FIRST QUARTER 2021
SABBATH SCHOOL INSIGHT #10
MARCH 6, 2021
“DOING THE UNTHINKABLE”

 

It has been said that a picture is worth a thousand words.  What words come to mind for you looking at this week’s lesson illustration?  My first question was, where is the lightning bolt coming from?  God?  The image leaves it up to the viewer but when asking others, everyone felt God was the implied source. Then I noticed that Jesus is taking the punishment for the little guy crouched in his shadow.  The idea is clear.  My question is, is this the best image we can come up with for the message of Isaiah 53 telling the story of the cross?  Is this really the message we want to communicate?

 

This week we are studying Isaiah 50-53, focusing on 50:4-10 and 52:13-53:12, considering the sufferings of God.  As we consider these passages and a few preceding verses, let’s see if we can come up with a better way to illustrated these concepts.

 

Isaiah 50:1. Here we find a series of rhetorical questions from God.  “Where is the certificate of your mother’s divorce, whom I have put away?” and “Which of My creditors is it to whom I have sold you?”  In other words, “Where is the lightning bolt from My throne that is doing away with you?  The answers come back clarifying the misconceptions inherent in the human heart.  “For your transgressions your mother has been put away.” “For your iniquities you have sold yourself.”  God brings the clarifying truth to the surface that it is we that sells ourselves or put ourselves away from God because we fail to yield our selfish hearts.  We cling to that which separates us from our God.  That was true for people then and it is still true today.

 

Isaiah 50:2. “Why when I came, was there no man?  Why, when I called, was there none to answer?”.  This question from God’s heart is so reminiscent of Song of Solomon 5:2-3, “I sleep but my heart is awake; It is the voice of my beloved!  He knocks, saying, “Open for me my sister, my love, my dove, my perfect one; For my head is covered with dew, my locks with the drops of the night.”  The she who he loves answers in her thoughts, “I have taken off my robe; How can I put it on again?  I have washed my feet; How can I defile them?”

 

No doubt Jesus was referencing this passage when He speaks in Revelation 3::20, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.  If anyone hears My voice, And opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.”  Does anyone hear His voice?  Has the church answered the door?  The question that came to Israel is the same question that comes to Laodicea, “Is my hand shortened at all that it cannot redeem?  Have I no power to deliver?  God in effect is asking, “Why do you not let me do all that I said I would do…all that I long and wish to do?”  “Open the door my best beloved.”

 

Isaiah 50:4-10. The incarnate Jesus is depicted here and His nature is revealed.  His learning came from God not from Himself.  He knew how, what, and when to speak not because He was God (though He was) but because He lived his entire life from beginning to end by faith in the Father.  Jesus depended on His Father to awaken Him, to lead Him, to instruct Him and to direct His words (John 8:38, 14:24). The Messiah Servant came not to do His own will but the will of the Father (John 6:38).  He did this so completely that He could say to Phillip, “If you have seen Me you have seen the Father.” (John 14:9).

 

It is so incredible and unthinkable what we did to Jesus.  And even more stupefying is that if we did it to Him, we would do it also to God the Father Himself if it were possible. Can you imagine meeting God and striking His back or tearing out His beard or stripping Him naked, or spitting in His face?

 

Jesus shows us exactly how God would have responded to this type of treatment.  He would do it without retaliation and with complete resolve to love us to the end.  And Jesus did it every step of the way relying on His Fathers help (vs 7).  The things He faced did not bring disgrace to Him because He knew He was completely loved and cared for by His Father.  His value and security came from Him alone.

 

Notice verse 8.  What is this verse teaching?  “He is near who justifies Me.”  While men were condemning Jesus, He would not try to justify Himself but rather depended on His Father alone to show Him to be right all the while keeping Him in righteousness.  And in what capacity did He endure all this?  “He does not give aid to angels (the unfallen) but He gives aid to the seed of Abraham (the fallen).  Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren (the seed of Abraham) that He might be a faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are tempted. Hebrews 2:16-18 (emphasis supplied).  “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with (be touched with the feeling of) our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Hebrews 4:15.

 

Isaiah 52:13 - 53:3. At the beginning of the last of the four Servant Songs of Isaiah (Isaiah 42:1-9, 49:1-13, 50:4-11, 52:13-53:12) which foretell the coming Messiah and the nature of His work and His person.   Isaiah starts with one of the most important words of the passage.  “Behold.”  God is inviting us to see something, to consider carefully and let what He is about to say sink deep into our heart. For “we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” 2 Corinthians 3:18. “For it is the God Who commanded light to shine out of darkness, Who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” 2 Corinthians 4:6.

 

Here in Isaiah we see His glory dealing “prudently” with deliberate consideration and care.  And while we may typically picture what it means to be “exalted and extolled on high”, the Servant is going to show us the reality of what exaltation in the Kingdom of heaven really looks like.  It directly contrasts with the exaltation of earthly kings and the enemy of souls (Isaiah 14:12-15).  The term translated “extolled and be very high” in the New King James Version could be translated “lifted up”.  While we may read these passages thinking of some future glory of our coming King, in this context, it is better seen as a reality of Heaven born exaltation which looks like this: “If I am lifted up, I will draw all men unto me” (John 12:32).

