Like a lamb led to the slaughter – Biblical Studies

Distressed he, and afflicted, he did not open his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that remains silent before its shearers, so he did not open his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was removed; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off from the land of the living, for the transgression of my people to whom the blow was due? His burial was allotted with the wicked, but he was with a rich man in his death, because he had done no violence, nor was there guile in his mouth.

This Sunday and next Sunday we continue to look at the Servant of the Lord in Isaiah 53. Two weeks ago we focused on Isaiah 52:13 to 53:6. The “servant song,” as it is sometimes called, begins: “Behold, my servant shall prosper.” . . And we said that the “servant” here in this song cannot be the people of Israel and it cannot be the prophet Isaiah, because he is serving both the people and the prophet. “. The Servant bears the sorrows and pains of the people and of Isaiah. The Servant is another person.

What Isaiah knows about the coming of the Servant

But Isaiah does not fully understand who this servant is. However, we saw last time that Isaiah knows at least five things about the coming of this Servant.

1. He knows that we are all rebellious subjects against our shepherd king—God (53:6).
2. He knows that God sends his Servant who will be rejected by the rebels (53:3).
3. He knows that by being rejected he was not failing in his mission, but rather becoming a ransom and substitute for rebellious subjects (53:5): “He was pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities.”
4. He knows that nations and kings who had not known or understood any of these things will be sprinkled by the Servant and their sight to see him will be restored. because of who he is (52:15).
5. And finally, Isaiah knows that the end result of all this will be that the servant will be high and exalted and so exalted that the kings of the earth will shut their mouths because of him in reverent silence (52:13, 15).

And we saw more last time that this is both revelation and validation. It is revelation because it reveals things about God and his way of salvation that we cannot know for ourselves. And it’s validation because it comes 700 years before Christ, who fulfills the prophecies of the Servant so amazingly down to the details of how he suffered, died and was buried.

Three more items revealed

Today the revelation and validation continues in verses 7 and 9. And we see that God revealed even more to Isaiah than we have seen. What we see is

1. the suffering of the servant and his response to that suffering (in verse 7);
2. the death of the Servant and his generation’s response to that death (in verse 8);
3. and finally, the burial of the servant and its strange and hopeful twist.

Why talk about suffering in spring?

Before we discuss these three verses, let me reflect on something with you. We are one week away from spring. The sun is starting to heat things up. Minnesota’s February heaviness feels like it’s wearing off. Why should you want to hear about suffering, death and burial this morning?

Or maybe you’re still caught up in the boys’ excitement. state basketball tournament, or maybe you’re just starting to feel the rush of all the NCAA games we have on our own. Or maybe you’re getting excited about starting your garden, or the start of softball season, or the golf course drying up, or spring break, or the wind in your face with riding a real bike and not cycling stationary, quiet walks at night without freezing, or the birth of the new baby, or eating in the backyard.

There are a hundred reasons in spring to feel fresh new sensations of expectation. That is the meaning of spring. So why should I want to think about suffering, death, and burial this morning?

We need more than a “spring” Christ

The answer requires some maturity to appreciate. In general, the older you are, the more you will feel a “yes” rising in your heart to this answer. The answer is this: spring does not last in this age, and if all you have is a spring Christ, you will feel destitute on your night of winter suffering, which may happen tomorrow, even at the beginning. of spring.

If I gave you a Christ who was cheerful, carefree, buddy, buddy, buddy, whose job it was to cheer you up in your springtime emotions, that would be a small part of the truth. And maybe it would be a brighter and more cheerful Sunday morning message. But you know what? I think most of the radio, television, and advertising is already doing that, encouraging them to be happy, optimistic, happy, successful, comfortable, easy-going, sporty, smiling, fun people. And you could jump in and say, “Look, Jesus invented all the good things in the world anyway, and he knows how to play ball, skate, ride a bike, surf, garden, and shoot a bucket better than anyone else in the world. universe”. So let’s keep going for Jesus. right.

