What you say is understandable David, and that's my impression of what happened that resulted in Jesus crying out, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"
To my understanding, it is not that the Father stopped loving Jesus or loved him any less or had any negative thoughts about Jesus at all.
That is not the nature of the forsaking by the Father, that Jesus referred to.
Jesus knew it would happen. He dreaded it. He sweat blood at the thought of the alone-ness that he had to experience, apart from the Father, while he, the lone scapegoat, went on his scapegoat journey to carry away the sins of the world.
He didn't mind making the trip to the sin dump, but the agony was being alone for that moment in eternity.
That is my opinion. I've read that the water and blood that came out when Jesus' side was pierced, indicates that he literally died of a broken heart. He loved God, like He told us we should - with all his heart.
I remember the intense sadness, a few times when I was a boy, and relatives who had come to visit had to depart, or we had to depart, from visiting them. Jesus' sadness, at being necessarily apart, in his task of bearing our sins, was infinitely greater, because He is infinitely greater.
When Jesus took our sins upon himself, then, at that point, he experienced cessation of fellowship with the Father. The sins got in the way, as our sins get in the way to hinder or block fellowship with God.
I've never before heard the term, "spiritual death". I agree with Shalom, that it doesn't sound good. It is, also, so brief... and books could probably be filled, if someone were to have the knowledge, describing Jesus' agony that led to his heartbreaking.
David, my statement that "those who have been talking about it haven't agreed on a concise definition" is still my main point in considering the disagreement on the matter. You have a definition. Steve has one, that is brief, but close to yours. Shalom seems to have a definition that seems too vile to express. So I don't believe that you are all talking about the same thing, especially Shalom.
That's why I said, those who are discussing it should just say what they mean, get as wordy and descriptive as necessary, instead of using that term, which is a shortcut for using a lot of words, but only if it means the same thing to each person in the discussion.
Speaking of a lot of words, I think I'm past my quota...
John |