 

It is here at the cross that the strong arm of the Lord is revealed.  And Isaiah starts this last Servant song with a clear reference to the cross which continues in verse 14 describing the result of the physical treatment He would undergo at the hands of those He came to save.  Notice how “many were astonished” (vs. 14) and many nations are “startled” (marginal reference for sprinkle) and the Kings including the Prince of this world himself, will be silenced (vs. 15). 

 

What is it that causes this overwhelming awareness and cessation of all argument against God?

“And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore, God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”  (Philippians 2:8-11).

 

HIs Lordship, His exaltation, and His glory all comes by virtue of the fact that He steps down.  Not stepped down as in past tense, but it has always been and always will be in His nature to step down on behalf of the others in His universe.  He literally did step down to be as it were “a tender plant, a root out of a dry ground” where He had “no form or comeliness”.  He would not use beauty, form, or stateliness, as we know them, to draw us to Him.  But rather He would introduce us to a beauty, form and stateliness that is completely foreign to us.  He would restore the image of true beauty and true Lordship that He might draw us to Himself.

 

Isaiah says He was a “Man of sorrows” (pain) and “acquainted with grief” (sickness) this means more than Jesus had migraines, or stubbed His toe.  The depths of this verse can be fully mined when we realize that our greatest sickness is the liabilities that sin has brought to our natures and that our greatest pains come as a result of living in a world of beings that have this nature. “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For indeed He does not give aid to angels, but He does give aid to the seed of Abraham. Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are tempted.” (Hebrews 2:14-18).

 

And when Heaven gave all, in the person of Jesus Christ, to this fallen world, we hid or covered our faces because we didn’t like what we saw.  We despised Him because He revealed the selfishness of our own hearts with perfect clarity.

 

Isaiah 53:4-12. He bore our sorrows and carried our griefs as He walked this planet more than two thousand years ago and, ultimately, as He died on the cross.  “Yet we esteemed Him stricken and smitten by God.”  Notice that the Bible does not say that He was stricken and smitten by God.  It was not God that esteemed Him that way.  It was we who did.  This is why the Sabbath School illustration, with the lightning bolt coming from presumably heaven, is an offense to God.  It is attributing man’s estimation of the cross to God.

 

Isaiah however, brings clarity to this idea in the next verse. “But”, meaning let’s undo the thoughts that man has about the whole situation and share the truth of it.  “But He was wounded (defiled) for our transgressions, He was bruised (crushed) for our iniquities, and the chastisement (discipline, correction) for our peace (health, safety, welfare, completeness) was upon Him, and by His stripes (wounds) we are healed.”  According to this verse, if God is not smiting or zapping, who is or what is?  We (our transgressions and our iniquities) are doing the wounding and the bruising.

 

Before we proceed further with the next thought, we have to consider possible objections by looking at verses 6 and 10.  Verse 6 says “the Lord laid on Him the iniquity” but the rest of verse 6 tells who’s iniquity it was.  It was ours.  It was the Lord Who allowed Jesus to bare the iniquity that finds its source in us by becoming “God with us”.

 

And verse 10 says it pleased the Lord to bruise (crush) Him.  The Lord actually had no pleasure in the crushing.  “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself”.  All that Christ suffered the Father suffered right along with Him.  So, what does verse 10 mean?  First, who really crushed Jesus?  Remember Genesis 3:15, when God was speaking to the serpent the devil.  “He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.”  Well, who crushed Jesus, the Father or the devil?  According to Genesis 3:15 it was the devil and by extension his agents.  It’s the same as asking who hardened Pharaoh’s heart?

 

God did not give a lightning bolt.  He gave His Son.  Verse 10 is simply saying, “For God so loved the world (it pleased the Lord), that He gave His only begotten Son (to bruise Him)” (John 3:16).  By giving His Son for the salvation of the human race, He knew He would be sending Him to be beaten and killed at our hand, by our sins, incited by the enemy of your soul and mine.

 

We should consider a little more closely part of verse 5, “by His stripes (wounds) we are healed?”  Notice, it doesn’t say by His stripes we are forgiven but it does say we are healed.  That is not to say forgiveness is not part of healing.  But healing is a much more wholistic word encompassing forgiveness and more.  A typical way Christianity at large would explain “by His stripes we are healed” would go something like this.  We have all sinned.  The wages of sin is death. Jesus died on the Cross and paid the penalty for sin and now we are healed because we are set free from the penalty of sin.  When we believe this, we have passed from death to eternal life.

