I preached from this text last
Sunday when we were in Arkansas. So if you've listened to it,
you're going to probably hear some things that you heard in
the message that I preached there, but I've had a week, and I always
end up seeing something else. So there'll be some things you
probably haven't heard if you listen to it. So let's turn here
to Isaiah 53 verse 7. Isaiah 53, 7. He was oppressed
and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He is brought
as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers
is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. Our subject this morning is perfect
suffering. And this is a holy, most sacred
subject we're dealing with this morning because not only are
we looking at the suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we're
looking at His heart, His conscience, as He suffered for His people. Now whenever God requires something
of a sinner in this book, whether it be in the law, whether it
be in the gospels, whatever it is, whenever God requires something
that we do, it must be done in perfection. It must be done without
any sin, perfectly. God doesn't receive anything
done in half measures. It has to be done perfectly.
And therefore, our perfect patience and our perfect meekness, brethren,
It's not by us. It's not by us. It's by the perfect
suffering of Christ Jesus, by whose obedience His people are
made righteous through faith in Him. We establish the law. We establish the Word of God. We establish His commands to
us. only through faith in Christ.
He's our righteousness. That means He's our obedience.
He's our holiness. That means He's that perfection
of heart. Now, the first thing that we
deal with here is that the sufferings of the God-man were like no other. Nobody ever suffered like He
did. First of all, in one regard, His suffering was at the hand
of depraved sinners. You see everything at the cross
and we see the depravity of man at the cross. Verse 7, we dealt
oppressively with him. Verse 7 says he was oppressed. It means to smite, to drive,
to exact, to rule over as a taskmaster. Because Christ declared he is
God. You remember that when he said,
I and my father are one. He declared he is God. You know
what we did? we picked up stones to stone him. We wanted to smite
him into saying he was not God. That's what we want. We oppressed
him. Because Christ declared that
he came to fulfill the law and the prophets for his people,
we called him an antinomian. We called him preaching licentious
doctrine. We said he's against the law.
He's the one that came to fulfill it. He gave it and then He came
to fulfill it for His people. But we oppressed Him with these
accusations. Because Christ declared that
no man could come to the Father but by Him. That He must bind
the strong man, the devil, Satan, under whose power we're held
in our depravity. That He must bind that man and
He must enter in and He must give life. Because He said that,
we said, we smote Him. with our tongues and said, he's
one with the devil. Because he did not conform to
man's vain traditions in religion. Men who took his very word and
perverted it and tried to come to God by their obedience and
by their works, and because he wouldn't conform to that, we
as depraved sinners, we smote him, We arrested him, we smote
him, and we crucified the Prince of Life. That's our depravity.
That's what our heart is, brethren. Then it says here, we dealt unjustly. Verse 8, he was taken from prison
and from judgment. In Acts 8.33 it says, in his
humiliation his judgment was taken away. When the judge of
all the earth, when the just judge of all the earth willingly
humbled himself and submitted himself into the hands of men
to put him on trial, we took all judgment, all justice away
from the Redeemer. The Jewish trial and the Roman
trial. He wasn't just tried by one people,
he was tried by two people. Two trials, the Jewish and the
Roman. And both were unjust. They started,
his trial started and ended in one night. We tried OJ Simpson
for how long? And the Prince of Life came and
we tried him in one night. He came freely to give His people
the unsearchable riches of His grace. And we dealt wickedly
in self-righteousness toward Him. Verse 9 says, He made His
grave with the wicked and with the rich in His death. We were
so wicked and we were so rich in our estimation of our own
righteousnesses that we said, we don't need a mediator. We
don't need God to do anything for us. And rather than bow to
him, we tried to eradicate a mediator. We tried to get rid of one who
said he was the Messiah. That's the depravity of our hearts.
