Appendix A: Forsaken

Appendix A

My God, my God, Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me

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? (Matt. 27:46; Mark 15:34; Psalm 22:1)

I have found so many commentators on the subject of Christ being forsaken that I did not believe that it would be feasible to quote them all in Part 1 of this series. Nevertheless, I did not want to cheat the reader out of the fruit of my research and so I make them available in this appendix. I pray that the insights shared by these men of the faith will help you to understand that the understanding of this passage that is prevalent in Word-of-Faith circles is not their own invention.

Even if the Faith Teachers and the authorities we cite here are incorrect, the fact that the Faith Teachers were not the first to teach this is proof enough of the historical foundations of modern Charismatic Word-of-Faith teaching.

The earliest quote that we can find that seems to support the position that there was a literal forsaking of Christ upon the cross is found in the writings of Augustine. Referencing what is said to be an erroneous translation in the Latin Vulgate, Augustine comments on Psalm 22:1-2:

Seeing that Christ certainly is without sin and without guilt, should we answer that these final words are those of the psalm? It would be very incomprehensible and contradictory if this psalm were not applied to Christ. And why did the Lord himself from atop the cross pronounce the first verse of this Psalm with his own mouth and say: "My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?" What did he wish to make us understand if not that the entire psalm refers to him, since he himself pronounced its beginning?

Therefore, there is no doubt that the following words, where he says "the words of my sins," are those of Christ. But whence then come the sins if not from the body which is the church? The one speaking is thus the body of Christ and the head. (The latin version and the Greek Septuagint translates Psalm 22:2 in this manner: "Far from my salvation (are) the words of my sins," )[1]

Though Augustine's meaning is not totally clear, he seems to be teaching that Christ was forsaken due to bearing the sins of the church which is His body.

It is said that the great reformer 16^th century, Martin Luther sat contemplating the words of this Scripture passage many years ago. After a long time he rose from his chair and exclaimed, "God forsaken of God! Who can understand that?"[2]

Yet, if Luther's short statement here does not convince the reader that Luther believed that Christ was literally separated from the Father on the cross then perhaps we can provide more convincing evidence. Commenting on Psalm 22 in his Operationes in Psalmos (1519-1521), Luther states:

Christ was and remains just and did not commit any sins ....

But at the moment in which he suffered, he took upon himself everything that is ours as if it were truly his, suffering even for that which we should have borne because of our sins and which the damned already suffer....

The punishment of God which strikes because of sins is not only the pains of death but also the fear and horror of the troubled conscience which experiences the eternal wrath and as if it were eternally abandoned and driven far from the face of God ....(p. 603)

In the eyes (of God) also, Christ was like one abandoned, one accursed, a sinner, a blasphemer, one damned, even if he is without sin and without guilt. The fact that he says "you have abandoned me" is certainly not a joke, a game, or hypocrisy. He is truly abandoned in all, as is the sinner when he sins...(p. 605)[3]

Luther's statements speak for themselves and need no interpretation. Another reformer of this time who has a whole theological system named after him has commented on this theme extensively. John Calvin, in his commentary on Matthew felt strongly that Christ experienced some loss of His Father's presence:

And about the ninth hour Jesus cried. Though in the cry which Christ uttered a power more than human was manifested, yet it was unquestionably drawn from him by intensity of sorrow. And certainly this was his chief conflict, and harder than all the other tortures, that in his anguish he was so far from being soothed by the assistance or favor of his Father, that he felt himself to be in some measure estranged from him. For not only did he offer his body as the price of our reconciliation with God, but. in his soul also he endured the punishments due to us; and thus he became, as Isaiah speaks, a man of sorrows, (53:3.) Those interpreters are widely mistaken who, laying aside this part of redemption, attended solely to the outward punishment of the flesh; for in order that Christ might satisfy for us, 6 it was necessary that he should be placed as a guilty person at the judgment-seat of God. Now nothing is more dreadful than to feel that God, whose wrath is worse than all deaths, is the Judge. When this temptation was presented to Christ, as if, having God opposed to him, he were already devoted to destruction, he was seized with horror, which would have been sufficient to swallow up a hundred times all the men in the world; but by the amazing power of the Spirit he achieved the victory. Nor is it by hypocrisy, or by assuming a character, that he complains of having been forsaken by the Father. Some allege that he employed this language in compliance with the opinion of the people, but this is an absurd mode of evading the difficulty; for the inward sadness of his soul was so powerful and violent, that it forced him to break out into a cry. Nor did the redemption which he accomplished consist solely in what was exhibited to the eye, (as I stated a little ago,) but having undertaken to be our surety, he resolved actually to undergo in our room the judgment of God.

But it appear absurd to say that an expression of despair escaped Christ. The reply is easy. Though the perception of the flesh would have led him to dread destruction, still in his heart faith remained firm, by which he beheld the presence of God, of whose absence he complains. We have explained elsewhere how the Divine nature gave way to the weakness of the flesh, so far as was necessary for our salvation, that Christ might accomplish all that was required of the Redeemer. We have likewise pointed out the distinction between the sentiment of nature and the knowledge of faith; and, there ore, the perception of God's estrangement from him, which Christ had, as suggested by natural feeling, did not hinder him from continuing to be assured by faith that God was reconciled to him. This is sufficiently evident from the two clauses of the complaint; for, before stating the temptation, he begins by saying that he betakes himself to God as his God, and thus by the shield of faith he courageously expels that appearance of forsaking which presented itself on the other side. In short, during this fearful torture his faith remained uninjured, so that, while he complained of being forsaken, he still relied on the aid of God as at hand.

That this expression eminently deserves our attention is evident from the circumstance, that the Holy Spirit, in order to engrave it more deeply on the memory of men, has chosen to relate it in the Syriac language; 7 for this has the same effect as if he made us hear Christ himself repeating the very words which then proceeded from his mouth. So much the more detestable is the indifference of those who lightly pass by, as a matter of jesting, the deep sadness and fearful trembling which Christ endured. No one who considers that Christ undertook the office of Mediator on the condition of suffering our condemnation, both in his body and in his soul, will think it strange that he maintained a struggle with the sorrows of death, as if an offended God had thrown him into a whirlpool of afflictions.[4]

First Calvin tells us that Christ suffered in His soul and he disputed with anyone that believed otherwise. Calvin does not believe that Christ was simply going through a loss of faith due to His sufferings but was actually sensing a loss of God's presence. Calvin believed that Christ truly suffered in His divine nature.

