If you have brought your own
Bibles with you, I would encourage you to turn with me to the 53rd
chapter of the Book of the Prophecy of Isaiah, Isaiah chapter 53. I shall begin the reading at
verse 1 of chapter 53 and conclude with verse 6, Isaiah Chapter
53, verses 1 through 6. Who hath believed our message,
and to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed? For he grew
up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground,
he hath no form nor comeliness, and when we see him there is
no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected
of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And as
one from whom men hide their face, he was despised and we
esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten
of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions,
He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace
was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed. All we, like sheep,
have gone astray. We have turned every one to his
own way, and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. Many who have studied the book
of the prophecy of Isaiah have called Isaiah the evangelist
of the Old Testament, and they have done this for good reasons.
An evangelist is basically one who proclaims or announces the
evangel, that is, the good news of God's saving mercy in Jesus
Christ. And when one takes in hand the
book of the prophecy of Isaiah, one is struck again and again
with some of the richest statements of the mercy and kindness of
God to sinners to be found anywhere in all of the word of God. Furthermore,
those announcements of God's mercy and kindness to sinners
are again and again shown to be mercies which will flow from
a unique person called in the prophecy of Isaiah, the Servant
of Jehovah. And it is that Servant of Jehovah
who is the subject of this portion of the Word of God which has
been read in your hearing. And in this particular section,
the prophet Isaiah is describing the sufferings of the Servant
of Jehovah with the details of an eyewitness. As one reads the
entire chapter that was read in your hearing, there is in
that chapter such a collection of details concerning the sufferings
of Jehovah that you think surely this must be an eyewitness who
actually beheld with his physical eyes the sufferings which the
servant of Jehovah was to undergo. And yet the wonder of it is,
he described these events no fewer than 800 years before they
ever came to pass. But not only does Isaiah give
us these great details concerning the sufferings of the servant
of Jehovah, but he then interprets the significance of those details
as only one could do whose eyes spiritually were opened to understand
the true spiritual significance of the sufferings that he already
described. Because, you see, the gospel
is not simply an announcement concerning the details of the
sufferings of the servant of Jehovah, but it also involves
God's meaning in terms of those sufferings. The gospel is not
merely the announcement that Christ died, but it is the announcement
that Christ died for our sins. And so it is proper to think
of Isaiah the prophet as Isaiah the evangelist, because as no
other Old Testament prophet, it was given to this man of God
to set forth the great details concerning the sufferings of
the servant of Jehovah, and then to give us God's own interpretation
of those sufferings. Now, it is in the midst of this
very careful and detailed description of the suffering of the servant
of Jehovah that the Prophet makes the great statement that will
form the focal point of our meditation this evening. Isaiah 53 and verse
6, All we like sheep have gone astray, We have turned every
one of us to his own way, And the Lord hath laid on him the
iniquity of us all. Now in order to think our way
through this beautiful, this simple, and yet profound statement
of the Word of God, I want you to notice with me that we have
basically two units of thought given to us by the Holy Spirit. First of all, there is a description
of our desperate situation. There is a description of our
desperate situation. In the language, all we like
sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one of us to his
own way. is nothing more or less than
a very careful and accurate description of our desperate situation as
sinners, then the second major unit of thought is this wonderful
announcement of God's gracious provision, and the Lord hath
laid on Him the iniquity of us all. Or perhaps we might approach
the text by saying it first of all conveys some bad news. And the bad news concerns you
and me. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned every one of us
to our own way. That's the bad news. But then
it's followed by the good news. And the good news tells us what
God has done and the Lord have laid on him the iniquity of us
all. Or we might say, with equal accuracy,
this verse contains the indictment of God's holy law in the light
of the claims of the Almighty God with respect to every one
of us. His law condemns us. His law
consigns us to death and to judgment because we have gone astray like
lost sheep. We have turned to our own ways.
But thank God the text also contains a wonderful pronouncement of
the gospel. The Lord hath laid on him the
iniquity of us all. And now let us then seek to understand
the mind of the Spirit in this glorious text. First of all,
what it says to us in this description of our desperate situation. You see, the Bible is not a flattering
book. The Bible tells us precisely
what we are. It tells us precisely what is
wrong with us. But as Robert Murray McShane
said, a godly Scottish preacher of another generation, that man
is your best friend who tells you the most truth about yourself. And as a preacher of the gospel,
I would be your friend tonight. I would be your best friend.
