Open your Bibles with me to the
book of Isaiah, the Old Testament prophet Isaiah, chapter 53. Now, many of you, if not most
of you, are familiar with this chapter. This is the gospel according
to Isaiah, as we might say, and it's a prophecy of the suffering
servant of Jehovah, the Lord Jesus Christ. Many do not understand
this passage. The unbelieving Jews, they claim
that the subject that Isaiah is speaking of here is national
Israel, but it is not. This is messianic, this is Christ.
And Isaiah was commanded by God to preach this gospel to his
nation. And he starts out, I'm gonna
read the whole chapter, but I'm gonna focus in on the last three
verses. And what I want you to see is
this. The title of the message is Christ's Victory Over Death. In his death, he became a victor,
a winner over death, the grave, hell, Satan, the flesh, sin. He conquered, he's the mighty
conqueror. We might say. That's why we say,
crown him with many crowns. Because there's so much benefit
that came out of his obedience unto death as the surety and
the substitute and the redeemer, the preserver of his people.
So this is Christ's victory over death. And in the last three
verses, you have five statements that speak of his resurrection.
Five statements that could not be stated truly if he had not
been risen from the dead. If he'd stayed in the grave,
they wouldn't be true. And of course, we know he is risen as
Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15. But look at verse one, who hath
believed our report, our doctrine, our message? He says, and what
he's telling Isaiah there is, he told Isaiah back in chapter
six, you go out and you preach the message, but he told him,
he said, they're not gonna hear you. And I've often joked about
that and said, well, that's some urgency for evangelism. Because we expect people to hear. Somebody says, well, you don't
know if people are going to believe it or not. And that's right.
But we're to preach to anybody who will listen. and were to
command them under the gospel to believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ, because there is no other way of salvation, no other way
of forgiveness, no other way of righteousness, no other way
of eternal life and glory. And that's why Paul said, if
Christ be not risen, we are of all men most miserable, of all
men most miserable, because we've preached that he is risen and
he's our hope. And if he's not our hope, then
what are we doing? We're just preaching a false
message, but we're not. Because he is risen. And so he
says, who hath believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the
Lord revealed? The arm represents power. And
that power is in Christ. Christ is the arm of God. He
is the power of God unto salvation as presented in the gospel message. The gospel is the power of God
unto salvation to everyone that believe it. And look at what
it says about him. Think about his life now, as
he was born in a very way that wasn't like the birth of what
we would call a noble or a king. He was born of a virgin, the
Virgin Mary, conceived in her womb by the Holy Spirit, laid
in a manger. You know what a manger really
is, don't you? It's a feed trough. where they feed the animals,
you know, things like that. Look, it says in verse two, 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. You know, these movies and these pictures where they portray
Jesus as walking around like he had some aura around him or
some like, that's not true. You couldn't have picked him
out of a crowd. like that and that's what he says there's no
beauty that we should desire him his outward appearance was
nothing special and so understand that that it's only by the power
of the holy spirit that we recognize the eternal spiritual beauty
of the person of christ he is a beautiful person God manifest
in the flesh. Look at verse three. He's despised
and rejected of men. A man of sorrows. We sing a hymn. Man of sorrows, what a name for
the Son of God who came. Ruined sinners to reclaim. Hallelujah,
what a Savior. Acquainted with grief, In His
humanity, in His sinless humanity, He knew grief and sorrow. He
cried, He hungered, He hurt, and we had, as it were, our faces
from Him. He was despised and we esteemed
Him not. This is how the natural man looks
at Christ. This is how I looked at Him before
God gave me eyes to see and ears to hear. You see, remember Christ
told the disciples in Matthew 13, He said, blessed are your
eyes for you see, blessed are your ears for you hear. And he
spoke of the Pharisees and he said, they have eyes to see,
but they don't see. They have ears to hear, but they
don't hear. They shut their eyes and they've closed their ears,
lest they be converted. They don't see his beauty. Do
you see his beauty today? The beauty of Christ. And I'm
talking about the spiritual beauty that's described in the truth,
the doctrine of Christ. Not in some painting, which is
nothing. It means nothing. I've often
told you the story about how I was getting my hair cut one
time. And this is a true story. This is not just a preacher's
tale. But I was getting my hair cut, and you know how they have
chairs lined up, and you've got different people. Well, the lady
that was cutting my hair, she'd come to our church every now
and then. The lady beside her found out that I was a preacher.
