Welcome to our program. Now today
I'm going to be preaching from the book of Isaiah chapter 53. I'm actually going to begin in
the last few verses of chapter 52 if you'd like to follow along
in your Bibles. The title of the message is Christ's
Suffering unto Victory. And I'll have to admit that it'll
probably take me more than one message to get through the chapter
because it's such a full and beautiful picture and prophecy
of the suffering servant, the Lord Jesus Christ, God's Messiah,
who came to this earth to save his people from our sins. And
so that's what I'll be looking at, but I want to begin in the
book of Luke chapter 9 to start off with, just to introduce the
message. And here in Luke chapter 9 and verse 28, we have the account
of what is known as the Mount of Transfiguration. It's where
the Lord Jesus Christ took some of his disciples and showed them
a vision of his beauty and glory as the suffering and conquering
Messiah, his suffering unto victory. It says in Luke chapter 9 and
verse 28, it says, It came to pass, about an eight days after
these sayings, he took Peter and John and James, those three
disciples, and he went up into a mountain to pray. And as he
prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered. His visage, or his
appearance, changed. And how did it change? It says
his raiment was white and glistering. This must have been a glorious
vision that he was giving them of himself. And look at verse
30 of Luke 9. It says, And behold, there talked
with him two men, which were Moses and Elias, or Elijah. Now Moses represents the law. You know who Moses was. He was
the mediator of the Old Covenant to whom God gave the law to Israel,
the Old Covenant law on Mount Sinai. Moses was used greatly
of God. He was the one who led Israel
out of Egypt, the Egyptian bondage, and then brought them into the
wilderness And he was the one whom God used to write the first
five books of the law, the first five books of the Old Testament. So he represents the law. And
then Elijah represents the prophets, the school of the prophets and
the message of the prophets. So here we have the law and the
prophets represented here speaking to the Lord Jesus Christ. And they talked with him. And
then it says in verse 31, "...who appeared in glory and spake,"
or spoke, "...of his deceits, which he should accomplish at
Jerusalem." Now you might picture this glorious vision here on
the Mount of Transfiguration. Here's Moses. And you know how
well thought of Moses was by the Jews. Peter, James, and John
standing there and they see this vision of Moses. And someone
asked, well, how did they know what Moses looked like? I don't
know. I know that they knew it was Moses. And then here's Elijah,
the same thing. They knew it was Elijah. And
they certainly knew our Lord in His humanity, the God-man,
the Messiah standing there. And you would say to yourself,
maybe, boy, I would sure love to hear what they were talking
about, Moses and Elijah, the law and the prophet, speaking
with the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, God in human flesh.
Well, he tells us exactly what they were talking about. They
were talking about his decease, his death. But did you notice
how they described it there? It's his decease which he should
accomplish at Jerusalem. His death is portrayed as an
accomplishment, not as a defeat. You know, we think about, we
fight death. And that's just a natural inclination
of man. When we hear we get sick, we
seek the cure, and we fight it with every fiber of our being.
But the Lord Jesus Christ, the Bible tells us, set his face
like a flint unto death. In the beginning of his ministry
to his disciples, when he would speak of his suffering unto death
at Jerusalem, they would be afraid, and in their human weakness,
they would say, oh no, let's don't do that. You remember after
Peter made that great confession, That's recorded in Matthew 16.
And the Lord told him how he must go to Jerusalem and suffer
and die and be resurrected the third day. Peter said, oh don't,
no, no. And the Lord said, get thee behind
me, say. So they didn't understand that in the early days. But he
was determined. He said it was for the very reason
to die that he came to this earth. And it was an accomplishment.
But now one other word here, he says his decease. You know
that word decease in the original is the Greek word that would
be translated exodus. In other words, his death that
he would accomplish at Jerusalem would be an exodus, a leading
out of. Just like Moses led the children
of Israel out of bondage of Egypt, Christ, in his death on the cross,
would lead his people, his sheep, his church, spiritual Israel,
God's elect, out of every tribe and nation, out of the bondage
of sin and Satan, and out from under the curse of the law. So
isn't that amazing? Now, Moses spoke of that. Elijah spoke of that. What does
that tell us? It tells us what the Lord Jesus
Christ told the Pharisees. When he told them in John chapter
5, he said, "...search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have
eternal life, for they are they which testify of me." The Old
Testament is about Christ. It's a book of Christ. After
his resurrection, before he ascended unto the Father, he sat down
with his disciples and he taught them how to preach the gospel
of Christ and him crucified and his resurrection out of the law
and the prophets and the Psalms. Later on in the book of Acts,
there was an Ethiopian eunuch who had been to Jerusalem to
worship according to the Jews and their ways. And he left that
place empty, but he had acquired a copy of the book of Isaiah,
and he read from chapter 53 that we're going to look at. And God
sent him a preacher named Philip, an evangelist, that means a bearer
of the good news of the gospel. And he asked the man, Philip
asked the man when he appeared there, he said, do you understand
what you're reading? And he said, how can I accept
some man? A man sent from God showed me. And Philip, and he
asked the question about these passages. Who's the prophet here
talking about? Is he talking about himself? Or is he talking
about someone else? And it says, Philip began at
those same scriptures and preached unto him Jesus, God, our salvation. Now that's what I want to do
here in Isaiah 53. I want to preach unto you Jesus.
