St. Aidan’s Sermons
Winnipeg, Manitoba
The Rev. Canon Dr. Brett Cane, January 30, 2011
Epiphany 4; 8:30 and 10:00 a.m. Holy Communion
The Suffering Servant #3:
“The Highest Priest and Ultimate Sacrifice”
Isaiah 52:13-53:12 (1 Corinthians 1:18-25; Matthew 16;21-25)
Opening Prayer:
Lord Jesus, you came amongst us as the Suffering Servant; help us now, by your Holy Spirit, to recognize your role as the Highest Priest and Ultimate Sacrifice that we might receive release from sin and, in turn, take on suffering as your servants for the sake of the Kingdom of our Father in heaven. Amen.
Introduction
This is the last sermon in our mini-series on the Suffering Servant found in the four passages from Isaiah 40-55 known as “The Servant Songs.”[1] Today’s passage from Isaiah 53 is so deep and powerful that we could dispense with any explanation altogether and just hear it read over and over again, allowing God to speak its profound truths directly to our hearts. However, I will give an explanation of the passage because we need to be clear about who it describes and what is happening. It is the key to both Jesus’ and our understanding of what he came to do – it is the centre piece of God’s rescue plan to bring the world back to himself. It all has to do with Jesus being the Highest Priest and Ultimate Sacrifice.
We will look first at the identity of the servant, then the passage itself under the heading of the servant’s description and task and end with our call to servanthood
The Servant’s Identity
We will begin with the Servant’s identity because this is the key to understanding the passage. We will first look at various options that have been proposed, then the view of the writers of the New Testament and finally Jesus himself.
1. Various options: Down through the ages, various candidates have been suggested as the servant in this passage. The first candidate is the nation of Israel itself. Israel has certainly been “despised and rejected…and familiar with suffering” (53:3), and “taken away by oppression and judgement” (53:8). But the Servant here is definitely an individual – his “appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being” (52:14) implies an individual as does “grew up” and “assigned a grave” (53:2, 9). The clincher for me is the declaration that “He took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows…he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities” (53:4-5). When the prophet refers to “our” he is surely speaking on behalf of God’s people. There is a contrast between the Servant and God’s people, therefore the Servant can not be Israel, but an individual. If the Servant is an individual, then could he be one of the prophets, such as Jeremiah or Moses? Jeremiah was much maligned and mistreated and is described as “a gentle lamb led to the slaughter” (Jeremiah 11:19) but the prophets bore the consequence of people’s sins, never the sins themselves. Never is the suffering of a prophet rewarded with the exultation of the Servant as described here: “He will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted” (52:13). The King is another possibility and the reference to “growing up before him like a tender shoot” (53:2) echoes “The righteous branch sprouting from David’s line” in Jeremiah 33:15 and King David did suffer at the hands of God’s enemies. Now, the King was elected for the sake of his people, and the King was the Lord’s fighter – both of these concepts are here in this Servant Song – but the King does not die instead of the people. The servant is neither the nation, neither one of the prophets, nor the King.
2. The Servant in the New Testament: Who did the writers of the New Testament think the Servant was? In the early preaching of the Apostles, Jesus is called the Servant four times in the first chapters of Acts – e.g. “The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus. You handed him over to be killed, and you disowned him before Pilate” (Acts 3:13. See also Acts 26; 4:27, 30). The title is not used later in Acts in preaching to the Gentiles because they would not have had the background to understand it – instead, they use Lord, Christ, or Son of God. In the story of Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch (Acts 8:26-39), the eunuch is reading from Isaiah 53 and asks Phillip, “Who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?” and it says, “Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus” (Acts 8:34-35). In Acts, Jesus is the Servant.
In the Epistles, Peter uses direct quotations from Isaiah 53 with reference to Jesus: e.g. “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth” (1 Peter 2:22). Paul refers to the Servant Songs many times[2] and includes an early hymn in Philippians 2:5-11 which depicts the course of events in Isaiah 53 perfectly: He “made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant…and became obedient unto death” (Philippians 2: 7, 9). Various writers also use the technical term, “Bearing the sins of many” (Isaiah 53:12) (e.g. Heb. 9:28, 1 Peter 2:24).
