Pastor Stephen Cronister Anchorage Alaska says that Christ is literally rehearsing or singing the Psalm 22, and that Christ is mourning for Israel who has rejected Him. This statement on the cross has nothing to do with separation from the Father.
Who else has understood this insight?
Yes. Chronister’s basic insight has substantial precedent, though his specific refinement that Christ is mourning for Israel is more distinctive.
The strongest parallel is actually very old. Athanasius (4th century) explicitly rejected the idea that the Father literally abandoned the Son. Commenting on “Why hast Thou forsaken Me?” he says that the Son cannot be forsaken by the Father because He is eternally in the Father, including while He uttered the cry. Augustine says essentially the same thing: “God had not forsaken Him,” arguing that the Father, Son, and Spirit, being one God, cannot undergo an ontological rupture. Augustine understands Christ as speaking representatively—in the voice of fallen humanity / His body—rather than reporting a literal fracture within the Trinity.
That is quite significant because it means the familiar modern formulation—“the Father turned His back on Jesus because God cannot look upon sin”—is certainly not the only historic Christian reading.
Several modern interpreters therefore explicitly argue along Chronister’s lines. Randy Frazee, for example, sees Jesus’ opening quotation as directing His hearers to Psalm 22 as a whole and specifically appeals to 22:24 to say that Jesus was not abandoned by the Father. Other contemporary treatments make essentially the same argument: the opening lament must be interpreted through the psalm's eventual declaration that God “has not hidden his face” from the afflicted one.
There is also a Jewish-roots exposition that comes extremely close to the formulation you heard from Chronister: Jesus' cry is described as a “harkening back” intended to remind observant Jews that Psalm 22 is being fulfilled before them; it explicitly cites Psalm 22:21 (“You have answered Me”) and 22:24 (“He has not hidden His face from Him”) against the Father-abandoning-Christ interpretation.
That's surprisingly close to the distinction we were making earlier:
real incarnational human suffering ≠ fracture within the Godhead.
Christ can genuinely undergo agony, judgment, death and the experience proper to the Last Adam without Father and Son ceasing to possess their eternal Trinitarian communion.
1. Jesus is intentionally quoting Psalm 22:1.
Virtually certain.
2. By quoting its first line, Jesus means His hearers to understand Psalm 22 as a whole.
Very plausible, and probably stronger than treating the quotation as an isolated theological proposition. Matthew has already constructed the crucifixion narrative around Psalm 22. Modern commentators frequently recognize this larger intertextual function.
3. Jesus is literally reciting/singing the entire Psalm aloud from the cross.
Possible, but not demonstrable from the Gospel text. Matthew and Mark record only Psalm 22:1. “Invoking the whole Psalm” is much easier to establish than “Jesus audibly sang all 31 verses.”
And then there is Chronister's further idea:
4. Christ is specifically mourning over Israel's rejection of Him.
That has some intriguing support from Psalm 22 itself, but it is not the standard ancient interpretation of Matthew 27:46.
Look at how Psalm 22 develops:
Messiah suffering → Israel summoned to recognize Him → nations turning to Yahweh → kingdom established.
That fits a dispensational/Messianic reading exceptionally well. The One rejected by Israel is simultaneously accomplishing the redemption through which Israel and ultimately the nations will worship Him.
But I would distinguish that from saying “Psalm 22:1 itself grammatically means Jesus is lamenting Israel.” The immediate speaker in Psalm 22 is unquestionably describing his own affliction. Chronister's Israel interpretation has to arise from the larger prophetic drama, not merely from the lexical meaning of עזבתני / ἐγκατέλιπές με, “you have forsaken me.”
The Father did forsake Him to the cross/death in the sense of not rescuing Him from His enemies and not preventing His death.
That is exactly what the first part of Psalm 22 is asking:
And yet Psalm 22:24 subsequently says God did not hide His face from Him and heard His cry.
So there is no contradiction if “forsaken” means:
The Father surrendered the Messiah to the appointed suffering and did not rescue Him from death
rather than:
The Father spiritually divorced Himself from the Son and the eternal fellowship of the Trinity was broken.
