THE SUFFERING SERVANT By Pastor Glenn Pease
Based on Isa. 53
Socrates once said that if a man of perfect virtue ever appeared the world would not admire him. He would be so different that his life would be a rebuke to their depravity, and so they would probably kill him as an enemy to their peace. Long before Socrates the same thing was said by Isaiah. He paints a prophetic portrait of the suffering life and death of the Messiah. This prophecy was so literally and completely fulfilled in all its details in the person of Jesus Christ that the Christian church has never doubted that we have in Isa. 53 a preview of the cross. There are those who would attempt to make it a picture of the sufferings of Isaiah or of the nation Israel, but all such attempts fail. There is no one who can claim this passage anymore than they can claim the sun as private property. Only Jesus fits this description. The New Testament writers of Matthew, Luke and John all refer to this passage as fulfilled in Jesus. In Acts 8:32-35 we read that when Philip came upon the Ethiopian Eunuch he was reading this passage and verses 34-35 says, "The Eunuch asked Philip, 'Tell me, please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?' Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus." The sacrificial suffering of Jesus is the theme of this passage, and no one who gives language any meaning can deny it. We want to look at two basic thoughts that are found here. I. THE SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST.
v. 1-3
Nothing illustrates man's depravity as much as his capacity to reject what is of greatest value. History is filled with men of genius who were hated for trying to serve their fellow men. Socrates was poisoned for trying to teach a higher concept of God. Galileo was threatened with torture for trying to teach the truth about the planets moving around the sun. He wrote to the ignorant priest of his day and told them that the Bible was written to tell us how to go to heaven and not how the heavens go. They said that he either agrees with their ignorance or they would pull out his fingernails. The French chemist Lavoisier was doing research for the good of the people, but he had to stop or have his head cut off. They cried out, "We have no need for chemistry." Not only the scientists, but the saints also have been persecuted for trying to lift the world out of their adamic muck. Men like John Bunyan and George Fox, of whom the world was not worthy, were treated like worthless insects. They were beaten and thrown into cells to stay for months and even years. But all of this folly of the world does not compare with the indescribable treatment of the Prince of Peace. They made Him a Prince of Pain and a God of grief. The world introduced Him so often to grief that He became a man of sorrows and one intimately acquainted with grief. Others have born the weight of their own sin, but on Him was laid the iniquity of us all. Others have sipped from the bowl of sorrow, but at one triumphant moment of love He drank damnation dry. No wonder He cried from the cross, "I thirst," for the flames of hell consumed Him in order that not a hair of our head be singed. Notice in verse 3 that He was a man of sorrows. It was not only the cross that Jesus suffered. His life as well as His death was part of the atonement. After Jesus healed Peter's mother-in-law many others brought their sick and Jesus healed them. Matt. 8:17 says, "That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and born our sicknesses." Jesus was bearing them already even before the cross. These first verses reveal what Christ had to suffer before the cross. There was unbelief, for He came unto His own but His own received Him not. It was because God did not do
things the way they thought He should. Messiah was suppose to come in great power, but instead He came as a tender plant with all the weakness of an infant, and His parents had to flea to save His life. He was a root out of dry ground, and such would not likely produce any fruit. Instead of a palace of splendor, He was born in a pile of straw. His father was not even a leader, and on top of it He lived in Nazareth, and what good thing could ever come out of that town? He was like a hillbilly from the sticks who didn't stand a chance of amounting to anything, and there was great prejudice against Him. In spite of His wisdom and miracles they called Him a wine bibber and a blasphemer. This was part of the atoning suffering of Christ. You recall how He wept over Jerusalem because He loved those people. They killed the prophets, and now they have rejected their own Messiah. Jesus said, "How often as the hen gathers her children under her wings would I have gathered you, but you would not." Here was a quality of pain that no one has ever known like Jesus did. Here was a pain that pierced deeper than the thorns on His brow. Jesus knew that their unbelief would lose for them the benefits of His atonement. They cried out, "His blood be upon us and our children." The great horror that this request was granted and they were slaughtered in the greatest tribulation the Jews had ever known in 70 A.D. The tragic part of it is that there was no one who understood His suffering and helped Him bear it. We usually think that Jesus said to His disciples, "Could you not watch with me one hour?" In a tone of anger, but I think it must have been in a tone of deep and desperate loneliness. A man can take a lot if he knows someone else cares, but Jesus did not even receive this consolation from His own disciples. The poet put itIt was alone the Savior prayed in dark Gethsemane; Alone He drained the bitter cup and suffered there for me. It was alone the Savior stood in Pilate's judgment hall; Alone the crown of thorns He wore, forsaken thus by all; Alone upon the cross He hung that others He might save; Forsaken then by God and man, alone, His life He gave. Let us not be too hasty to say, "If only I had been there." The Jews said that too, for they thought, "If only we had been in the days of our fathers we would not have been partaker with them in the blood of the prophets." It is so easy to look back and think you would choose to be more wise, but nothing but pride can make us think that if we would have stood before the cross we would never have reviled the one we now so adore. Let us remember that Jesus died there, not just for the sins of those of that day, but for the sins of all us for all time. This leads us to considerII. THEIR SUBSTITUTIONARY NATURE.
