A Wesleyan Appropriation of the Cry of Dereliction - Part 2

In the last post, I introduced a series that would begin to explore a Wesleyan interpretation of Jesus' cry of dereliction, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" I concluded the post by saying that it is reasonable to suggest that John Wesley held that whatever is meant by God's hiding his face from Jesus, it should be read analogically. Even if Wesley did not explicitly make this statement, I think this conclusion is the only way to avoid a tragedy of creating a rift within the Holy Trinity. This short post will draw attention to the unity of the Godhead in saving the world. This, according to Wesley, is the ground of our redemption, which has its apex at the cross of Christ.

Whatever else might be implied by Wesley’s definition of ‘forsaken’ and his comments on the Father’s face being hidden, on no occasion does Wesley suggest that there is ever (even on the cross) any animosity between the Persons of the Godhead. The movement of redemption is not solely the work of the Son of God. Wesley suggests that all Persons in the Trinity are at work in redemption in a letter to William Law. In a section of the letter that he borrowed from Anna Maria Van Schurman’s journal, he quotes her as saying:

The origin and cause of our redemption is the ineffable love of God the Father, who willed to redeem us by the blood of His own Son; the grace of the Son, who freely took our curse upon Him, and imparts His blessing and merits to us; and the Holy Spirit, who communicates the love of the Father and the grace of the Son to our hearts.

Readers of my blog may have seen this quote posted before, which I did here. In addition to this unity of a redeeming purpose, Wesley also advocated, in orthodox fashion, the unity of essence among the divine Persons, and makes this especially known in his strong defense of the full divinity of Christ. Christ is of the same essence as the Father and the Spirit. If there is any "split" or "separation" in the Godhead at the cross, then this is unquestionably advocating polytheism.

I've posted before on drawing wisdom from the Fathers of the Church on this matter, but I think the thoughts from Saints Athanasius and Chrysostom on the cry of dereliction are worth repeating. St. Athanasius:

For behold when He says, "Why hast Thou forsaken Me?" the Father shewed that He was ever and even then in Him; for the earth knowing its Lord who spoke, straightway trembled, and the vail was rent...then seeing these signs, [the centurion] confessed that "truly He was the Son of God."

And St. Chrysostom:

That darkness [at the cross] was a token of the Father's anger at their [the crowd's] crime...He saith, "Eli, Eli, lima sabachthani?" that unto His last breath they might see that He honors His Father, and is no adversary of God...and by all things, He shows how He is of one mind with Him that begat Him.

If we suggest, in the fashion of Wesley, that in Jesus' death, the wrath of God was assuaged or propitiated (an issue that needs to be addressed, but is too much for this post), we must not read this so strictly that it breaks the bond and unity of essence among the divine Persons. Otherwise, we'd have one god saving us from another.

Seeing the significance of maintaining the unity of essence and purpose between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, we will next address how the doctrine of Christ's two natures may speak to the issue of Jesus' dereliction cry.