The Fourth Song of the Lord's Servant II (Isaiah 53:1-6)
Rev. Myung-Sin Choi
“1 Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? 2 For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, And as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness; And when we see Him, There is no beauty that we should desire Him. 3 He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. 4 Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. 5 But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed. 6 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.”
Introduction
This week, I read a book about a missionary, Kim Hae-Young. Right now, she is 58 years old. She has a very sad past, after she was born at the age of 3 days old, her father beat her so severely that became paralyzed. She wasn’t able to grow even as an adult as she only grew as tall as 134 cm. Her father continued to consume himself to alcohol and ended up committing suicide. The mother continued to chastise her and told her that she wished she wasn’t born at all and she ruined her entire family, and her life. The only education that she received was from elementary school. Her life was so hard and she ended up getting kicked out of her house, and she ended up living as a maid. She only received 3,000 won which was $30 a month. She thought that she couldn’t like this anymore so she entered into technical school to learn knitting skills. She learned knitting skills and ended up attending church at that school. She loved God so much that she went to church with her classmates and the assistant pastor of that church didn’t pay any attention to her but only paying attention to her classmates. None of the assistant pastor and church members paid any attention to her so she became so hurt. She thought to herself that she shouldn’t go to church and she didn’t deserve to go to church so she thought about quitting church. But she thought very closely about this but she realized that she shouldn’t give up on church and God, and committed to look up to God alone even if people ignored or mistreated her at church. God saw her heart that God ended up blessing her greatly. She was so good at knitting that she went to the national knitting competition and she won first place, a gold medal. She also attended a mission trip in Africa and while volunteering in this mission trip, she realized this was her calling. She set up a technical school in Africa, and helped children there. All of the people in Korea would ignore and bully her but in Africa, all of the children were following her steps and became very close to her. She ended up raising up 4,500 workers there and the government recognized her work, and she received a medal for her work. She wanted to advance her education so she went to Columbia University, and received her masters there. She didn’t want to end there so she went back to Korea, and received her doctorates in Mission Work. She is continuing her volunteer work in Kenya as part of an NGO. There was a word of God that she held onto her entire life. The word that she held onto was Philippians 2:5 “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” - This was what she held onto her entire life. And Kim continued to confess that her scars, pain, and inferiority all became her diamonds. These diamonds are Jesus Christ. This was her testimony. When I heard the testimony of Kim, I realized that her experiences in her life became her greatest fruits in Jesus Christ. The word that God is giving to us today is regarding the passion of Jesus Christ. Today’s sermon is about the young life of Jesus Christ. If we didn’t have these Biblical scriptures, we wouldn’t know what kind of experiences Jesus Christ had when He was young. Isaiah recorded all of the recordings of the young life of Jesus Christ. Let us receive grace today.
1. The Background of the Lord's Servant
1) The background of the Servant's birth
Verses 1-2 - We can see the calling of who is believing in God. This was the plea for the Israelites to throw away idolatry and follow God but we can see that even after this plea, no one followed God. Who followed God? No one was following God at that time. We spoke about this last time that through the cross of Jesus Christ, many kings and nations returned back to God. The Israelites denied God so God’s hand ended up going towards the Gentiles.
What was the background of Jesus Christ growing up? He lived a life where He was ignored by many people and like fragile grass. He lived in a land and area where no one’s attention was towards, He was born in a countryside. He was like a tender plant, a root out of dry ground. In this firm ground, there was a tender plant. In a firm ground where plants are hard to grow out of, a tender plant grew out of it. This was what Jesus Christ was like. This means that Jesus Christ came from a fallen royal lineage. That royal lineage was King David. People forgot about King David and his lineage. Jesus Christ came from this lineage and His father was a carpenter. A carpenter job back then was considered a low level job. No one recognized this job but Jesus came from this family background. His face was not considered a beauty and considered a typical boy from the countryside. Nothing in His appearance was considered desirable for the world and He was a skinny boy without any form or comeliness. This was His appearance and background that people would doubt that He truly was the Son of God. Since He wasn’t that handsome or from a good family background, no one recognized Him and would ignore Him in worldly standards.
2) Actual experience of the life of suffering
Verse 3 - He was despised and rejected by men. He came to the world as Son of God but He was rejected and despised by men. He was only despised and criticized by men. He was always met with grief, sorrow, and suffering in this world. He grew up in a poor family background and He lived in poverty. Many theologians predict that Jesus’ father, Joseph died at a young age. Since His father died from a young age, at an early age had to raise and take care of His family. He had a lot of siblings and He also had to take care of His widowed mother. He was familiar with suffering from a young age. Many theologians speculate that Jesus’ father suffered and died from an illness. Jesus saw His father, Joseph suffer from an illness and die in suffering and agony.
Leviticus 13:45-46 “Now the leper on whom the sore is, his clothes shall be torn and his head bare; and he shall cover his mustache, and cry, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ 46 He shall be unclean. All the days he has the sore he shall be unclean. He is unclean, and he shall dwell alone; his dwelling shall be outside the camp.” - The lepers back then couldn’t live with other people and lived abandoned by others. Whenever they would walk around and travel, they had to wear complete clothing around them and they had to proclaim loudly that they are a leper, “Unclean.” People would hear that and they would try to avoid them, and hide their faces from them so they don’t get leprosy from them. This was what Jesus experienced and received from people of this world. People talk about how people were bullied in this world, the person who was the most bullied was Jesus Christ. Imagine the agony and pain that He received from all of the bullying that Jesus received. Not only that but all of the Israelites also rejected Jesus.
