Isaiah 53 - Complete

Who Hath Believed? --- Isaiah 53; Part 1


The aging prophet, gray, and a little disheveled;
Slowed perceptively in the pace of his words:
There were murmurs; and an uneasy grumbling;
Haltingly; purposefully, he lowered his head,
And slumped his shoulders in prayerful resignation.
The message is given: a true and faithful account,
Yet few there were who would give it acceptance:
"Who hath believed our report?" he prayed.
For he knew; the awesome loftiness of the mystery,
Would require a faith only the few could receive.
Most would recon it folly, exceeding all capacities.

"But that He had done so many miracles before them,
Yet they believed not on Him:
That the saying of Isaiah the prophet might be
Fulfilled, which he spake,
Lord, who hath believed our report?
And to whom hath the Arm of the Lord been revealed?"

The Power of God, and His plan unto salvation,
Be hidden in plain sight from the generality of men:
Though externally clear and visible to all,
Yet not internally revealed and made known.
"And to whom is the Arm of the Lord revealed?"
It is written that all are called unto salvation;
Even so, the external voice is of no avail to most.
The sagacity of their own mischievous understandings,
Cannot attain, or even ascertain the promise:
For none come to Him save by epiphany of the Spirit,
Whereby the secret of  Messiah is revealed.

"For many are called, but few are chosen."
"But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood,
An holy nation, a peculiar people;
That ye should show forth the promise of Him
Who hath called you out of darkness,
Into His marvelous Light."


A Tender Plant --- Isaiah 53; Part 2


"And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem
Of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots."

He shall sprout up in a bleak, depleted land,
Humble, lowly, unnoticed among the community;
To the naked eye; in danger of being crushed under foot,
Destroyed by frost, or washed away in floods.
Yet, in the eye of God, He shall be highly exalted,
And greatly esteemed as the beloved only Son:
Growing upright and blameless before Him: a tender plant.
His advent shall not emerge from the flower of creation;
But as a root in the desert; jarring the course of nature,
Formed and fashioned in a field untouched by earthly rains.

"Therefore, the Lord Himself shall give you a sign;
Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son,
And shall call His name Immanuel."

The common expectation was that He would come:
A man of great charisma and much prowess;
One who would catch the eye, inflame the heart,
And transform the expectations of all.
But he will have not the elegance or polish admired by men:
A gangly sprig, without verdue, leaves, or blossom,
Nothing extraordinary, beautiful, or agreeable to see.
There is no glowing majesty, nor signs of it in Him:
Raised by coarse parents in an abject province,
He dwelt in a humble cottage, and labored as a tradesman.

"He was in the world, and the world was made
By Him, and the world knew Him not."



Despised And Rejected --- Isaiah 53; Part 3


"But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men,
And despised of the people."

He was tirelessly renounced for the meanness of His birth;
Openly ridiculed for His hapless externality in public life,
Whilst privately reviled for unmasking the seducing gall,
Being pumped like excess bilge from the Temple mount.
Authorities despised Him for the balm He bestowed;
While tending to the lost with all the easy, gusty plainness
Of an old country shepherd husbanding his cherished flock;
Thus, they rejected Him as one unfit for the foundation stone.

"And He beheld them, and said, 'What is this then that is
Written, the stone which the builders rejected, the same
is become the head of the corner?'"

As the Paschal Lamb, one ordained unto sacrifice,
He accepted and drank the bitter cup of pain and sorrow:
For all His days are sorrows, and His travail grief;
Yea, His heart taketh not to rest in the night.
In disgust and revulsion did all eyes dance afar.
And did the heads avert their gaze and all turn away;
In deprecation, unable to see, in this one broken man;
The Fountain of Life pledged unto a bereft and broken world.


"He came unto His own, and His own received Him not."


Smitten Of God --- Isaiah; 53; Part 4


"That it may be fulfilled, which was spoken of by Isaiah the prophet,
Saying, Himself took our infirmaties and bare our sicknesses."

Effectuation through miracles, is albeit a full spiritual parable
Of the impact of the deeper fulfillment of His redemptive intent:
All sickness has an intimate connection to the fallen soul;
As it is also with the grief and sorrow that life gathers;
For the healing act absorbs the bitter draught of the abject heart,
And heavy, therefore, was the weight of the affliction He bore.
For He knew and transported all in the bond of deliverance;
So by the power of the unparalleled sympathy of pure Grace,
The gall of the load is shifted unto Him; onto His shoulders.

