“He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; 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.”
~Isaiah 53:7 (ESV)
This is the example Christ set forth for us. Did he ever complain? Did he ever deserve better than He received? Being the perfect, Holy One, He truly could lay claim to deserving all our praise and worship and adoration. And yet, during His time on earth, He was not esteemed.
“He was despised and rejected by men.” (Isaiah 53:3 ESV)
Isaiah chapter 53 is what is called a “messianic prophecy”. It simply means God gave a prophet something to say about the savior of not only the faithful of Israel, but all nations in the earth. This prophecy was spoken by Isaiah to Israel hundreds of years before Jesus was born and yet it describes in vivid detail things about the life of Jesus!
Oh my, how the perfect one suffered in many ways including the sufferings leading up to his crucifixion. I am at a loss for words, but the scriptures are full of words concerning His great love and sacrifice for us. Let us read together Isaiah 53 today and worship this King who was brought low for us.
"Who believes what we've heard and seen? Who would have thought God’s saving power would look like this? The servant grew up before God—a scrawny seedling, a scrubby plant in a parched field. There was nothing attractive about him, nothing to cause us to take a second look. He was looked down on and passed over, a man who suffered, who knew pain firsthand. One look at him and people turned away. We looked down on him, thought he was scum. But the fact is, it was our pains he carried—our disfigurements, all the things wrong with us. We thought he brought it on himself, that God was punishing him for his own failures. But it was our sins that did that to him, that ripped and tore and crushed him—our sins! He took the punishment, and that made us whole. Through his bruises we get healed. We’re all like sheep who've wandered off and gotten lost. We've all done our own thing, gone our own way. And God has piled all our sins, everything we've done wrong, on him, on him.
He was beaten, he was tortured, but he didn't say a word. Like a lamb taken to be slaughtered and like a sheep being sheared, he took it all in silence. Justice miscarried, and he was led off—and did anyone really know what was happening? He died without a thought for his own welfare, beaten bloody for the sins of my people. They buried him with the wicked, threw him in a grave with a rich man, even though he’d never hurt a soul or said one word that wasn't true.
Still, it’s what God had in mind all along, to crush him with pain. The plan was that he give himself as an offering for sin so that he’d see life come from it—life, life, and more life. And God’s plan will deeply prosper through him.
Out of that terrible travail of soul, he’ll see that it’s worth it and be glad he did it. Through what he experienced, my righteous one, my servant, will make many “righteous ones,” as he himself carries the burden of their sins. Therefore I’ll reward him extravagantly—the best of everything, the highest honors—
Because he looked death in the face and didn't flinch, because he embraced the company of the lowest. He took on his own shoulders the sin of the many, he took up the cause of all the black sheep."
~Isaiah 53 (MSG)
~Jaime Scharf
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