Is it true that "The Father turned His face away" on the cross?

from the old testament

• The “face” of God is often used to express either His favor or judgment. For example, God's "face" is toward the blessed in Numbers 6:25: “[may] the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you.” Conversely, “the face of the LORD is against those who do evil, to cut off the memory of them from the earth” (Psalm 34:16). God also might figuratively hide His face (Psalm 13:1) though He is omnipresent, meaning He is everywhere (Psalm 139:7–12; Jeremiah 23:23–24). In each case, “face” figuratively communicates God’s relationship to someone. In this figurative sense, it's possible to say that God hid His face from Jesus or set His face against Him.
• Scripture also presents times of darkness as God pouring out His judgment. For example, God removed all light from Egypt for three days as one of His plagues against them (Exodus 10:21–23). Other examples include Amos 8:9 and Joel 2:1–2. Thus, it is reasonable to connect the darkness during Jesus’ crucifixion with other acts of God's judgment.

from the new testament

• During the crucifixion, Jesus asked, in agony, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). While some have argued that he was merely quoting from Psalm 22 to identify with human sufferings, the reality was that He was bearing the sin of the world. Consequently, He faced a relational separation in His humanity with the Father that He had never experienced before.
• Though the forsakenness was real, the Psalm He was quoting specifically said “he has not hidden his face from him” (Psalm 22:24). So, it is best not to interpret this forsakenness as God turning His face away in the sense that God was unwilling to look at Jesus during the period of judgment.
• Indeed, when referring to God’s judgment of others, Scripture doesn't indicate that He turns away. For example, Revelation 14:10–11 reads, “[the one who receives the beast’s mark] will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night, these worshipers of the beast and its image, and whoever receives the mark of its name.” The Father treated Jesus as if He had sinned (2 Corinthians 5:21; Galatians 3:13), so there is no reason to believe the Father was unwilling to look at Jesus as He bore the wrath of sinners.
• The Old and New Testaments indicate that while it is figuratively acceptable to speak of God hiding His “face” from sinners, it goes too far to conclude that the Father literally abandoned or turned away from Jesus. He poured out His wrath on Jesus, and that was the experience of abandonment Jesus felt (Hebrews 4:15).
• The darkness during the crucifixion (Matthew 27:45; Mark 15:33; Luke 23:44–45) is best understood as a visible display of judgment, much like the key judgments in the Old Testament.

implications for today

Sin is serious. In fact, to God, it is vile. The Father crushing Jesus on the cross (Isaiah 53:10), expressed His real and fierce wrath against sin. The darkness likely symbolized judgment for all the world to see (cf. Amos 8:9). And maybe the Father metaphorically did turn His face away when Christ was on the cross. But the reality is that we simply don’t know exactly what happened between Father and Son in those three hours.

What we do know is that the Father never stopped loving His Son, nor was there a split between the divine members of the Godhead. We also know that in His human nature, Jesus experienced true relational abandonment when He took on the sins of the world. Jesus was treated like a sinner, and His heavenly Father became His judge.

Believers today need to know all this. It shows how serious sin is and how loving God is. We can share this truth with others who don't know either truth.