Father, into your hands I commit My Spirit!
It was now about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour, while the sun’s light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.
Then Jesus, calling out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” And having said this he breathed his last.
Now when the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God, saying, “Certainly this man was innocent!” And all the crowds that had assembled for this spectacle, when they saw what had taken place, returned home beating their breasts. And all his acquaintances and the women who had followed him from Galilee stood at a distance watching these things. –Luke 23:44-49
Hope on the Cross
Jesus sixth saying from the Cross is a prayer of surrender and trust. Jesus prayed:
Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit
His cry is found in Psalm 31:5: “Into your hands I commit my spirit, for you have redeemed me, O Lord, Faithful God.” Out of a place of deep distress of body and soul, the Psalmist prays in lament and petition: “Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eye is wasted from grief; my soul and my body also.” (Psalm 31:9) Out of the anguish of the Dark Night of the Soul, Psalmist’s Spirit is liberated to be completely and totally surrendered to steadfast Love of God.
Make your face shine on your servant; save me in your steadfast love! –Psalm 31:16
Out of the depths of Spiritual Abandonment, God brings the soul of the believer to a place of surrender and Divine Reunion. The word translated in our English versions as “steadfast love” is the Hebrew word Chesed, (pronounced with a hard “h” from the back of the throat: khesed, or ẖesed). Teachers of the Old Testament have long recognized this as the primary posture of God toward humans, and the essential virtue to be emulated in our lives. The Jewish Rabbi Simlai expounded: “The Torah begins and ends with chesed.”
God is absolutely faithful and steadfast in His covenantal love toward His people. As Paul reflects on Divine Love in 1 Corinthians 13:7-8:
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.
Out of the deep anguish of His soul, Jesus arrives at a place of absolute confidence in the Father’s steadfast love for Him. He places His total trust in a posture of surrender and absolute trust. Through the Cross, Jesus understood God to be imminently trustworthy and good—worthy of trust.
Though you may be going through a time of evil and difficulty, God remains steadfast in His love for you. The very sufferings that you are going through can and will be used by God to pour out His abundant love on you. This is why Paul encourages us to rejoice in our sufferings knowing the ultimate outcome for us in them:
Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. –Romans 5:3-8
The ultimate act of chesed, covenantal steadfast love, is in Jesus’ surrender unto death for you. Christ died for you. He absolutely surrendered His Spirit to His Father for your sake, so that you would absolutely surrender your Spirit for His sake.