A well known follower of Calvin's teachings was John Owen (1616-1683). In his famous work, The Death of Death in the Death of Christ, Owen believed that the punishment for our sins were not only upon Christ's flesh, but His soul and spirit as well:

"My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" And this, by the way, will be worth our observation that we may know with whom our Saviour chiefly had to do, and what was that which he underwent for sinners; which also will give some light to the grand query concerning the persons of them for whom he undertook all this. His sufferings were far from consisting in mere corporal perpessions and afflictions, with such impressions upon his soul and spirit as were the effects and issues only of them. It was no more nor less than the curse of the law of God which he underwent for us: for he freed us from the curse " by being made a curses," Gal 3:13; which contained all the punishment that was due to sin, either in the severity of God's justice, or according to the exigence of that law which required obedience.[5] (italics mine)

Another Calvinist pastor who deserves some attention in this area was the Greek and Hebrew scholar John Gill. Gill pastored the same church that would soon be taken by C. H. Spurgeon. In his commentary on Matthew 27:46, Gill states:

The whole of it evinces the truth of Christ's human nature, that he was in all things made like unto his brethren; that he had an human soul, and endured sorrows and sufferings in it, of which this of desertion was not the least: the heinousness of sin may be learnt from hence, which not only drove the angels out of heaven, and Adam out of the garden, and separates, with respect to communion, between God and his children; but even caused him to hide his face from his own Son, whilst he was bearing, and suffering for, the sins of his people. [6]

Gill states here, that the desertion of Christ was of the same type as the desertion of Adam, that is spiritual death. Also his commentary on 2 Cor. 5:21 is illuminating:

But besides all this, he was made sin itself by imputation; the sins of all his people were transferred unto him, laid upon him, and placed to his account; he sustained their persons, and bore their sins; and having them upon him, and being chargeable with, and answerable for them, he was treated by the justice of God as if he had been not only a sinner, but a mass of sin:[7]

Yet, Calvinists are not the only ones who took the meaning of Christ's words literally. In His explanatory notes on Mark 15:34, John Wesley makes a similar statement concerning Mark 15:34:

"My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me - Thereby claiming God as his God; and yet lamenting his Father's withdrawing the tokens of his love, and treating him as an enemy, while he bare our sins."[8]

Matthew Henry, whose popular commentary has blessed its readers for centuries believes that there was a literal separation of the Godhead at the moment that our Lord became sin and spoke those very sad words:

There was a thick darkness over the land, from noon until three in the afternoon. The Jews were doing their utmost to extinguish the Sun of Righteousness. The darkness signified the cloud which the human soul of Christ was under, when he was making it an offering for sin. He did not complain that his disciples forsook him, but that his Father forsook him. In this especially he was made sin for us. When Paul was to be offered as a sacrifice for the service saints, he could joy and rejoice, Phi_2:17; but it is another thing to be offered as a sacrifice for the sin of sinners.[9]

Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892), who is probably the most well known follower of Calvinistic doctrine, wrote this concerning Psalm 22:1:

Why hast thou forsaken me? We must lay the emphasis on every word of this saddest of all utterances. "Why?" what is the great cause of such a strange fact as for God to leave his own Son at such a time and in such a plight? There was no cause in him, why then was he deserted? "Hast:" it is done, and the Saviour is feeling its dread effect as he asks the question; it is surely true, but how mysterious! It was no threatening of forsaking which made the great Surety cry aloud, he endured that forsaking in very deed. "Thou:" I can understand why traitorous Judas and timid Peter should be gone, but thou, my God, my faithful friend, how canst thou leave me? This is worst of all, yea, worse than all put together. Hell itself has for its fiercest flame the separation of the soul from God. "Forsaken:" if thou hadst chastened I might bear it, for thy face would shine; but to forsake me utterly, ah! why is this? "Me:" thine innocent, obedient, suffering Son, why leavest thou me to perish? A sight of self seen by penitence, and of Jesus on the cross seen by faith will best expound this question. Jesus is forsaken because our sins had separated between us and our God.[10] (Italics mine)

Although Spurgeon does not believe that there was a "dissolution of the hypostatic union"[11], he believed that a forsaking in some sense had taken place between Christ and the Father. Spurgeon taught the redemptive value of this forsaking of Christ:

Christ's desertion is preventive of your final desertion. Because he was forsaken for a time you shall not be forsaken for ever. For he was forsaken for you. It is every way as much for the dear Son of God, the darling delight of his soul, to be forsaken of God for a time, as if such a poor inconsiderable thing as thou art shouldest be cast off to eternity. Now, this being equivalent and borne in thy room, must needs give thee the highest security in the world that God will never finally withdraw from thee.[12]

Rev. G. A. Chadwick, who was the dean of Armagh in London back in the 1800s wrote a commentary on Mark that was a part of the Expositor series of that same century. Although Chadwick does not believe that it was due to Christ having become a sinner as (in his words) "the old notion" states (proof that this was taught long before our century), here are some of his comments on Mark 15:34:

In some true sense God forsook Him. And we have to seek for a meaning of this awful statement -- inadequate no doubt, for all our thoughts must come short of such a reality, but free from pervarication and evasion. It is wholly unsatisfactory to regard the verse as merely the heading of a Psalm, (Psalm 22) cheerful for the most part, which Jesus inaudibly recited. Why was only this verse uttered aloud? How false an impression must have been produced upon the multitude, upon St. John, upon the penitent thief, if Jesus were suffering less than the extreme of spiritual anguish. Nay, we feel that never before can the verse have attained its fullest meaning, a meaning which no experience of David could more than dimly shadow forth, since we ask in our sorrows, Why have we forsaken God? but Jesus said, Why hast Thou forsaken Me?[13]

If Rev. Chadwick had not written this over 100 years ago I would almost think that he was addressing the critics of our day. Many critics dispute the Word-of-Faith teaching on Jesus' cry on the cross by saying that He was simply quoting Psalm 22, but it had nothing to do with a literal separation. So far, the commentators we cite here would not agree.

The prolific writer and pastor, Andrew Murray (1828-1917) seemed to believe that in the period that our Lord made the distressing cry, He began to taste death in all its bitterness. In his devotional commentary on Hebrews, Murray wrote:

"Death is inseperably connected with sin, and the curse which God pronounced upon it. When Jesus, as the Second Adam, tasted death for all; when in Gethsemane, He with strong crying and tears besought His Father that the cup might pass from Him; when on the cross He cried, My God! My God! Why hast thou forsaken Me? He tasted death in all its bitterness, both as the terrible fruit of sin, the revelation of what sin is in its very nature, and as the penalty God had attached to it."[14]

Could Murray be saying that Jesus died spiritually on the cross? The implication seems to be there. Murray says emphatically that when our Lord mad His famous cry that He tasted death and that He suffered the penalty attached to sin.

