Isaiah 53: The Centre of This World’s History

The cross is history’s absolute climax. When Paul defines the heart, the core, of our faith – and we need to be very clear about this – it’s `Christ, crucified`. (1 Corinthians 1:23, 2:2, 15:3; vital passages to note down, because sometimes we’ll need to stand firm on what is that absolute centre.) But why? Why do we wear crosses? Can we explain what the cross was for?

Today we’re looking at the profound prophecy of Isaiah 53, which foretold the cross 700 years beforehand, yet explains more about it even than we find in the gospels! (If you prefer the video version of this, it’s https://youtu.be/dAxKDag96Jg – & please let me know !)

What happened to God’s unique Servant, to Christ, was so incredible, no one would have believed it. `Many… were appalled at him — his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being, and his form marred beyond human likeness… He had no beauty or majesty` [this is Jesus!] `to attract us to him; nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by mankind; a man of suffering, familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces, he was despised….` (53:1-3). How can this be? This was God’s Son himself; `a man of sorrows`, such as we with sin-blunted senses will never know… Weeping over his beloved city, because their rejection of all he had done could only end in bloody catastrophe; weeping at the agony and bereavement of death at Lazarus’ tomb…

And the chapter piles it on. There’s the unjust trial, where Christ silently absorbed the evil (`He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth… By oppression and judgment he was taken away, yet who of his generation protested?`, vv7-8); his apparent rejection even by God (v4, cf Matthew 27:43); the apparent utter fruitlessness of all his agony (v8, cf Isaiah 49:4); the eventual burial with the wicked (and, prophetically, `with the rich`) (v9); Christ going right to the bottom of the pit, `disfigured beyond any man`… Horror piled on horror, shame upon shame: our Muslim friends understandably find it so hard to conceive that God could allow this to happen, even to a prophet, let alone to God himself. But we know why it did: this infinite pain was only because He is a God of infinite love, for us; only in Christ do we see a `God who has scars` – and those scars were for us, on our behalf…

But still why? Vv4-6 explain. `We all, like sheep, have gone astray… and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all… He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him; and by his wounds we are healed!` On the cross Christ was taking the penalty, the punishment, of our sin. And I say `he`, but how utterly agonizing it must have been for the Father too, watching his Son go through this – as `the Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all…` Doesn’t it tell us something profound about the Trinity to think of the Father and the Son loving us, planning this together, from the heart of eternity? (`God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ`, 2 Cor 5:19.) No doubt the Father wept over his son, like David crying out over Absalom, `O my son Absalom! My son, my son Absalom!` But that penalty had to be paid, if the universe was to be just….

And this is deeply important. For many years liberals have refused to face what Scripture says here, seeing the cross only as a demonstration of God’s love. It was that, of course – utterly, wondrously so – but the cross makes no sense unless there is far more. (If someone went to the top of a building and shouted down to us, `This is how much I love you`, then threw themselves off, it might be love, but it would also be utter waste and stupidity.) The reason liberals refuse to face the fact that Christ was `pierced for our transgressions` is that they also refuse to face what God in Scripture says about the seriousness of sin: about sin (if there is justice in the universe) having to have a penalty; about the reality therefore (portrayed so often in both testaments) of judgment; and about the theme running throughout the old testament – Cain and Abel, Passover, the God-ordained old testament sacrifices, the blood on the `mercy seat` where God met with his people – showing repeatedly that, as Hebrews 9 says, without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness of sin. And so to be forgiven and know God’s presence, we need – and we have! – a Substitute who will pay our penalty by shedding his blood; a Substitute foreshadowed by the Passover lamb (1 Cor 5:7), by the ram that took Isaac’s place (Gen 22), by all those animals that died in the temple because of Israelites’ sins (eg Lev 16, 17:11). The technical phrase for this reality, this doctrine of our Substitute who pays our penalty, is penal substitution; and affirming it is one of the clearest marks as to whether someone is a Bible Christian or not.

And why does it matter? Because where sin is denied to have a penalty, ultimately right and wrong lose their significance. And this is naïve and unreal; because evil exists in the world, and evil exists in me. The evil I do matters, and cannot just be ignored if I happen to be God’s favourite. Otherwise the universe is about favouritism, not justice. (If we believe this, we may become unjust too.) This is a key weakness in Islam. The penalty for my sins – utter separation from the life of God, that is, hell – had to be paid. And when Jesus cried out in utter dereliction `My God, my God, why have You forsaken me??`, he was paying it, and so opening the way back for me to God. This is the heart of the cross, the heart of Christian faith, the heart of history.

But! – it didn’t end with that scream of unimaginable, infinite agony. `He was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished. He was assigned a grave with the wicked` (v8). But the story was not over, and now comes another astounding (to that era) revelation: after his death, the Servant will rise from the dead! `Though the LORD makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days… After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied` (v10): it is, as Jesus shouted finally on the cross, triumphantly finished and dealt with!

So now the benefits start to flood in through the gateway the cross has opened! There’s transformation for us: we were like sheep going astray (v6); but we’re now His `offspring`, children of the living God! Our `guilt is taken away and [our] sin atoned for`, like in Isaiah 6, so in God’s eyes it’s as if we had never sinned: not because of anything we’ve done in atonement, but because of what the Servant has done; and (v11) by the `knowledge` of this (that the Servant has `borne our iniquities`) `my righteous Servant will justify many!` Once we take it in, in repentance and faith, the cross becomes the gateway for huge goodness from God, because He has dealt with the sin which blocked it all. So the Servant’s death becomes `the punishment that brought us peace`; and not only that, `by his wounds we are healed`(v5), like the sick and demonized to whom Matthew applies this triumphant verse (8:17). Huge goodness starting now, and huge goodness in heaven forever!

And let’s not miss the chapter’s surprising final verse: `He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.` Here, surely, we have what Hebrews presents as Christ’s ministry after his death, right now: `He is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them` (7:25). We are saved both because of Jesus’ blood and because we have a Great High Priest rooting for us in heaven (Heb 10:19-22); and whenever we need him, he’s praying for us! When we’ve sinned, he’s like the perfect lawyer `who speaks to the Father in our defence` (1 John 2:1), pointing out joyfully to his ever-just Father what his death secured for us in forgiveness and love; guaranteeing, indeed, that loving Father’s listening ear! And whenever we need help – this is a certainty to file away for when we face crisis – he’s praying all-powerfully for us. And we know, as Hebrews 4:15 says, that he knows exactly what our crises are like; as the Servant he has been through all we could ever go through, and now he `always lives to intercede for us`. And so wholeness must surely come, deliverance must come…

`He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed!` There’s so much there (that’s why we take communion regularly, to start to grasp it all); the cross is the centre of history, and now for us there’s forgiveness; peace; healing; wholeness; heaven! All because he was pierced for our transgressions. All so clear in this incredible prophecy – 700 years before it happened!

It’s not surprising that this amazing section leads into the wonderful gospel passage of ch55, as we’ll see next time. But for now he, Jesus, the Servant who went through the deepest agony for us and came out triumphantly the other side, deserves all our adoration. Let’s do it…!