And obviously, as I told you, I'm not going to take more than
one message, so I urge you to get these messages and listen
to this. Let's look. Now actually the
portion that Isaiah 53 relates and communicates begins in the
last verses of Isaiah 52. And so I'll first want to go
to Isaiah 52 verse 13. And the first thing I want you
to see about Christ the suffering servant, Christ suffering under
victory, is number one, his destiny of glory. Now Christ was set
up before the foundation of the world. to be the Savior of his
people. The salvation that God freely
provides in and by the person and the finished work of his
Son is no afterthought. In other words, when Adam fell
in the garden and took sides with Satan against God, that
doesn't mean that Satan sneaked up on God and took him by surprise.
That was well within the purpose and plan of God. Now I know people
don't understand that and they deny it because they don't, but
God is not the author of sin now. We can never make God the
author of sin. Yet we must understand that the
very reason God created this world and the very reason man
fell was already established in eternity past because God
had purpose to glorify himself in the salvation of fallen sinners
through the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we read of his destiny
in Isaiah 52 beginning at verse 13. It says, Behold, my servant
shall build prudently. Now that means literally this,
the servant of the Lord, the servant of God, shall be successful. He shall not fail. He shall literally
prosper. In other words, whatever he comes
to do, he's going to accomplish it. He's going to satisfy it.
He's going to meet every condition that God requires for the salvation
of his people. He's going to fulfill every requirement.
There's not going to be one jot or tittle of the law that will
be broken. He'll keep it all. He'll satisfy
the justice of God. His death will be an accomplishment,
as he told them in Luke chapter 9. The servant of the Lord shall
deal prudently. He shall prosper. Now isn't that
interesting that he called here the servant of the Lord? In the
book of Isaiah, there are portions of scripture which are known
commonly as the servant psalms. And those are psalms that relate
and communicate and reveal Christ as the servant of the Father.
This, Isaiah 53, is the fourth of the servant psalms. Here he
is the suffering servant who's destined to be glorified because
he will accomplish what he sets out to do. But isn't it interesting
that the Lord Jesus Christ is called a servant? And you know,
that sometimes meant, in our pride, in our self-righteousness,
we would normally, by nature, we would be offended by being
called a servant. We're not the servants, we're
not the slaves of anyone. But our Lord humbled himself
to become a servant. In the book of Philippians chapter
2 and verse 7 it says, he made himself of no reputation. Now who is it we're speaking
of? We're talking about God in human flesh. No reputation, referring
to God, God who created this world. The Lord Jesus Christ
who is the eternal word, the living word. He is Jesus, for
He shall save His people from their sins. He is Emmanuel, which
is God with us. He made Himself of no reputation. We spend our lives trying to
build up our reputation. But in order to save His people,
in His destiny, He had to make Himself of no reputation. And
it says in verse 7 of Philippians 2, He took upon Himself the form
of a servant. and he was made in the likeness
of men. What a great, great condescension. Again, as I quoted a while ago,
in Matthew chapter 1, when the angel came to Joseph and gave
him the name of the Messiah, it said, his name shall be called
Jesus. For he shall save his people from their sins. That's
because the name Jesus, which is a derivative of the Old Testament
Hebrew, named Joshua or Yeshua, means Jehovah, our Savior. God, our Savior. who saves. And then Emmanuel, his name shall
be called Emmanuel, which being interpreted, God with us. This
was his destiny. His destiny was to be glorified
as the Savior. as the Messiah, as the Lord of
Glory. He made himself of no reputation
and became a servant. In order to be glorified, he
had to humble himself and become obedient even unto death, even
the death of the cross. So in order to be glorified as
the Savior, as the sovereign Savior and Majesty, He had to
come and do His work. He had to accomplish His death. And that's what it's saying.