v. 4-6
There are many theories of the atonement, and all of them have some truth, but none of them contain the whole truth. What Christ did for us is too vast for any theory to cover. One thing we know, and that is that it is the greatest truth that the mind can consider. It is a law of the universe because of the holiness of God's nature that sin must be punished. There is no way around it, for there is a price that must be paid for all violations of the will of God. Sin is not forgiven, but the sinner is. The sin must be punished, and since sin is in the sinner, how can the sinner escape punishment? These verses give us the only answer to the sin problem of how God can be just in that He does not let any sin go unpunished, and yet at the same time He saves the sinner? The only answer can be in a substitute. Joseph Parker wrote, "When I feel myself in my heart of hearts a sinner, a
trespasser against God's law and God's love; when I feel that a thought may overwhelm me in destruction, that a secret, unexpressed desire may shut me out of heaven and make me glad to go to hell to be away from the face of Him that sitteth upon the throne-then when I am told that Jesus Christ was wounded for my transgressions, that upon Him was laid the chastisement of my peace, press my way through all the difficulties and say if I perish I will pray and perish at the cross, for if this be not sufficient, it hath not entered into the heart of man to solve the problem of human depravity and the human consciousness of sin." Jesus bore in His own body our sin on the cross, and on Him was laid the iniquity of us all. The atonement was not only basic for our salvation, but for our continued privilege of confessing and receiving forgiveness, for He once for all died for all sin. The interesting question that arises from this passage: Does the atonement cover sickness as well as sin? Verse 4 says He bore our infirmities and carried our sorrows, which could include sickness and disease. It would appear that Jesus died not only for the physical results but for the mental causes of illness as well. Modern studies show that over half of the patients in hospitals are there because of psychosomatic problems. We need to keep in mind that the Hebrew people did not make a distinction between sicknesses of the mind and of the body. All were the result of sin. We must also keep in mind that they were wrong at this point, for not all suffering is the result of sin, as we are taught through the book of Job. There is suffering that is not related to one's personal sin at all, but which exist because of sin in the world. The Scriptures often equate sin and sickness, and the only cure for it is the atoning blood of Christ. Isaiah in referring to the wickedness to the nation said, "The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint." When Jesus was charged with eating with sinners He said, "It is the sick who need the physician." Jesus records the fulfillment of this prophecy and equates conversion and healing. So Jesus did die for all sin, and that would include the sicknesses that result from sin, but the question is, is all sickness the result of sin? The Bible gives examples that indicate that the answer is no. We have mentioned Job in the Old Testament and in the New Testament we can think of Paul's thorn in the flesh. Whatever this handicap was, it was not the result of sin. Paul prayed for its removal, but it was not answered, for it was likely some inherent weakness due to a fallen world but no personal sin. We have to recognize that though we can claim forgiveness of sin and healing from its results, we cannot claim healing for that which results from living in a fallen world. The whole creation groans together with us as we wait for the final redemption. Meanwhile earthquakes can kill thousands, and Christians suffer persecution, and they die in many of the storms of nature. what the atonement covered can never see its full results realized until Christ comes again, for only then will it be fully applied to a fallen world. The idea of substitution may seem unfair to some. Let every man carry his own burden is the way we often feel. The Lord helps those who help themselves is the common way of thinking. The problem with this is that it totally misrepresents the condition of man. If I am shot on the battlefield and ask you to carry me that is a valid request, and that is the case with fallen man. He is beyond helping himself in the battle with sin. The best he can do is to become self-righteous, and this is to be completely in the grip of sin. That is why the substitutionary atonement is the greatest truth in the world. Without a substitute to take our punishment we would all be lost without hope. Jesus became our substitute, and in Him we have our only hope. Let us thank Him daily that He became our suffering servant.