Another prolific and devotional writer who taught on this theme is F. B. Meyer (1847-1929). Meyer, along with Andrew Murray, was one of the leaders in the Higher-Life Movement and the two often spoke together at yearly meetings in Keswick, England. In his devotional commentary on John, Meyer says the following:

"My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" - It would be between eleven o'clock and noon that these incidents took place; but from noon till three in the afternoon a pall of darkness hung over the cross and city. We know not how it came, but it appears to have silenced all the uproar which had surged around the cross, and to have filled the minds of all with awe. Men might have gazed rudely on his dying agony; nature refused to behold it. Men had stripped Him, but an unseen hand drew drapery about Him. For three hours it lasted and was a befitting emblem of the darkness that enveloped his soul, when He who knew no sin was made to be sin for us, "that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him."

Do you wonder that He felt thus, and question how such a forsaking had been possible at such an hour? There is but one explanation. This was not a normal human experience. Only once in the history of the race has all iniquity been laid on one head; only once has it been possible, in drinking the cup of death, to taste death for every man. "He who knew no sin was made sin for us. He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities." On no other hypothesis that that Jesus was the lamb of God, bearing away the sin of the world, can you account for the darkness of that midday midnight which obscured his soul. I cannot tell what transpired; I have no philosophy of the Atonement to offer; I only believe that the whole nature of God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself; and that, in virtue of what was done there, we may apply for forgiveness to the faithfulness and justice of God.[15]

Meyer seems to imply that at the time that Christ felt that He had been forsaken by the Father, He had become sin on our behalf, and that Christ tasting death for every man. Meyer refuses to give any philosophical musings on this. Nevertheless, Meyer was quite consistent in how He viewed this event and these words spoken by our Lord. In another one of his devotional writings, Meyer wrote:

There is no possible way of understanding, or interpreting, these words, except by believing that He was suffering for sins not his own; that He was bearing away the sin of the world. It is not for a moment conceivable that the Father could have ever seemed to forsake his well-beloved Son, unless He had stood as the representative of a guilty race, and during those hours of midday midnight had become the propitiation for the sins of the world.[16]

Dr. Meyer could not see any other explanation for Christ having made the statement other than the fact that He was at this time made sin for us and that the Father had at this time actually forsaken the Son. Both Andrew Murray and F. B. Meyer were respected Bible teachers in their time and even today their books are being sold – many years after going home to be with their Lord.

Another well known Bible Teacher of this era is a personal favorite of mine, Albert B. Simpson (1843-1919). He wrote this on Psalm 22:1:

For the first time in His existence He felt the withdrawal of the Father's love. Never had the Father's face been so clouded before. But now it is turned away. Nay, it is turned against Him. "It was the LORD'S will to crush him" (Isaiah 53:10). "Therefore, I have begun to destroy you" (Micah 6:13). We can scarcely understand it. But it was strangely, awfully true. For one day God dealt with Jesus as He will deal with sinful, rebellious men. All other agonies could not compare with this. This was the dregs of the cup of woe – the desertion, the wrath of God.[17]

I don't think we could justly be accused of misunderstanding Simpson if we were to say that he took Jesus cry on the cross in a true literal sense.

Frederick E. Marsh (1858-1931) was a teacher at the Bible Missionary Institute in England and a member of the Advent Testimony Movement. He was also a friend of F. B. Meyer and an associate of A. B. Simpson. In his book, Why Did Christ Die? Marsh makes the following comments on Psalm 22:1:

"My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" (verse 1) He that standeth Surety for another shall smart for it. Man had forsaken God, the Fountain of Living Waters (Jer. II. 13), and he must answer for his sin, or another must answer for him. Christ came to us where we were, and answered for us in standing as our surety. He was forsaken by the Righteous God as He bore the penalty of our sin. The word "forsaken" is rendered "left destitute" in Genesis xxiv. 27; and "faileth" in Psalm xxxviii. 10. These words might be read into the text, and as they are, they give added emphasis to the fact that Christ was left alone, He was destitute of help, heaven failed Him, and God forsook Him. When Martin Luther was confronted with this fact, he sat benumbed for a time, and exclaimed at last, "God forsaken by God." He was destitute of help that we might have salvation. He was failed in the hour of His extremity that God might never fail us in any extremity. He was forsaken that the blood-brought promise might be ours – "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee." He was orphaned that we might be Fathered.[18]

Sir Robert Anderson (1841-1918), who wrote many books during his lifetime (some of them to refute the so called "Higher Criticism" which was an attack on the Bible). In his book, Redemption Truths, Anderson says the following about the cry of our Lord on the cross:

We are in the habit of assuming that His work as the Sin-bearer began when He was nailed to the cross. But that was the act of the Roman soldiers, whereas this depended on the decree of God. And this was the death He dreaded-not the yielding up of His spirit, for death in that sense was the close of His sufferings, the gate through which He passed to victory. The cup which the Father had given Him to drink was death in its primary and deepest sense, as separation from God. Scripture speaks of it as His “being made a curse for us.” The meaning of such words is one of the mysteries of our redemption. And yet, with extraordinary levity and daring, we presume to enter this "holiest of all.”[19] (Italics mine)

So Anderson taught that Christ experienced a true separation from God. Anderson also saw this separation as a form of death.

F.W. Grant (1834-1902) was among the Plymouth Brethren and an author of some Christian books. Grant made a statement that seems to capture the Word-of-Faith side of this debate in our day:

How important, then, to have a right apprehension of this essential feature of His wondrous work! Yet there are those among evangelical Christians so called who see no difference between the Lord’ s sufferings in life and those in His death,-between Gethsemane with its bloody sweat and the blood of the cross! They see not the contrast between a time of which He yet says, “I am not alone, for My Father is with Me” and that of His cry, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” The three hours’ dark-ness while He hangs upon the tree is almost universally misinterpreted as the sympathy of Nature with her Head and Lord, whereas it is the manifest expression of the withdrawal of Him who is light, and finds, therefore, its true interpretation in that cry of forsaken sorrow.[20]

In a later chapter, Grant gives a very detailed explanation of what he believes is the difference in the latter statement of Jesus:

The twenty-second psalm now unfolds the reality of the sacrifice upon which all is based. It is the well-known psalm of atonement, so solemn and so dear to the Christian heart. It is the sin-offering, -the requirement, as I have elsewhere said, of the divine nature. The forsaking of God is the necessary result of the holy One being made sin.

