Despised, Rejected, Stricken and Afflicted

This is what Jesus came to do: to justify us by his self sacrifice, to satisfy the righteous judgment of God on all the sheep who go their own way against human sin, and he will justify the many. He will bear their wrongdoings, pay the price. And by his blood, he changes the fate of all of us. The righteous condemnation that was against us is suddenly wiped away, and you are declared righteous in his sight. That's why righteousness is such a part of this passage. This is why the Giving Tree is not the one we need. It's insufficient. This is Christ the King's sermons.

Christ the King's sermons is a ministry of Christ the King Presbyterian Church located in Raleigh, North Carolina. CTK is a community rooted in the depth of the gospel, refined by hard conversations, fueled by meaningful relationships, and committed to redemptive work in Raleigh.

We're looking at Isaiah 52:13 through the end of 53, and it's our custom to read God's word aloud together, reading from the RSV, which is in the pew, page 632 if you want to join us. So let's read God's word aloud together.

Behold, my servant shall prosper and he shall be exalted and lifted up and shall be very high. As many were astonished at him, his appearance was so marred beyond recognition and his form beyond that of the sons of men, so shall he startle many nations. Kings shall shut their mouths because of him, for that which has not been told them they shall see, and that which they have not heard, they shall understand.

Who has believed what we have heard, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For he grew up before him like a young plant and like a root out of dry ground. He had no form or comeliness that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, as one from whom men hide their faces. He was despised and we esteemed him not.

Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. Yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. Upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. 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 is before its shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth.

By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off from the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? They may make grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence and there was no deceit in his mouth.

Yet it was the will of the Lord to bruise him. He has put him to grief. When he makes himself an offering for sin, he shall see his offspring. He shall prolong his days. The will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see the fruit of the travail of his soul and be satisfied.

By his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors. Yet he bore the sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors.

— Isaiah 52:13–53:12 (RSV)

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Well, today, as we've said and sang and seen, is Palm Sunday—that great day when the people of God—not just cute kids, as what we had this morning—welcomed Jesus coming into Jerusalem as a conquering king. Now it wasn't just cute kids; it was a huge crowd that gathered to see him. And yet, what a confusing day.

If you are a student of the Bible or if you've been around church, you know that every Christmas time we pull out Isaiah—we pull out this section of Isaiah—and there's a section we read every year at Christmas time. We read about how unto us a child is given and that the government will be on his shoulders and that his name will be called Wonderful Counselor and Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. And then this promise of the greatness of his government and peace—there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from this time forth forevermore.

And every Christmas, we're like, "Amen." Well, this is what God's people were familiar with from Isaiah. This is what they were waiting for: a conquering king. This is what they gathered for in Jerusalem that day—a conqueror, one who was going to come and drop the hammer and make everything right.

The people of God sat around for centuries before this scratching their heads because Isaiah himself later prophesied in this book that God is going to send Assyria and come and wipe out the Northern Kingdom. And only about a hundred and fifty years later, he's going to send the Babylonians—he's going to take the Southern Kingdom into exile. And people are asking: where is the king? We were promised a king. And that's what the people of God were expecting. From Isaiah onward, they were confused. What is God doing?

So Jesus comes into Jerusalem that day and goes straight from there, walking the pathway to the cross, which we're going to do this week. We're going to follow him along that pathway. And immediately following his resurrection, the early church turned to this passage more than anywhere else in their Old Testament, in their Hebrew scriptures, to try to make sense of what had happened to their conquering king.

Because what no one could have suspected was that these two lines would converge: the sufferer that we've been reading about over and over each Sunday going through these passages, and the king. That this would be a king who conquers through suffering, who wins by losing.

Every week as we've taught and walked through these passages—these suffering servant passages—I've tried to connect each one of these promises in Isaiah with our need. Isaiah 40: sin alienates us, but the servant comforts us. Isaiah 55: sin poisons us, the servant brings us to the feast. Isaiah 61: sin brings disintegration, the servant reintegrates us. Isaiah 49: sin disorients us, but the servant reorients us. Isaiah 64: sin makes us guilty, but the servant makes us righteous. And today: sin makes us sick. Sin makes us sick, and only the servant brings us healing—but through suffering.

That's really my outline for today: two things. Sin makes us sick. The servant heals us.