And we got to talking about different things. It wasn't anything religious.
But this lady beside her, she painted. And she wanted to show
me this painting. And she showed me the painting.
It was with a guy whose hair was all messed up and wild-eyed
and had some kind of a grin on his face. And she asked me who
that is. And I said, well, it looks like
Charles Manson to me. And she got mad. She thought
that was Jesus. But I swear it looked like Charlie
Manson. That's the first thing that popped into my head. And
I wondered, why would a woman be painting a picture of Charlie
Manson anyway? But anyway, those paintings mean nothing. They
mean absolutely nothing. They're not sacred. These icons,
all of that, forget it. Here is the description of the
person and the work of Christ and the doctrine of Christ. Who
is Jesus Christ? Well he's despised and rejected
of men, he's a man of sorrows, all of that. We esteemed him
not, despised him, all of that. But who is he really? He's God
manifest in the flesh. The glory of God is in the face
of Jesus Christ. Now that doesn't mean in his
physical face. What it means is in his glorious
person and his finished work, we see the glory of God in how
God can save sinners and still be just and righteous and do
so in mercy and grace. Just and justifier. Look at verse
four. Now here comes the ground of
salvation. Surely he hath borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows. He died for the sins of his people. imputed, charged, accounted to
him. Our sin debt, which we ran up in Adam, in our fallen Adam,
and in our personal sins, and all the debt of those sins were
charged, accounted, reckoned to Jesus Christ as the surety
of his people. And it says, yet we did esteem
him strict and smitten of God and afflicted. Now what that
means is this, now Christ was smitten of God the Father. If
you look, jump over to verse 10, it says, yet it pleased the
Lord to bruise him. Well that's the Father bringing
his wrath down upon the Son for the sins of his people charged
to him. But we by nature, we esteem him
as being cursed of God, as if he deserved what he got. Well,
he did not deserve what he got based upon any personal sins.
He had none. The only justice that was done
was for his death in our place, for our sins charged to him.
So he says in verse five, but he was wounded for our transgressions. See that? He was wounded for
our transgressions. He was bruised or crushed for
our iniquities. the chastisement of our peace.
The punishment that was required to bring peace was upon him. All conditioned on him. All fell
on him. And with his stripes, we are
healed. His stripes? What do you mean
his stripes? That's where they whipped him.
With a cat of nine tail, brought forth his blood. And it says
in verse six, all we like sheep have gone astray. That's us by
nature. We've gone astray. We fell in Adam. We're born in
sin, depravity, spiritual death. We've turned everyone to his
own way. We've got our way of salvation, but only God's way
is the right way. And it says, and the Lord hath
laid on him the iniquity of us all. That's imputation. The Lord
laid it on him. How did he lay it on him? He
accounted it. He charged it. The sin debt. the sins of his people, imputed
them to Christ. He took my debt. It's like if
somebody, if you had a debt and somebody said, put it on my account,
I'll repay it. That's what Christ did for God's
elect, for his people. Think about that. We deserve
to die and to be damned. I was telling Amy about one of
the songs that she played. I always think about this when
I hear that song. The song is entitled, I Should Have Been
Crucified. That's the wrong way to put it.
It's not I should have been crucified. If I should have been, I would
have been. But I would have been crucified were it not for the
Lord of glory. I deserve it, I earned it, but
he took it. And he was bruised, he was crushed
for our iniquity. The Lord hath laid on him the
iniquity of us all, all of his people, all who are brought to
faith in Christ, all who live and die in the faith and live
again. He was oppressed, verse seven, and he was afflicted,
yet he opened not his mouth. He didn't defend himself in order
to avoid the cross. He took it willingly. He's brought
as a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before her shears
is done, so he opened and nodded his mouth. Verse eight, he was
taken from prison and from judgment, and who shall declare his generation? Who's going to speak of him in
glory? For he was cut off out of the
land of the living. What does that mean? It means
he died. For the transgression of my people was he stricken.