This is what is throughout put in contrast with all other sufferings. All felt as they are, and no indifference to any,-the bodily anguish, the shame, the heartless wickedness of the assailants,-yet the one agony which outweighs all the rest is this for-saking of God. “ My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? far from helping Me, from the words of My roaring ? 0 My God, I cry in the day-time, and Thou hearest not, and in the night-season, and am not silent!” “Be not far from Me, for trouble is near; for there is none to help.” “But be not Thou far from Me, 0 Lord: 0 My strength, haste Thee to help Me ! ”

This forsaking is also carefully distinguished from any thing that a righteous man ever suffered. “Our fathers trusted in Thee; they trusted, and Thou didst deliver them: they looked unto Thee, and were delivered; they trusted in Thee, and were not confounded. But I am a worm, and no man.” Yet a long line of martyrs witness to us that, as to deliverance simply from the hands of enemies, multitudes have cried and not been deliv-ered, the sufferings through which they passed only proving that they were not forsaken, but onthe contrary maintained and enabled for whatever they passed through by a power manifesting itself thus the more. How many before and since have proved Paul’s experience, “ Persecuted, but not forsaken “! None of these patient sufferers, pre-cious and acceptable as their patience was to God, touched even the border of the darkness of the cross,-when the cry of the holy One found no response.

What to Him that desertion was, He Himself alone could know. “Thou art He that took Me out of the womb; Thou didst make me hope even upon My mother’ s breasts; I was cast upon Thee from the womb; Thou art My God even from My mother’ s belly.” To us, born in sin and shapen in iniquity, to whom estrangement from God is the natural condition, and who, even when by grace redeemed, can so readily slip out of communion with God, how little is it possible to realize the agony of this condition. With us, too, when out of communion, it implies a state which prevents realization. The spiritual sense is blunted, the spiritual affections are not in play; and if even in this state sorrows and troubles surprise us which make us feel vainly after Him, the consequences of the terrible loss are sure to overshadow and obscure the spiritual loss itself; while at the most the dark-ness that can envelop one who has ever known God is the darkness of a clouded sun compared with a night of total absence in the case of Him who was made sin for us.

Alone in human weakness, with every element of bitterness in the dreadful cup which was His to drink, He could ask, as none among men beside could, “Why hast Thou forsaken Me?” yet proclaim at the same time the holiness of Him who had forsaken Him. “But Thou art holy: dwelling amid the praises of Israel.” Is not here, in fact, the reason of this forsaking, that the holy One would dwell amid the praises of a redeemed people? That worship could never be but for the cross. He must be in the outside place of dark-ness, that we might be, children of light, in the light with God.[21]

Well known pastor G. Campbell Morgan (1863-1945), was a prolific writer with about sixty books to his credit. Morgan believed that the Lord's having been forsaken was equal to spiritual death:

The hour was come, and He had accomplished all that was within the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. He had entered into, and passed through, the deep mystery of spiritual death. In that experienced He had cried, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken Me?" and in that mystic cry revealed all that it is possible for men to know of that experience. All was over, except the physical dissolution which was the sacramental symbol of the spiritual death.[22]

Morgan seems to believe that the culmination of Jesus' spiritual death was His physical death. Morgan was a respected evangelical in his day and as far as I know none of his teaching was considered heretical. Nevertheless, he probably would not do well among today's critics.

A. C. Gaebelin, one of the consulting editors for the Scofield Reference Bible and editor of a magazine called Our Hope. He was also well known in his time as a Bible Expoitor and has written several books to this effect. In an exposition of the book of Matthew, Gaebelin gives us these comments:

The deepest agony has not yet been reached. Awful as the physical and mental sufferings of the Son of God must have been, there was still greater suffering before Him, a suffering before which all the other sufferings pale. Up to this point He had suffered from wicked men, energized by the devil. But now He is approaching the moment when He who knew no sin is to be made sin, when, instead of suffering from men, He is to suffer from God Himself. The cup from which His holy Being shrank He takes now to drink to the last drop.

“Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour; but about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is, My God, my God, why hast Thou for-saken Me?” (verses 45-47). A solemn darkness settled over the whole land. Was it a darkness which covered the entire earth? Hardly, for in a part of the world it was night and darkness was not possi-ble. No doubt the darkness covered the entire land and perhaps the entire Roman world. It enshrouded the cross with the great sufferer so that He was no longer visible to those who kept guard and those who looked on. That it was not an eclipse of the sun is learned from the fact that it was full moon at that time. It was a supernatural dark-ness.

At the termination of the darkness about the ninth hour we hear His voice out of the darkness. About the ninth hour He cried, not in feebleness, but with a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” But what is the mean-ing of this darkness? It was the outer sign of what passed over Him, who was then the sinner’s substitute before a holy and righteous God. God had hidden His face from Him; He was forsaken by God Himself. His cry explains the meaning of the darkness, and the darkness gives us the meaning of His bitter cry, God had turned from Him, left Him, who had taken the sinner’s place. He then bore our sins, was made sin for us and was the offering for sin. But who can fathom it? Who can understand the deep mys-tery, the deep suffering when the holy and righteous God dealt with sin in Him, who had no sin, but who was made sin ?

“He was alone with God, made sin; nothing to turn aside the cup of justice; nothing to deaden it. The power which was in Him did not shelter Him; it rendered Him capable of bearing that which weighed on His soul, the feeling of the horror of the curse in the measure in which the Iove of the Father was familiar to Him, the feeling of that which it was to be made sin in the measure of the divine holiness which was in Him. Neither the one nor the other could be measured. He drank then the cup of judgment of God against sin. All forces Him to utter the cry, a cry which we are allowed to hear that we might know what passed there, the reality of atonement: ‘My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?’ It is a forsaking which none can fathom, save He who felt it.[23]

We cannot doubt that Dr. Gaebelin believed in the literal meaning of these words spoken in by our Lord upon the cross in what was the darkest hour of His earthly life.

These well respected theologians and Bible teachers obviously took the meaning of Jesus cry to the Father to the conclusion that Christ was truly forsaken on the cross.

The Calvinistic Bible teacher, Arthur W. Pink, in his exposition of Matthew 27:46 equated the forsaking of Jesus to spiritual death:

As we can see, Pink took the words of Christ literally and applied them to their logical conclusion.

Alfred Edersheim (1825-1889), was a preacher, lecturer, and writer. He wrote many Christian books on Jewish themes and his books are still widely read. Edersheim had this to say about Jesus' cry on the cross:

The darkness was such not only to Nature ; Jesus, also, entered into darkness : Body, Soul, and Spirit. It was now, not as before, a contest-but suffering. Into this, to us, fathomless depth of the mystery of His Sufferings, we dare not, as indeed we cannot, enter. It was of the Body; yet not of the Body only, but of physical life. The increasing, nameless agonies of the Crucifixion were deepening into the bitterness of death. All nature shrinks from death, and there is a physical horror of the separation between body and soul which, as a purely natural phenomenon, is in every instance only overcome, and that only by a higher principle. And we conceive that, the pure1 the being, the greater the violence of the tearing asunder of the bond with which God Almighty originally bound together body and soul. In the Perfect Man this must have reached the highest degree. So, also, had in those dark hours the sense of man-forsakenness and of His own isolation from man; so, also, had the intense silence of God, the withdrawal of God, the sense of His God-forsakennest and absolute loneliness. The sacrificial, vicarious, expiatory, and redemptive character of His Death, if It does not explain to 11s) yet helps us to understand, Christ’s sense of God-forsakenness in the supreme moment of the Cross.