How Sin Makes Us Sick

Now one of the hidden realities of life in this world is that we're sick. Every one of us is sick. We don't see ourselves as sick. In fact, most people that I know of in our church are kind of health nut people. You exercise a lot. You are careful with what you eat. You may even count your calories. You are very aware of what's going in—like you're very thoughtful about your body. Any health nuts here? Come on, I know you. Raise your hands. There's a lot of you, right? There's a lot of us.

And then there's also those who are germaphobes. Anybody ready with the hand sanitizer? Knowing what flu strain is coming, right? You're aware of this. Or you read the internet articles about the viruses. Anybody raise your hands. Come on. This is a safe place. You're good. We know about our bodies. We're very aware of our bodies.

But what scripture tells us is that we're sick in our souls. We are of a soul sickness. Now when I use the word soul, that's not a word that a lot of people use. You may not even know—if I pressed on you and said where is your soul, you'd be like: I don't know. In scripture, the soul is all the inner parts of you, all the inward part. Your emotions, your volition, your choosing, your rational thoughts. You have a body, but you are a soul. You are a soul.

And for us to see that our souls are sick is not obvious to us. Isaiah 53 points this condition to us in the weirdest of language. Let me show you where it says: this is how you know your soul is sick.

Each of us is a sheep who wants to go his or her own way. — Isaiah 53

That's soul sickness. Doesn't sound so bad either, does it? That's a metaphor, though, that we need to consider. It's constant throughout the pages of scripture, and if you've been around the church, you may be so familiar with it that you miss the power of it.

So let's think about sheep this morning. If the passage said we were like cats who go their own way, that would make sense. Anybody own a cat? No, you don't. Cats choose to live with you. No one owns a cat. You know this, right? And cats are not herd animals. You can't really train a cat. You can sort of maybe influence your cat—that's about it. Cats by definition, nobody's a cat shepherd. Herding cats is a joke for that reason.

Or what if the scripture used words like octopus or octopi? Each of us are octopi that go around, or praying mantises, or bears, right? All of those don't work in the same way. But sheep? Sheep are unique. There are two reasons I think why God chooses this metaphor to describe his people.

One: sheep are herd animals. They are with other sheep.

Second: sheep need a shepherd. They need a person—a different species—that guides them, protects them, shows them the way to go.

And so when the passage says here that we are all like sheep who go our own way, it's not just an image of confusion on the part of the sheep. It's an image of rebellion. I'm not going to be a sheep.

It's not a statement of individuality, it's a statement of mutiny. A sheep to say I'm going to go my own way as I am going to be my own shepherd. My way, my wisdom, my path, that's what I'm choosing, me. I'm first. To be a sheep who says no more shepherd for me, I'm good, is not just a statement of independence, it's a statement of rebellion and it is a deep soul sickness.

To go against a person's design is to do violence to yourself. So I just got this brand new iPad for preaching, love it. But if I take my iPad and I'm like, you know, I've got a picture in my home and I just need to nail it into the wall, what does it do to my iPad? Is an iPad made for nailing? No, just about everything else, right. But if I take my iPad, my beloved iPad, my precious, and I use it to nail into the wall—by going against the design I ruin, I destroy my iPad. I can say this is mine to do whatever I want to with, and you could be like, yeah, but you're an idiot if you do that because you're doing violence.

In the same way, when people say I'm my own person, I can do whatever I want with myself, that's a statement where you're going against your design. You are made for God and by God to be with God, to be used in the way and to function in the way that God has designed you to be. And I know that's hard. We live in a culture like, I'm me, I can do whatever I want to. That's a very debatable statement because you're made by the goodness of a God who says, "In my image, in my likeness, with my blessing." He's designed you this way. So to defy your design means there are parts of you that will no longer work right. Parts of you that will not function the way they're supposed to work.

And we see this in this passage that as a result, your emotions, your rationality, and your choices are gonna be off. They're not gonna work right. An independent, self-shepherding sheep—those things aren't gonna work.

Emotional, Volitional, and Intellectual Distortion

Let me show you this emotional distortion. This is what happens when sheep are self-shepherding, right? When the shepherd of our souls appears on the stage in human history, what does it say? No thanks, we don't like him. Right?

He had no form or comeliness that we should desire him, no beauty that we should cherish him.

Something is wrong with sheep, with the way a sheep feels when it emotionally rejects its shepherd. Don't want him. Something's wrong with us in terms of revelation, our choices. When the shepherd of our souls appears on the stage in human history, this is what we did:

He was despised and rejected. A man of sorrow is acquainted with grief.