It could make a great case for God-centered recreation. And I have on occasion. But the burden of my life is not to improve your spring leisure. My burden is to help you survive and thrive in the winter of your life, to help you say, “When everything around my soul gives way, then Christ is all my help and support.” Not many people in this culture have that goal for you. Not many dedicate their lives to that.

winter is coming for everyone

One of the reasons I’m doing this is because I know winter is coming for each of you. There are winters of health and winters of marriage and winters of parenting and winters of vocation and there will be one last winter of death. In those winters you don’t want a happy-go-lucky friend, sidekick, companion of Christ. You will want a Christ who was “a man of sorrows and experienced in sorrow.” And you’ll want pastors who are better at crying than laughing. And you will want hope, not a joyful, joyous, sunny, springy, toothy, television hope, but a solid, unshakable, eternal, God-guaranteed hope in the face of total darkness.

And that hope has its root and foundation in the suffering, death and burial of the Servant of the Lord, Jesus Christ. So he looks at these three verses with me:

1. verse 7, the suffering of the Servant and his response;
2. verse 8, the death of the Servant and the response of the others; Y
3. verse 9, the burial of the Servant, and its strange and hopeful twist.

The Servant’s Suffering

Verse 7: “He was distressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; as a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and as a sheep that remains silent before its shearers, so he did not open his mouth.

Four things that happened to him

We see four things that happened to him and we hear three times how he responded.

1. First, he was “oppressed.” The word is used more often in the Old Testament than the bosses do to make life miserable for their slaves. They demand that they make bricks without straw. They press hard and bring a terrible sense of pressure and burden and stress and strain and oppression on the slaves. Jesus experienced this in the way that his enemies continually stalked him and eventually captured and tormented him.
2. Second, he was “distressed.” The word implies humiliation, to be cast down, to scorn, to embarrass, to belittle, to mock, to mock, to ridicule, to mock. All of this was the gall that Jesus sucked up during his entire ministry and forced himself to swallow in the last terrible week.
3. Third, he was led as a Lamb to the slaughter. The slaughter does not come until verse 8. Here he is simply led into it. And that is a scary thing. It’s one thing to be downtrodden and grieving if you know you’ll be walking out of jail in a few hours into the spring breeze and sunshine. It’s something completely different if you know that everything leads to slaughter. Jesus knew it. For him there would be no more springs this side of the resurrection.
4. Fourth, he was sheared. “As a sheep before his shearers…” He was stripped of his clothes, of his friends, of his honor, of his divine protection. No one has ever been as naked as Jesus on Golgotha ​​on Good Friday. No one has ever been so deprived of everything nice and beautiful, except love.

How does he respond?

Which leads to how the Servant responded to all of this. Three times we are told in verse 7: “He was distressed and afflicted,

1. he did not open his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that
2. mute before their shearers, so
3. he did not open his mouth. ”

His response was an astonishing silence, patience, acceptance.

jesus on trial

At the mock trial in the middle of the night at Caiaphas’ house when Jesus was accused by false witnesses, the high priest said, “Don’t you answer? What is this that these men testify against you?” And Jesus was silent (Matthew 26:62-63).

Then later, early in the morning, Pilate said to Jesus at the Roman headquarters, “Don’t you answer? See how many charges you’re charged. But Jesus didn’t answer any more, so Pilate was astonished (Mark 15:4-5).

Pilate sent Jesus to Herod, and Luke tells us that Herod “asked him at length, but he answered him nothing.” (Luke 23:9).

Jesus knew his prophecy. He knew his calling. He was the Servant of the Lord. He was the Messiah. He was the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Therefore, when they insulted him, he did not respond with insults and when he suffered, he did not threaten (1 Peter 1:23).

But he did not merely suffer and responded with patient and silent obedience. He also died.

The Death of the Servant

Verse 8: “By oppression and judgment he was cut off; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off from the land of the living, for the transgression of my people to whom the blow was due?

Immolated like the Passover lamb

“He was cut off from the land of the living.” He not only he was taken to the slaughterhouse. He was murdered. And like all the other Passover lambs or Israel’s sin offerings, he was not sacrificed for his own transgressions. He was sacrificed for the transgressions of his people. We deserved to be sacrificed for our sin, but he was sacrificed in his place.

This is the heart of God’s gospel: Jesus, the Servant of God, was cut off from the land of the living NOT for his own transgressions, but for the transgressions of his people. It runs throughout this chapter. He was wounded for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that made us whole was upon him and by his stripes we are healed. The Lord bore in him the sin of all of us. And now verse 8 makes it very clear: he died.

That is why 1 Corinthians 15:3 summarizes the gospel with these simple words: “Christ died for us according to the Scriptures”….