Isaiah 53:4
This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.
Is there anything that you are carrying with you right now that you wish you didn't have to carry? If I was going to have you reflect on those things, what would they be? Do you feel like maybe you're a failure and the inner voice inside of your head makes you feel defeated and you wish it could go away? Have you had a financial setback or a health challenge that seems too great to overcome?
Maybe you feel lonely or isolated and you desire a close relationship. Or maybe it's the fact that you have experienced loss at a deep level and a sense of grief has settled into your heart. Maybe it's something else. But you wish someone could come and just take it from you. Take the load right off your back. Our scripture for this evening is Isaiah 53.4.
It can be found on the front of your bulletin. It reads, Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. It's amazing that we have this prophecy of Christ's death and his resurrection 700 years before the actual event. Isaiah doesn't mention the word resurrection in this passage.
But he vividly details the news that a suffering servant will die. And he explains how that servant will deal with sin. And what that means for his followers. This passage is clearly speaking about Christ. Our text for this evening is embedded within what is called the Fourth Servant Song. And one thing that you'll notice about the text is that Isaiah speaks of future events as though they have already occurred.
And this is intentional. He says, Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. So the point I want to draw out of Isaiah 53.4 is this. That Christ took our sin entirely upon himself, which pleased God. Christ took our sin entirely upon himself, which pleased God. And I want to work through two points as we look at this text.
One being the weight of our sin. And the second one being the burden of satisfaction. So the first point, the weight of our sin. Our verse starts out with the word surely. The surely here should be read with confidence. The surely here is connecting us to what a reader would have just read concerning the servant. The servant who is to come. In the preceding verses we find out that the servant, it says that he shall act wisely.
He shall be high and lifted up. He shall be exalted. But it also says that the servant, that his appearance was marred beyond human semblance. He had no form or majesty that we should look at him. No beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men. And then it says, surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. we shouldn't read this surely as if it is a question the surely becomes here because the servant is not who we expected no form or majesty no beauty that we should desire him and he was despised and rejected by men despite this we know that the servant without a doubt and with certainty has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.
So who is the servant? The way the pronouns are used here, he is referring to the servant. This is the coming Messiah, Jesus Christ. Anytime that we see we or our, then it's referring to the servant's disciple. I want you to pay particular attention to what this coming Messiah has certainly done. He has promised to do two things here. The first thing that he does is that he has borne our griefs.
Born, or we could say bore, are very old-fashioned terms to many of us. But essentially it means that he bears the weight of something. The second thing that he does is that he carries our sorrows. This suffering servant has uniquely situated himself into position that can make our burdens his. He can take the entire weight of sin and its consequences and place it all upon himself.
Lest we not forget that this servant was blameless. There was no reason for him to endure even an ounce of weight from sin. The action here is of substitution. He has taken our griefs and our sorrows. It's not his own sin that he's taken here. It's our sin that he has taken here. Peter says in 1 Peter 2.24 that Jesus bore, using this same language here, bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.
And by his wounds you have been healed. The fact is clear that Jesus took our sins and Jesus took the consequential weight of our sins, including the burdens. There are bitter consequences that result from our sin. Grief here means to be sick with sadness and emotional anguish, particularly because something's been done to us or been done by us.
Sorrow here refers to both the physical and the mental difficulties and pain. Ultimately, grief and sorrow, they're a result of the fall in Genesis 3. And Jesus took sin and its effects upon himself. So what is the weight of our sin? I think the weight of our sin is most visible to us through its consequences. Sin is deceitful to the human soul.
Its nature is intended to entrap you. Sin is treacherous. It can spiral out of control and affect other areas of our life that we didn't intend it to affect. And this can cause deep pain, sadness, and suffering. The weight of sin and its burdens are astronomical. This should cause you to pause in amazement and awe.
God loves you so much that he provided a way for your sin and all the consequences of sin to be placed on someone else. God the Father in love and mercy provided a servant who would suffer the entire penalty for sin for us. So how does this apply to us? If you're a Christian, does this mean that you won't experience grief or sorrow? Does this mean that you don't experience or feel things here in this world that cause pain and suffering?
