There is a moment here where everything seems to collapse into darkness. The sky grows dim, the noise fades, and Jesus cries out with words that have echoed through centuries: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
It is one of the most unsettling sentences in Scripture. Yet it can be painfully familiar.
Most of us know what it is to feel lost, unsupported, or abandoned — as if God has stepped back, heaven has gone quiet, and our prayers hit the ceiling and fall back down unheard. Good Friday brings this experience to the centre.
In the first reflection, we sat with the ache of being misunderstood, but misunderstanding is only one part of the human story. There are times when the ache goes deeper, when God himself seems distant, His presence and voice far away. Jesus enters that place too.
However, many people misunderstand this cry.
The Son is not actually separated from the Father, he isn’t forsaken, despite feeling the God‑forsakenness of human suffering — so deeply that the rawness of human experience becomes too much.
The cry of dereliction is not a dramatic performance, but an honest prayer of a suffering man who feels the absence of the One he has trusted all his life.
In that moment, Jesus does something profoundly important.
He reaches for Scripture.
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” is not random. It is the opening line of Psalm 22. In his deepest darkness, Jesus doesn’t search for new words or craft a teachable moment. He returns to the inherited prayers that generations carried before him — the psalms that have held the cries of God’s people and where God has always been found.
While Psalm 22 begins in despair, it ends in trust and vindication. Jesus knew this when his mouth uttered those words. His voice speaks one line; his heart prays the whole psalm.
This is not a tidy theological flourish. It is the act of someone whose inner world is shaped by Scripture, reaching for the only language he has left. It’s not perfect; it is the instinctive cry of a heart formed in prayer.
The psalms are the prayer book of Israel where every human emotion is displayed: love, anger, hope, despair, trust, confusion, joy, dereliction. They give language to the places where language fails.
Jesus has the cross pressing against his back, every painful breath becoming harder, his body close to surrender. As the weight of the world rests on his shoulders, it is not the cross that holds him, but a psalm — a poetic song to pray when prayer feels impossible.
We know what it’s like to enter prayer without words — to sit in silence, feeling the distance like a weight on the tongue. We want to pray but cannot. In those moments, Jesus shows us what to do: go to where God has been found before. Scripture. The Psalms. The songs of faith. Using someone else’s words to carry you.
Here, we learn the difference between feeling forsaken and being forsaken. Jesus feels the full weight of abandonment, yet the Father has not abandoned him. The silence is real, but not the whole story.
Feeling forsaken is not the same as being forsaken.
Good Friday shows us that if Jesus has been there, then that place is not Godless. It’s filled with his presence and experience.
It embraces seasons when God feels distant — when prayer feels like speaking into the dark, faith feels thin, and silence stretches, making distance feel like disinterest.
Jesus’ lament is not hidden. He prays it, gives it to God, and lets the question stand. In doing so, he dignifies our questions too.
God can be present and silent, working and hidden, near and yet unfelt.
The cry of dereliction then is not the end of faith, but faith stripped‑back — faith clinging to an invisible God.
We may withdraw, panic, assume we’ve done something wrong, and stop praying because prayer feels pointless. Some of us may keep going, but with a quiet ache we can’t name.
Good Friday invites us to respond differently — not by pretending everything is fine, not by forcing ourselves to feel something we do not feel, but by doing what Jesus does: bringing the truth of our experience to God, even when God feels far away.
Like Jesus, we can pray into the silence, trusting that silence is not empty.
We can speak our questions, knowing they are not signs of failure.
We can name our forsakenness, knowing Christ has stood in that place before us.
This moment does not resolve quickly.
It is not meant to.
The cry still hangs in the air.
The question remains unanswered.
The darkness has not yet lifted.
Yet, even here — especially here — Christ stands with us.
As we move through this hour, we hold this truth gently:
God’s presence is not always felt.
Silence is not abandonment. Even when we cannot sense Him, Christ has already stepped into the depths we fear.
Here is part one of this reflection.
Here is part three.
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