Behold, My servant shall prosper. It says, He shall be exalted
and extolled and very high. He shall be very high. He's going
to have a name which is above every name. That's His destiny.
You see, here's what this is implanting in our minds if we
have spiritual ears to hear and eyes to see. The Lord Jesus Christ
is not a failure. He shall not fail. That's spoken
back in Isaiah 42 in the first servant song. He shall not fail. He shall never fail. He shall
never falter. When he came and died on the
cross for his people, he saved his people from their sins. He
enabled God to be both a just God and a Savior. He established
righteousness Let me show you what Daniel in chapter 9 and
verse 24 said of him concerning his destiny and the fulfillment
of his work. It says in verse 24 of Daniel
9, 70 weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy
city. Now that is a symbolic number
that shows the time of Christ here on earth to do his work.
It's a symbolic number. And he says here's what he's
going to do. He's going to finish the transgression. He's going
to make an end of sins. Now that's a glorious thing.
He didn't try to save his people from their sins. He made an end
of sins. He's going to make reconciliation
for iniquity. He's going to bring in everlasting
righteousness. He's going to seal up the vision,
that is, and prophecy, that is the Word of God. Every prophecy
of the Old Testament Every type and picture and shadow was sealed
up and fulfilled in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
It says he's going to anoint the most holy. God anointed him
to be the Savior of his people. So his destiny is a destiny of
glory. It's not a destiny of failure.
I heard of a preacher out in Chicago who years ago made the
statement that because He believed Christ died for everybody and
was trying to save everybody. That hell, therefore, was a huge
monument to his failure to save people. And I thought, oh my
soul, that is not the Christ of the Bible, my friend. Hell
is not a monument to the failure of Christ to save his people.
Let me tell you what hell is. Hell is the just punishment for
sinners who continue to reject Christ. Hell is a monument to
God's justice in punishing sins. All for whom Christ died shall
be saved. He did not fail. That was not
his destiny. He will be extolled and exalted. As I said, he will be given a
name which is above every name, and every knee is going to bow,
and every tongue is going to confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord. In verse 14 of chapter 52, it
continues with his destiny and glory, his destiny of glory. It says, as many as were astonished
at thee, and it says, his visage was so marred, more than any
man, and his form more than the sons of men. Now that speaks
of his suffering unto death. Now what we have here in these
three verses at the end of 52 is kind of like a summation of
what is laid out in detail in 53. And what he's saying here,
people looked upon him with astonishment. One time he preached and it said
that the scribes and the Pharisees and the people were astonished
at his doctrine. He spoke with so much wisdom.
He spoke with so much authority. He is God in human flesh. And
He made the, listen, He performed the miracles. He made the deaf
hear and the blind see. He healed lepers. He fed 5,000
with just a few loaves and fishes. He calmed the sea. He made the
lame walk. He raised the dead. And when
he was on the cross, think about the physical signs that God gave
of the glory of this person who was accomplishing his death,
who was saving his people from their sins, who was establishing
righteousness. The sun darkened, the sky darkened. The earthquake, the veil in the
temple was torn into from top to bottom and the dead arose
from the grave just like when Christ stood at the tomb of Lazarus
and he said, Lazarus come forth and Lazarus came out of that
grave. Many of those of his sheep who had died and were resurrected
just like Lazarus and walked the streets of Jerusalem and
they were astonished and then he arose from the dead and he
appeared unto his disciples and unto many and he ascended unto
his father, and he ever lived there to make intercession. And
when the gospel began to go out, what an astonishing thing it
was when Peter, the one who had denied him three times just a
few weeks before, he stood there in Jerusalem and he preached
the gospel and 3,000 souls were converted, and later on 5,000.
And it keeps going on and on. They were astonished at him.
But now in order to accomplish this victory, this glory, his
destiny, he had to suffer. He had to bleed. He had to die
on the cross. And for that reason, his visage,
his appearance, was so marred more than any man. In other words,
no man suffered like Christ suffered. and his form more than the sons
of men." And look at verse 15, "...so shall he sprinkle many
nations, the kings shall shut their mouths at him, for that
which had not been told them shall they see, and that which
they had not heard shall they consider." Now what he's teaching
there is this, is that Christ has a people that he accomplishes
in his destiny of glory, even among the Gentiles. You see,
spiritual Israel is made up of both God's elect out of the Jewish
nation and God's elect out of the Gentile nations. Who are
they? They are all who come to Christ for salvation. The Bible
says, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. Now, all who believe, who are
they? They are spiritual Israel. They
are His church. They are His sheep. They are
God's elect. And what it's saying here is
that it's His destiny of glory to bring all of his sheep into
the fold, into his bosom as the shepherd. He has Jewish sheep,
he has Gentile sheep. He told them in John 10, he said,
other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them I must
bring, also a must bring. And kings, even kings will stop
their mouths at him. He said they won't have anything
to say. They can't stop him. They can't hinder him. Man cannot
stop the victory of the suffering servant. That's his destiny.