For the transgressions of God's people. And he made his grave
with the wicked. He died just like we died. except
he died as a substitute, as a surety, as a representative, and with
the rich in his debt. Some people say that's a reference
to Joseph of Arimathea who gave his tomb. Joseph was a rich man. Because he had done no violence,
neither was any deceit in his mouth. Now, five statements that
prove that Christ arose from the dead. It says in verse 10,
yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him. It pleased the Lord to crush
his son, the father, crushing the son. Remember when he was
hanging on the cross, he said, my God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? Well, he knew why, he wasn't
asking a question, he was making a point. Why did God crush him? Again, for the sins of his people,
charged to his account. He says, when thou shalt make
his soul an offering for sin, He wasn't made a sinner, he wasn't
corrupted, he was the sinless sacrifice, the lamb without blemish
and without spot, but he was a sin offering, a sin bearer. He shall see, here's the first
statement that shows he was resurrected from the dead. After he made
his soul an offering for sin, that means he died, he shall
see his seed He shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of
the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see his seed."
Now, what is his seed? That's his offspring. That's
all that the Father gave to him, all people, that the Father gave
to him before the foundation of the world, for whom he lived
and died and was buried and arose again. That's his children. Look
over at Psalm 22 with me. In the book of Psalms, this is
what we call the Psalm of the cross. Because it starts out
with that very statement that he made on the cross. When he
said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? But look at
the end of that Psalm in verse 30. Now this is all the result
of his death and his resurrection. And it says in verse 30 of Psalm
22, a seed shall serve him. That's his children. That's his
offspring. All for whom he lived and died
and was buried and arose again. It shall be accounted to the
Lord for a generation. In other words, he gets the credit,
not us. And in verse 31 says, they shall
come and shall declare his righteousness. They're gonna come to him and
they're going to declare not their own righteousness, but
his. That's his righteousness imputed
to us. That's the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel.
And he said, unto a people that shall be born that he hath done
this. That's the new birth. Let me
show you one more scripture on that though. Go to first John
chapter one, or chapter three, over in the New Testament. Make
you use your Bible a little bit. First John chapter three, verse
nine. A lot of people have this verse
mixed up. But here's what it's saying. Because of the death,
burial, and resurrection of Christ, which ensures that He put away
our sins, removed the penalty, satisfied justice, brought forth
righteousness, His people, all for whom He lived and died and
was buried in a rose, will live with Him. And the first the first
part of that new life, that resurrected life. You know when it comes?
Right here on earth in the new birth. Born again by the Spirit. That's when a dead sinner, a
sinner dead in sins, is made alive, is quickened. Remember Ephesians 2.1, and you
hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins? That's
when you're quickened. How do you know you've been quickened?
Do you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as your only way of salvation? Do you believe in Him as the
only way of forgiveness, the only way of righteousness? Do
you love His truth, the preaching of the gospel, the preaching
of the truth? Well, look at 1 John 3 and verse 9. It says, whosoever
is born of God, that's the new birth, doth not commit sin. Now what do you mean you don't
commit sin? You know even after you're born again you're still
a sinner, a sinner saved by grace. You still don't have any righteousness
of your own to brag about. The only righteousness that I
can brag to you about right here as I'm standing by or sitting
behind this pulpit preaching the gospel, the only righteousness,
now listen to me, the only righteousness that I can brag about is Christ's
righteousness given to me. imputed to me. I can say, well, I studied hard
this week, I prayed hard this week, I preach and all that. That's not my righteousness before
God. And that's one evidence of being
born again. You know that there's no righteousness
except Christ. Now we have new life, we have
new hearts, new minds, all of that in the new birth. And that's
what he says here, whosoever is born of God does not commit
sin. The sin that he's talking about is a specific sin of totally
rejecting and apostatizing, falling away from Christ. If you're born
again, you're saved and you will be saved to the end. You will
not leave Christ. You may stray for a while, many
have, but he will not let you go. And that's what this verse
is saying. Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin, for
his seed remaineth in him. His offspring, the elect of God,
that's another word for him. The church, believers, born again
people. People who have faith in him,
who have repented of dead works, that's the gift of God. They
remain in Christ, they will not leave him. And he says, and he
cannot sin, he cannot leave Christ because he's born of God. So
when he says back here in Isaiah 53, he shall see his seed, he's
gonna see his people. He'll prolong his days, he's
gonna live forever. and the pleasure of the Lord
shall prosper in his hand." There'll be no defeat. There'll be no
failure. What that teaches us is this.