It was the combination of the Old Testament idea of sacrifice, and of the Old Testament ideal of willing suffering as the Servant of Jehovah, now fulfilled in Christ, which found its fullest expression in the language of the twenty-second Psalm. It was fitting-rather, it was true that the willing suffering of the true Sacrifice should now find vent in its opening words: ‘ My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me ? ‘--Eli, Eli, ha sabacthanei? These words, cried with a loud voice at the close of the period of extreme agony, marked the climax and the end of this suffering of Christ, of which the utmost compass was the withdrawal of God and the felt loneliness of the Sufferer. But they that stood by the Cross, misinterpreting the meaning, and mistaking the opening words for the name Elias, imagined that the Sufferer had called for Elias. We can scarcely doubt that these were the soldiers who stood by the Cross. They were not necessarily Romans; on the contrary, as we have seen, these Legions were generally recruited from Provincials. On the other hand, no Jew would have mistaken Eli for the name of Elijah, nor yet misinterpreted a quotation of Psalm xxii. 1 as a call for that prophet.[25]

Charles Cuthbert Hall was a well known Presbyterian minister who wrote several books. Many of his books seemed to be a refutation of the fatalistic Calvinism of his day. He addressed this theme of Christ being forsaken by the Father in his book, Does God Send Trouble? Joe McIntyre makes reference to this book in his excellent work on theological influences of E. W. Kenyon.[26] Yet, this was not the only time that Hall addressed this theme. In another one of his books, The Gospel of the Divine Sacrifice, Hall says the following:

No wonder that Christ, in Whom the Godhead dwelt, when He realized that the hour had come when that humiliation under sin must be publicly disclosed in the horrors of Calvary, that He must drink that deadly cup of wrath in the sight of men, sank in the darkness of the Garden, a sweat of blood breaking sweat of blood breaking from Him, and prayed: "O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me!" No wonder, when the shame of that humiliation was actively experienced in the nakedness of the cross, it seemed to Him that Godhead Itself was blotted out as with a cloud, and he cried: "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me!"[27]

W. Hoste is also among the many quoted here who believed that Christ was literally forsaken when He was made sin for us. In a book he edited with contributions by several well known ministers of his day, he contributed one chapter in which he made this statement:

His was a unique death. He was forsaken of God at the last. No other servant of God ever had such an experience. David, contemplating the “valley of the shadow of death,” feared no evil, for he knew Jehovah would be with him. But in the valley of death itself Jesus cried ‘ (My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” Not only the sun was darkened, but God hid His face. For Christ was there as the sin-bearer. “His own self bear our sins in His own body on the tree.” He suffered once for those sins. On that Cross He died as the sin-offering, “without the camp.” There He cried, “Thou hast brought Me into the dust of death.”[28]

Philip Mauro (1859-1952), who was a lawyer that converted to Christ at the height of his career, authored several Christian books. In one of his books which was a treatise on Romans seven, deals with our Lord's cry on the cross:

That period reached its culminating intensity during the three hours of darkness on the Cross, when the Father's face was averted, when Christ was forsaken of God, and when even the light of nature was withdrawn. In the garden He was apprehended as a criminal -- as a transgressor of the Law which He had given on Sinai -- and His arrest was effected by the hand of the officers of the Law. They came out against Him as against a thief. But all this was done that the Scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled. And at that moment He was left ALONE. All the disciples “forsook Him and fled” (Matt. Xxvi. 55, 56).[29]

Buford Battin, a minister with the Nazarene Holiness church believed that Christ was literally forsaken on the cross: "Always God had been real to Jesus. Now, why was He forsaken? What a mystery! Jesus was not unconscious. It was not just a feeling of being forsaken. He knew what it was all about. Now he was actually forsaken."[30] Battin goes on further to say:

Adam and Eve had communion with God until they sinned and then fellowship was broken. Sin brings a cloud between God and man separating a soul from the presence of God. Sin separated Jesus from the Father. The sins were not His but the sins of the world which He took upon Himself. "For He hath made Him to be sin who knew no sin" (2 Cor. 5:21). Jesus was dying as a sinner must die and the sins of the world He took upon Himself separated Him from God.[31]

J. T. Mawson, like many of those we have quoted in this appendix, believed that the Father forsook Jesus when He was made sin for us:

As He hung upon that Cross He was just as holy as He was when He sat on the Throne and created angels.

Just as holy in His perfect manhood as He was in His Godhead glory. Then if Jesus is holy, and if God is holy, what is the meaning of thus cry ? It is because we were unholy, because we were sinful, because we were far from God and unfit for His Presence. It is because of this that Jesus was forsaken, for there in that darkness He was made sin for us.[32]

Mawson believes seems to believe that this truth is vitally important as he goes on to say, "Thus He suffered ! Our Christianity will have no foundation if we pass over this. Any change brought about in our lives that leaves this out will be but a temporary, a superficial change."[33]

In A Harmony of the Four Gospels by J. W. McGarvey and Philip Y. Pendleton, we find this interesting commentary on Jesus' cry to the Father:

Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? The words of the cry are found at Psalms 22:1. "Eli" is Hebrew, "Eloi" is Aramaic or Syro-Chaldaic for "My God". The former would be used by Jesus if he quoted the Scripture, the latter if he spoke the language of the people. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? We can imagine what it would mean to a righteous man to feel that he was forsaken of God. But the more we feel and enjoy the love of another, the greater our sense of loss at being deprived of it. Considering, therefore, the near and dear relationship between the Son and Father, it is evident that we can never know or fathom the depth of anguish which this cry expressed. Suffice it to say, that this was without doubt the most excruciating of all Christ's sufferings, and it, too, was a suffering in our stead.[34]

The great Chinese preacher and author, Watchman Nee, also gives an interesting comment on the cry of our Savior upon the cross. Nee, like many we have referenced here believes that an actual separation took place:

The scene of darkness was awesome in its terribleness! Here is God, who is most holy. And how He hates sin intensely; yet now He must bear the sins of the entire world and be made sin for us. Who can comprehend in the slightest such agony? On the one hand there were the gibes of Satan and his evil spirits: "Son of God, today is Your day, why do You not come down from the cross? (see Matt. 27.39-42) On the other hand God the Father forsook Him: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" (Matt. 27.46 quoting Ps. 22.1) What a tragic scene here! God hates sin so much that He hates the sins which His own Son bore on behalf of men. Do see that God cannot live with sin, He cannot even tolerate the sight of sin. And hence if He must forsake His Son who bore others' sins, will He most assuredly forsake you eternally, oh sinner, if you do not receive Christ as your Savior?[35]

