Why Did You Dump Me?

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

A Quiz About a Bad Psalm 22 Paraphrase

Welcome back to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. I usually say, �Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. This is Mike Abendroth. But see, I threw in a curveball, a curveball. We here at the radio show want you to think about the one who never compromised, the Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Now, we don�t want to compromise, and we want to talk about things that provoke you to think biblically, and that is the way the show goes. So, without further ado, I�m going to read from something, and you tell me what it is, okay?

This is kind of get-to-know-me. This is 20 questions. This is truth or consequences. How many people know that show? See, when I think about these old shows, then I think how old I must be when I sit around and watch Gunsmoke.

When I was a kid with my father, we watched Rifleman. We watched all in the family. We watched Gloom, Despair, Misery, Deep Dark Depression, Excessive. I don�t know. If it weren�t for bad luck, I�ve had no luck at all.

We watched those kind of shows. I hate to admit it, but we did. So, I�m going to read something, and I�ll give you a clue. There�s a theological rub to this because, after all, that�s the radio show, and you tell me what it is that I�m reading.

From what am I reading? Ready? God, God, my God, why did you dump me miles from nowhere? Doubled up with pain, I call to God all the day long. No answer, nothing. Okay, what would you guess? If you were on No Compromise Radio Ministry, and you had to guess, you know, quotes 4500, what would you say?

It�s almost not fair because this one�s so bad. This one�s so awful. There are times where I get the nuances of this particular book. There are occasions where it�s a pass, but then it just slaughters the original meaning, oftentimes like this.

So, let me read it to you one more time. From what am I reading? God, God, my God, why did you dump me miles from nowhere? Doubled up with pain, I call to God all the day long. No answer, nothing. Okay, are you ready?

For those of you that don�t know what we do around here, I�m trying to get you to think biblically, and that is from Psalm 22. No, that�s actually not from Psalm 22. I read to you the Message Bible, Eugene Peterson Nabda Press, and this was his attempt of Psalm 22.

It�s not close. It�s not close, Psalm 22. When we translate this with street language, with the language of the people, with, I want to say guttural, but that�s not it. Maybe it�s the gutter. What am I looking for?

It ruins things for us, and what does it ruin? Well, let me read to you from the, this is either the ESV or NAS, which one is this? This is the ESV. And let me read to you Psalm 22, verse 1 in the ESV, and then you can kind of compare this message moment.

It�s brought to you by No God Formized Radio. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Let�s just stop there. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Isn�t it fascinating? We read Psalm 22 in the ESV, and then we read it in the message.

Now, the message is going to tell you from its publisher and from its author that it�s not meant to be strict, literal, it�s meant to get nuances, and they have a variety of ways that they try to rationalize it, and to some degree, I guess I know where they�re coming from.

But now let�s go to Matthew 27 and figure this out. So remember, God, God, my God, why did you dump me miles from nowhere? Trying to get a ride all the way home, you dump me out on Route 20, what�s the matter you?

Right? It�s like, �Henno. Remember, we have hashtag Henno now, H-E-N-N-O. It�s very important that you, when you�re tweeting stuff and tweeting things and you�re on Facebook and other things, it�s hashtag H-E-N-N-O.

And for those of you that already know the inside scoop, I don�t need to tell you what that means, but for those of you that maybe are new to the show, my grandmother Nona, she�s no longer on the earth.

She died years ago. She lived to be about 93 or so. She would answer the phone. Remember the phones? Rotary phones. She�d answer the phone, �Henno but she didn�t know she was doing it. We always say, �Grandma you say, �Hello and she said, she didn�t have an accent or anything.

She was, I think, some Swedish, Danish kind of lady. Loved Grandma. Loved that Grandma. Her name, to me, was Grandma Up the Hill because there�s two grandparents, sets of grandparents, and one lived on 65th Street, just on a regular street.

They had an alley in the back. And then Grandma, who lived on 64th Street, she lived up the hill. And so this was Grandma Up the Hill, and so she would say, �Henno and so now when somebody does a theological faux pas, we say, �Henno.

And so we�ve got Psalm 22 in the message, �God, God, my God, why did you dump me It�s like a girl that dumps you. You know, you�re dating. You think to yourself, you know, I should probably dump her sometime, but we�ll keep around for the holidays or something, you know, date a little bit longer.