And I cannot be your friend, let alone your best friend, unless
I tell you the truth about yourself." And in this text, God has told
us the truth about ourselves. He has described our desperate
situation, and notice He does so in terms of two basic categories
of thought. First of all, a statement about
an unreasonable strain. All we like sheep have gone astray. We, every one of us, like a great
flock of sheep, have gone away from the side of the one who
is our rightful shepherd. We have gone out of the path
that is marked for us as the shepherd. We have exposed ourselves
to the danger of defenseless sheep who are away from the side
of the shepherd who is their great protector and out of the
path which always results in their safety and in their well-being. One man who has studied for years
and very carefully the Hebrew language suggests that a good
translation of this would be, like a flock of sheep. that has lost its shepherd, all
of us has gone astray. Now what does that mean in concrete
terms? All we like sheep have gone astray. What does it mean when the prophet
describes our desperate situation under the figure of a great flock
of sheep who have left the side of their shepherd? Let me suggest
that it involves at least two things. First of all, we have
left the living God as the supreme object of our love and our devotion. When a sheep leaves the side
of a shepherd, he leaves the side of that one to which he
is to be attached in the deepest bonds of love and devotion. You and I, as creatures made
in the image of God, were made to know God. We were made to
hold communion with God. The thing that sets us apart
from every one of God's creatures except the angels, all of the
brute creation, the dogs, the cows, the cats, our precious
little parakeets and any other pet animals we may have, that
which makes us qualitatively different is the fact that you
and I were made with the capacity to know God, and were made in
such a way that our true meaning in life could only be discovered
as God Himself was the supreme object of our love and our devotion. And the moment Any creature made
in the image of God, made to know God, made to hold communion
with God, any creature leaves this God as the supreme object
of his love and devotion, he comes under this description,
all we like sheep have gone astray. And in a very real sense, this
verse was fulfilled in the Garden of Eden. When Adam, our first
father, who by divine appointment was constituted the head of the
human race, when Adam, in disobedience to God, partook of the forbidden
fruit, the scripture says, as in Adam, all die. And we went astray in our first
father Adam. And from the time we came forth
from our mother's wombs, we are as those who belong to that great
flock of sheep who have gone astray from the living God as
the supreme object of love and devotion. Let me ask you a simple
question as you sit here this evening. What is the first and
greatest commandment of all the commandments of God? Some of
you are well enough acquainted with your Bibles to know the
answer to that question. A certain Jewish religious leader
once asked that question of our Lord Jesus Christ. It's recorded
in Matthew's Gospel, chapter 22. And he said, Teacher, which
is the first and greatest commandment? And you remember the answer of
the Lord Jesus? The first and greatest commandment is this.
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God. with all thy heart, with
all thy mind, with all thy soul, and with all thy strength. Now
follow closely. If that is the first and greatest
commandment, what is the first and greatest sin anyone can commit? Is it murder? Is it adultery? Is it thievery? Is it Sabbath-breaking? Is it cursing? Is it swearing? Is it theft? No, no. If the highest commandment is
to love God with all the heart, mind, soul, and strength, the
greatest sin any creature can commit is to fail to love God
with all the heart, with all the mind, with all the soul,
and with all the strength. And who, sitting here tonight,
from the youngest to the oldest, would dare to say, from the dawning
of consciousness, that is, from the moment you can remember anything,
you remember setting the living God before you as your supreme
object of love and devotion, so that in every circumstance
of every day, in every relationship, your most desired object was
to please the living God. There's not a person here in
his right mind who would dare to say that that was your experience.
That's why the prophet can say, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have indeed gone astray from
the living God As the great heavenly shepherd whom we should each
one love with heart, mind, soul, and strength, we have gone away
from him as the supreme object of our love and our devotion. And yet so seldom do we think
of that as sin. We think of sin in terms of social
ills. We think of sins in terms of
those things which society may yet frown upon. But, my friend,
you will never have an understanding of sin in the light of the scriptures
until you understand by the teaching of the Spirit through the Word
that you were made to know God. You were made that that God should
have the place of unrivaled affection in your heart, and failure to
give it to Him is to be guilty of the greatest sin. One of the
saddest verses in all of the Bible is found in Paul's description
of the human race in the third chapter of the epistle to the
Romans, when summarizing the condition of all men, both Jew
and Greek, Quoting from the Old Testament, he says this, Romans
chapter 3 and verse 10, as it is written, there is none righteous,
no, not one. There is none that understandeth. There is none. There is none. There is none that seeketh after
God. I say that's one of the saddest
verses in all the Bible. Of the multitudes of the billions
of creatures who have been brought forth, each one made to know
God, each one under solemn obligations to love Him with all the heart,
mind, soul, and strength, there is not one that seeks after that
God by nature. And so the prophet can say, all
we like sheep have gone astray. But we have not only left the
living God as the supreme object of our love and devotion, we
have also left the law of God as the supreme standard of thought
and of conduct. We have left the law of God as
the supreme standard of thought and of conduct. For you see,
we were not only made to know God, to have hearts that beat
with Him or toward Him as the supreme object of our love. You
and I were made to obey God. We were not made to be little
independent, self-determining gods. choosing for ourselves
what is right and what is wrong, why we shall live and how we
shall live. No, no. The God who made us placed
us under his own gracious authority, demanding nothing but what is
good for us and demanding nothing but that which would glorify
him, which is why the scripture says the law of God is holy and
spiritual and just and good. It is like the God who gave it.