The Interpreter's Bible Commentary on Psalm 22:1 goes further in its explanation of the cry of Christ than most of the commentaries I have read thus far:

The fact that these were the words from the Psalter which our Lord used on the cross is full of significance doctrinally. He must have known many of the Psalms by heart; their sunnier songs must have been on his lips. Why did he not quote, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, ... thou art with me," instead of this terrible cry? Is the answer indeed that at this moment God was not with him? Are we actually faced with the appalling spectacle of Jesus without God? "It was damnation," the old preacher cried, "and he took it lovingly." Whatever happened to him afterward, at this moment too he descended into hell; for what is hell but the state of a spirit with whom God will not have anything to do? In that one cry the Lord took all the swords of the world's pain, and gathering them into one, pressed them to his own heart. Those who neglect the atonement must face gravely this darkness of the night that the Lord went through.[36]

Albert Barnes in his popular commentary makes this statement concerning Matthew 27:46:

Had there been no deeper and more awful sufferings, it would be difficult to see why Jesus should have shrunk from these sorrows, and used such a remarkable expression. Isaiah tells us, #Isa 53:4,5| "He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows. He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed." He hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, #Gal 3:13| he was made a sin-offering, #2Cor 5:21| he died in our place, on our account, that he might bring us near to God. It was this, doubtless, which caused his intense sufferings. It was the manifestation of God's hatred of sin to his soul, in some way which he has not explained, that he experienced in that dread hour. It was suffering, endured by him, that was due to us; and suffering by which, and by which alone, we can be saved from eternal death. [37]

Louis T. Talbot, was a man whose teaching was strongly dispensational, believed that there was a literal separation between the Father and Son when our Lord uttered these words:

What is death? Cessation of existence? No! The death that comes as a consequence of sin is not physical death only; it is that and more; it is eternal separation from God. Sin separated Adam from God, who is the Fount of all life. Sin separated Cain from God; and in bitter remorse the murderer cried out to a holy God: "From thy face shall I be hid" (Gen. 4:14). Sin in the home separates husband from wife; sin in the business world separates employer from employee; sin in the heart separates the sinner from the Saviour. Natural death separates soul and spirit from the body; penal death separates soul and spirit from God. Sin spells separation.

That is why there was a supernatural darkness at the cross. A holy God was hiding His face from the Sin-Bearer. That is why the holy Son of God cried out in that dark hours: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" You will note that He did not say, "My Father ... why hast thou forsaken me?" though He was the only begotten Son of the Father. In this moment He was addressing God as the Supreme Ruler and Judge. And a holy God can not look upon sin. Sin separates! At Calvary all the demerit and sin and transgression and guilt of the race were rolled upon the Lord Jesus. The agony of the cross was not the physical suffering; it was the separation it brought between Him and His Father in heaven, with whom He had ever known unbroken fellowship, before whom He had always been well-pleasing.[38]

The late Ray C. Stedman, who was the pastor of Peninsula Bible Church in Palo Alto California and who authored several books wrote that the opening words of Psalm 22 "... have been called 'the cry of dereliction,' that is, the cry of abandonment as the sufferer becomes aware that He is forsaken by His God."[39] Stedman not only believed this to be the "cry of dereliction" but he also called this "Immanuel's orphaned cry." Stedman gives us more detail concerning the meaning of this phrase:

So here we have the strange mystery of the abandonment of the Son of God – what some have called "Immanuel's orphaned cry" – "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Jesus actually spoke these words in Aramaic. Because He cried out with a loud voice, passersby misunderstood Him. He said, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?" When the bystanders heard the words, "Eloi, Eloi," they thought He was calling for Elijah. But He was calling out for God from the depths of His being because of His sense of abandonment. The strangeness of that rejection by God is highlighted for us by the sufferer's stated awareness of the faithful character of God.[40]

Stedman, in commenting on Mark 15:34 compared the Lord's agonies to that of a girl being raped by an ugly man:

As Jesus' cry rang out, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" there must have been many in the crowd who recognized that it was the opening words of the 22nd Psalm. If you want to get the background and atmosphere of the cross, read that Psalm through. There is no adequate explanation for the question that Jesus asked except that which Scripture itself gives, notably in Second Corinthians 5:21, where Paul says, "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

I don't think it's possible for any of us to even remotely understand the agony that wrung this tremendous cry from the lips of Jesus. If you can imagine a beautiful young girl, an innocent virgin, being raped by an ugly, foul, rapacious man, and the horror that she would feel in that moment, you aren't even in range of what was going through the soul of Jesus when he was made sin for us. You say, "I don't understand it." Well, join the club -- I am way beyond my depth in trying to explain anything about these events to you.[41]

A note in the Life Application Bible also shows us that its primarily Evangelical contributors saw a literal separation of Christ and the Father when Jesus made His cry in Matthew 27:46:

Jesus was not questioning God, he was quoting the first line of Psalm 22 – a deep spiritual expression of the anguish he felt when he took on the sins of the world and thus was separated from his Father. This was what Jesus dreaded as he prayed to God in the garden to take the cup from him (26:39). The physical agony was horrible, but even worse was the period of spiritual separation from God. Jesus suffered this double death so that we would never have to experience eternal separation from God.[42]

Lawrence O. Richards, who has written several commentaries, Bible dictionaries, and other helpful Bible study tools was not shy in expressing his belief that our Lord actually experienced spiritual death when He uttered His cry in Matthew 27:46:

As God the Son our Lord had spent eternity past in the unbroken fellowship of love that pulsed steadily within the Godhead. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were at one, and were one. Even in the Incarnation Jesus lived a life of unbroken fellowship with the Father.

But now the Son of God was dying on the cross – dying that He might take upon Himself the burden of our sins, and suffer death in our place. For this awesome moment Jesus, who knew no sin, was "made ... sin" for us (2 Cor. 5:21). And at that extended moment, stretching over three darkened hours, God the Father forsook the Son, turning away from Him, and Christ experienced spiritual death – isolation from God.[43]

One of the most popular Bible teachers in our own day is Warren W. Wiersbe. Wiersbe is well respected in Evangelical circles. Though He has written many books, his most popular writings are probably the "BE" series. Dr. Wiersbe has this to say on the Matthew 27:45:

... Jesus cried, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken Me?" This was a direct quotation from Psalm 22:1. It was during the time of darkness that Jesus had been made sin for us (2 Cor. 5:21). He had been forsaken by the Father! That darkness was a symbol of the judgment that He endured when He was "made a curse" for us (Gal. 3:13). Psalm 22:2 suggests a period of light and a period of darkness; and Psalm 22:3 emphasizes the holiness of God. How could a holy God look with favor on His Son who had become sin?[44]

It is to be noted that Wiersbe is neither a Pentecostal nor is he a Charismatic. Wiersbe holds to some cessationist theology. Therefore, no one could rightly accuse Dr. Wiersbe of being influenced by Word-Faith doctrine. Because Wiersbe has edited several books of sermons by classic preachers, it would be easier to verify from these the influence upon his own theological perspective.

