Introduction: Grace be to you and peace, from God our Father, and from our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ. Our text for this evening is the Old Testament Lesson just read, from Isaiah, chapters 52 & 53. We begin with prayer.
Dear fellow disciples of our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ:
- It is obviously counter-intuitive that the slaughter of Jesus upon the cross was His greatest glory. We likely would never think of His crucifixion as displaying His glory, had Jesus not said it Himself. You remember that in John’s gospel, at the beginning of the final week of Jesus’ earthly ministry, Jesus was informed by Phillip and Andrew that some Greeks wanted to meet with Him. To this Jesus cryptically replied: “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” [John 12:23,24]
- In our text for this evening, from Isaiah – and this is the longest and most detailed explanation of the theological significance and meaning of Christ’s crucifixion in Holy Scripture, it is not until the end that some glimmer of positive things is given. And these positive things are set firmly against the humiliating suffering and death of the Lord’s servant, Jesus Christ. It truly is a phenomena that demands our contemplation!
- So as we contemplate these things, it is critical that we see and understand the nature of God, His heart, His love, and what He truly values. For then we will see how much we mean to Him, and we will also see the pathway to everlasting glory and honor for ourselves, which God has promised to bestow upon His dear children of faith. So let us first understand that:
I. The Physical Appearance Of Jesus Was Quite Unimpressive
Text: “For He grew up before Him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; He had no form or majesty that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we esteemed Him not.”
Statement: Most of the artistic depictions of Jesus – all of which are purely imaginative and creative – make Him out to be manly, striking, or perhaps even “pretty,” beautiful if you will. Almost certainly all of these depictions are in error. We understand why an artist would do this, especially one who knows the love of Jesus and what He did for us. But that beauty of Jesus, which we also appreciate and adore, had nothing to do with His actual physical appearance.
Application: Of course, in our time, physical attractiveness and beauty is at a premium, and pretty much everyone “gussies” themselves up to appear as attractive as we can. Not so with Jesus, and not so with God – to whom all human beings are precious, beautiful, and beloved, especially those who are doing and accomplishing His will, those who repent and believe the Gospel, so that their sins are washed and cleansed away, and Christ’s righteousness has been place over them! That Christ would suffer and die for this, that we might have these blessings from God, makes Him glorious. But again, our text highlights the reality, that:
II. The Marring Of Christ’s Appearance Was Appalling – The Just Consequence Of Our Sin, And Inflicted Upon Him By Sinful People
Text: “As many were astonished at You— His appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and His form beyond that of the children of mankind.”
“He was pierced for our transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities; upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with His wounds we are healed.”
“Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so He opened not his mouth.”
“It was the will of the LORD to crush Him; He has put Him to grief; when His soul makes an offering for guilt.”
Statement: Again, the artist’s renditions of Jesus almost never take these biblical descriptions into consideration. But these statements in our text bid us to think carefully and deeply about Jesus’ suffering and death, just how battered and beaten He really was. True, that after His resurrection His wounds had been treated and were healing. Still, He was able to show Thomas the wounds on His hands and side. And surely His resurrected body is now glorified, but even in the book of Revelation John describes Jesus as “a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain.” The scars of Jesus execution remain visible even in the glory of heaven!
Application: Again, this disfigurement, this marring of Jesus “beyond human form or semblance,” is the glory of Jesus, the glory which He claimed as the kernel of wheat that must die! So He died – gloriously – in the greatest shame, for the greatest good of mankind. And this is why His death is so glorious, for it is certain that:
III. The Blessings Accomplished By Christ – For Us – Are Magnificent
A. He Died For Our Forgiveness, Our Justification, Our Atonement, Our Redemption
Text: “But He was pierced for our transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities; upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with His wounds we are healed.”
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”
“He was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of My people.”
“Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush Him; He has put Him to grief; when His soul makes an offering for guilt.”
“By His knowledge shall the Righteous One, My servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and He shall bear their iniquities.”
B. God’s Will To Have Children, To Have Us As His Dear Children, Was Accomplished – And He Is Satisfied With Us, With All That He Has Done For Us
Text: “He shall see His offspring; He shall prolong His days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in His hand. Out of the anguish of His soul He shall see and be satisfied.”
1. So We Have Full Salvation
2. We receive the spoils along with Jesus
Text: “Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors.”
3. We have Christ interceding for us
Text: “He bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.”
4. We have eternal blessedness
Text: “He shall see His offspring; He shall prolong His days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in His hand.”
Statement: All of these blessings that are poured out upon us through the crucifixion of Jesus, these are what please God the most! He did it all because He cherishes and loves us so highly! So the suffering pleased Him, not because Jesus is masochistic, or because the Father is sadistic, but rather because He saw the outcome of His suffering, the joy of providing salvation and eternal blessedness to so many – those to whom He would give new birth and newness of life through faith in Jesus! And this is what He has done for us; He has made us His offspring, His dear children!
Application: But in seeing the real suffering of Jesus, we can clearly see the huge value that God places upon us, and the tremendous dignity with which He has created us and graced us with. We are that important to God, that His suffering and death for our redemption is glorious to Him. And hopefully it is glorious also to us. And perhaps as we grasp and understand what is counter-intuitive, we will also be moved to follow Jesus – to deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and love others even as Jesus has loved us!
Conclusion: And this does happen to God’s offspring, His children. And when others see your good deeds, they shall, as Jesus predicted, “glorify your Father who is in heaven. So it is that we also are incorporated into the glory of God. But we must remember that this may involve the loss of physical beauty, the loss of worldly wealth and glory, and humble submission to suffering and privation. This is the way of Christ, the way of the cross, but also the way of glory in the kingdom of God.
But of this we may be certain, that in the end God’s will shall prosper, and His will is our greatest blessedness and joy! Thanks and praise be to Jesus, Amen.
Votum: And the peace of God, which surpasses all human understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds in the true faith, which is in Christ Jesus, even unto life everlasting, Amen.