Christ is All!: April 2022

The Son was stricken and smitten by God His Father (Isaiah 53:4)

The Son was pierced with the sword of God His Father’s anger (Zechariah 13:7, Mark 14:27)

The Son was crushed by God His Father – and it pleased Him to do it (Isaiah 53:10)
The Son was made a curse and cursed by God His Father

(Galatians 3:13)
The Son was a propitiation for sinners

(He absorbed the wrath of God His Father – that’s what propitiation means) (Romans 3:25; 1 John 4:10)
The Son drank the cup of God’s infinite wrath (Matthew 26:39-44)
The Son was forsaken by God His Father (Matthew 27:46)

The Son was cut off by God His Father (Daniel 9:26; Isaiah 53:8; Colossians 2:11)

The Son was cast out of the covenantal presence of God His Father (Hebrews 13:12)
The Son was not spared by God His Father (Romans 8:32)

1. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Was Stricken And Smitten By God His Father
The prophets help us understand exactly what Jesus endured on the cross for sinners because they show us what the Suffering Servant would endure and what sinners who have rebelled against God would endure.

Isaiah 53:4 teaches that God struck (מֻכֵּ֥ה) His Son on the cross: “Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten (מֻכֵּ֥ה) by God, and afflicted.”

Ezekiel 7 shows us what it means to be smitten or struck (מֻכֵּ֥ה) by God: His wrath is poured out; His anger is spent; His judgment and punishment given; there’s no sparing and no pity:

Now I will soon pour out my wrath upon you, and spend my anger against you, and judge you according to your ways, and I will punish you for all your abominations. And my eye will not spare, nor will I have pity. I will punish you according to your ways, while your abominations are in your midst. Then you will know that I am the LORD, who strikes [מֻכֵּ֥ה] (Ezekiel 7:8-9).

God’s wrath was poured out on Jesus; God’s anger was spent on Jesus; God’s judgment and punishment was given to Jesus; and there was no sparing or pity shown to Jesus on that cross, so that we will never face God’s wrath, so that God’s anger will never be spent on us, so that God’s judgment and punishment will never be given to us, and so that we will not be spared any grace or mercy purchased for us on that cross!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

2. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Was Pierced With The Sword Of God His Father’s Anger
Zechariah 13:7: Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who stands next to me," declares the LORD of hosts. "Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered . . . ."

Mark 14:27: And Jesus said to them, "You will all fall away, for it is written, 'I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.'"

Since Jesus was made sin (law-breaking and idolatry) on the cross (2 Corinthians 5:21), the favor of His Father was withdrawn from Him; He was not pitied or spared (Romans 8:32), the sword of the LORD was raised against Him (Zechariah 13:7); He was made a reproach and a taunt in the sight of all who passed by (Mark 15:29); He was punished in anger; and all God’s wrath and anger was spent on Christ on the cross. We see all of this illustrated in the way God deals with sin in Ezekiel chapter 5:

You have been more unruly than the nations around you and have not followed my decrees or kept my laws . . . I myself will withdraw my favor; I will not look on you with pity or spare you . . . I will scatter to the winds and pursue with drawn sword. Then my anger will cease and my wrath against them will subside, and I will be avenged. And when I have spent my wrath upon them, they will know that I the LORD have spoken in my zeal. I will make you a ruin and a reproach among the nations around you, in the sight of all who pass by. You will be a reproach and a taunt, a warning and an object of horror to the nations around you when I inflict punishment on you in anger and in wrath and with stinging rebuke. I the LORD have spoken (Ezekiel 5:7,11,12-15).

I will bring disaster upon them, my fierce anger, declares the LORD. I will send the sword after them, until I have consumed them . . . . (Jeremiah 49:37).

All of this happened “in anger.” On the cross, Jesus was made our sin and was struck down by God: The Father poured out His wrath on the Son; The Father’s anger was spent on His own Son; He endured God’s judgment and punishment; There was no sparing or pity; All who passed by did reproach and taunt Him (Matthew 27:39) . . . so that all those who repent and believe in Christ will be spared and pitied and never face the wrath, anger, judgment, and punishment of God forever!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

The striking down of Jesus on the cross included the very personal anger of the Father toward the Son. If you remove the personal anger of God from the striking down of Jesus on the cross, then the striking down of Jesus on the cross was a joy and a delight! But it wasn’t! And Jesus was struck down on the cross by God His Father, so that we might never be struck down by God our Father!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

3. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Was Crushed By God His Father
Isaiah 53:10: Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him . . . .