Now I want you to notice the teaching of Romans chapter 8
and verse 7. Paul describes every one of these
straying sheep in this very graphic language. Look at it. The carnal
mind, that is, the basic inward disposition of every person who
has only what he was conceived and born with. The person who
has never been born of the Spirit of God, the person who has never
been wrought upon by the mighty power of God in grace, the carnal
mind, now notice the language, is enmity against God, for it
is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be. Now notice the language. The
carnal mind, it doesn't say, is at enmity or at warfare with
God. It says the carnal mind is enmity
itself against God. In other words, the basic disposition
of every man, every woman, every boy, every girl, every person
who has ever lived upon the face of the earth, apart from the
grace of God, it could all be summarized in terms of a clenched
fist. pointed heaven, the carnal mind
is enmity against God. Now, how does it express its
enmity? Look at the next part of the
verse for it is not subject to the law of God. You see, our
enmity against God does not necessarily express itself by everyone becoming
an atheist and saying, I don't believe there's a God. There
is no God, there is no heaven, there is none of it. Some do
that. But it says our carnal mind, which is enmity against
God, finds expression at this point. It is not subject to the
law of God. That is, the righteous demands
of God expressed in His law, the summary of which is given
to us in the Ten Commandments. And the greatest proof that Isaiah
was not overstating the case when he said, all we like sheep
have gone astray, that we like a great flock of sheep have not
only left God as the supreme object of love and devotion,
but we've left his law as the supreme standard of thought and
conduct. The greatest proof is just to
bring your life and thought alongside those ten words that God gave
upon Mount Sinai. That God says, Thou shalt have
no other gods before me in the light of who I am, the only true
and living God, your maker, your creator, your sustainer, your
benefactor. Worship no other God but me and
worship me every day, every moment of all your existence. And what
have we done? We show our enmity against God
by setting our affection upon a thousand other things and making
those things our God. Paul says in Colossians covetousness,
the grasping after things is idolatry. How does a man break
the first commandment when he goes out into the woods and cuts
down a tree and brings it home and carves it into a little garden,
sets it on the mantle of his fireplace in his lovely middle
class home and bows down and does some mumbo jumbo and worships
it? No, no. He shows his idolatry in terms
of possessions, house, car, career, clothes, face, form, man will
make a God of anything. And anything which is the supreme
object of your love, anything for which you give your zeal
and the devotion of your heart and your energies at the expense
of obeying God, that's your God, and you're an idolater. God says, remember the Sabbath
to keep it holy. I've structured life in such
a way that there will be six days to fulfill your legitimate
task and to accomplish the labor necessary to sustain your life
and to provide for others. But I claim for myself in a peculiar
way, one day in seven, that on that day you may remember you're
not a dog, you're not a horse, you're not a cat, you're not
a cow. You're made in my image. You are made to know me, made
to love me, made to hold communion with me. And in my goodness,
I've given you one day in seven. that you may draw aside from
your normal mundane responsibilities. Set your mind upon the great
realities and that with concentration for a whole day upon who I am. Go to hear my word. Use the day
for public and private meditation and communion with those who
know that they are not dogs or cats or beasts, but our creatures
stand for eternity. What do you do with God's commandment?
Remember the Sabbath to keep it holy. it's not going to monkey
around with my days i've got a right to do what i want but
on the weekends i've worked hard during the week and i enjoy watching
the ballgame sunday afternoon and i enjoy this and i enjoy
that my friend does it matter to you that almighty god has
claims upon one day in seven you say i don't care if he does
i'll do my own thing that's right that's exactly what i say i meant
when he said all we like sheep have gone astray We've gone astray
from God's law as the supreme standard of thought and conduct.
God says, thou shalt not commit adultery. And in that commandment,
according to the Lord Jesus, God forbids not just the act,
but the very thought of lust. God forbids us to set the mind
and the heart upon any object of sexual gratification. But
the legitimate object, and that is our own wives or husbands
within the sacred confines of the marriage bond. And every
time a man allows his eyes to glance over the glossy photographs
of unprincipled women who pose for playboy and penthouse, they
are saying, in essence, I don't care what Almighty God says. My sexual appetites are my own. You see how we have gone astray
from the living God and his law as the supreme standard of thought
and of conduct. Listen to me, children. Almighty
God has said, Honor thy father and thy mother. Give them the
respect that is due their position. When they make just and righteous
requirements, all the way from asking you to make your bed before
you go to school in the morning, taking out the garbage, drying
the dishes, it doesn't matter what it is. And inwardly you
crumble and fight against it and mumble. You see what you're
showing? You're one of those sheep who's gone astray. You're
one of those sheep who has turned aside from God's law as the supreme
standard of thought and of conduct. We could go right through every
one of the Ten Commandments and show that Isaiah is telling the
truth. Now, who has done this? Look
at the text. It says, All, all we like sheep
have gone astray. My friend, listen to me tonight.