"In all their affliction, He was afflicted"

The same measure meted out to Job by his friends,
Was again allotted and administered unto Him,
At the impulse of the very same doctrinal prepossession;
Measuring the sin of the sufferer by the suffering he endures.
'He must have been of great evil portent to suffer so';
The always rough and ready verdict of the self righteous.
They presuppose that only transgression begets affliction;
However, in this place, the transgressions are of others,
Yet the withering blows and affliction are allotted to Him.

"For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust,
That He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh,
But quickened by the Spirit."


With His Stripes --- Isaiah 53; Part 5


"For He made Him to be sin for us,who knew no sin;
That we might be made the righteousness of God in Him."


Wounded: as one pierced by lance and spike;
Bruised by fist, reed, and the drub of the muted whip;
Chastised by thorns, spittle, mocking, and public humiliation:
The soul is aroused and evoked by the seen here presented,
For this is not simply an innocent man, overwhelmed
In a tidal flood of evil unleashed by the iniquity of others;
The blow that wounds is struck directly, purposefully at Him,
That in Him, the cosmologic rupture of rebellion is mended;
And through Him a way has been opened to heal the breach,
To end transgression, make an end of sin, and to make
Reconciliation for iniquity, and avail it to all who will.


"Who, His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree,
That we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness:
By whose stripes ye are healed."


Gone Astray -- Isaiah 53; Part 6


"I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek
 Thy servant; for I do not forget Thy Commandments."

The simile of a scattered flock paints an arrant picture:
The universality of  transgression; the solitude of sin;
Its divisive impact and its distinctive rejection of control.
All have wandered along paths of their own choosing;
Becoming separated, and isolated in small grazing groups,
Or individually exposed, entangled in the high brambles:
Some are unwilling, but all are unable to return to the fold;
For there is none recognized to collect; to defend; and to guide.

"I am the good shepherd, and know My sheep,
And am known of mine."

Iniquity and its penalty were caused to light on Him;
Not merely a sin offering; He became sin for all:
The vicarious embodiment of the aggregate sin of all mankind;
Not sins in the plural, for the sin of the world is one.
Thus, the chosen are not simply renewed and made righteous;
We are reborn! Crafted into the very righteousness of God.
In ourselves, scattered; In Him, gathered together;
By nature, we wander; In Him, a Way is provided;
In Him is our recovery procured; and woe averted.

"I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth
His life for the sheep."


Silent Sufferance --- Isaiah 53; Part 7


"I was dumb, I opened not My mouth; because Thou didst it."
"Who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered,
He threatened not; but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously."


He was early bade answerable; a voluntary surety for the many;
Close satisfaction was, from ancient times demanded; and sternly exacted:
Though He had commanded the clouds of glory from above,
And walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire;
He humbled Himself and became obedient even unto death;
His lips opened only in brief witness, never in complaint,
To others who had no standing, He spoke nothing at all.
The gaze fixes on His silent sufferance: pure manifest meekness;
To bespeak His love for the famished in a desolate world,
And for the joy that was formerly set so clearly before Him,
He openly, even willingly, assumed the burden and satisfied the demand.


"I will keep My mouth with a bridle, while the wicked is before Me.
I was dumb with silence, I held My peace"


Cut Off --- Isaiah 53; Part 8


"Saying, God hath forsaken Him: persecute and take Him;
For there is none to deliver Him."

As a lamb bound for slaughter, was He grimly shuttled,
From curia, to the council of elders, then unto Caesar;
Hurriedly handled in the fell of night, beset by focused steel.
No crier was sent out to arouse a witness of exemption;
No weeper, wailing urgently, led His death procession,
Seeking mercy and quittance, as was the custom;
In His humiliation at foul hands; judgment was detracted:
An unjust death by illegal violence under the mask of law.

"Now the chief priests, and elders, and all the council, sought
False witness against Jesus, to put Him to death"

In great solitude of bitter encumbrance was He consumed;
As He had lived--misapprehended and despised--so He died:
Cut off out of the land of the living; yet not for Himself.
A deep cry of agony rent His soul and pierced the air,
As the appointed burden was cast fully upon Him,
And the Love in which He lived turned away in censure;
He was consumed and drained as a pool in the desert:
Delivered; stricken; to make atonement for transgression.


He Made His Grave --- Isaiah 53; Part 9


"Then answered all the people, and said,
His blood be on us, and on our children."