2. The Passion of the Lord's Servant
1) He carried our sorrows
Verse 4 - There is a deep meaning here. There is something we must hold onto here. Jesus took all of our griefs and sorrows. These griefs and sorrows were ours but Jesus took all of that in. He bore all of that Himself. God continued to give the word of God to the Israelites but the Israelites continued to ignore and reject God’s word. We need to hold onto the meaning of the cross here.
Deuteronomy 21:23 “His body shall not remain overnight on the tree, but you shall surely bury him that day, so that you do not defile the land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance; for he who is hanged is accursed of God.” - Many people deemed Jesus cursed when He was nailed and dying on the cross. People thought that Jesus was dying for His sins and curses.
That is not correct, as we can see in 1 Peter 2:22 “Who committed no sin, Nor was deceit found in His mouth.” - This means that Jesus had no sin and He didn’t commit sin. Then, what is this sin talking about? This sin was the sin of man, the sin of the young lamb of the Passover. During the Passover, the only reason why the Israelites lived was because of the blood of the young lamb that was on the door post. In the Old Testament, they had to sacrifice an animal to receive cleansing of their sins and to live. The only reason why Jesus died on the cross was to cleanse the sins of mankind. He bore all of our sins, agony, suffering, and curses of mankind and died on the cross. The sins and curses that we were supposed to bear, Jesus bore all of that and died on the cross for our behalf. What is this sin that Jesus bore? We can see in verse 5.
2) Double Imputation
Verse 5 - He was pierced for our transgressions. The transgressions were due to the fact that we disobeyed God’s word. We committed sin against God because we disobeyed God’s word. How did God forgive our sins? This was able to happen because Jesus was pierced for our sins on the cross. Where was Jesus pierced? He was pierced with a crown of thorns on the cross. He wore the crown of thorns on the cross because of the sins of man. Our iniquities is talking about our original sin, the sin of Genesis 3, 6, and 11. How can we solve our original sin? His body was crushed and pierced, and blood and water came out. Since His blood was shed on the cross, our sins were cleansed. His punishment bought mankind peace. The punishment is referring to the fact that He was nailed on the cross, His body pierced, and the suffering that He experienced as a result. Through the nailing of the cross of His hands and feet, we were able to experience peace as mankind. All of our mental and physical afflictions were all solved because of the peace that Jesus granted us on the cross. By His wounds, we were healed. His wounds were referring to all of the whippings that Jesus received, how His skin was removed from His body as a result. For us, this was all of the pain and suffering that Jesus experienced and received. This was the suffering and pain that we had to go through. We were supposed to live in suffering and agony on this Earth, and a life of hell on this Earth but all of this was transferred to Jesus Christ.
2 Corinthians 5:21 “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” - This is astounding. On our behalf, Jesus was nailed to the cross. All of the sins and suffering of man, Jesus bore all of that and died on the cross. But inside all of that, God called us righteous again. Jesus cleansed and finished everything on the cross but it didn’t end with that, God’s righteousness entered into us after the death of Jesus on the cross. In theology, we call this, “Double Imputation.” Jesus died on the cross and we died on the cross along with Jesus, and God’s righteousness entered into us after our sins were cleansed. Inside of this, we have become righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. This is important. Only those who believe that Jesus is the Christ and within this faith, you can become righteous. We should be grateful and thankful for the grace of God. We should be living a life of curse and have nothing for our lives but God who saw all of this, He sacrificed His Son, the Son of God. If you truly know this, then you have no choice but to shed tears before God.
3. The Power of the Lord's Servant
1) The master key to all problems
Verse 6 - This is an astounding Bible verse. This is talking about people who were separated from God and the nature of man. Mankind have gone astray and they only live for their own worldly desires. They have gone astray but only following after their own sinfulness. They think they can live a good life without God. But a life without God and separated from God, then the end destination is towards destruction.
Psalm 14:3 “They have all turned aside, They have together become corrupt; There is none who does good, No, not one.” - Mankind had no choice but to live in sin and destruction but God saw all of this, and resolved to take all of the iniquities of mankind. Mankind took their own paths and ways but the end was always suffering and curses. God knew that mankind cannot continue to live like this so He resolved to take all of the sins and curses of mankind. He resolved all of the problems of man on the cross. This means that the answer to all problems is Jesus Christ alone. All of the spiritual, mental, physical, family, afterlife, and generational problems have been finished on the cross. Jesus Christ took all of the sins of mankind and finished it all on the cross. Do you believe in this? This is the core of the entire Bible. All we have to do is hold onto Jesus Christ. We need to raise up the bartizans to block disasters.
2) The bartizan that blocks disasters
Colossians 2:3, 12, 15 “In whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. 12 Buried with Him in baptism, in which you also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” - Inside of Jesus Christ, all things are within Him.
Colossians 2:12 - We have gained a new life and experienced resurrection. Jesus Christ finished everything on the cross.
Colossians 2:15 - The power of the cross of Jesus Christ has the power of absolute victory and power to overcome all darkness. This is why we say that Jesus is the Christ. May we become people who can raise these bartizans.
Conclusion
1 Peter 2:9 “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” - We need to hold onto who we are. We are a royal priesthood, a holy nation, and the people who have been called out of darkness into His marvelous light. We are the absolute disciples who can shine the light of Jesus Christ. May we proclaim and preach of the cross of Jesus Christ.
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