Are you prepared to say that Isaiah was wrong? Are you so
blind to your own sin that you would dare to stand up in this
building tonight and say, oh, wait a minute, preacher, wait
just a minute. No, I haven't been exactly perfect,
but I've always loved God and I've always kept his law. Oh,
my friend, listen, listen. If you have any of your rational
faculties, listen to me. You can only say that if you
are pitifully and pathetically ignorant of your own heart. and of the most basic truths
of the word of God. For you have not had the living
God as the supreme object of your love and devotion every
hour of every day, of every week, of every month, of every year
of your life, nor have I. God's law has not been the supreme
standard of conduct in thought and in attitude and disposition.
All we like sheep have gone astray, and I said our desperate condition
involves a statement of unreasonable strain. For what is there in
God that makes him unworthy of your love and mine? What is there
in the being of God that makes him unworthy of being loved with
all the heart, all the mind, all the soul, and all the strength? Who sitting here tonight can
say that you have discovered something in God that makes him
unworthy of that kind of love? Who here can say that he has
found something in God's law that makes it unworthy of being
the regulating principle of every thought and motive and desire
of our hearts? The scripture says that law is
spiritual and holy and just and good. God being who he is and
man being who he is, that law is a perfect expression of what
he's right in the creature's relationship to God and the creature's
relationship to his fellow creature. How unreasonable that we should
stray from such a God, that we should stray from such a law. But it's the truth all We, like
sheep, have gone astray. But now notice in the second
place that this statement of our desperate condition involves
not only an unreasonable straying, but an unpending self-assertion. Look at the language of the text.
We have turned, and now he moves from this general group description
to a very specific individual application We have turned every
one of us to his own way. You see, that's a statement concerning
an unbending self-assertion that is true of every one of us. Now notice, it does not say We
have turned every one of us to drunkenness. If the Bible had
said every one of us had turned to drunkenness, you would find
and prove the first error that's ever been found and proven in
the Bible. It simply would not be true. There are sitting in
this building men, women, boys and girls who've never been drunk.
It doesn't say we've turned everyone to immorality. We've turned everyone
to stealing. We've turned every one of us
to lying or cheating, insensitivity to the poor, covetousness, greed
or gossip. There are some of us who, by
the grace of God, have been kept from some of those sins, at least
outwardly. But notice what it does say.
Look at the text. We have turned every one of us
to his own way. In other words, The common denominator
of every single sinner is that he has turned into a course of
unbending self-assertion. Let me put it in contemporary
jargon, as I try to thunder it over the train's horn. We've
all turned to doing our own thing. That's it. If we put the text
in twentieth-century Americanese, that's what we come up with.
We've turned to doing our own thing. We've turned everyone
to his own way. And the best commentary upon
this is 2 Corinthians 5 and verse 15. Here we read the words of
the apostle, speaking of the condition of every person by
nature 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse
15, and that he died for all that is Christ, the one dying
for all that is all his people and those who come to life in
him, that they that live should no longer, here are the words,
live unto themselves. But unto him who for their sakes
died and rose again. But that's the description of
every person by nature living unto, and what's the great goal
of life? Himself. Living to please self. Doing my own thing. And that is the fundamental common
denominator of every single fallen son and daughter of Adam. Now,
that may lead to open immorality. It may lead to a very moral,
upright life. It may lead, in some cases, to
great irreligion and blasphemy and opposition to the Church
of Christ. It may lead to someone being
very, very kind and cordial to the gospel and to the Lord Jesus
and to the people of God. But whatever it leads to, The
common denominator of every single sinner is he lives to please
himself. We have turned every one of us
to his own way, to his own way. And there's no exception. Each
of us has turned to his own way. And again, that brings us right
to the heart of what sin is. Sin is the creature turning away
from God as the supreme object of his love, his law as the supreme
rule of conduct, and turning in upon himself and living life
to please himself in terms of obeying the impulses of his own
depraved nature. That's why Jesus could say, for
from within, out of the heart, and then he gives the category
of sin. that are the expression of turning to our own way. Now, my friend, has it ever come
home to your heart that this is a description of you? Are
you prepared to stand up tonight and say, Isaiah, wait a minute,
wait a minute, you never should have written that! You didn't
see that down there in 1980 in Yazoo City, I would be sitting
there when that preacher came and preached that text! And Isaiah,
I want to inform you, you're wrong! Anyone here prepared to
tell the prophet he's wrong? Don't be prepared to do so unless
you're prepared to tell Almighty God he's wrong, because the prophet
was the mouthpiece of God. This is God's statement about
the real situation. Our desperate situation A situation
described in terms of an unreasonable strain, in terms of an unbending
self-assertion. And you may ask the question,
well, how does God feel about all of this? And the Bible's
very plain about how God feels about it. On the one hand, his
holy anger burns in the face of man's rebellion. How do we
know it? Turn to the early chapters of
Genesis and we see that sad, sad picture of God banishing
Adam from the garden because of sin. A few chapters later,
we see the whole face of the earth covered with water. And
we see upon the face of the water the bloated bodies of infants
and young people and adults, all who have been blotted out
in the flood that God sent upon the world of the ungodly, sparing
only one man and his family. You want to know how God feels
when men turn to their own way? When men say, Our sexual capacities
are our business. We do with them what we please.