And then we did all of this because we hated God. We did it because
He was holy and righteous, and His holiness and righteousness,
beside our pretended holiness and righteousness, exposed us.
and that's why we crucified him. Verse 9 there at the end says,
Because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his
mouth. He said, If I had not come and spoken unto them, they
had not had sin, but now they have no cloak for their sin.
Now these four things are the only things that come from our
nature as we're born in Adam the first time. Injustice, oppression,
injustice, wicked self-righteousness, and enmity against God. This
is what God says we are by nature. Now, we poured contempt upon
Christ's offices. When we poured contempt upon
His kingly office, when we put a mock crown upon Him and a mock
robe upon Him and bowed our knee and said, Hail, King of the Jews,
We poured contempt upon his prophetical office when we blindfolded him
and said, prophesy, who is it that smote you? And we poured
contempt on his priestly office when we reviled him on the cross
saying, he saved others, himself he cannot save. Now that's what,
unless we're born of God, unless Christ is formed in us and sanctifies
us from our flesh, from this, from what we are, and teaches
us in our new man Him, and that He is our only righteousness,
He is our only sanctification. Unless He does that, this right
here is the sum and substance of all our religion. I don't
care if you bow into a stump or if you're sitting in the finest
building in the United States of America claiming to worship
Christ. without Him teaching us in truth and in spirit. This
is the sum and substance of our religion. And those things are
what is in our flesh still. This is what our old fleshly
man is still. That's why our flesh profits
nothing. And every time that somebody reviles us and reproaches
us and we speak back and revile them back and threaten them back,
these things are what we do. We deal oppressively. We deal
unjustly, we deal in wicked self-righteousness, and we deal in enmity against
God. This is what we do. Therefore, for God's elect, the
Lamb of God had to come and suffer in perfect obedience to God the
Father. He had to. He submitted himself
willingly. Verse 7 says, and he was afflicted. and he was afflicted. It means
he answered it all by submitting himself to it all. It means submission. He submitted to it. He allowed
himself to be afflicted. While our substitute was oppressed
unjustly by wicked men, verse 10 says, Yet it pleased the Lord
to bruise him. He hath put him to grief. You
see, this was the Father's will. And Christ knew this was the
Father's will. He entered into covenant with
God the Father before the foundation of the world to come and do this
for His people. And so this is why He came. This
was the only way God could be declared just and the justifier. This is the only way God's righteousness
could be declared and showed forth and upheld was by Christ
doing this one way on the cross. The worst of his oppression wasn't
at the hands of men. It wasn't what men, wicked hands
did to him. It was verse 6. He was bearing
our sin. The Lord laid on him the iniquity
of us all. That was the worst of his oppression.
Bearing the shame of our sin in his body on the tree. And
his oppression was bearing justice at the hands of God. Verse 8
says, For the transgression of my people was he stricken. This
is what oppressed him. But our Savior willingly submitted
to it. He willingly gave Himself to
suffer this affliction. Verse 9 says, He made, He made
His grave with the wicked and with the rich in His death. He
was the only fit one to do it because He had done no violence.
