracle.

To me, Jesus dying on the cross, uttering those words of complete abandonment is the best reconciliation of every bad thing that ever happened to every good person. 

The bad things are reconciled, because they happened to Jesus too, especially to Jesus. Jesus was good. Really good. Jesus was obedient, really obedient. It’s almost like the cancer diagnosis happened to Jesus too. And the earthquakes. And the terrorist attacks.

Every bad thing that ever happened, happened to Jesus too, and worse.

Jesus felt that betrayal. Jesus felt abandoned. Jesus felt forsaken. It wasn’t fair. And he uttered those words out loud, in public. Those human words.

And it was acceptable. To feel human feelings. It acceptable to feel forsaken. It was human to feel forsaken.  

But, as we know from the story, it turns out that God didn’t actually forsake Jesus. God was there all the time.

And Jesus did get his miracle.  The miracle of resurrection.

And though there may be times on this Earth when we feel forsaken by God, He is also with us all the time and we will get our miracle too. 

When I see injustice in the world and in the lives of people I know, I circle back around to this, no matter what bad things happen to good people, they happened to Jesus too, and just like Jesus, we will not stay forsaken. Just like Jesus, we will rise. We will all rise. Amen.