To “crush” is very strong language that God the Holy Spirit uses to describe God’s anger and rage toward His enemies and the enemies of His people:

Psalm 89:10: You crushed Rahab like a carcass; you scattered your enemies with your mighty arm.

“Rahab” here is representative of God’s enemies or any force opposed to God. Kenneth Laing Harris and August Konkel comment on the meaning of “Rahab” in Job 26:12-13: “Rahab and the fleeing serpent refer to the same being and make the point that God is and will be sovereign over any powerful figure opposed to him (note that in Isaiah, God uses “Rahab” as another name for Egypt, see Isa. 30:7).” (ESV Study Bible Notes)

When God crushed Rahab, He did so in anger, and His anger was not restrained – so much so that Rahab’s allies trembled before Him: Job 9:13: God does not restrain his anger; even the cohorts of Rahab cowered at his feet.

In the same way, when God crushed His own Son on that cross, He did so in anger, and His anger was not restrained so that the whole earth quaked and Jesus was covered in darkness. Jesus willingly took this crushing by the anger of God upon Himself so that we might never face God’s crushing anger and only tremble at His amazing grace. We will never tremble at His insatiable fury because Jesus did (think Gethsemane) in our place.

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

4. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Was Cursed By God His Father
There was a curse that Jesus really endured: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us – for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree’” (Galatians 3:13). This verse teaches that on the cross, Jesus was both made a curse and cursed by God His Father. Part of what it means to be cursed by God is to experience the real, true, and personal anger of God. After warning God’s people about all of the horrible curses they would face for disobeying God’s commandments and turning away from Him to worship other gods, the Holy Spirit inspired Moses to write these frightening words: “Therefore the anger of the LORD was kindled against this land, bringing upon it all the curses written in this book, and the LORD uprooted them from their land in anger and fury and great wrath, and cast them into another land, as they are this day” (Deuteronomy 29:27-28). God’s anger is always present in His curse:

The LORD will not be willing to forgive him, but rather the anger of the LORD and his jealousy will smoke against that man, and the curses written in this book will settle upon him, and the LORD will blot out his name from under heaven (Deuteronomy 29:20).

For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: As my anger and my wrath were poured out on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so my wrath will be poured out on you when you go to Egypt. You shall become an execration, a horror, a curse, and a taunt. You shall see this place no more (Jeremiah 42:18).

God’s cursing is done in anger toward the cursed object. On the cross, Jesus was made sin – He was made our commandment breaking and idolatry – and therefore the anger of the LORD burned hot against Jesus in fury and great wrath, just like it did against the covenant breaking Israelites. He took all the curses that Israel and all sinners deserve so that all who repent and believe in Christ might be redeemed!

The cursing of Jesus on the cross included the very personal anger of the Father toward the Son. If you remove the personal anger of God from the cursing of Jesus on the cross, then the cursing of Jesus on the cross was a joy and a delight! But it wasn’t! And Jesus was cursed on the cross by God His Father so that we might never be condemned or cursed by God our Father!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

5. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Was The Propitiation Of God His Father
Propitiation is the removal or satisfaction of anger. On the cross Jesus died as a propitiation to remove God’s anger from us: “Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood . . . In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (Romans 3:24-25; 1 John 4:10). This means that Jesus Himself absorbed God’s anger on the cross so that we would never endure it. In order to absorb that anger, Jesus had to be made the object of that anger.

