The portion you refer to is found in Matthew 27:45-46, “Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”

Let’s look at Mark 15:25 where we read, “And it was the third hour, and they crucified him.”  Our verses above tell us that it was the ninth hour when the Lord Jesus uttered these horrific words of suffering.  We learn from this that the Lord Jesus was on the cross for six hours…from the third hour of the day until the ninth.  From the sixth hour, there was “darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour.”  For His time on the cross, three hours were spent in the light of day and the next three hours were spent in darkness.

The Jews, spewing out hatred against the Lord Jesus, had quoted Psalm 22:8 against Him when they said, “He trusted in God; let him deliver him now, if he will have him: for he said, I am the Son of God.” (Matthew 27:43).

It was about the ninth hour that the Lord “cried with a loud voice, saying Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani…”  ‘Eli, Eli,’ etc., is the Syro-Chaldaic language (the common language in use by the Jews in the time of Christ).  The Lord quoted the first words of Psalm 22; they mean “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me.”  Without hesitation we can consider these words to be of the greatest suffering. 

Why did the Lord Jesus say, “My God, my God” instead of “My Father, my Father”?  To answer this excellent question, I want to quote from a very good and godly writer from the 19th century, “He was alone with God, made sin; nothing to turn aside the cup of justice; nothing to deaden it.  The power which was in Him did not shelter Him; it rendered Him capable of bearing that which weighed on His soul, the feeling of the horror of the curse in the measure in which the love of the Father was familiar to Him, the feeling of that which it was to be made sin in the measure of the divine holiness which was in Him.  Neither the one nor the other could be measured.  He drank then the cup of judgment of God against sin.  All forces Him to utter the cry, a cry which we are allowed to hear that we might know what passed there, the reality of atonement: ‘My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?’  It is a forsaking which none can fathom, save He who felt it.” (J.N. Darby)

It was the judgment of God that the Lord Jesus was suffering on that cross, so it was God that forsook Him in the hour of His deepest need.  What a blessed plan to bring salvation to sinners like you and me.  God fully judged the Lord Jesus (Romans 8:31-32) and forsook Him there so that He might truly suffer the wrath of God that rightly belongs to you and me.  How much the Lord loves us!  Have you received the Lord Jesus as your savior?  Let the sufferings of Christ on the cross remind you how great the judgment of God is upon sin.  Let it remind you of your desperate need of salvation so that you do not have to suffer the wrath of God.  Let it remind of the immeasurable love of Christ who loved you enough to suffer so greatly.  How can you be saved?  How can you receive the Lord Jesus Christ as your savior?  Acts 16:31 is so exact and concise.  It says, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved…”  (CC)  (523.4)