And if we want to turn our passions as men toward men, no one can
tell us what to do. It's our urge and we'll do as
we please with it until that became a lifestyle in Sodom.
You want to know how God feels about it? Stand outside the cities
of the plain and see the smoke ascending up when Almighty God
sends fireballs of brimstone down from heaven upon Sodom. And upon the more. How does God
feel. When his creatures made to know
him and love him and obey him turn away from him and turn away
from his law his righteous anger is provoked so the scripture
says God is angry with the wicked every day. Thou hast all workers
of iniquity. But more than that. God's justice
has been offended and demands to be satisfied. That's why the
word of God says, cursed is everyone that continues not in all things
that are written in the book of the law to do them. The wages
of sin is death. As a just God, God is committed
to uphold his law. And when men break his law, the
only way left God has to uphold his law is to punish the lawbreaker. That's why the scripture says,
the soul that sinneth, it shall die. Thank God, not only is his
holy anger stirred and his holy justice stirred, but his holy
love is pained and grieved as he sees the creature departing
from him. You read some of the saddest
verses in all of the Bible in Genesis six, when God beholds
the whole race turning aside into the most advanced forms
of sin that brought the flood upon the entire world. It says
that it grieved God in his heart. that he had made man. It grieved
him at his heart that he had made man. When the Lord Jesus
came to the brow of the city of Jerusalem and looked down
upon it and realized that in a few short years that city would
be absolutely leveled by the advancing armies of Rome until
not one stone in the temple would be left on top of another and
that mothers with child would be ripped up. And babies and
infants and teenagers would be destroyed in the carnage and
the bloodshed. It says that beholding the city,
he wailed over it. He wept. And he cried, Jerusalem,
Jerusalem. My friend, listen to me tonight.
You may not take seriously what Isaiah says about you. You may
not take seriously that like a sheep you've gone astray. that
you've turned your own way, but mark it. Almighty God who made
you takes it very seriously. Almighty God who made you takes
it very seriously. Every one of your sins provokes
his wrath. Every one of your turning to
your own way provokes his holy justice. Thank God the text doesn't
end with the bad news. Or I doubt I could continue as
a preacher. Look with me now at the second
part of the text as we quickly seek to work our way through
it. This text not only contains this description of our desperate
condition, but thank God the bad news is followed with the
good news. And here it is. Notice. And the
Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. And here we have a
statement of the gracious provision of God from our desperate condition
to God's gracious provision. And now I want you to notice
several things about that. First of all, notice the author
of this provision. Look at it. And the Lord hath
laid on him In other words, our condition is so desperate that
unless Almighty God intervenes, there is no hope. But thank God
He has intervened. A beautiful parallel to this
verse is Ephesians 2, 1 through 4. In the first three verses
of Ephesians, you have that graphic description in differing language,
but it's the same thing in essence. You hath he made alive who were
dead in your trespasses and sins, wherein ye once walked according
to the course of this world, according to the prince of the
power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of
disobedience, among whom we all had our conversation in time
past, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind,
and were by nature children of wrath. That is, we were under
the wrath and anger of God, even as the rest. And you know what
the next two words are? But God. But God. And if there had been no but
God, we would forever be the children of wrath. And we would
all ultimately sink into hell under the pure and righteous
wrath of God to be eternal monuments of that holy aspect of his character. But thank God there is that intervention
of the Lord himself. Jehovah, he is called in this
passage, the great eternal I am, the great God of covenant grace
and mercy. And you see, the provision that
meets our need is the provision in which God takes the initiative,
the provision of which God alone, God himself, is the great author. My friend, listen very carefully.
Do you want to have a good rule of thumb by which to judge any
religious system as to whether or not it's true? Here's a good
rule of thumb. It's not exhaustive, but it's
pretty accurate. Here's a good rule of thumb.
Whatever that religious system says about how sinners get fixed
up, what place does God have in the whole scheme? Does He
have the first place, the middle place, and the last place? Is
it of God from beginning to end? Or does it start with man and
end with man? Or start with man and have a
little bit of God sandwiched in between and end with man?
You see, the doctrine of the Bible is that our desperate condition
can only be met by the intervention and the activity of Almighty
God. And that's the truth from Genesis
to Revelation. When Adam sinned, he could do
only one thing with reference to God. You remember what he
did? He ran from Him and tried to hide from Him, but it was
God who took the initiative and came to him. And from that incident
onward, no sinner is ever rescued. but what God has taken the initiative. And so the author of this provision
in grace is God. But now what's the method? Look
at the strange language. The method of God's provision
is all bound up in this language. And the Lord, that is, Jehovah
God, has made to light on him, that is, the servant of Jehovah,
the iniquity of us all. Oh, you say that sounds like
pretty heavy language. I can't get hold of that. My
friend, listen to me. You better put your thinking
cap on and cry to God, the Holy Ghost, that you may get hold
of this, because in this and in this alone is your salvation.