The putting forward of Jesus as a propitiation on the cross included the very personal anger of the Father toward the Son. If you remove the personal anger of God from Jesus’ propitiatory sacrifice, then there is no propitiation, and His propitiatory sacrifice was a joy and a delight! But it wasn’t! And Jesus was put forward as a propitiation on the cross by God His Father so that we might never propitiate God our Father’s wrath and anger in hell!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

6. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Drank The Cup That Contained God His Father’s Anger

There was a cup that Jesus really drank on the cross: “And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will’” (Matthew 26:39). That cup Jesus would drink is clearly defined in the Old Testament. It is the cup of the Father’s infinite wrath toward the wicked: “Wake yourself, wake yourself, stand up, O Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the hand of the LORD the cup of his wrath, who have drunk to the dregs the bowl, the cup of staggering” (Isaiah 51:17). Jeremiah 25 goes into more gruesome detail concerning what the cup of God’s wrath contains:

Thus the LORD, the God of Israel, said to me: “Take from my hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the nations to whom I send you drink it. They shall drink and stagger and be crazed because of the sword that I am sending among them.” So I took the cup from the LORD’s hand, and made all the nations to whom the LORD sent me drink it . . . For the LORD is laying waste their pasture, and the peaceful folds are devastated because of the fierce anger of the LORD (Jeremiah 25:15-17, 36-37).

To drink the cup of God’s judgment means God is fiercely angry with the one He judges. From the surrounding context, we can gather that the cup contained the fierce anger of the Lord, complete destruction, being made an object of horror and scorn, everlasting ruin, the banishing of all joy and gladness, being made desolate, staggering, the Lord’s mighty roar and thunder, and judgment. Jesus endured all of that for us on the cross. That’s penal substitution. You see this as well in how the cup is described in the book of Revelation:

Revelation 14:10: he also will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.

Revelation 16:19: The great city was split into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell, and God remembered Babylon the great, to make her drain the cup of the wine of the fury of his wrath.

This cup is the cup of God’s wrath, the cup of His anger, the cup of torment, and the cup of God’s fury.

The Puritan John Flavel vividly described the cup of anger that Jesus drank:

And as it was the wrath of God that lay upon his soul, so it was the pure wrath of God, without any allay or mixture: not one drop of comfort came from heaven or earth; all the ingredients in his cup were bitter ones: There was wrath without mercy; yes, wrath without the least degree of sparing mercy; “for God spared not his own Son,” Rom. 8:32. Had Christ been abated or spared, we had not . . . all the wrath of God was poured out upon him, even to the last drop; so that there is not one drop reserved for the elect to feel. Christ’s cup was deep and large, it contained all the fury and wrath of an infinite God in it! and yet he drank it up: he bare it all.

Jesus really did drink that cup to the dregs. And Him doing so is my only hope. This is why Jesus prayed not once, not twice, but three times for the Father to please take the cup away. He knew that He would face and endure the infinite anger of His Father toward Himself and truly be forsaken by God. There is mystery here, but we must affirm this truth or we lose the Gospel.

The drinking of the cup of God’s wrath by Jesus on the cross included the very personal anger of the Father toward the Son because He was made sin. If you remove the personal anger of God from the cup of God’s wrath, then the drinking of the cup of God’s wrath by Jesus on the cross was a joy and a delight! But it wasn’t! And Jesus drank that cup of God’s wrath on the cross so that we might never drink that cup in hell forever!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

7. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Was Forsaken By God His Father
On the cross, Jesus was forsaken by His Father: “And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?’ that is, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’” (Matthew 27:46).

The Old Testament gives us a frightening picture of what it means to be forsaken by God and to be forsaken more generally. And you guest it – it includes the personal anger of God toward the forsaken object.

When Judah and Jerusalem forsook the LORD and served other gods, the LORD’s anger burned toward them, and He forsook them: “Because of their guilt, God's anger came upon Judah and Jerusalem . . . Because you have forsaken the LORD, he has forsaken you” (2 Chronicles 24:18, 20).

When God forsakes, it means He’s angry. When Israel forsook the LORD, they are described as despising their God and being utterly estranged from Him: “They have forsaken the LORD, they have despised the Holy One of Israel, they are utterly estranged” (Isaiah 1:4).

Jeremiah even states that God’s forsaking of His people because of their rebellion and sin includes God’s hatred toward them: “I have forsaken my house; I have abandoned my heritage; I have given the beloved of my soul into the hands of her enemies. My heritage has become to me like a lion in the forest; she has lifted up her voice against me; therefore I hate her” (Jeremiah 12:7-8).