Eitan Bar, a modern Jewish Christian scholar, makes essentially this distinction: Jesus was “abandoned” to death in the sense that the Father did not intervene to prevent the sacrifice, yet this did not mean a rupture within the Godhead; he too appeals to Psalm 22:24 and Jesus' final address, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit,” as evidence against that conception.
Athanasius — explicitly: the Father did not forsake the Son; the Father was in Him even as He spoke the words.
Augustine — explicitly denies that the Father actually abandoned Christ and interprets the saying representatively in relation to the humanity Christ assumed.
Various modern Psalm-22/intertextual interpreters — Jesus invokes the whole Psalm, whose own answer is that God “has not hidden his face from him.”
So Chronister did not originate the no-Trinitarian-separation insight at all; it reaches at least to the great fourth-century Christological debates. What seems much more characteristic of Chronister is tying that ancient Christological observation to a strongly Israel-centered prophetic reading of the entirety of Psalm 22.
And there is a rather devastating textual observation in his favor: if Matthew 27:46 is supposed to prove that the Father “hid His face” from Christ, Jesus chose to communicate that doctrine by quoting a Psalm which explicitly says of the suffering individual, “He hath NOT hidden His face from him” (Ps 22:24). Any interpretation of v.1 has to explain v.24.
That doesn't eliminate substitutionary judgment—Isaiah 53 and the rest of the NT still have to be dealt with—but it makes “the Trinity was relationally severed because the Father could not look at Jesus” a considerably more questionable inference than it is often presented as being.
Who else has understood this insight?
Yes. Chronister’s basic insight has substantial precedent, though his specific refinement that Christ is mourning for Israel is more distinctive.
The strongest parallel is actually very old. Athanasius (4th century) explicitly rejected the idea that the Father literally abandoned the Son. Commenting on “Why hast Thou forsaken Me?” he says that the Son cannot be forsaken by the Father because He is eternally in the Father, including while He uttered the cry. Augustine says essentially the same thing: “God had not forsaken Him,” arguing that the Father, Son, and Spirit, being one God, cannot undergo an ontological rupture. Augustine understands Christ as speaking representatively—in the voice of fallen humanity / His body—rather than reporting a literal fracture within the Trinity.
That is quite significant because it means the familiar modern formulation—“the Father turned His back on Jesus because God cannot look upon sin”—is certainly not the only historic Christian reading.
Psalm 22 itself is the major problem for the “Father turned away” interpretation
Chronister has an exceptionally strong textual point here. Matthew 27:46 isn't an isolated sentence. Jesus quotes Psalm 22:1, while the Passion narrative surrounding Him is saturated with Psalm 22:- Psalm 22:7–8 — mockery, shaking heads, “He trusted in the LORD; let Him deliver him.”
- Matthew 27:39–43 — virtually the same scene and language.
- Psalm 22:18 — garments divided and lots cast.
- Matthew 27:35 / John 19:23–24 — precisely that happens.
- Psalm 22:15 — thirst/dried mouth.
- John 19:28 — “I thirst.”
- Psalm 22 progresses from apparent abandonment to vindication and worldwide proclamation.
That verse is difficult to square with the popular claim that the point of Psalm 22:1 is literally “the Father hid His face from Jesus.” Psalm 22 itself eventually says almost the exact opposite.
Several modern interpreters therefore explicitly argue along Chronister’s lines. Randy Frazee, for example, sees Jesus’ opening quotation as directing His hearers to Psalm 22 as a whole and specifically appeals to 22:24 to say that Jesus was not abandoned by the Father. Other contemporary treatments make essentially the same argument: the opening lament must be interpreted through the psalm's eventual declaration that God “has not hidden his face” from the afflicted one.
There is also a Jewish-roots exposition that comes extremely close to the formulation you heard from Chronister: Jesus' cry is described as a “harkening back” intended to remind observant Jews that Psalm 22 is being fulfilled before them; it explicitly cites Psalm 22:21 (“You have answered Me”) and 22:24 (“He has not hidden His face from Him”) against the Father-abandoning-Christ interpretation.