Maybe things will get better. And then she dumps you, and then you think, �Why didn�t I dump her? I need to be the person who did that and then you get all flummoxed. Is that a word? Anyway, when we go to Matthew 27, what would we think would be there?

Matthew 27 and Jesus' Cry of Abandonment

Now, Jesus is delivered to Pilate to be crucified. And the people, remember, are yelling, �His blood be on us and our children. We have the Barabbas substitution. The soldiers are mocking Jesus, stripping Him, scarlet robes on Him, jamming the thorn crown into His head, reed in His right hand, �Hail, King of the Jews.

Spinning, hitting Him with the reed on the head, the text says, mocking, stripping Him of the robe and putting His clothes on Him, they led Him astray to crucify Him. And so, the Message Bible would say things like, �We�ll take the blame, we and our children after us.

Pardon Barabbas. And they take Him to the place called Skull Hill. This is all from Matthew 27�s account in the Message Bible. Offered Him a mild painkiller, but He tasted it and then He wouldn�t drink it.

He saved others. He can�t save Himself, King of Israel. Okay, so, Psalm 22, �God, God, my God, why did you dump me miles from nowhere That�s the message. So, now we read the message, Matthew 27. Remember, the Message Bible doesn�t give us the exact verses, so I�m just zooming into the particular spot.

The particular spot in our other Bibles would be around verse 45, well, verse 45 and 46. From noon to three, the whole earth was dark. Around mid-afternoon, Jesus groaned out of the depths. So, the ESV says, �Now the sixth hour there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.

Okay. And then it says in the ESV, �And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice saying. So, what did Jesus say? Well, rightly so, Eugene Peterson, in the Message Bible, it says, �Crying out loudly, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani which means, �My God, my God, why have you abandoned me

Okay, I will accept the word �abandon. The ESV says, �Why have you forsaken me That�s the typical translation, but I get it. I wouldn�t argue with that, �forsaken, abandoned. So, here�s the thing.

Jesus quotes Psalm 22, verse 1, but when you play fast and loose with Bible translation, for instance, if you talk about the Son of Man, and then you say to yourself, �Oh yes, that is Daniel 7. This is a designation of the Messiah.

If you were to translate son of a person, son of a woman, son from a woman, there�s a variety of different ways people do it, then you�re going to miss out. You�re going to miss out when you translate things.

This has nothing to do with the message, per se, but this is Bible translation and the gender crisis for translation. If you say that the man of God may be adequate, right, equipped for every good work, 2 Timothy chapter 3, verse 17, well, who�s the man of God?

The Scripture�s inspired. It�s the toolbox for the man of God. Who�s the man of God? Well, if it�s the person of God, it�s true for anyone who wants to do ministry or think about the Lord properly. The Word of God is inspired, and it will help you.

It�s adequate. It�s sufficient. We believe in Sola Scriptura. But the point of the passage happens to be primarily that Timothy, the elder, needs to know from Paul that he�s got everything he needs when it comes to the Scriptures.

The Spirit of God applying the Scriptures is everything he needs for gospel ministry. And of course, the barnacles. So, my name�s Mike Avendroth. This is No Compromise Radio Ministry, and we�re just talking about translations, and we�re just going with the flow.

I have other things that I was going to talk about in this segment, but right now we�re still involved with this. So, the bad news is when you mess around with the Old Testament, for whatever reason, then the tie-ins to the New are more clouded.

One of the things I think that the Lord has helped me see over the last 10 years of ministry is more continuity between the Old and New Testament. I used to think that there was less continuity, and of course I would understand that there�s continuity between the person and nature of God.

God doesn�t change between Old Testament and New Testament. I would understand that. I understood that there�s a continuity in the ministry of the Holy Spirit, that when people were saved in the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit convicted them of their sin, regenerated them through faith alone, the non-meritorious instrument of faith alone, that the Spirit of God would keep them from losing their salvation, and I saw that continuity.

Some of the types, for instance, and the good way to think about a type is just it means example, to quote S. Lewis Johnson, and so I would see, oh, I�m so steeped in the Old Testament that when I�m reading the New Testament, there are allusions and there are flickers even though we go from Hebrew, which 97 of the Old Testament is written in Hebrew, a little Aramaic here or there, sprinkled in Daniel and Esther, if memory serves me, and then you�ve got even Greek words with Hebrew meanings.