The gospel of Christ, the gospel of salvation by God's grace in
Christ does not present to people a possibility of salvation if
you'll do your part. No. It presents the certainty
of the salvation of all for whom he died and was buried in a rose
again. And he will bring you to faith in Christ. But let's
go back, verse 11. Here's the second statement that
tells us he is risen. Verse 11. He shall see of the
travail of his soul and be satisfied. The travail. Back in the biblical
days, that was a word that they used to describe a woman having
a baby. The travail. That has to do with
pain. It has to do with suffering.
It has to do with perseverance. And what he's doing, he's likening
the death of Christ with all that pain and sorrow and suffering
like a woman in childbirth trying to have a baby. And what he says here, Christ
in all of the travail that he suffered in his soul, in the
end of it all, he's not going to be in sorrow. He's going to
be satisfied. You women who've had a baby,
When that baby's born and that baby's healthy, weren't you satisfied? Oh my. Beyond description. And that's what it's saying here.
He's gonna see out of that travail, out of that death and that bear,
and in his resurrection, he's going to see the complete redemption
and salvation and life, resurrection of all for whom he travailed. Romans 10, four says, Christ
is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believe. Travail
of his soul. Look back at the next one. Here's
statement number three. It says in verse 11, by his knowledge,
shall my righteous servant justify many. Now what I believe that's
talking about, his knowledge, it's talking about the things
that he experienced and came to know firsthand. Back up there
it talks about how he was a man of sorrows. He knew sorrow because
he experienced it. He knew grief because he experienced
it. He knew pain because he experienced
it. And by all that that he went
through, he justified many. Now what is it to be justified?
It means that all our sins are forgiven on a just ground. And what is the only just ground?
The blood of Jesus Christ. There's no other ground upon
which God can justly and rightly forgive sin. Many false preachers will tell
people that God will forgive your sins because you repent. That's not true. God forgives
sins based on the blood of Christ. And if the Holy Spirit ever brings
you or me or anybody to see that and believe it, then you'll repent. Repentance will be the result.
Your mind and heart will be changed towards God and towards yourself. Well, it said, and here's the
basis of that. Look at verse 11, look at the
last line of verse 11. For he shall bear their iniquities.
Again, that's the doctrine of imputation. Ours, iniquities. You know what iniquity means,
don't you? It means unequal, inequity. And you'll hear people
sometimes talk like this. They'll say, well, when I get
before God at judgment, he's going to weigh my good works
with my bad works, and whichever one tips the scales, if it's
my bad works, if they tip the scales, then I'm going to hell.
If my good works tip the scales, then I'm going to heaven. And
the answer to that is false gospel. That's not good news for you.
And it's not good news for me. Because no matter how good we
try to be, No matter how we achieve what the world calls morality
or sincerity or love, there's absolutely no way that our good
works can tip the scale. It's always unequal and it's
always against us. There's an Old Testament story
in the book of Daniel about a king named Belshazzar. He had a party. And during that party, the Lord
sent a message. And it was a hand, a giant hand,
writing on the wall in that language, the language of the Babylonians,
or the Chaldeans, as they say, the same thing. And nobody could
interpret what the hand wrote except a man named Daniel, God's
servant. And so they called in Daniel
and said, can you interpret what this hand wrote on that wall?
And Daniel said, yeah. And he said, here's what it says.