In the Gospels, Jesus is called “The Lamb of God” (John 1:29) by John the Baptist which is a composite picture of Old Testament sacrifice and the “Lamb led to the slaughter” of Isaiah 53:7. When John, the Gospel writer, describes people’s reactions to Jesus, he quotes Isaiah 53:1:“Lord, who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” (John 12:38). Matthew (8:17) describes Jesus’ healing ministry by quoting words taken from Isaiah 53:4 – “He took up our infirmities and carried our diseases” as well as half the first Servant Song (Matthew 12:18-21 = Isaiah 42: 1-4).
The early Church identified Jesus with the suffering Servant of Isaiah 53. Where did get they get the inspiration to do this? From Jesus’ own understanding of who he was and what he had come to do.
3. Jesus’ own understanding: Jesus took two pictures from the Old Testament to apply to himself. One was the Son of Man from Daniel 7:13, 14 – with its connotations of glory, kingly power, and deliverance. The other was the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 40-55 – with its picture of humiliation, sacrifice, and death for others. Jesus saw himself as the Servant King – the King who would win victory by giving up himself to suffering and death. When we looked at Isaiah 42:1, the First Servant Song, we spoke about the union of these two pictures in the voice from heaven at his baptism – “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11). Jesus was described as both the chosen and beloved Servant of God of Isaiah 42:1 as well as the kingly Son of God of Psalm 2:7.
Jesus constantly referred to these two pictures throughout his ministry, especially that of the Suffering Servant. For example, “He will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted” (Isaiah 52:13) lies behind Jesus’ affirmations throughout John: “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life” (John 3:14-15); “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will, draw all people to myself” (John 12:32). When we add Jesus’ words in John 17:1-2 about the time having come for his glory to be revealed – that time being his crucifixion – we have the complete picture. Jesus saw his being “lifted up” – his death on the cross – as both the way in which he would bear people’s sins and also the way through to his victory, vindication and exaltation.
Jesus also spoke continually of the necessity for him to suffer: “From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things…and that he must be killed and on the third day raised to life” (Matthew 16:21). Three times he predicts his suffering and death and the disciples can not understand – the concept of the Messiah suffering was not part of their Jewish understanding at that point. Jesus links this necessity with the need for the Scriptures to be fulfilled, especially passages from Isaiah 53. For example, referring to Isaiah 53:12, he says, “It is written ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’; and I tell you this must be fulfilled in me” (Luke 22:37). On the evening of the first Easter Day, he tells the frightened disciples, “Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” (Luke 24:26). Add to this Jesus’ teaching about his “Blood being poured out for many” (Matthew 26:28) and that he had come to “Give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45) and Jesus self-identification with the Suffering Servant is complete. This self-understanding came to Jesus as he meditated upon the Word of God, especially the Servant Songs in Isaiah 40-55. And it is from Jesus that the writers of the New Testament knew to identify him as the Suffering Servant.
The Servant’s Description and Task
Let us now look at the passage in detail and see what Jesus saw about himself in this passage. It is in three parts: it begins and ends with God proclaiming the success of the Servant’s work, his humiliation, and his exultation (52:13-15 and 53:11b-12). In the middle verses, (53:1-11 a) we hear the report about the Servant’s life and work from those who have experienced the salvation he has brought. Their report also contains the dual themes of humiliation and exaltation.
In the Prologue (52:13-15) we hear God’s testimony which is a summary of all that follows: “My servant …will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted” (verse 13). Jesus’ victory and vindication is stated clearly at the outset. God’s affirmation is what gave him the confidence to do all that follows. We, too, can have confidence in times of suffering because our end is revealed to us – “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). But before glory there is suffering and humiliation: “Many were appalled at him…his appearance was so disfigured…and his form marred” (verse 14). The astonishment at his humiliation is equalled by the astonishment at his exaltation: “He will startle many nations and kings will shut their mouths because of him…what they have not heard they will understand” (verse 15). The exaltation of Jesus, the Servant, will be so great that far distant places (nations) and exalted circles (kings) will hear about it. The fact that one so utterly abased is God’s means of salvation is unheard of, without precedent, absolutely unique. Power through weakness – this is not how we thought God worked! As we saw last week’s sermon – Jesus reveals a Creator who dies for his creatures to bring them back to him.