However, one Charismatic Bible Teacher who has taught that there was a literal separation of the Father and Son was Calvary Chapel founder and Pastor Chuck Smith. In his comments on Matthew 27:46 Smith says:

And so by crying, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" He has given them a reference point to look up, in order that they might have a more full understanding of just what's going on.

But also as we hear His cry we begin to understand the agony in the garden the night before, when He began to sweat as it were great drops of blood falling to the ground, as He was pleading with the father, if it was possible let the cup pass. This is the bitterness of the cup that He had to drink, that effect that sin has of separating a man from God. Through the eternity past, He has always been one with the father, never separated. But when God laid on Him the iniquities of us all, because God can not look in agreement upon sin, there came that separation, as He tasted for a moment that separation from God, in order that you would not have to be separated from God eternally. God laid on Him the iniquities of us all. And when the sin's of the world were laid on Jesus, He was forsaken of God. And thus that cry, that rang out; my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me."[45]

In more comments on Mark 15:34, Chuck Smith likens Jesus' cry to having experienced a spiritual death:

It was because of the holiness of God that Jesus was forsaken of God. For sin always separates a man from God and when the sins of the world were placed upon Jesus, that fellowship that He had experienced, that coexistence, that oneness with the Father was broken. He who had existed with God from the beginning, He who shared the glory of God before the world ever existed was forsaken of God when God laid on Him the iniquities of us all. He tasted of death for every man. He tasted of death for you. He experienced the consequence of sin, spiritual death, separation from God. And thus, the cry, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" He was forsaken of God in order that you would never have to be forsaken of God. God help you that you never echo that prayer of Jesus. Those who live in sin, those who refuse Jesus as their Savior experience separation from God, spiritual death.[46]

The irony of presenting these quotes by Chuck Smith is the fact that the staunchest critic of the interpretation of this passage held by Smith is Hendrik Hanegraaf, who is allegedly affiliated with Calvary Chapel. Hanegraaf, who is the president of the Christian Research Institute, claims to have been ordained by Smith for the ministry. Though Smith and the Faith Teachers differ on many things, they both seem to agree on the interpretation of Matthew 27:46. Yet this is the very interpretation that Hanegraaf disputes in order to label the Faith Teachers as heretics.[47]

Smith certainly does not end the score of modern teachers who teach that Christ experienced a literal separation from the Father on the cross. R. C. Sproul makes it clear beyond all doubt that this is the proper interpretation of the cry of Jesus:

"Let me say this, if Jesus was not really forsaken on the cross you are still in your sins. You have no redemption. You have no salvation. Because the whole point of the of the cross is that if Jesus is going to bear our sins and bear the sanctions of the covenant.

Let me ask you this, what was the sign of the old covenant? Circumcision. Talk about primitive and obscene signs. Why did the Jew cut off the foreskin of his flesh? …The Jew was saying ‘Oh, God! If I fail to keep everyone of the terms of this covenant may I be cut off from you, cut off from your presence, cut off from the light of your countenance, cut off from your blessedness, just as I have now ritually cut off the foreskin of my flesh!’

Do you understand that the cross is the supreme circumcision? Because when Jesus takes the curse upon himself, so identifies with our sin that He becomes a curse, God cuts Him off!And justly so, because at the moment that Christ takes upon Himself the sin of the world [b]that figure that is on the cross is the most grotesque most obscene mass of sin concentrated in the history of the world. And God is too holy to even look at iniquity and when Christ is hanging on the cross the Father, as it were, turns His back, He removes His face, He turns out the ligh, He cuts off His son, and so here is Jesus bearing the sin, it’s touching His human nature who has been in perfect blessed relationship with God throughout His ministry, now gone.

I have heard a million sermons about the nails and the thorns, and granted the physical agony of crucifixion is a ghastly thing, but there have been thousands of people who have died on the cross and who have had more horrible painful excruciating deaths than that. But only one has received the full measure of the curse of death. I doubt that Jesus is even aware of the nails and the spear, He was so overwhelmed by the outer darkness. Dear friends, on the cross Jesus is in Hell! Right there. Totally bereft of the grace and presence of God, utterly separated from all blessedness of the Father. He becomes a curse for you, so that you someday will be able to see the face of God. So that the light of his countenance will fall on you, God turned His back on His Son. No wonder He screamed, He screamed from the depths of His soul."[48]

In another teaching Sproul says, "His scream was the scream of the damned."[49] If anyone could in all good consciousness deny that this advocate of Reformed theology does not believe that Christ suffered more than just a physical death then they are not being honest when reading his statements.

Yet, even as explicit and clear as Sproul is, he is only matched in his frank presentation by John MacArthur:

Well, spiritual death is usually defined as separation from God. In that sense, I would say, yes, Christ did die spiritually. We know He died physically; I mean, that’s obvious, because they crucified Him and He yielded up His spirit, right? And they ran a spear into His side and out came the pericardial fluid, mixed with blood, which indicated probably that His heart had burst. And so we know He died physically.

What, beyond that, what He experienced was a separation from God. And, I believe, in that sense, there was a spiritual alienation-there was a spiritual death. Spiritual death is alienation from God, and Jesus articulated that when He said, ‘My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?’ I think, in the experience of bearing sin in His own body--literally, Paul says, ‘Being made sin for us’--the separation occurred.” [50]

My friend, Duane Lindstrom, who provided the quote also makes an observation that I believe is necessary to include here: "Actually, in the full quote MacArthur goes on to mention Copeland by name and says that he disagrees that Jesus suffered in hell or that Jesus was made a sinner and needed to be born again. The suffering in hell issue is, as we know is a non-issue since Calvin taught it and there is plenty of biblical evidence. "

I would also venture to add that as we have shown in this series of essays, Martin Luther taught that Jesus became a sinner upon the cross and so does modern day reformed theologian Michael Horton. This does not make the doctrine correct but we mention this so that if one would criticize Faith Teachers such as Kenneth Copeland for such outlandish statements then they must also bring the same condemnation upon these two men.