In Lamentations, God’s anger is clearly included in what it means to be forsaken by God: “Why do you forget us forever, why do you forsake us for so many days? Restore us to yourself, O LORD, that we may be restored! Renew our days as of old – unless you have utterly rejected us, and you remain exceedingly angry with us” (Lamentations 5:20-22).

These passages teach us that the very essence of what it means to be forsaken by God is that God is angry with the object He forsakes. Jesus being forsaken by God on the cross included the very personal anger of the Father toward the Son because He was made sin. If you remove the personal anger of God from Jesus being forsaken on the cross, then the forsaking of Jesus on the cross was a joy and a delight! But it wasn’t! And Jesus was forsaken on the cross by God His Father so that we might never be forsaken by God our Father!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

8. Jesus Christ, God's Son, Was Cut Off By God His Father

In the book of Leviticus, over and over again we see God tell His people that if they commit certain sins, He will cut them off from His people. In Daniel 9:26, we read: "Then after the sixty-two weeks the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing."

Jesus would be cut off and have nothing. Think about that. A couple other places in Scripture use this "cut off" imagery to describe what Jesus endured as well:

Isaiah 53:8: who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?

Colossians 2:11: In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ

Commenting on Colossians 2:11, Tom Schreiner comments: "Perhaps, however, a reference to Christ's death is slightly preferable since the words 'the body of the flesh' are repeated from Col 1:22 where the reference is certainly to Christ's death. The death of Christ is then described as the 'circumcision of Christ.' At his death, so to speak, God cut off Christ's bodily life, just as the foreskin is removed in circumcision." Schreiner notes that Hunt, P. T. O'Brien, and J. D. G. Dunn all take this same view. (Thomas R. Schreiner, "Baptism in the Epistles: An Initiation Rite for Believers," in Believer's Baptism: Sign Of The New Covenant In Christ, (Nashville: B & H Academic, 2006), 76.)

Jesus was cut off and had nothing while on that cross! What does that mean according to the Old Testament context of being cut off?

The opposite of being cut off is not being forsaken:

Psalm 37:28: For the LORD loves justice; he will not forsake his saints. They are preserved forever, but the children of the wicked shall be cut off.

Being cut off means God is angry with the one He cuts off and curses the one He cuts off:

Jeremiah 44:8: Why do you provoke me to anger with the works of your hands, making offerings to other gods in the land of Egypt where you have come to live, so that you may be cut off and become a curse and a taunt among all the nations of the earth?

God sets His face against the person He cuts off:

Leviticus 17:10: If any one of the house of Israel or of the strangers who sojourn among them eats any blood, I will set my face against that person who eats blood and will cut him off from among his people.

Jeremiah 44:11: Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will set my face against you for harm, to cut off all Judah.

Ezekiel 14:8: And I will set my face against that man; I will make him a sign and a byword and cut him off from the midst of my people, and you shall know that I am the LORD.

God's presence is withdrawn from the one He cuts off:

Leviticus 22:3: Say to them, "If any one of all your offspring throughout your generations approaches the holy things that the people of Israel dedicate to the LORD, while he has an uncleanness, that person shall be cut off from my presence: I am the LORD."

Those cursed by God, like Jesus was on the cross (Galatians 3:13), are cut off by God:

Psalm 37:22: for those blessed by the LORD shall inherit the land, but those cursed by him shall be cut off.

Jesus prayed Psalm 31:5 from the cross: "Into your hand I commit my spirit." Look what Psalm 31:22 says: "I had said in my alarm, 'I am cut off from your sight.'"

(Oh good! We can sing "How Deep The Father's Love" again!)

Sinclair Ferguson writes: "His [Christ's] death is everything that death truly is . . . alienation from the face of the Father." (Page 104)

Jesus was cut off so that we will never be cut off!

Jesus was forsaken so that we will never be forsaken!

Jesus bore God's anger and curse so that we never will bear that anger and curse!

Jesus had His Father's face set against Him so that our Father's face will always smile toward us!

Jesus was cut off from the presence of God so that we will dwell in God's presence forever and never be cut off!