Now when we look at Isaiah 53 now, the first three verses of
that chapter speaks of his life of humiliation. And Isaiah begins
with this. He says in verse 1 of 53, he
says, who hath believed our report? That is, who hath believed our
doctrine? And he goes on, he says, and
to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? The arm of the Lord
is a symbolic way of speaking of his power. Now the Bible tells
us that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. That word
power in the New Testament is the same word we get our English
word dynamite from. In other words, this gospel message
of Christ and Him crucified, of how God saves sinners, is
a powerful message that penetrates the hard shell of self-righteousness
and darkness into the heart of God's people and brings them
to a saving knowledge of Christ and that by the power of the
Holy Spirit in the new birth. Now to whom is the, who hath
believed our report? I'll tell you exactly who. God
Christ's sheep. They believe the report. They're
brought from unbelief to faith in Christ. To whom is the power
of God revealed? To his sheep. And then he speaks
of his humiliation. He says, verse two, for he shall
grow 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 shall see him there's no beauty that we should desire
him. Verse 3, he is despised and rejected
of men. He's a man of sorrows and acquainted
with grief and we hid as it were our faces from him. He was despised
and we esteemed him not. Now there's several things here
about his humiliation. You remember I quoted from Philippians
2 a little while ago. Talked about in verse 7 how he
took upon himself the form of a servant, made himself of no
reputation. It says in Philippians 2 and
verse 8, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself
and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
And remember what I said, in order for him to fulfill his
destiny of glory, to accomplish all that he was sent to do, he
had to be humiliated, he had to condescend, to be identified
with his sheep, his people, in our name and in our nature, yet
without sin, and he had to walk among men. And here's what it
says, he shall grow up before him as a tender plant. Christ
in his birth, in his youth, was a tender plant. He is God and
He is man, yet He grew as a man in wisdom and stature. Now, I
cannot explain that to you. He is God. He knows everything.
God cannot grow, but this person who is God did grow. He's God-man. It says, He hath no form nor
comeliness. In other words, He had no outward beauty that would
draw people to Him. It wasn't His appearance, His
look, the lust of the eyes that drew you to Christ. And He says,
when we shall see Him, there's no beauty that we should desire
Him. There was nothing about His outward appearance that would
draw men to Him. And then when He was on the cross,
He was so marred that it was repulsive. And then in verse
3, this describes the nature of man. This is us by nature.
He is despised and rejected of men. The Bible says in John chapter
1 and verse 11, He came unto His own and his own received
him not. You see, by nature, if left to
ourselves, we will always despise and reject the true Lord of Glory. Oh, I can tell you about myself
in this, when I first heard the true gospel, how I rejected and
hated it. Because it went against my grain,
it went against my self-righteousness. My hope was shattered when I
heard the true gospel. I came to see that if I believed
that, I have to say I was lost. And therefore I despised and
rejected the Lord of Glory. He was a man of sorrows. He knew
sorrow and grief and pain and suffering. He was without sin,
yet in his humanity he suffered all the infirmities of the flesh.
He was acquainted with grief. When Lazarus died and the people
did not believe, he wept. Jesus wept. He sorrowed over
the rejection of men and the unbelief of men. And it says,
we hid as it were our faces from Him. We couldn't even look at
Him. That's what it's saying. When He was marred in His visage,
when He was beaten to the pulp with the crown of thorns and
on that cross, we hid our faces from Him. He was despised and
we esteemed Him not. He's the Lord of glory who came
to this earth, but we esteemed Him not. This is the humiliation. that Christ had to go through
in order to realize his destiny of glory as God-man. This is
what is being taught here, that Christ, he had a destiny of glory,
he will not fail, but he also had a life of humiliation and
condescension. He submitted himself, we're going
to talk about that next week, willingly, because he loved his
Father and he loved his people. There is no comparison to what
Christ the God-man went through to save his people from their
sins. Now, I hope this message has
been helpful to your understanding of the Scriptures. We'll continue
in Isaiah 53 next week. If you'd like to get a copy of
this message, listen to the announcers. He'll give you the details. The
title is Christ's Suffering unto Victory. And I hope you'll join
us next week for another message from God's Word.