Athanasius is especially interesting given what we discussed about Gethsemane
Athanasius actually connects these issues. He argues that Christ's weeping, distress, request concerning the cup, and cry from the cross belong genuinely to His assumed humanity, while denying that the divine Word Himself fell into terror or became separated from the Father.That's surprisingly close to the distinction we were making earlier:
real incarnational human suffering ≠ fracture within the Godhead.
Christ can genuinely undergo agony, judgment, death and the experience proper to the Last Adam without Father and Son ceasing to possess their eternal Trinitarian communion.
But there are actually three separate propositions here
This is where I would slightly qualify Chronister.1. Jesus is intentionally quoting Psalm 22:1.
Virtually certain.
2. By quoting its first line, Jesus means His hearers to understand Psalm 22 as a whole.
Very plausible, and probably stronger than treating the quotation as an isolated theological proposition. Matthew has already constructed the crucifixion narrative around Psalm 22. Modern commentators frequently recognize this larger intertextual function.
3. Jesus is literally reciting/singing the entire Psalm aloud from the cross.
Possible, but not demonstrable from the Gospel text. Matthew and Mark record only Psalm 22:1. “Invoking the whole Psalm” is much easier to establish than “Jesus audibly sang all 31 verses.”
And then there is Chronister's further idea:
4. Christ is specifically mourning over Israel's rejection of Him.
That has some intriguing support from Psalm 22 itself, but it is not the standard ancient interpretation of Matthew 27:46.
Look at how Psalm 22 develops:
Then:
So the movement is remarkable:
Messiah suffering → Israel summoned to recognize Him → nations turning to Yahweh → kingdom established.
That fits a dispensational/Messianic reading exceptionally well. The One rejected by Israel is simultaneously accomplishing the redemption through which Israel and ultimately the nations will worship Him.
But I would distinguish that from saying “Psalm 22:1 itself grammatically means Jesus is lamenting Israel.” The immediate speaker in Psalm 22 is unquestionably describing his own affliction. Chronister's Israel interpretation has to arise from the larger prophetic drama, not merely from the lexical meaning of עזבתני / ἐγκατέλιπές με, “you have forsaken me.”
And there is an important sense in which Christ really was “forsaken”
This helps reconcile the language without inventing a broken Trinity.The Father did forsake Him to the cross/death in the sense of not rescuing Him from His enemies and not preventing His death.
That is exactly what the first part of Psalm 22 is asking:
The question concerns deliverance from suffering and death.
And yet Psalm 22:24 subsequently says God did not hide His face from Him and heard His cry.
So there is no contradiction if “forsaken” means:
The Father surrendered the Messiah to the appointed suffering and did not rescue Him from death
rather than:
The Father spiritually divorced Himself from the Son and the eternal fellowship of the Trinity was broken.
Eitan Bar, a modern Jewish Christian scholar, makes essentially this distinction: Jesus was “abandoned” to death in the sense that the Father did not intervene to prevent the sacrifice, yet this did not mean a rupture within the Godhead; he too appeals to Psalm 22:24 and Jesus' final address, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit,” as evidence against that conception.
So who anticipated Chronister?
Most notably:Athanasius — explicitly: the Father did not forsake the Son; the Father was in Him even as He spoke the words.
Augustine — explicitly denies that the Father actually abandoned Christ and interprets the saying representatively in relation to the humanity Christ assumed.
Various modern Psalm-22/intertextual interpreters — Jesus invokes the whole Psalm, whose own answer is that God “has not hidden his face from him.”
So Chronister did not originate the no-Trinitarian-separation insight at all; it reaches at least to the great fourth-century Christological debates. What seems much more characteristic of Chronister is tying that ancient Christological observation to a strongly Israel-centered prophetic reading of the entirety of Psalm 22.
And there is a rather devastating textual observation in his favor: if Matthew 27:46 is supposed to prove that the Father “hid His face” from Christ, Jesus chose to communicate that doctrine by quoting a Psalm which explicitly says of the suffering individual, “He hath NOT hidden His face from him” (Ps 22:24). Any interpretation of v.1 has to explain v.24.
That doesn't eliminate substitutionary judgment—Isaiah 53 and the rest of the NT still have to be dealt with—but it makes “the Trinity was relationally severed because the Father could not look at Jesus” a considerably more questionable inference than it is often presented as being.