It could be true that all of these men are wrong. The Scriptures are our foundation for living and not the writings of men, no matter how great they were in their preaching and teaching. However, my reason for quoting these writings is to prove that the Faith Teachers are not teaching something, in the sense of Matt. 27:45 that was never taught before. If the interpretation of Matthew 27:45 as taught by these respected authors is incorrect, are our present day apologists the only ones that are correct in their interpretation of this passage (and others as well)? Are they all heretics too? Its no surprise that I would answer in the negative. I hope those who struggle with the Faith Movement's position on this will at least consider the fact that it is not something invented by them or a concept borrowed from the cults.

Note: A very special thanks to my friend, Duane Lindstrom who helped me with the research on this topic. Duane helped by finding the quotes by R. C. Sproul, John MacArthur, and John Gill.

Notes

As quoted in Gerard Rosse's excellent theological work, The Cry of Jesus on the Cross: A Biblical and Theological Study (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1987), p. 74
I am not sure of the original source of this quote from Martin Luther, nevertheless, it is quoted in many sermons by Evangelical ministers on Matthew 27:46.
As quoted in Gerard Rosse's, The Cry of Jesus on the Cross: A Biblical and Theological Study, pp. 83, 84
Calvin, John Calvins Commentaries (Available at http://www.ccel.org)
Owen, John The Death of Death in the Death of Christ (Book I – Chapter Three) (Can be found at http://www.heffy.com/theology.com)
Gill, John John Gill's Exposition of the Bible (Paris, AR: The Baptist Standard Bearer), The New John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible Modernized and adapted for the computer by Larry Pierce of Online Bible. All Rights Reserved, Larry Pierce, Winterbourne, Ontario. Available at Crosswalk.com
Ibid.
Wesley, John Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible (Online version available at http://www.godrules.net)
Henry, Matthew Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (Comes with the e-sword program which can be downloaded from http://www.e-sword.net)
Spurgeon, Charles H. The Treasury of David (available at http://bible.crosswalk.com/Commentaries/TreasuryofDavid/)
Ibid.
Ibid.
Chadwick, G. A., D.D. The Gospel of St. Mark (available at http://www.ccel.org)
Murray, Andrew The Holiest of All (Tarrytown, NY: Fleming H. Revell Co.,), p. 296
Meyer, Frederick B. Gospel of John (Fort Washington, PA: Christian Literature Crusade, 1988), pp. 350, 351
Meyer, F.B. Great Verses Through The Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1966), p. 385
Simpson, Albert B. The Christ in the Bible Commentary (Volume III) (Camp Hill, PA: Christian Publications, 1993), pp. 189, 190
Marsh, Frederick E. Why Did Christ Die? (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1985), p. 74
Anderson, Sir Robert Redemption Truths (Niagra Falls, NY: Shiloh Christian Library)
Grant, F. W. Atonement (Niagra Falls, NY: Shiloh Christian Library), pp. 78, 79
Ibid., pp. 125-127
Morgan, G. Campbell Life Applications from Every Chapter of the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Fleming H. Revell, 1926), p. 325
Gaebelein, Arno C The Gospel of Matthew: And Exposition (Niagra Falls, NY: Shiloh Christian Library), pp. 600, 601
Pink, Arthur W. The Seven Sayings of The Saviour on the Cross (Can be found at http://www.pbministries.org)
Edersheim, Alfred The Life and Times of Jesus The Messiah (Niagra Falls, NY: Shiloh Christian Library), pp. 613, 614
McIntyre, Joe E.W. Kenyon: The True Story (Lake Mary, FL: Creation House, 1997). In Chapter 17 titled, Concurring Voices on the Sufferings of Christ, McIntyre quotes from the writings of several men that taught what we has been labeled in our day as JDS. Among them are Billy Graham, J. N. Darby, H. A. Ironside, John Calvin, Charles Spurgeon, R. W. Dale, Henry C. Mabie, G. Campbell Morgan, and Charles Cuthbert Hall.I have enjoyed many e-mail conversations with Pastor McIntyre and his book on Kenyon has had a major impact on my own research and writing.
Hall, Charles C. The Gospel of the Divine Sacrifice (New York, NY: Hodder and Stoughton), pp. 114, 115
Hoste, W. The Great Sacrifice (Niagra Falls, NY: Shiloh Christian Library), p. 88
Mauro, Philip The Wretched Man and His Deliverance (Romans VII) (North Kansas City, MO: Christian Publisher's Bookhouse, 1910), p. 60
Battin, Buford Messages from the Cross (Spokane, WA: Holiness Data Ministry).
Ibid.
Mawson, J. T. Standing By The Cross (Niagra Falls, NY: Shiloh Christian Library), p. 116
Ibid., p. 117
McGarvey, J.W. A Harmony of the Gospels (Can be found at http://www.crosswalk.com)
Nee, Watchman Full of Grace and Truth (Volume One) (New York, Christian Fellowship Publishers, 1980), pp. 184, 185
Sclater, Poteat, and Ballard The Interpreter's Bible Commentary Vol. IV (New York: Abingdon Press, 1955), p. 117
Barnes, Albert Barnes New Testament Notes (Tempe, AZ, The CrossWire Bible Society), The Sword Project Bible Software which can be downloaded for free at http://www.crosswire.org
Talbot, Louis T. God's Plan of the Ages (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1936), pp. 90, 91
Stedman, Ray C. Psalms of Faith (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1973), p. 71
Ibid., p. 72
Stedman, Ray C. Commentary on Mark (Available at http://www.pbc.org/)
Life Application Bible: The Living Bible (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1988), p. 1395
Richards, Lawrence O. The Victor Bible Background Commentary: New Testament (Wheaton, Ill: Victor Books, 1994), pp. 145, 146
Wiersbe, Warren W. The Bible Exposition Commentary (Vol. I) (Wheaton, Ill: Victor Books, 1989), p. 103
Smith Chuck Sermon Notes on Matthew (Available at http://CalvaryChapel.com)
Smith Chuck Sermon Notes on Mark (Available at http://CalvaryChapel.com)
Hanegraaff, Hendrik Christianity in Crisis, (Harvest House Publishers, Oregon, 1993). In contrast to his mentor, Chuck Smith, Hanegraaf says, "(T)he notion of Jesus being overtaken by 'the very nature of death' is contradicted by Jesus' claim that He has 'life in Himself' (John 5:26; cf. 1:4), is 'the resurrection and the life' (11:25), and is "the way, the truth, and the life" (14:6). The 'spiritual death of Christ' teaching entails an implicit denial of Christ's deity and, in turn, of the Trinity." By making this statement concerning the Faith teachers, Hanegraaff is in essence accusing Chuck Smith and the other men quoted in this appendix.
R.C. Sproul, The Cross of Christ, Audio Series
R.C. Sproul, Table Talk, page 6
MacArthur Jr, John. tape, GC 70-15, titled "Bible Questions and Answers"

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