Jesus was cut off from God's sight so that we will never be cut off from God's sight for all eternity!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

9. Jesus Christ, God's Son, Was Cast Out Of The Covenantal Presence Of God His Father

When Jesus was crucified on the cross, He suffered outside the camp, which signified His suffering away from the presence of God, Who is the holy, holy, holy One who dwelt inside the Israelite camp in the Old Testament:

Numbers 5:2-3: Command the people of Israel that they put out of the camp everyone who is leprous or has a discharge and everyone who is unclean through contact with the dead. You shall put out both male and female, putting them outside the camp, that they may not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell.

Notice God dwelt in the midst of the camp, therefore, those who were unclean in any way had to be put outside the camp. This is exactly like what happened to Jesus on the cross:

Hebrews 13:12: So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood.

In his excellent article making this exact point, Guy Richard comments:

When I say that God was not evangelically present outside the camp, I mean that God was working for the good of the people only inside the camp. To be sure, God was working outside the camp, but He was not working for the good of the people who were there, because they were not His people, and He was not their God. Romans 8:28 is a glorious promise that every Christian ought to hold dear. But it only applies to Christians, or as Paul says, to “those who love God” and “are called according to his purpose.” It does not apply to those who are not God’s people. And the same basic idea can be used in reference to those who were living inside and outside the camp. God was present inside the camp for the good of His people but not so outside the camp. God was present outside the camp only in judgment and wrath.
According to the Bible, there is only one place that is ultimately outside of God’s covenantal and evangelical presence forevermore, and that is hell. It is the one place about whose citizens it can truly and permanently be said that God is not their God, and they are not His people. It is the one place in which God is present only in judgment and wrath (remember that God’s omnipresence means that He is present even in hell) and never for blessing. It is, therefore, no surprise that Jesus repeatedly refers to hell as the place of “outer darkness” where there is “weeping and gnashing of teeth” (e.g., Matt. 8:12; 13:42, 50; 22:13; 24:51; 25:30). It is the place outside of God’s covenantal and evangelical presence. It is outside the camp.
This interpretation would seem to be supported by the fact that the Jews were required to take the bodies of the animals (that had become sin by imputation) outside the camp and to burn them up in fire, because the New Testament repeatedly refers to hell in terms of fire. It is the “fiery furnace” (Matt. 13:42, 50), the “eternal fire” (Matt. 25:41), the “unquenchable fire” (Mark 9:43), and “the lake of fire” (Rev. 20:14). And those who escape hell are said to escape “as through fire” (1 Cor. 3:15) or to have been snatched “out of the fire” (Jude 23).
Once we understand this, we can see that the Old Testament sacrificial system symbolically required that the bodies of the animals (which had become sin by way of imputation) be taken to hell and wholly consumed in fire. And it is in this light that Hebrews 13:12 is so significant, because it says: “So [or, perhaps better, therefore] Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood.” The point should be clear: there is a direct connection between Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross—which was outside the city gates of Jerusalem—and the practice of burning the animal sacrifices outside the camp in the Old Testament. Just as the animal sacrifices were credited with the sins of the people, killed, and sent outside the camp to hell to be wholly consumed in fire, so Christ was credited with the sins of His people (2 Cor. 5:21), killed, and sent “outside the camp” to hell to be wholly consumed.
And the idea is that all this took place on the cross. Jesus went to hell—the place outside of God’s covenantal and evangelical presence—as our sin bearer, and He was wholly consumed in wrath and judgment. It was then that He uttered the well-known cry of dereliction: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46; Mark 15:34). At that moment, God was treating Him as though He was sin—the sin of all who would ever believe in Him, past, present, and future. Jesus was wholly consumed in fire as the sin-bearing sacrifice, and we are told that this took place “outside the gate.”

According to Hebrews 13:11–12, Jesus did descend into hell. He did so on the cross as He bore an eternity of hell for all the sins of all His people who would ever live. He was wholly consumed. That means that there is no hell left for those who are in Christ. He descended into hell so that we would never have to. He stood in our place and took the judgment and wrath of God poured out against our sins. And He rose again from the dead on the third day to confirm that His sacrifice was in fact accepted by the God of the universe. Praise God from whom all blessings flow!