There was no deceit in His mouth. He was the only fit one who could
do this. No man took His life. It may
appear that way, but no man took his life. He willingly laid down
his life. He said, no man takes it from
me, I lay it down of myself. Now get this, this is very important. It was a must that while he bore
our sins in his own body, and while he bore the stroke of justice,
he must at the same time offer his soul unto God in perfect
holy obedience. Verse 10 says, It pleased the
Lord to bruise him. He hath put him to grief, when
thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin. You see there, there's
the body. It pleased the Lord to bruise
him. That's body and spirit. He hath put him to grief. And
body and spirit. But in his soul, He's offering
his soul to God in perfect holy obedience. And he shall see his
seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord
shall prosper in his hand. Christ was given a body to bear
our sins. He was given a body to bear the
sins of God's elect and to be smitten for those sins. But he
had to do so for God to be just. For God to justify His people,
He had to do so. And He had to do so in perfect,
holy faith and fidelity unto God in His heart. And He did. He did. His faith and patience
unto death was as necessary to fulfilling the law, to making
His people holy and righteous as His bearing our sins and stripes
in His own body on the tree. Both were necessary. Christ is
sanctification. and righteousness. He spoke. We're made holy by Christ our
sanctification being formed in us, in our heart. He's our life. And that's when
we behold He really is the only holy one. And that's when we
believe He is truly the only righteous one. Now thirdly, let's
look at this. How Did our Savior suffer unto
death in perfect, faithful patience and meekness unto God? How did
He do that? Verse 7 says, He was oppressed
and He was afflicted. He bore tremendous smitings in
His body. He suffered the vilest reproaches
that Satan and wicked men could spew against Him. He bore even
more in His soul, offering Himself to God, and He bore it from the
hand of God. But verse 7 says, He openeth
not his mouth. He is brought as a lamb to the
slaughter, and as a sheep before shears his dumb, so he openeth
not his mouth. Now Christ spoke seven excellent
sayings from the cross. But what it means here is he
never opened his mouth to revile. He never opened his mouth to
threaten. Peter said, He did no sin, neither was guile found
in his mouth, who when he was reviled, he reviled not again.
When he suffered, he threatened not. Isn't this so with you? Maybe it's just so with me. If
somebody hits me, I've been In my younger days, I've been
hit pretty hard. And when I'm hit, I immediately
want to hit back. It's just a knee jerk. I mean,
I can't help it. He didn't. He didn't. There was
no thought in his heart. He was in complete control of
himself. Now, everything we suffer, everything
we suffer is given according to the will of God. Peter said,
them that suffer according to the will of God. Now, Scripture
says, if need be, if need be. It's always for our good. It's
always for our good. We can't see that, but our suffering
is always for our good. He said, if need be, God willingly
gives His people various burdens to bear to try our faith. You
know, some are heavy. Very heavy. Some are lighter.
Some of the sufferings we go through are just for a little
while. Others are for a long while. Maybe all our lives. Some
are spiritual. Others touch our bodies. But
brethren, all our sufferings are light compared to what Christ
suffered. All of our sufferings. They're
light compared to what Christ suffered. He suffered all the
things that we suffer, but He suffered much more. He suffered
in ways we can't comprehend, in ways we can't even imagine.
And yet Christ's patience, His meekness toward God was exactly
according to the will of God. It was God willing everything
that He bore, and Christ bearing it exactly as God required it
to be born. Perfectly. Perfectly. First of
all, Christ's patience was according to the will of God in His willingness
to receive it. The troubles and the deaths that
were laid on Christ in our room instead were innumerable. He
said, innumerable evils have come past me about. Yet he willingly,
patiently received them all. Every one. When it comes to our
patience, our meekness before God, we think this, Lord, if
it had just been anything else, I could have bore it. But not
this. This is just too hard for me.
Now Christ though, Christ received all the trouble that God the
Father laid on Him and He opened not His mouth. And then also
Christ's patience was according to the will of God in His ability
to exercise patience throughout all His sufferings until the
end. You know, James tells us this. He says, count it all joy
when you fall into different temptations, into different trials. He says, count it joy. Here's
why. Knowing this, that the trying
of your faith worketh patience. But, he says, let patience have
her perfect work. That you may be perfect and entire,
wanting nothing. He's saying, endure the trial
patiently, waiting on God to bring you to that end for which
He gave it. Endure it, waiting on God to
grow you and to make you better by what He's doing for you through
the suffering. But when we suffer, is that what
we do usually? I'm just being honest with you,
that's not what I do usually. When I suffer, I murmur. I don't want to. That woman right
there can suffer and keep her mouth shut. I can't. I can't. I want to be like her when I
grow up. I can't do it. When I suffer, I open my mouth. I open my mouth. We don't want
to wait on God. If we do start suffering, we
want it to be over. We want to get through it. We
want to be done with it. Now Christ, Christ's patience,
like His faith, was perfect. It had no opposite of patience
to it. He opened not His mouth because
His heart was in perfect submission to the Father. That's why He
didn't open His mouth. In Christ alone, in Him alone,
do we see patience have her perfect work. He was perfect, entire,
wanting nothing. And He accomplished the end for
which God gave the trial. to glorify God and to save His
people from our sins. He accomplished the end for which
God gave the trial and He did it by patiently enduring to the
end, opening not His mouth. So brethren, when we lose patience,
when we see Christ and we hear God tell us to be patient and
be meek and we see ourselves... I preached this last Sunday and
Monday morning on the way to the airport Everybody was trying
to give me directions when we pulled into McDonald's to get
some breakfast. Everybody was trying to give
me directions on where to park, where to back up, where to go
and everything. And I said, I wish everybody just quit talking.