 

While this is true, having the penalty for sin paid for is likened to the 10 lepers who came to Jesus by faith believing He could heal them.  All ten by faith took Him at His word and went to present themselves before the priest to be pronounced clean.  Implicit in this command was the sacrificial offering to be made by the priest typical for the offering of Jesus on behalf of uncleanness and sin (see Leviticus 14).  All ten stepped out in faith on Christ’s word alone.  But there was only one to whom Jesus said, “your faith has made you well”, your faith has healed you, your faith has saved you.  Ten out of ten had faith to fix the external problem but only one out of ten had the faith and heart-felt appreciation for all that Christ had done for him.  It is notable that Jesus healed all 10 of this external problem even though He knew only one would be fully healed (Romans 3:23-24; Romans 5:18). Naturally, he returned and with a “loud voice glorified God” and bowed down (worshiped) before Jesus and with a thankful heart returned to Jesus with a willing heart. Can you see this healed leper responding to the First Angels Message?  Ten out of ten were willing to have the outside cleansed but only one in ten had saving faith and was actually healed.

 

The point is, healing involves the whole person and a changed heart moved in full appreciation for what God has done.  Healing starts with beholding the complete sacrifice for sin that Heaven has made which leads to a heart change and full surrender.

 

These verses in Chapter 53 should be seen not merely as a prophecy of a single period in earth’s history when Jesus walked upon this planet.  This final Messianic Song of Isaiah brings a description of what the Suffering Servant has suffered and continues to suffer since sin began.  Consider this one passage from E. J. Waggoner in reference to Isaiah chapter 53:

 

“This chapter lets us in on the secret of those sufferings.  “With His stripes we are healed.” “By His knowledge shall My righteous Servant make many righteous.”  Here we have a parallel to the statement, “By the obedience of One shall many be made righteous.” Romans 5:19. How can the obedience of One make many righteous?  Manifestly only by that One’s presence in the many, living the obedience.

 

So, we have the answer to the question as to how Christ by His knowledge shall make many righteous.  How does He know? - Not by laborious search and study, but by personal experience.... He is “touched with the feeling of our infirmities.”  The Lord knows our frame, not simply because He made us, but because He Himself bears everything that humanity bears.  That which was in the beginning with God, and was God, and which became flesh, and dwelt among us, penetrates to every fiber of every being, and suffers everything to which human flesh is heir.  There is not a sickness, not a pain, not a temptation, not an injustice, that oppresses any of the children of men, that does not press with equal weight upon the Lord; nay it presses even more strongly upon the Lord than it does upon us…

 

Yet He keeps silence.  Century after century has the human race been piling sin and misery upon the Lord, by their deviation from truth, the way of life, yet He bears it without a murmur.... It was not simply in the High Priest’s place, and in Pilot’s court, and on Calvary, that Jesus bore insult and abuse and pain without murmuring;  He has been doing that for the last six thousand years; and the very thing which is to His everlasting honour, has been set down to His reproach.  Men have charged the Lord with indifference to human suffering, because He did not rise up in His might, and suddenly put an end to it all.  How little they knew!  They did not understand that He was literally suffering all these evils, allowing them to be heaped upon Him. And that His silence under the suffering of sin and oppression and injustice was the only way of salvation from them, to the human race.” (Treasures in Isaiah; p. 447, 448)

 

Also consider this passage from the pen of Ellen White, also indicating that the cross was not merely a single event, but unfolds a much bigger picture:

 

“The result of hastening or hindering the gospel, we think of, if at all, in relation to ourselves and to the world. Few think of its relation to God. Few give thought to the suffering that sin has caused our Creator. All heaven suffered in Christ’s agony; but that suffering did not begin or end with His manifestation in humanity. The cross is a revelation to our dull senses of the pain that sin, from its very inception, has brought to the heart of God. Every departure from the right, every deed of cruelty, every failure of humanity to reach God’s ideal, brings grief to Heaven. When there came upon Israel the calamities that inevitably followed separation from God,—subjugation by their enemies, oppression, cruelty, and death,—it is said of God, that “His soul was grieved for the misery of Israel.” Judges 10:16. “In all their affliction He was afflicted;... and He bare them, and carried them all the days of old.” Isaiah 63:9.

 

His Spirit “maketh intercession for us with groanings, which cannot be uttered.” Romans 8:26. As the “whole creation groaneth and travaileth together in pain” (Romans 8:26, 22), the heart of the infinite Father is pained in sympathy. Our world is a vast lazar-house, a scene of misery that no pen can picture, misery that we dare not allow even our thoughts to dwell upon. Did we realize it as it is, the burden would be too terrible. Yet God feels it all. In order to destroy sin and its results He gave His best Beloved, and He has put it in our power, by co-operation with Him, to bring this scene of misery to an end. “This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.” Matthew 24:14. (General Conference Bulletin; July 1,1902)

 

Studying these passages this week has been a rich study for me and I pray it has been for you as well.  I want to simply end with a single question and invite you to send in your answers.  I would enjoy beholding them.  So here is your question/assignment.  After studying these passages this week, what illustration would you draw to depict this week’s lesson?  What thousand words would your picture communicate?

 

May our lives paint the portrait worthy of the redeeming love that is continually poured out in our behalf.

 

~Kelly Kinsley