Making a similar point, Robert Letham comments:

To fathom the depths of what Christ endured we would need to spend eternity in hell. He was rejected by humankind, abandoned by God, subject to the full curse of the law and more besides . . . Christ's suffering in our place included his being subject to the full force of God's wrath. We deserved that ourselves . . . Suffering outside the city gates, he was cast outside the protective canopy of the law. In his trial and what followed he endured not only the full sanction of the Jewish law but also much more. The law prescribed death. But by suffering outside the camp in the place where sacrifices were burned up completely, Jesus was made to suffer as one upon whom the law could exact only so much, as one ultimately delivers up to a judgment and an ordeal that surpassed all the powers of the law, to the fierce exaction of divine wrath . . . He faced the curse of God against a lawbreaker. He endured the holy judgment of God against the unrighteous. He was made sin. He experienced the fearsome fate of falling into the hands of the living God, who is a consuming fire. He took our place as the guilty, the accursed, the covenant breaker. He was abandoned. He cried, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?'" (Robert Letham, The Work of Christ, 133, 142-143).

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

10. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Was Not Spared By God His Father

God the Father did not “spare” (φείδομαι) His own Son on the cross: “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all . . . .” Romans 8:32

What does it mean for the judging, angry God not to spare someone? The same word for “spare”(φείδομαι) in the LXX (Greek translation of the Old Testament) is used in the following examples when God determined to judge sinners. Note that in each example, experiencing God’s anger and a total lack of compassion or pity is showcased as part of what it means for God not to spare them judgment:

He made a path for his anger; he did not spare (φείδομαι) them from death, but gave their lives over to the plague (Psalm 78:50).

And I will dash them one against another, fathers and sons together, declares the LORD. I will not pity or spare (φείδομαι) or have compassion, that I should not destroy them (Jeremiah 13:14).

He shall strike them down with the edge of the sword. He shall not pity them or spare (φείδομαι) them or have compassion (Jeremiah 21:7).

Therefore, as I live, declares the Lord GOD, surely, because you have defiled my sanctuary with all your detestable things and with all your abominations, therefore I will withdraw. My eye will not spare (φείδομαι), and I will have no pity. A third part of you shall die of pestilence and be consumed with famine in your midst; a third part shall fall by the sword all around you; and a third part I will scatter to all the winds and will unsheathe the sword after them. Thus shall my anger spend itself, and I will vent my fury upon them and satisfy myself. And they shall know that I am the LORD - that I have spoken in my jealousy - when I spend my fury upon them (Ezekiel 5:11-13).

Now the end is upon you, and I will send my anger upon you; I will judge you according to your ways, and I will punish you for all your abominations. And my eye will not spare (φείδομαι) you, nor will I have pity, but I will punish you for your ways . . . (Ezekiel 7:3-4).

Now I will soon pour out my wrath upon you, and spend my anger against you, and judge you according to your ways, and I will punish you for all your abominations. And my eye will not spare (φείδομαι), nor will I have pity (Ezekiel 7:8-9).

Therefore I will act in wrath. My eye will not spare (φείδομαι), nor will I have pity (Ezekiel 8:18).

In all of these prophetic descriptions, God’s anger is clearly included in what it means for God not to spare someone from His judgment. God did not spare His anger from those who sinned and rebelled against Him in these biblical and prophetic descriptions, and in the same manner, God did not spare His own Son from His anger on the cross either. God spent His anger and fury on His own Son at the cross and did not spare and showed no compassion. God put Him to death and gave Him all of our damnation.

In a sermon on Romans 8:32, Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones gave a powerful picture of what it meant for Jesus not to be spared by His Father on the cross:

He was delivered up by God the Father to bear the full wrath of God Himself against sin. He was delivered up to bear the full penalty of God’s holy law upon sin and transgression. That’s what He was delivered up to and nothing was withheld. Now, it’s an extraordinary thing how people try to detract from this . . . Surely He hath put Him to grief. You can’t take it out. If you do you miss the central glory of the cross. In other words we’ve got to realize this: that our Lord experienced there all the torment and the suffering and the agony that results from the punishment of sin . . . He knew that there was to be a moment when God, having made Him to be sin, God having put our sins upon Him, God His Father was going to smite Him. He was going to strike Him. He would avert His face from Him. And He who had ever looked into the face of His Father and loved Him from all eternity would be separated from Him. And would experience the agony of the grief and the suffering of any soul under the wrath of God against sin . . . God delivered Him up – He didn't spare Him anything. When He put our sins upon Him, though He was His own dearly beloved Son, He didn’t withhold any part of the punishment. He poured it all upon Him. Everything that it deserved, He kept nothing back of it . . . He delivered Him up for us all. And He poured the vials of His wrath upon Him. He smote Him! He struck Him! He wounded Him! He bruised Him! He afflicted Him! He’s put Him to grief! With nothing at all being kept back. Oh my friends! How important it is that we should take the Scripture as it is! And not allow our philosophies about the Person of the Son or that it was inconceivable that the Father, in His love, should ever do that to His Son, Who was innocent – that’s their argument you see – they argue always from the love of God, and they think they understand it, and they think they’re making the love of God bigger. Can’t you see that they are making it very much smaller? The love of God is as great as this: that He did that to His Son for us!

On the cross, Jesus was not spared from facing the very personal anger of the Father toward Him because He was made sin. If Jesus was spared the personal anger of God on the cross, then He was spared the very essence of what made the cross so horrific. And the cross would have been a joy and delight! But it wasn’t! And Jesus was not spared on the cross by God His Father so that we might be spared all of God our Father’s wrath, anger, fury, cursing, striking, forsaking, crushing, and condemnation forever!

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

11. The Bible Says God Was Very Angry With Jesus On The Cross

I once saw a new book on the cross wrongly claim (following one little either misunderstood or mistaken statement by John Calvin) that God was not angry with Jesus when He suffered and died on the cross. This is incorrect according to God's Word. Let's get ready for Good Friday!

Though God loved Jesus when He was on the cross, and though God was well pleased with Jesus when He died on the cross because of the glorious obedience and sacrifice that He offered to His Father, God was also angry with His Son at the same time and poured His wrath out on His Son because of our sins imputed to Him so that we might be saved from God's wrath forever! This is the heart of the Gospel! We've got to get this right!

And the Bible actually tells us, plainly and clearly, that God was angry with Jesus on the cross.

Bruce Waltke and Fred Zaspel write about how the Psalms are about Jesus Christ:

The Psalms are about Jesus. The significance of this royal orientation goes further as we seek to understand the psalms in canonical perspective. We have it on Jesus’s authority (Luke 24:44) that the psalms are about him. Some of the psalms are more directly predictive, such as Psalm 2 and Psalm 110. In others David stands as a “type” or picture of Christ and is prospective of him in more subtle ways.

Psalm 89 is about Jesus, God's preeminent Anointed One, and there we read very clearly that God was angry with Jesus:

You have been very angry with your Anointed One. Psalm 89:38

I'm not sure how much more clear God could be to settle this question once and for all. Yes, this Psalm is about God's Davidic King under God's judgment in exile. But it's also about David's greater Son, the Lord Jesus Christ! God the Father was very angry with His Messiah on that cross because of our sins counted to Him, and God punished Jesus with the anger we deserve so that we will never face that anger in hell! This is our only hope!

If John Calvin or any other theologian misspoke about the cross and what they wrote directly contradicts Scripture, we must always follow the clear teaching of God's infallible, inerrant, and inspired Word. God's Word has the final say, and we must submit to it, believe it, and teach it.

And love it! Hallelujah! What a Savior!

This truth is at the heart of propitiation; it's at the heart of the cross; and it's at the heart of the Gospel.