I just preached this. Keep your mouth shut. I just
preached it. So when you fail, when you see yourself like you
are, anything but patient, anything but meek before God, behold Christ,
our perfect sufferer, the one who was perfectly meek. He's
our obedience. He's our righteousness before
God. Now, let's look at this too.
Christ's suffering in perfect patience proves that our high
priest is holy and righteous through and through. Though he
bore our sins in his own body on the tree, He had to do that
to be justly wounded for our transgressions, to be justly
bruised for our iniquities. He came to declare God righteous. But though he did that, in his
soul, our high priest remained holy, harmless, undefiled, separate
from sinners. Though he bore our spots in his
own body on the tree, yet in his soul, through the eternal
Spirit, he offered himself without spot to God. Both were necessary. He's putting away our sin, He's
justifying us, He's paying the penalty of the law, and at the
same time, He's obeying the precept of the law. That's the mystery
of the cross. I know what men will think. Men
will say, I just can't conceive how that could possibly take
place in one person at one time. How he could be justly paying
the penalty of divine justice and at the same time fulfilling
the law. Well, with men none of these things are possible,
but with God they are. We just bow. Faith is the evidence. Not my reason and my able to
comprehend it. Faith is the evidence, brethren.
That's why, because we see Him holy and righteous through and
through as He suffered, that's why when Christ is formed in
us, in our new man, our conscience is purged from dead works by
His blood to serve the living God. That's when Christ is made
unto us righteousness and sanctification. We see He's the only righteous
one. He's the only holy one. There's
something profoundly I forget the word now, but you
know, you think, well, if I'm made holy within a new man, then
I start looking within. But the thing about being made
holy within, truly holy within, is it makes you start looking
outside of yourself. It makes you look to Him who's
holy. That's when we behold Him. Then here's something else we
see on the cross. His patience proves that He is
wisdom. His patience proves he is wisdom.
Now listen to this. James said, who is a wise man
and endued with knowledge among you? Who's a wise man endued
with knowledge among you? And then he says this, let him
show out of a good conversation, out of his conduct, his deportment,
his demeanor, Let him show his works with meekness, with meekness,
with meekness of wisdom. That's what the scripture says.
Alright, listen to this. Proverbs 17, 27 says, He that
hath knowledge spareth his words. And a man of understanding is
of an excellent spirit. He spares His words even when
He's suffering, and His Spirit's excellent even when He's suffering.
We look at Christ, we see preeminent meekness and preeminent patience
of wisdom. We see Him preeminently sparing
His words. He opened not His mouth. And
all of this we see in the face of preeminent suffering. Now
you know what that tells us? Christ is preeminent wisdom. He's preeminent wisdom. He was
preeminently patient and preeminently meek in the preeminent suffering
of this earth. And he proves by that that he's
preeminent wisdom. That's why Colossians 2, 3 says,
in Christ are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. If you
had a treasure chest and you needed some treasures, where
would you go? You'd go to the treasure chest,
wouldn't you? Well, Christ is that treasure chest. And in Him
are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. You need
wisdom and knowledge? You need patience? You need meekness?