You are found weighed in the balance and found lacking. That's us. So how are the scales
gonna be balanced? Only by the grace of God in Christ. Standing before God, washed in
his blood, clothed in His righteousness. And you know what the result
of that is? You'll live forever with God in Him. By His knowledge,
He'll justify. And who will He justify? Many.
Not everybody without exception, but many. How many? I don't know.
You don't either. As many as the Lord ordained
to eternal life. As many whose names were written
in the Lamb's Book of Life. You say, well, if that's not
everybody, I don't want any part of it. Well, that's up to you.
But I'll tell you what, I want to be one of that many. How about
you? Well, look unto Christ, and be ye saved. All the ends
of the earth. All right, here's the fourth one. Look at verse
12. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and
he will divide the spoiled with the strong. You know, whenever
In wars, nation against nation, whenever a king or his army conquered
another nation, they had spoils of war. We talk about that now. They defeat their enemy and they
gain the spoils. Well, that's what Christ did
on the cross. He died and in dying, he defeated all his and
all our enemies. Who are our enemies? Well, the
world. He defeated the world. The flesh,
the devil, sin, death, the grave, he defeated them. And what happens? He gets the
spoils. And we who are in him, called
here the strong. Now we're not strong, but we're
strong in Christ. You remember Paul said, when
I'm weak, I'm strong. In other words, when I recognize my inadequacy,
my weakness, my inability, That brings me to look to Christ even
more, and I know whom I have believed, and I'm persuaded that
he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him against
that day. Our strength is Christ, and that's
it. Well, why is all that happening?
Look at verse 12 again. Therefore will I divide him a
portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the
strong, because, why? Because you believed, Because
you repented? Because you walked an aisle and
gave your heart to Jesus? Because you were baptized? No. No. Look at it. Because he hath
poured out his soul unto death. And because he was numbered with
the transgressors. What does that mean? He identified
himself as the surety of his people. He was numbered with
us. for whom He died. Our sins, again,
imputed to Him. His righteousness imputed to
us. That's why. And that's why we believe. That's
why we repent. That's why we give our heart
to Jesus. Because of what He did. And our salvation is conditioned
on what He accomplished, not on what we do. And that makes
it sure and certain. That's why his resurrection is
so important. If he wasn't raised from the
dead, all of this would be nothing. Worthless. Last statement. It says, he hath poured out his
soul unto dead, numbered with the transgressors, he bare the
sin of many, and here's the last statement, made intercession
for the transgressors. Turn to 1 John 2. He made intercession. Now, what
does that mean? Well, the Bible says that there's
one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. Christ, he lived a perfect life. He died on the cross for the
sins of his people, laid to his charge, imputed to him. He was
buried, he arose again the third day, and then what happened after
that? He ascended unto the Father, and he now sits at the right
hand of the Father, he's sitting, the God-man is in heaven sitting
because he finished the work, the work's done, he's our rest,
he's our Sabbath, and he continually makes intercession, intercedes
for us, Jesus Christ the righteous, so that we can never be condemned. Verse 1 of 1 John 2, my little
children, these things write I unto you that you sin not,
and if any man sin, which we all do, we have an advocate with
the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation,
that's a sin-bearing sacrifice that satisfies, he is the propitiation
for our sins, and not for ours only, but also the sins of the
whole world. Now the whole world there doesn't
mean everybody without exception. It means God's elect all over
this world, Jew and Gentile, all who are brought to faith.
Christ intercedes for us. And we cannot be lost. We cannot
be condemned. The Bible says, who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies.
Who can condemn? It's Christ that died, yea rather
is risen again and seated at the right hand of the Father,
ever living to make intercession. to intercede for us. That's the
points and the necessity and the value of Christ's victory
over death, of his resurrection from the dead. And yes, we preach
that every Sunday here. That's the gospel. And that's
the only hope that we have. Well, let's turn in our hymnals
to hymn number 52, Majestic Sweetness sits in throne, that's Christ
on the throne, saving His people from their sins, interceding
for us, the resurrected Savior.