In his chapter on the book of Acts in the excellent work, Commentary On The New Testament Use Of The Old Testament, I. Howard Marshall includes Psalm 89:38 in the Psalms that are messianic and refer to Jesus Christ:

It is often said that although the concept of the Messiah/Christ is found in the OT, the term itself is not found with this reference, and that this usage developed only later in Jewish literature. However, whereas the original reference in the relevant OT passages was to the reigning monarch (or an immediate successor), by the time the psalms were collected and effectively canonized (cf. Luke 24:44) the references in them were understood, where appropriate, as messianic (cf. Ps. 2:2; 18:50; 20:6; 28:8; 84:9; 89:38 . . . .) (Page 540, emphasis mine)

Justin Huffman, in his tremendously helpful article, "The Davidic Covenant: Psalm 89 and the Servant King", writes:

Psalm 89 . . . as an exposition of the Davidic Covenant plainly prophesies concerning the coming Christ. Yet this prophecy . . . includes elements of both a victorious kingship and of a suffering servant of Yahweh [like in Isaiah 52-53] . . . We began this paper by asking the question: can both suffering servant and victorious king be promised and foreshadowed in the same figure, in the same Davidic covenant? And we find, in answer to the psalmist's plaintive cry, that the answer mysteriously and gloriously is, "Yes." In fact, it must be this way, according to Jesus himself. The humiliation of the Davidic king in the days of Psalm 89, then, was not a failing of the Davidic covenant, but was rather a foreshadowing of how God would bring about eventual victory through apparent suffering and defeat in the Messiah. Jesus would be the Servant King. "Ironically this psalm in which suffering and glory jostle sets up a mysterious pattern which was followed by the Heir: 'Here is your king' was spoken of one wearing a crown of thorns."

Huffman also cites Richard Belcher in his book: The Messiah And The Psalms: Preaching Christ From All The Psalms, writing:

Richard Belcher even argues that the placement of Psalm 89 among the royal psalms forms a prophetic pattern for the coming Messiah: the progression of the royal psalms in the Psalter prefigures the ministry of Christ. The royal psalms move from coronation (Psalm 2, used at Jesus' baptism), to the righteous reign of the king (Psalm 72 speaks of Christ's kingship and leads to the Israelites trying to crown Jesus), to the humiliation and rejection of the king in Psalm 89, to resurrection and ascension in Psalm 110 (referred to in Acts 2 in relation to Christ's resurrection and ascension into heaven), and then to the final triumph of the king in Psalm 144.

This excellent Ligonier article argues for the messianic nature of Psalm 89 as well:

In light of the person and work of Christ, we understand why this psalm belongs to the category of messianic psalms. Our Savior endured God's wrath in the place of His people, bearing the sins of David's line and the sins of His chosen ones (Rom. 3:21–26). He was likewise insulted by His enemies (Matt. 27:27–31). In receiving this wrath in our place, Jesus revealed the steadfast love of God for David and for His people, and in raising Jesus from the dead to reign forever, God fulfilled His promise to David (Phil. 2:5–11).

Here is a chart I made showing how Jesus fulfills Psalm 89:

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

12. What About Orthodox Trinitarian Theology And The Cross?

I was greatly helped by this article by Derek Rishmawy on how orthodox Trinitarian theology relates to what Jesus suffered on the cross. I affirm all that he affirms about the Trinity and the classic doctrine of God, while maintaining that the Father did really and truly forsake the Son on the cross and was angry with the Son on the cross. This summary paragraph is particularly helpful, though I would use the term "anger" instead of "hate." (Rishmawy is not arguing for the Christus Odium view in this paragraph or article, but writes this could be an orthodox formulation of it):

When we say that on the cross “the Father hated the Son” we confess an operation and execution of judgement and hate that must be conceived along the constrained, analogical lines consistent with divine perfection. We also confess it is the hate of the one, undivided, Triune God, Father, Son, and Spirit, per divine simplicity and the inseparable operations axiom. And yet, again, that triune agency is not flat. The operation of judgment or hate is particularly appropriated to the person of the Father, even though it is also the avenging hate of Son and Spirit, as it is that of the Godhead. Furthermore, while the act of making satisfaction via the work of the Redeemer is the one work of God, per considerations regarding appropriation, the term of operation, and the communication of operations, we can say it is particularly the divine Son who is the subject of this act and so can be said to suffer the judgment/hate of God the Father in the cross in his human suffering in body and soul. In that sense, one might say that on the cross the Son endured the hate of the Father. Even still, while he endured that hate, he was nevertheless beloved and well-pleasing to the Father.

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

To learn more about the great King Jesus and His glorious Gospel message, please watch American Gospel: Christ Alone. You can watch the full documentary here with a free, 3 day trial.

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