Despised, rejected—that's purposeful. Humans looked at him and said, I don't want him. No thank you. There was something distorted. When a sheep, who's a self-governing sheep, if you choose, if you volitionally reject your shepherd, something's wrong.

And finally, intellectual distortion. When the shepherd of our souls appears on the stage of human history:

We considered him worthless, as one from whom men hide their faces. He was despised and we esteemed him not.

Esteemed means what we think about him. Our volition, our emotion, our rationality—all of it is distorted when we are self-shepherding sheep, when we choose to go our own way. A sheep that defies its sheepness and rejects its shepherd is a sick sheep.

One really amazing pastor, now deceased, John Stott, used to say it this way: "The essence of sin is me substituting myself for God." Now I think that's really helpful because there are other definitions we use of sin—missing the mark, falling short of the standard—that are true. But when you are like, I'm gonna be my shepherd, I'm gonna be my own shepherd and go my own way, you are in a sense saying I am God of my life. I'm the Lord, I call the shots. And there's sort of no in between. This is sort of like pregnant or dead. There's a binary. Right? So for us to be like, I want God but I want to be my own shepherd, that doesn't work. There's one God in your life and it's either you calling all your own shots or it's God and you're saying He gets to say. And the essence of sin, Stott says, is to substitute ourselves for God.

You know, just because soul sickness doesn't come with a cough or a rash, we may not realize we're sick. In fact, you may look around and you're like, everybody's like this—which is exactly my point, right? Just because you can go back to the two-year-old class and they're like, "Mine, me first," you're like, "Yeah, this is the natural condition. I'm like, it's normal." This is a widespread sickness we all got here. This is an epidemic, but it's not normal. We're all sick.

Some of you who are Christians this morning may be tempted to tune me out. You're like, finally, we're getting a sermon for the non-Christians who are here this morning.

You know, those people, he's talking to those people who don't know that Jesus is a shepherd. Somebody needs this sermon, not me. Grocery list, right? But watch out. Soul sickness affects all people. Christians don't stop sinning when they become Christians. I don't know if you've noticed that. Exhibit A, right?

In fact there may be no more important warning I could give to our church right now in this political moment. Oh, got your attention. I saw some eyeballs. Right? Political? Yes. I need to warn you about being independent, self-shepherding sheepness—that sickness.

One of the ways that you see the soul sickness in you, if you're a Christian, is you're tired of Jesus. You're bored. Heard it all before. Tell me something I don't know. The soup du jour in America is wanting to be in a body of other people that all think the same and believe the same and evaluate everything the same. When uniformity with regard to political ideology is the main thing, or same thinking about economic policy or total agreement about social issues—when those characterize a church, that's not a church anymore, it's a club.

And it is the tendency everybody's doing this right now. I want to be in a church where everybody's like me. Danger, Will Robinson. Beware of yourself. Because when a church ceases to be about Jesus in the middle and it becomes about something else, it is not a church anymore, it's a club. And that's really dangerous for your soul.

My favorite thing about our church is we're about Jesus and lots of people disagree. They disagree with their pastor, they don't like the sermons. You're like, I'm not sure I agree with all this. Praise God. I don't want a church where everybody's exactly the same. We want Jesus to be the center of what we're doing here. And we need a flock. Beware the tendency of the human heart to say I don't need a flock and I'm tired of Jesus.

The good news is that God heals us. And he heals us over and over and over again because we're sick over and over and over again with this. And until Jesus comes back or you're home with him in glory, you're going to continue to get this sheep sickness where you're tempted to go your own way.

This passage describes in such detail the sufferings of Jesus. I could preach for the next ten years on this passage, so I'm not going to do that because you all have lunch. But you know, it describes the sufferings of Jesus. Anybody been to Waffle House recently? You order the hash browns—you can get them scattered, covered, and smothered, right? Which is the right way to get them. Scattered means they are cooked on the grill and not on a ring. Smothered means they're topped with grilled onions. Covered means they got cheese on them. And when I read this passage, it almost feels like all the things are just added on to Jesus—scattered, covered, smothered—like when we get despised, rejected, stricken, and afflicted. This complex order of everything that's dumped on Jesus.

What Does Jesus' Suffering Mean?