David Hill wrote a book called, I think, that very thing, Greek Words with Hebrew Meanings, and there�s this continuity, there�s this flow, and you�re steeped, to use that word again, in the Old Testament, and then you just see maybe not a direct quote in the New Testament, but all kinds of allusions.

For example, the book of Revelation, while there may not be dozens upon dozens of quotes from the Old Testament, there are many allusions. I didn�t say I, illusions, I said ah-lusions. Right? It�s when people say eminence, eminence.

Easy for a kid from Nebraska to say, right, eminence, eminence, et cetera. What else was I mispronouncing? I used to say, I tip my hand to you, but then Pastor Steve said, don�t say that, I tip my hand to you.

I used to say, Nietzsche, but it�s Nietzsche, so, see, I have to learn these things the hard way. I used to say, et cetera, and then I learned it as et. Oh, there�s a Latin word named et, called et. So, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

When you�re reading the Message Bible, which I think the only reason you should own a Message Bible is if you want to just look up things like this just for theological kicks or something. How did that word come into play?

I know what the word kick means, to take your foot and, you know, move it along, force equals mass times acceleration, but how do we get the slang kicks? I get my kick out of you. Maybe it was Frank. Who knows?

Frank Sinatra. I do have to say, when I was in New York City with a family, my wife and the younger kids, we went to Bryant Park and skated Thanksgiving afternoon. We went to see the Thanksgiving Macy�s Day Parade, or the Macy�s Thanksgiving Day Parade, and it�s interesting to see a lot of the stars on the floats, and I didn�t really know one of them.

And, you know, my daughter would say, oh, that lady, you know, she sings, it�s all about the bass, or something like that, and the only one I really knew out of everybody was Gene Simmons. It�s bad. Anyway, ice skating at Bryant Park for free, Thanksgiving night, listening to Frank Sinatra looking up at the red and green Empire State Building.

It was a charismatic moment for me. It really was. I was almost slain in spirit. Oh, no, I fell down in the ice. Technically, I brought my hockey skates and never fell. How about that? A lot of people did, though.

And why did I get joy out of seeing other people fall? I shot and froid all the way. God, God, my God, why did you dump me miles from nowhere? So, awful translation in Psalm 22, and then you�re reading even in his own paraphrase in Matthew 27, you don�t get the connection.

And the connection is very important. This is one of those connections you don�t want to miss. Now, the Old Testament speaks of Christ. I know that, John 5 and Luke 24. To what degree does it speak of Christ?

That is to say, atomistically, in every word, in every verse, in every paragraph, in every book, you know, we have to be careful on how we see Christ. That is, especially with authorial intent. Did the author want me to see Christ here?

Or do I just read it and think about Christ? And, of course, there�s this huge debate to what degree. And what I would say is, out of the 150 Psalms in the Bible, not all of them are technically called Messianic Psalms.

There are didactic Psalms, Psalm 1. There are lament Psalms. There�s a variety of different kinds of Psalms, wisdom Psalms. And so, Psalm 2, Messianic, kiss the sun lest you perish. Psalm 110, my Lord said to, you know, Lord said to my Lord, said to my right hand.

There�s a variety of kinds of Messianic Psalms. And Psalm 22 is one of those. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And you can imagine the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. I�m going to do a series of seven sayings on the cross one of these days.

When Jesus says that, he, remember, almost always, if in fact not always, if in fact always, Jesus says, �My Father. And there�s this close tie to the Father. And the Father has endorsed the Son. And in the public ministry, this is my beloved Son in whom I�m well pleased.

He has said over and above Moses and Elijah, the Law and the Prophets, this is my Son. And you can hear him on the Mount of Transfiguration. And there�s been that closeness from eternity past, the closeness between the Father and the Son and the Spirit, one nature, one essence, the intimacy, the closeness.

And now Jesus, even though he�s not sinful, remember Jesus never sinned, he is the sin bearer. And the judgment of God, the darkness of God has covered the land from noon until three. And Jesus cries out the ninth hour, �God, you�ve forsaken me.

Why have you forsaken me And the theological reason would be so that he wouldn�t have to forsake us, right? That�s the amazing thing. The theological reason in addition to that last statement is the Father could not make his face shine upon the Son while the Son was sin bearing.