God's one method For coming to us in our desperate condition
is the method of this verse. What is it? It is the substitutionary
sin bearing of the servant of Jehovah. The Lord hath made to
rest upon him that is the servant of Jehovah, the iniquity of us
all. And in that little part of the
verse is bound up the whole gospel. It tells us, first of all, that
God's method pertains to his dealings with his son, who is
pictured in this passage as the servant of Jehovah. Our salvation
is bound up not in what we do for God, or in the name of God,
or with respect to the church of God, but it's bound up with
what God the Father does to God the Son. You say, what? My friend, yes. Your salvation
and mine are bound up, not in what we do for God, not in what
we do to God or to his church, but our salvation is bound up
with what God the Father does to God the Son, who is the servant
of Jehovah, God incarnate. And what does he do to him according
to Isaiah? This is what he does to him.
Jehovah causes to rest. That's what the word means. Jehovah
causes to alight, to rest upon him, the iniquity of us all. You see, sin means guilt. Guilt
means punishment. And if the guilt is transferred,
then the punishment is vicariously, that is, borne by another. Picture it this way. Lighten
this microphone to my right. as the servant of Jehovah, the
Lord Jesus. The scripture says of him that
he was holy. He was harmless. He was undefiled. He was separate from sinners.
He could look out into the face of his contemporaries who were
hawking every step he made, listening to every word, watching every
action. And he could look them right
in the eye and say, which one of you can convince me or convict
me of sin? And his worst enemies were silent.
He was sinless, not only in the eyes of men, but you remember,
God himself spoke from heaven and he said, this is my son in
whom I am well pleased. Everything about him pleases
me. Now, follow closely. This verse says that Jehovah,
his father in the mystery of the Trinity, the father made
to rest or to light upon him. That handkerchief is the sins
of all those who believe upon him. This verse says that the
father made to light, to rest, to come to bear upon his son,
the servant of Jehovah, the sin of us all. Now, surely he did
not make his son polluted with the defilement of our sin. He
did not make his son chargeable with the commission of our sin.
No, what he did was to lay upon his son the guilt of our sin. Now follow closely. When guilt
is upon anyone in the presence of God, and God deals with that
person in justice, He does one thing. He punishes the guilty
one. And that's why we read down in
this 53rd chapter of Isaiah, and we read the language of verse
10. It pleased the Lord to bruise
Him. Who is to him the servant of
Jehovah when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin? In other words, my friend, in
a mystery that we can never fathom, God the Father bruised God the
Son when God the Son had the guilt of the sins of men laid
upon him. And what did that bruising mean?
Did it mean simply that the Father permitted the scribes and the
Pharisees to stand around His cross and to taunt Him and to
mock Him and say, Ha, ha, you saved others! Come on, show your
stuff! Save yourselves! Come down from
the cross! Do your thing! We'll believe
on you! The Father did permit that. But that was not the Father
making our sins delight upon Him. No. When our sins were charged
to the Son of God, It pleased the Lord directly to bruise him. It pleased God the Father to
sink the soul of His Son into the darkness, into the abyss,
into the blackness and the agony of a felt hell, until under the
pressure of that felt agony of the darkness of the deepest depths
of hell, He cried out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken
me? My friend, listen to me. That
cry is either sheer nonsense or the most cruel cry ever uttered
upon the face of the earth, unless what Isaiah says is true. Was
Jesus mistaken when he said, my God, why have you forsaken
me? I can take the abandonment of
these poor blind religious leaders. Father, forgive them. They know
not what they do. I can take the forsaking of my
own disciples in the hour of my need. They have fallen before
the weakness of the flesh. The Spirit is willing, but the
flesh is weak. I can overlook and forgive the
folly of my disciples. I can bear even the mockery and
the shame and the spittle of these poor, blind, bigoted religious
leaders. But My Father, My Father, why
hast Thou abandoned Me? And if the heavens were ever
pierced with an answer, the answer would have been this, My Son.
I have abandoned You because You are bearing the sins of men. You are bearing the sins of all
those for whom you willingly consented to become substitute
in surety and representative. My son, when in eternity I chose
a people in you and gave them to you to be your responsibility
on their behalf to become incarnate, on their behalf to live under
the law and render perfect obedience to the law, and on their behalf
to go to that place of execution and bear the penal sanctions
of the law, to bear the wages of sin which is death. The great
mystery of the cross is this, that the Father bruises the Son
and bruises Him with those pangs of separation which is the essence
of hell. And we cannot fathom it. Martin
Luther one time was said to have sat for some three hours at his
desk, concentrating all the powers of that mighty mind and that
sensitive soul upon these words, My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? And it is said at the end of
the three hours, he pushed himself back from his desk, threw up
his hands and exclaimed, Oh, God, who can fathom this? God, forsaken by God. My friends, we cannot fathom
it, but in that is our only hope and all our salvation. The divine
method of dealing with the problem of sin is not to wink at it,
for the Bible says thou art of purer eyes than to look upon
iniquity or to simply pass over it. Thou wilt by no means clear
the guilty. It was not to lower the demands
of the law which says the wages of sin is death. No, no, there
was but one way for God to be God in all the integrity of his
holiness and justice and for guilty sinners to be set free.