Go to the source. Go to the source. That's why
when Christ is formed in our newly created hearts, Christ
is made unto us wisdom. We stop looking to our knowledge
to justify us. We stop looking to our ability
to justify us. And then here's what we do. Look
at verse 11. Look there in the middle. We start looking to Him
of whom it said, by His knowledge shall my righteous servant justify
many. That's when Christ has made wisdom
to us, when we start looking to Him who by His knowledge justified
us from our sin. Alright, Christ's patience proves
that He's the faithful one. His patience proves He's the
faithful one. Peter said, He committed Himself
to him that judgeth righteously. Look back at Isaiah 50 and verse
5. He says there in verse 5, this
is the Lord speaking, Lord Jesus. He said, The Lord God hath opened
mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. I gave
my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off
the hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting. Why not?
Because he was faithful. Because he believed God. Look,
for the Lord God will help me. Therefore shall I not be confounded. Therefore have I set my face
like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed. He's
near that justifies me. Who will contend with me? Let
us stand together. Who's my adversary? Let him come
near to me. Behold, the Lord God will help
me. Who is he that shall condemn me? Lo, they all shall wax old
as a garment. The moth shall eat them up. That's
faith, brethren. That's faith. You mean Christ
Jesus served the Father in faith? Well, sure He did. That's the
fulfillment of the law. Faith that works by love. He
believed God. He trusted God. The righteousness
of God, the righteousness of God is manifest by Christ's own
faithfulness. That's why we read the faith
of Christ. That's why when Christ the faithful
reveals He is our righteousness and gives us faith from faith
to faith, from His faith to our faith, we cease trusting in our
faith. Don't you hear men say, all I've
got is my faith, all I've got is Christ. True faith relies
on the faithful one. Listen to this. Knowing that
a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the
faith of Jesus Christ. That's his faith. Even we have
believed in Jesus Christ. That's our faith. Even we have
believed in his faithfulness. that we might be justified by
the faith of Christ, that we might be justified by His faithfulness. See that? Not by the works of
the law. By the works of the law, no man should be justified.
That's in Galatians 2.16. And if you have a modern translation,
that's gone. It's gone. Because they translate
all of that faith in Christ. They make it all to be your faith
in Christ. You're not justified by your faith in Christ. I know
that's the old traditional doctrine of the Reformation, that we're
justified by faith, but the meaning of that is we're justified by
the faith of Christ. Our faith relies on Him who justified
us. That's why Paul said, I want
to be found in Him, not having mine own righteousness which
is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ,
by His faithfulness. Now lastly, turn to 1 Peter,
1 Peter chapter 2. Here the Holy Spirit tells us
to follow Christ, our example. He tells us now, by Christ we've
been redeemed, we've been justified, we've been made righteous. Every
elect child, everybody for whom he died, everyone to whom he
shall and must give faith, We've been saved by Him, by Christ.