Well, no. Sometimes we feel like David in Psalm 38. We feel like arrows have sunk into us. And we feel like a hand is pressing down upon us. We feel like our sins are causing us to drown. And even our wounds that we have, they're foul and festering. David says at one point in Psalm 38, I am faint and severely crushed. I groan because of the anguish in my heart.
It's important to remember that sadness and grief are natural. And they're common human emotions. And it's normal to experience sadness and grief from time to time in our lives. We'll experience grief and sorrow. We'll experience pain and suffering. But for the Christian, we know that this is a temporal state. We know that God loved us so much that we don't have to experience the sadness of this world forever.
For the Christian, our sins and consequences of our sins should be a constant reminder of what God has done for us through Christ. We'll have seasons in our life where we feel low and broken and deserted. And if this is you, I want to encourage you to use that time in your life to reflect on the great love and mercy of God. The consequences of sin remind us of our dependency on someone greater, someone other than ourselves, someone past ourselves, someone who is capable and has capacity to take the weight of sin and its consequences.
David may have said, I am faint and severely crushed, but he also said that the Lord is near the brokenhearted. He saves those crushed in spirit. I also think this passage should give us confidence in our Savior that leads us to a deeper understanding of His love and compassion. This confidence, it might not be there at first, or even at times it may wane. But it is a rock-solid truth given to us in Scripture that we can lean on in times of trouble and uncertainty.
So may I ask you, what was yours that you have transferred to Jesus? What weight is he bearing now and carrying for you? Surely, and I say this with confidence, he took your grief and carried your sorrow. And at times, we can be overwhelmed by our circumstances, but we all know God's word to be true.
We have a great comfort in knowing that our Savior took our grief and carried our sorrows. So point number two, the burden of satisfaction. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteem him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. Jesus did not deserve this. The misconception here is that some thought it was the just penalty for Jesus' own sin. But there's irony here.
The irony here is that the servant was rejected, but in turn became a substitute for the rebels who rejected him. The words stricken, smitten, and afflicted here show us the totality of the punishment that was to be placed upon Christ. The punishment was severe. Literally, smitten by God means to be punished by God himself. The affliction that Christ endured was humiliating.
It was physically and mentally harsh. This type of affliction brought him low. Why did it have to happen like this? We were the ones who sinned. It's our griefs, our sorrows, our transgressions. It was all laid upon Him. It was God's plan from the beginning for sin to be dealt with through Christ.
It was the will of the Lord to crush Him. You can look at verse 10. In order for us to become righteous, our sin had to be taken from us and then placed upon another. It was placed upon Jesus, and then it was crushed. Did it have to be Jesus? Why couldn't there just be another way? You might say, well, God's sovereign, He's powerful.
Couldn't He have created another way for atonement to be provided? Well, let me tell you, the only way forward was through Jesus, the Christ, the perfect spotless Lamb. This is the most loving act the world has ever seen. One theologian put it this way, the greatest sorrow and burden you can lay on the Father, the greatest unkindness you can do is to not believe that He loves you.
This is why Peter said that Jesus died for the sins once for all, the just and for the unjust, so that he might bring us to God. This is also why Paul said that God, for our sake, made Jesus to be sin, who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. The only way we have a clear path to God is through the intercessory work of Christ.
Christ was stricken for our sake. Christ was smitten by God for our sake. Christ was afflicted for our sake. God's wrath was appeased. The burden was satisfied. God brought Jesus so low that he was emptied of all of his glory. But because Christ was faithful to his Father, God exalted him above every other name. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you for giving us Christ. Your word says that he had no form or majesty that we should look at him and no beauty that we should desire him. Yet because of your work in us and for us, we are able to see his beauty and desire him. Your word says that Christ was despised and rejected by men and we understand that it was our sin that Christ bore on the cross. We praise you for this incredible act of mercy and grace that we get to experience.
Christ, you took our sin and its consequences and you carried them unto death. You are a perfect and obedient Savior. All praise and glory be to Jesus. Amen.