And that was for God the Son to become their substitute and
to bear the bruising of the Father. That's why Paul could say in
Romans 8, 32, he that spared not his son. Now, you kids understand
what that means. When you ask someone to spare
you, you mean, don't give me all that's coming to me. Don't
give me everything I deserve. The old saying, spare the robbed
and spoil the child. We mean withhold the robbed and
spoil the child. The scripture says he spared
not his son. That is, he held nothing back.
He brought down all the fury of his righteous, holy anger
upon his son. In the language of a hymn that
I wish were in our hymn books, but it isn't. This is the heart
of the gospel. Oh, Christ. What burdens bowed
thy head? Our load was laid on thee. Thou stoodest in the sinner's
stead. It's bare, all ill for me. Death and the curse were in our
cup. O Christ was full for thee. But thou hast drained the last
dark drop. Tis empty now for me. That bitter
cup, love, drink it up! Now blessings draft for me. Jehovah bade his sword awake. O Christ, it woke hence thee.
Thine open bosom was its ward. Now sleeps that sword for me. My friends, that's the gospel.
not some nebulous, undefined notion that in some way or another
Jesus was a good man who died a tragic death, and if I believe
that, then everything's all right. That's not the gospel. The gospel
is that a holy God hates your sin and hates my sin. A holy
God will punish sin and sinners. And that holy God so loved the
world as to give His only begotten Son to bruise his son. You say to me, preacher, how
do I know that in the death of that one there was enough to
take away the sin of any sinner who comes? Oh, my friend, God's
given a receipt. It's a wonderful thing to have
a receipt on an outstanding bill that when the bill collector
comes very humbly, of course, you just say, sir, paid in full. There it is. And you know what
the receipt is from God Almighty? The open tomb in Bethlehem, in
Jerusalem. The scripture says he was delivered
up for our offenses, raised for our justification. What were
the last words of Jesus on the cross? Do you remember? The last
words were these. It is finished. I am finished. As though death
were conquering him. Oh, no, no. It's one word in
the original. Tetelestai. It hath been accomplished. Then it says, He gave up His
Spirit. He was in control. He was a conqueror
upon that cross. And somehow the Father conveyed
to the Lord Jesus that indeed as that cup which He shrunk from
in the garden had been placed to His lips, and He held it to
His lips through those dark hours upon Calvary, the Father somehow
conveyed to the Son that the last drop had been drunk, and
when it was, the Lord Jesus could, with a hand of loving obedience,
push the cup from his lips and say in triumph, It is finished! Well, how do I know it's really
finished? God says, Well, first of all,
I'll leave my son in the grave long enough to prove to everyone
it wasn't just half a death, it was a real death. And then
on the third day, God raised him from the dead. And you know
what God will say? Paid in full. And the resurrection is the receipt
of God Almighty that the sins of his people were paid for. My friends, that's the gospel.
That's the glorious announcement that Jehovah has done something
and all that he has done He is done in the substitutionary sin
bearing of the servant of Jehovah. Now, in closing, you ask me the
question and I answer. What do I do in the light of
all of this? If I sit here tonight and confess I've never seen myself
this way before, I've been just drifting through life, kind of
a nice middle-class, ordinary, good, religious church member,
but I've seen things about me tonight that I never saw before.
I've seen my heart. I see that I am one of those
sheep who've gone astray. I have not loved God. I thought
sin was in this, that, or the other, but I see my sin. What
can I do?" My friend, the answer is found right here in this same
prophet. Listen to him as he speaks to
you from chapter 55 in verse 6 and 7. Seek ye the Lord while
he may be found. Call ye upon him while he is
near and he's near in the preaching of his word. But you say, in
what way shall I seek him? In what way shall I call upon
him? And the prophet says, listen to me and I'll answer you. Let
the wicked forsake his way. There it is again. We've turned
everyone to his own way. The prophet now says God has
done something for all the wrath and all the judgment you deserve
for turning to your own way. Now, in the light of that, seek
the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him while he's near.
And to do so, you must forsake your way. That way in which you
are the boss, in which your will and your plans and your notions
and your ideas and your passions and your lusts and your ambitions
are at the center. Forsake that way. Not a part
of it, not two parts of it, not three parts of it. Forsake your
way. Furthermore, look at the text.
Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts. This is no little deal of an
external reformation. You've got to be willing to deal
with the sins of the heart. Forsake the thoughts, those wrong
thoughts about God, about sin, about yourself, about salvation,
about the world, about possessions, about sex, about money. You've
got to be willing to forsake your thoughts about everything
and bring your mind subject to the thoughts of God. You say, well, what happens if
I do that? Well, look again. Let Isaiah tell you his words
are better than mine. Let him look at it now. Let him
return on to the Lord. You went astray like a sheep.
