Psalm 22 is the deep descent of the Messiah movement. It begins with the cry Jesus prays from the cross: “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” In this episode, we pray Psalm 22 as the prayer of the Beloved who enters forsakenness, mockery, bodily suffering, and the terror of disconnection without severing trust. The Psalm moves from abandonment to testimony to worldwide worship, showing us that in Jesus, the forsaken One becomes the risen One who declares the Name to his siblings and leads the praise of the world.
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My God, do not be far.
Hold us when we feel forsaken.
Psalm 22 begins in the place no one wants to pray from:
My God, my God,
why have You forsaken me?
This is the Psalm Jesus prays from the cross. He does not quote it as a detached verse. He enters the Psalm’s whole world: forsakenness, mockery, bodily collapse, surrounding hostility, a cry for rescue, and then, somehow, praise in the assembly, food for the afflicted, and worship among the nations.
Psalm 22 moves from abandonment to testimony to worldwide worship. The forsaken one becomes the worship leader of the world.
Even in the first cry, there is attachment:
My God.
My God.
Secure attachment does not mean we always feel close to God. Sometimes secure attachment sounds like refusing to stop praying from the place where God feels absent.
Psalm 22 gives us permission to bring felt abandonment into prayer without cleaning it up first.
Imagine praying this in Babylon. The city is broken. The Temple is gone. The nations stare. The people feel forsaken. Psalm 22 gives them a way to cry without losing the story of God’s faithfulness.
Imagine praying this today from the place of deep rupture: depression, family collapse, public shame, bodily suffering, trauma, grief, or a season where God feels painfully far away. Psalm 22 teaches us to say “My God” even before we feel rescued.
And then imagine this prayer in Jesus’ voice.
On the cross, Jesus prays as the Beloved who feels forsaken and still says, “My God.” He does not teach attachment to God from a safe distance. He enters the place where God feels absent. He prays from the terror of disconnection without severing the relationship.
The turn comes when the afflicted one discovers that YAHWEH has not hidden His face forever:
For He has not despised
and He has not detested
the affliction of the afflicted one.
He has not hidden His face
from him.
When he cried to Him,
He heard.
In Jesus, Psalm 22 becomes the cross and resurrection prayer. The place of abandonment becomes the doorway into worldwide praise. The crucified Messiah is not abandoned to Death. The risen Messiah declares the Name to his siblings.
This Psalm can give people permission to pray from felt abandonment without shame. It can help communities resist premature triumph while still trusting that praise may come. It can connect our suffering to the Messiah’s suffering without romanticizing pain. And it can enlarge hope: the cry of one afflicted person can become food for the poor, praise in the assembly, and testimony for generations yet unborn.
May the crucified Messiah meet you in the place you cannot clean up.
May the risen Beloved declare the Name over you as family.
May your heart live to the Eternity.
And may the God who heard the afflicted One hear you.
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