The middle verses (53:1-11a), the report of those who experienced the salvation the Servant has brought, parallel Jesus’ life perfectly. I am grateful to Henri Blocher,[3] for the following comparison:
Just as it is in the Song, so it was with Jesus. The Servant “grew up…like a root out of dry ground” (verse 2); Jesus was born in obscurity and poverty. The Servant “had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him” (verse 2); Jesus did not use ordinary human means to draw people to himself. The Servant was disbelieved, “despised and rejected by others” (verse 3); Jesus constantly met with unbelief and rejection. The Servant was “a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering” (verse 3); Jesus, more than any man, knew the depths of suffering. The Servant “had done no violence, nor as any deceit in his mouth” (verse 9); none was able to convict Jesus of sin. Even so, just as the Servant was taken away “by oppression and judgement” (verse 8), so Jesus was the victim of a miscarriage of justice. Yet the Servant, “did not open his mouth” (verse 7); Jesus yielded himself, uncomplaining, to unjust punishment. The Servant was put to death “cut off from the land of the living” (verse 8), “buried with the wicked” (verse 9); and “numbered with the transgressors” (verse 12); Jesus was crucified – a criminal’s death – with two thieves. The righteous Servant shall “make many to be accounted righteous” (verse 11); Jesus died, the just for the unjust, to justify us by his blood. The Servant rose again “to prolong his days” (verse 10); who but the Lord Jesus has ever risen from the dead, never to die again, and has been supremely exalted?
Who could not fail to see the Lord Jesus is described here!
Then, at the centre of everything (verses 4-6) is the meaning behind it all. Human wisdom, as we heard in 1 Corinthians 1, sees the cross as foolishness and assumes that Jesus’ death on the cross was defeat – indeed, some would see it as punishment for his own sin. “We considered him stricken by God, smitten by him and afflicted (verse 4). But here, we see that it was for our sins that he suffered and died: “He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him and by his wounds we are healed” (verse 5). This is what the sacrificial system in the Books of Moses was instituted for – it could not really deal with sin’s curse and penalty but it pointed to the need for One to come as “The Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world” (John 1:29). We are “the sheep who have gone astray…and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (verse 6). God in Christ took our place and absorbed our punishment. What a Saviour!
In the final verses (11b-12), the epilogue, God declares that through all the servant has done, we have been declared “justified” – not guilty (verse 11). What’s more, it is by knowing him (verse 11), by being his “offspring” (verse10) – by being in a personal relationship of love, trust and obedience with him – we come to benefit from his work. There is nothing we can add to the servant’s work – our only work is to accept the invitation to be in relationship with him – to be grafted into Jesus, the vine (John 15:1). The passage concludes with a summation of all that has taken place: Jesus, the Servant, “has poured out his life unto death…he bore the sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors” (verse 12) – that is why Jesus could cry out on the cross: “It is finished!” (John 19:30).
Our Call to Servanthood
But this is just the beginning for us! When we join ourselves to Jesus, we are to become like him – our pattern of life is to be modelled on that of the Servant. Our way to glory is not by power or might (Zechariah 4:6), but by the same life of self-sacrifice for others. Jesus is very clear about this:
Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. (Mark 10:43-45)
As is Peter:
To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. (1 Peter 2:21)
Paul sums it all up in a hymn whose words magnificently summarize today’s Servant passage:
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:5-11)
Jesus served you as the Highest Priest and Ultimate Sacrifice – the Suffering Servant. Out of his love he has freed you from your sins and made you his own. Your response is to imitate Christ – not to be a sin-offering, but to be his servant and the servant of others – and that will include suffering of some kind. Are you willing to be a suffering servant?
[1] Isaiah 42:1-9; 49:1-7; 50:4-9; 52;13-53:12
[2] 2nd Song: Acts 13:46, 47 (Is. 49:6); 4th Song: Rom. 10:16 (Is. 53:1); Rom. 15:20, 21 (Is. 52:15)
[3] Adapted from Henri Blocher, Songs of the Servant. (London: Inter Varsity Press, 1975), pg. 58,