God was not the supreme object of your love and devotion. Now
turn to him. Take him as the supreme object
of your love and devotion. Take his son as your savior and
your Lord. Take his law as the rule of your
life. Return unto the Lord. You say,
but if I do, what treatment will I receive from him? Let the prophet
answer you. Look at his words and he will
have mercy upon him. and to our God that is returned
to our God for he will abundantly pardon you say Mr. Martin that
doesn't make sense You mean after this whole lifetime of living
to myself, going astray like a lost sheep, seeking the Lord
in faith and repentance, returning to Him, seeking mercy from His
Son. You mean just like that, all
my sins are forgiven? All of my past is blotted out?
I can't understand that. God says, I know all about that.
So look at the next verse. He says, For my thoughts are
not your thoughts. Neither are my ways your way,
saith the Lord. Isn't it wonderful how thoroughly
God knows us? He knows all the questions and
all the objections you raise, and He clears them all away.
Oh, my friend, sitting here tonight, may I entreat you as we close? What is there? What is there
about God, His Son, and His Gospel? What is there about the terms
of repentance and faith? that are not gracious and reasonable. Oh, my friend, may God help you
to do exactly what the prophet says you should do. Seek the
Lord. It doesn't say get a little religion.
It doesn't say make a decision. It doesn't say go through the
motions of a profession of faith. It says seek the Lord, have dealings
with God. And it tells you how to have
dealings with God in repentance and faith. Forsake your way.
Forsake your thoughts. Repentance. Faith. Turn to the
Lord in the confidence of his mercy and his pardon. And when
thoughts rise up saying that's too good to be true, it can't
be true. Remember, God says my thoughts are not your thoughts.
I'm not like you are. I'm God. I have labored in this past hour
and five minutes, my friends. As best I know how, in independence
upon the Holy Ghost, to open up what I believe is one of the
most simple and clear verses in all of the Bible concerning
the bad news and the good news. You will never appreciate the
good news of the last part of the verse until you take seriously
the bad news. All we like sheep have gone astray. We've turned every one of us
to his own way. But if you take the bad news
seriously and don't listen to the good news, it'll drive you
to despair. So God gives you both that you might be wooed
to salvation. And that's why we're here tonight
for one purpose, to be your servants for Christ's sake, to set before
you this gospel and to plead with you to embrace the Savior,
that you might know this salvation. If you sit here as one who says,
oh, yes, I'm Christian. My friend, are you a Christian
in the Bible way? Have you forsaken your way? Or
have you been deceived by this teaching you can trust Jesus
while still living your own way? You can have him as Savior, but
not as Lord. Where do you find that in the book? You don't find
pardon and mercy till you forsake your own way. If you're a professing
Christian who's dishonoring the name of God like millions in
this country, the so-called born-again generation, supposed to be 40
million born-again Christians in America, Forty million truly
born-again Christians living by the way of God's law would
shake this nation to its foundations. The abortion racket would be
run out into the ocean, and pornography would be sunk upon the garbage
heaps of every city. No, what we've got is a bunch
of people who name the name of Jesus with their lips, but who've
never forsaken their way. and returned unto the Lord and
embraced him and his way. And if you're part of that number,
my friend, give up your cheap, shallow religion. It may do for
now, but it won't do for the day of judgment. Oh, seek a true
and vital relationship to God in the person of his dear son. And I want to reiterate tonight,
as we have done in other nights, we are not priests. Pastor Justly,
his elders, myself, we're preachers, servants of Christ, telling you
the way of God. You can have direct dealings
with God sitting right where you are, but we are his servants. And if there are questions that
are unresolved in your mind that are a stumbling block in your
seeking the Lord and laying hold of his salvation, then it would
not be an imposition upon any of us for you to come. and to
share with us the concern that is a stumbling block to your
coming to Christ. And we will do our best by opening
the scriptures and praying with you and for you to be of help.
But my friend, no dealings with us are a substitute for having
dealings with the Lord. Let us pray. Our Heavenly Father, Our hearts
rejoice this night before the blazing light of the biblical
gospel. We thank you that in faithfulness
to our souls you have told us the bad news about us, but that
in love to our souls you have announced the good news. Take
the simple proclamation of your truth and make it effectual to
the salvation of sinners. to the confirmation of faith
in the hearts of your people, and grant that those who have
heard this word in this auditorium, those who have heard it in their
homes and in their cars by means of the radio, oh, may there be
many amongst them who will be drawn to the knowledge of our
Lord Jesus Christ. Seal then your word to our hearts,
and as we leave this building, guard us from the kind of idle
and senseless chatter that would drive your word from our thoughts. May our conversation be wholesome
and edifying and serve to rivet the truth upon our hearts. May
our conversation not be concerning this building, your servant,
or any other circumstances, but may it be of your son, his salvation,
and the glory of the gospel. Hear this prayer that together
we offer in your presence, and may the benediction of that presence
rest upon us and abide with us through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. These messages come to you from
the Mount Olive Presbyterian Church Tape Library at Post Office
Box 142, Mount Olive, Mississippi, 39119. USA, and are used with the permission
of the Second Presbyterian Church in Yazoo City, Mississippi, under
whose auspices these messages were given.