So I want to make this really simple today. What does it mean? What do all these sufferings mean? How does his suffering heal us? Now I got three ways you can understand that, and I'm going to build up to the last one. It can be a demonstration. Jesus' suffering could be a demonstration to you of something. It could be a moral example of something, or it can be a substitute. Ding ding ding. That's the one I'm going to.

So demonstration of God's love. Now some point out that Jesus' suffering and death is a demonstration—this is how much God loves you. And of course there's language of this in our Bibles.

God demonstrates his love for us in this: Christ dying for sinners — Romans 5

But it's not just that. Let me talk about this. Let's say that I had somebody in our congregation who's good with a video camera. Anybody know of someone like that? Maybe our associate pastor. Right? Meet me down at the train tracks by Neomond, and I'm like, hey, I want you to show up at 11:30. We're going to film this video, right on the train tracks by Neomond. You're like, okay, I'm tuning in for this. And I'm like, I just want to show this church how much I love this church. So I go and stand on the train tracks. You hear the dinging—ding ding ding—the arms are coming down and a freight train comes, or maybe the Carolinian, I don't know, and it comes and just runs me over. That's the end of the video.

Now you watch that video and you're like, wow, what an amazing pastor? No, you're like, you're an idiot. Like, what was that for? That was a needless demonstration. Did anybody ask you to do that, pastor? Nobody asked you to do that.

And it brings nothing. It doesn't do anything. Maybe it's a flex, but you only get to do it once. A lot of people understand the cross this way. I've heard so many people who are unbelievers in personal conversations say, "I didn't ask Jesus to do this" because they understand it as an empty gesture, a demonstration. They're like, "It doesn't make any sense."

No, it's entirely different if someone is on the tracks and the arms are coming down and I run. I am sprinting and I push them out of the way and in doing so I get killed. That's an entirely different scenario, isn't it? Because it's a substitute. It's a willing sacrifice. It is as it says here, rendering myself as a sin offering. Rendering myself an offering.

The Moral Example Paradigm

The second way people understand this is a moral example. Now I gotta be careful with this one because I'm gonna hurt you. But if you grew up in the church like I did, you probably heard the story. Let's put this up on the screen. Shel Silverstein had this book called The Giving Tree. And man, in the eighties we just ate this stuff up with a spoon in church, right? So it's kind of a simple story, pen and ink drawings, and it's about the relationship between a little boy and a tree. I'm gonna tell it to you real quick.

So little boy grows up, he loves the tree, he loves to swing in its branches and when he does so he's happy and the tree's happy. But as he grows up he becomes less happy. And so one day the boy comes to him and the tree says, "Boy, come swinging my branches." The boy says, "Don't want to do that anymore. What I need now is a house for my family." He's grown. The tree says, "Well, you can cut down my branches and make a house." And so he does, he builds a house. Boy comes back a little older, middle aged man. The tree says, "Boy, come play in my shade, swing on my branches," and the boy says, "I don't want to do that anymore. I'm really unhappy. I'd like to build a boat and sail away." And the tree says, "Okay, come and take my trunk." So he cuts down the trunk and makes it into a boat and he sails away. And finally the boy comes back as an old man. And the tree says, "Come, oh, I don't have any branches. Oh, come sit in my—I don't have any shade." And the old man now says, "It's okay. All I need is a stump." And the stump now says, "Well, at least you can sit on a stump." And he does. And the tree's happy and the boy's happy.

Now this was taught to me over and over, maybe some of you growing up—this is what God's like. This is what you're supposed to be like. Give, serve, love like this. Be like the tree. Moral example. You know what would be sort of the human equivalent of the giving tree? It would be an adult child of parents who are enablers. The child's an addict, they keep exasperating and depleting the family and there's no redemption. It's just giving and giving and giving and no redemption. Is that what Jesus came to do?

A lot of people find the cross reprehensible. They hate the cross because they find that the death of Jesus feels like child abuse. They're like, "How can a father say you do this, give like this? That's actually really unhealthy." And it's because they're looking at this as a moral example paradigm. This is what God's like, this is what you're supposed to do, go and do. It's crushing. It's weird.

But the death of Jesus was no divine child abuse. This was the settled plan of God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit in eternity past. This is why it says here,

It was the Father's will to crush him — Isaiah 53:10

But also as the active decision of the Son to offer himself as a sin offering. He offered himself. It's not a weird unhealthy story—it's a rescue.