Now, I don�t think the Father was not loving the Son at the time. This I believe was the highlight, the pinnacle, Philippians chapter 2 talks about this Son, this wonderful Son, and certainly learning obedience as the writer of Hebrews would say.

This Son, matter of fact, I�m going to turn to Philippians chapter 2 just to read it. This was the pinnacle of the Father�s love for the Son at Calvary because he knew what it would take. And here we have the Son loving the Father and doing his will even though he knew what it would take and what was happening.

And we have this, it�s hard to explain, I mean, how can the Father turn his back, and so you have to use language like �as it were� on the Son here, it�s just language probably of accommodation, but we do know Jesus is now the sin bearer.

He is the sin bearer and the Father is punishing him in our place as he is the Lamb of God. And it says in Philippians chapter 2 that he became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

I don�t want you to think as Jesus was burying our sins that the Father was not loving him any longer. I think that would be wrong to say. This is the pinnacle of Christ�s obedience and when your Son obeys you, there is a great love.

It�s an unchanging love, of course, an everlasting love. And so here we have the tie-in. So you want to be careful with the Message Bible because you�re going to lose these kind of nuances. I want the Old Testament translated properly.

So then when I�m reading the New Testament, I can see the tie-ins. Can you imagine? My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? We have the Father judging the Son in our place. Hear the substitutionary language?

On our account. For us. Now I know Karl Barth was about as wacky as you can get on so many different subjects, but broken clock strikes twice a day. Hupere, Barth said, is probably the most important word of the entire New Testament.

For us, on our behalf, in our place. That kind of language. So we are either to be forsaken or the Son is forsaken for us. And you can hearken back to Job. Will anybody be a mediator between God and man?

Can there be an arbiter? We need someone to stand between us and God. We know that person�s name is Jesus Christ, the Eternal Son. He always existed as the Eternal Son, would show up occasionally in the Old Testament as the Angel of the Lord, a Theophany, technically a Christophany, an appearing of Christ before the Incarnation.

And he would show up in maybe Genesis 3 in the Garden, that�s Jesus. Certainly Joshua 5, the Captain of the Lord�s Army, that is Jesus. And we have the Theophany, he would show up, that is Christ, Christophany.

And that eventually, in a manger in Bethlehem, he cloaked himself with humanity and will keep that humanity from here on out, has that humanity now. And so, hard to have Jesus in your heart when he�s got a body, I�m not so sure that would fit, plus he�s in heaven at the right hand of the Father.

Use a Literal Translation to Preserve Old Testament and New Testament Connections

So my name is Mike Abendroth, this is No Compromise Radio Ministry. What�s my point? What�s the overall theological point besides, �Hey, don�t use this. Well, the positive point is, use a Bible that has a literal, word-for-word translation approach.

Now, you can�t really get strictly literal because languages don�t do that. We can�t go from one language to another perfectly literally, and it just won�t work out. But with the philosophy of translation, there are phrase-for-phrase type translations like New Living, and NIV, and there are word-for-word kind of translations.

And that would be King James, New King James, ESV, NAS, those types of things. I think there are probably more. My personal preference is the New American Standard, although, how about this, I preach from the ESV.

Well, lots of reasons, one, the New American Standard, the people that own the rights are I think they don�t understand how to market it, how to release it, how to use what�s been given to them, for the most part, in my opinion.

And the ESV does, and so I still, there�s some spots the ESV just smokes the NAS. Most of the time I think the NAS is a little bit better. But nonetheless, Mike Ebendroth here, No Compromise Radio Ministry.

If you can pick up a message Bible, or you know what, maybe that was your first Bible when you got saved and you realize you�ve grown out of it. But I�d still keep it once in a while, because then you can go back to things like this, Psalm 22.

I mean, why did you dump me? It�s just so not right. You just lose it all. I don�t want that kind of language when I�m thinking about the Lord. If, you know, I don�t know, for a teaching point somewhere down the line, you could say, �Oh, the message Bible sometimes interpretively gets it right.

Of course you could say that. But why do it? So let�s avoid the message Bible and let�s use our ESV and NAS. You can even use the King James. I�m reading through the King James right now, and it�s fascinating to see some of the words.

Superfluity and other things. You can write us at info at nocompromiseradio .com, or you can go to the YouTube site, No Compromise Radio. Quite a few YouTubes there for your edification.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Ebendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God�s Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We�re right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff, or management.