Psalm 22 and Its Fulfillment in Jesus Christ

Psalm 22 is a remarkable prophecy regarding Jesus Christ’s final hours in mortality, when He suffered intense abuse followed by His Crucifixion. See the chart below. The psalm describes the people’s contempt of Jesus as they scorned and mocked Him and treated Him as if He were no greater than a worm. The psalm imparts the exact words Jesus spoke while on the cross: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (v. 1). Jesus spoke these words with “a loud voice” (Matt. 27:46) or, according to the psalm, with “roaring” words (Ps. 22:1), as if a mighty lion is speaking them. The psalm contains an explicit reference to the piercing of Jesus’s hands and feet (v. 16)—“They pierced my hands and my feet”—that was fulfilled when Jesus was crucified. The psalm’s words, “They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture” (v. 18), were precisely fulfilled by those who crucified Jesus. Matthew recorded, “And they crucified him, and parted his garments, casting lots: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots” (Matt. 27:35).

Psalm 22 also contains a vivid description of what happened to Jesus’s physical body while on the cross: “All my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws. . . . They pierced my hands and my feet” (vv. 14–16). These verses describe what happened to Jesus’s body (bones, heart, bowels, tongue, jaws, hands, feet) as it was stretched out and nailed to the cross and remained so for hours.