A Rescue, Not an Example

When I was an early teenager I remember going over after delivering papers on my paper route to the neighbor's house, catty corner to our house. My mom was there with my siblings. My baby sister, ten years younger, fell in the pool. Nobody was watching. And I saw it. I jumped in the pool with my clothes on, pushed her out. Now that's a rescue.

How would it have been if I walked over the edge of the pool and I'm like, "Here's how you're going to swim. You're going to do this and you're going to hold your breath. You're going to kick at the same time. Or I've got a brochure for you now on swimming. Would you like to read this?" No, I mean, there's nothing like a rescue. A rescue is someone helpless, they're drowning right now. Jump in right now, push up. That's what we need.

This is why I like—demonstration of God's love, yes, it is that. Moral example, maybe. But substitute—there's nothing other than we can really conclude from this than substitute. This is the only interpretation of Jesus' death and suffering that makes any sense. Substitute.

John Stott said this: "The essence of sin is me substituting myself for God." Well, you know the rest of the statement. "The gospel is God substituting himself for me."

Jesus dying in my place, it's my substitute. To what end? Verse 11:

After he suffered he will see the light of life and be satisfied. By knowledge of him my righteous servant will justify many and he will bear their iniquities. — Isaiah 53:11

That word justify—man, that is a million dollar word in the Bible. The word justify is the same way we use the word in everyday language. Can you justify that statement? It means could you back up what you just said? Can you prove that point? Can you make that case at home? To justify us is to argue or to prove or to change someone's mind.

This is what Jesus came to do—to justify us by his self-sacrifice, to satisfy the righteous judgment of God on all of us who go our own way, against human sin. He will justify them and he will bear their wrongdoings, pay the price, and by his blood he changes the fate of all of us. The righteous condemnation that was against us is suddenly wiped away and you are declared righteous in his sight. That's why righteousness is such a part of this passage. This is why the giving tree is not the one we need. It's insufficient.

The Tree of Life

Let me say this in conclusion. We're going to put this picture as an artist's rendering. This is the tree we need. Somebody created this sculpture. It was temporarily in Sainte-Chapelle in Paris. This is an artist's rendering of the tree of life.

Now the tree of life appears in a couple places in your Bible. It's in Genesis in the garden. And there are two trees actually. A lot of people just think there's the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but there's also a tree of life. And what would have happened if Adam and Eve, after eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, had wandered over and eaten of the tree of life? They would have lived forever but in sin, apart from the Lord. Instead, God casts them out of the garden so they won't eat of that tree, because he knows there's a time when we will eat of that tree.

At the end of the Bible, if you turn to the very last chapter, there's this beautiful picture. There is the tree of life and it's covered in fruit. It says:

For the healing of the nations. — Revelation 22:2

It's for the healing of the nations. We have all kinds of stories of trees. They're in Harry Potter, they're in Lord of the Rings, they're in Chronicles of Narnia. We have lots of trees, and I think it's because we have some unfinished business with the tree. We have some unfinished business with this tree. And you're hungry—you may not even know it—for this tree.

Jesus went and took the tree of the curse. He went and suffered on the cross to bring you into relationship, to bring your healing. But what is ultimately to come is eating from this tree—the healing of the nations. Everything in you made right and whole. This is what we're really hungry for. Not the giving tree. Not the tree that gives and gives and gives and sort of satisfies in some short way, but this fullness. This is what you long for.

The Son of God takes on our humanity, becomes truly God and truly human so that he might take away the tree of the curse and give us the tree of blessing. Come to the doctor this morning, would you? There's more wrong with you than you know, but there's more right in Jesus than you can imagine. He wants to heal the places you don't even know about that are hurt. The longings that you can barely bear to name. The things that you hope for and you're like, that's never gonna happen.

More to come next week. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Prayer

Father, we thank you that the gospel goes way deeper and way wider than we could imagine. Father, I pray for my brothers and sisters. Lord, would Jesus not become old news for us? Protect us from ourselves. Protect us from wandering off into our shepherdless sheepness. Father, we pray that you would not only draw us closer to yourself but one another. That we would always be telling one another these things—that there is a longing and a fulfillment to our longing that nothing in this life will fulfill. There's a healing that nothing in this life will bring, and there's a hope that nothing can touch. Father, would we always be telling one another this story? We pray this in Christ's name, amen.

Let's respond to God's word together in song. Would you stand?