Now listen, lastly, this is what he says, now follow Christ as
our example. As we walk through this earth,
Peter's telling us to submit to rulers and masters and so
on, and in verse 18 he says there, in the last part, he says, not
only to the good and gentle, but also to the frail, to those
that are not good and are rough and mean with you. He says, submit
to them too. Verse 19, for this is thank-worthy,
If a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully. That's what Christ did. He had
done no sin. Listen to this, verse 20. For
what glory is it if when you be buffeted for your faults you
shall take it patiently? There's no glory in that. But
if when you do well and suffer for it, you take it patiently,
this is acceptable with God. That's what Christ did. For even
hereunto were you called." You mean I was called to suffer unjustly? Yep. Yep. Because Christ also
suffered for us, leaving us an example that you should follow
His steps. Now, first of all, make sure
our suffering is not due to our faults. Verse 22 says, "...who
did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth." If we're
buffeted for our faults, we should take that patiently. We deserve
that. But if you have done well, as
far as man's doing well is concerned, and you're buffeted for that,
Take it patiently, he says. We don't want to be reviled for
our faults. So let's don't give any man a
reason to revile us. Let's don't be at fault before
him. Then secondly, when you do suffer
for doing well, revile not and threaten not. Verse 23. When
he was reviled, he reviled not again. When he suffered, he threatened
not. The strongest answer ever given
came without words. Christ had power to summons more
than 12 legions of angels. But the greatest power ever displayed
was not in exercising His omnipotence. The greatest power ever displayed
was by opening not His mouth. So when folks say mean things,
we don't have to open our mouth. When they email you and try to
lure you into a debate, you don't have to hit reply. See how fast it goes away if
you don't reply. People don't like to shout a
box. They like to hit somebody. Instead, do thee a committed
all to Christ. Verse 23. But committed himself
to him that judgeth righteously. Everything we just read in Isaiah
50, you'll find it in Romans 8. But in Romans 8, you'll find
it talking about us toward Christ. Who's going to condemn me? He's
justified me. He's making intercession for
me. So he says committed all to him. You see, the greatest
power ever displayed was displayed by committing it all to the Father.
by submitting to be crucified. By that, Christ fulfilled the
law. By that, He took away the sin of His people. By that, He
justified us, making us righteous. By that, He conquered Satan,
death, and hell for His people. Christ's meekness triumphed over
the injuries of His enemies rather than the injuries triumphing
over Him. And the way he did it was he opened out his mouth
and he committed himself to him that judges righteously. So now
Christ is risen. All power as the God-man is given
to him, all judgment is given to him. So he's saying, commit
yourself and your cause to him that judges righteously. This
whole world is going to be judged in righteousness by that man
whom God has raised from the dead. He knows everything you
feel. He knows everything you suffer.
So remember, remember that Christ glorified God and He saved His
people by humbling Himself under God's mighty hand. In some way,
what you're suffering right now, what you're suffering right now,
in some way, is going to glorify God and it's going to be for
the good of His people. What else could we want? What
else could we want? Therefore, in due time, God also
highly exalted him. When it was time, when God was
glorified and the good of His people had been met, God highly
exalted our Redeemer. And so He says to us, humble
yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, that
He may exalt you in due time. That He may exalt you in due
time. Casting all your care upon Him,
for He careth for you. This is the truth. When we're
strong enough to pop off to somebody, we're at our weakest. But when
we're so weak that we can't do anything but commit it to Christ,
that's when we're the strongest. That's when we're strong, because
He's our strength then. The power of Christ rests upon
us then. And that's when we find His grace
is really sufficient. It's really sufficient. Now,
what's going to constrain you to do this? I can't constrain
you to do this. No other man can constrain you
to do this. If they could, it wouldn't be faith, working by
love. But here's our constraint. This is our constraint to believe
Him. This is our constraint to cast our care into His hand.
This is our constraint to wait on Him to exalt us in due time. Look at verse 24. "...who His
own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree." Connect
that with what we just read. He committed Himself. He opened
out His mouth and committed Himself while He bore our sins in His
own body on the tree. You know what you're going to
suffer for most? You're going to suffer for His sake most. Because men won't bow to Him. You're going to suffer for His
sake most. He says, so remember, He kept
His mouth shut and committed it to Christ when He was bearing
our sins. So when you bear sins for men
for His sake, do the same. Look here. He did it that we
being dead to sins. You mean when I lose my patience
and I do all that, that God says, I don't know what you're talking
about. That man's dead. Yeah, he's dead. By Christ, he's
dead. Dead to sins. That we should
live unto righteousness. Capital R. by whose stripes you
were healed. Not now, you were. Way back then,
when he did it, we were healed. For you were as sheep going astray,
but are now returned unto the shepherd and bishop of your souls.
Amen.