The elders thereof are filled with violence;
The inhabitants of the city have spoken lies,
And their tongue is deceitful in their mouths.
To His righteousness He held fast and did not let go;
His heart did not reproach Him as long as He lived;
As the crimson gates of doom were opened unto Him,
And He passed through the doors of the shadow of death.

"I should have been as though I had not been;
I should have been carried from the womb to the grave."

His place was assigned among sinners and the condemned;
Yet He abhoreth all in the congregation of evil doers,
And God surely will not permit Him to rest with the aberrant;
For the wicked are ashamed, and are silent in the grave.
The Father in Heaven will not forsake His Anointed One:
'His days are preserved forever, in glory, at My right hand;
But the seed of the wicked shall soon be cut off.'

"Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen
 Clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury."

Yet did the overruling providence of Almighty God
Bear witness unto His Servant and certify His testimony,
By appointing that He should be highly esteemed in death:
Carefully; so tenderly; and mournfully was He prepared,
For rest in a noble tomb amidst an honorary garden.
Forasmuch as, without any trace of deceit in His mouth,
Did He set before them the way of life, and the way of death;
And neither did His lips drink of the wine of violence.

"Have mercy upon Me, Oh Lord; consider My trouble which
I suffer of them that hate Me, Thou that liftest Me up
From the gates of death."


The Mystery Of Messiah --- Isaiah 53; Part 10


"Awake, Oh sword, against My shepherd, and against the man
That is My fellow, sayeth the Lord of Hosts: smite the shepherd,"

The mystery of Messiah interprets the types and shadows of the law;
That sacrificial system bore witness to the needs of men's souls,
And prophesied of One in whom these would be met and satisfied.
He is sacrifice; yet, in the divine paradigm, He is priest also;
His stroke slaying the offering; ....... His soul being the offering;
And He both offers and receives in concurrance with Divine will.
Yet the distinctive essence of His sacrifice is attained only
In prayerful contemplation of the cleansing power flowing from it;
The pleasure taken by the Lord in bruising Him is a mystery,
Only until we partake of the bounty revealed in His redemptive act.

"His seed also shall I make to endure forever, and His throne,
As the days of Heaven."

Death hinders not the produce of His seed; but is the cause for it,
By His quickening will He procure unto Himself a people;
For a seed and a remnant shall believe on and serve Him,
And the Lord shall account them unto Him for a generation.
Of the increase of His consolation there shall be no ending;
He asked only life of Thee, and Thou gavest it to Him,
His dominion is of everlasting and it shall not pass,
And His Kingdom is ageless, neither shall it be destroyed.
In Him, at Thy pleasure, are mercy and truth united,
And through Him, have righteousness and peace embraced.

"Behold My servant, whom I uphold; Mine elect, In whom
My soul delighteth; I have put My Spirit upon Him:
He shall bring forth judgment to the gentiles."




Satisfied --- Isaiah 53; Part 11


"As for me, I will behold Thy face in righteousness:
I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness."

To satisfy the desolate estrangement of rebellion;
To recapture and reclaim the determined waste ground,
And cause the bud of the tender herb to spring forth:
This was His Divine charge from ancient times of old.
He shall behold all of the works of His hands;
Weighing the anguish and desolation of His soul,
The breach is healed; the seed is spread: all is satisfied.

"Also I will make Him My firstborn, higher than the Kings of earth."

All who are drawn to Him and the power of His resurrection;
And who come to partake in the fellowship of His sufferings,
Overcome with weeping, and with many supplications:
Are conformed into His death; and transformed into His life.
In Him shall all the seed of Israel be justified before God;
And by His grace, made heirs to the sure hope of eternal life;
That He should become the firstborn among many brethren.

"Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all
Iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people,
Jealous of good works."



Dominion --- Isaiah 53; Part 12 and Epilogue
"Ask of Me, and I shall give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance
And the uttermost parts of the Earth for Thy possession."

Because He endured and suffered the day of His humiliation;
Thou makest Him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands;
Yet the oil and the wine are with Him in His high place:
For sacrifice and intercession are the foundation of His Kingdom.
In everlasting righteousness, will He exercise authority;
And He shall reign as High King and as High Priest forever.

"For He testifieth,'Thou art a Priest forever after the Order of Melchizedek'."


Epilogue:

Look ye once more at this sorrowful, yet majestic figure,
That rises, strangely blended, before the prophet's eye:
Sinlessness and sorrow; God's approval and God's affliction;
Rejection and rule; death and life; humiliation and dominion.
Listen; Hear the last echos of the prophet's lonely voice,
As it dies in our ear, 'He bore the sins of many';
Then hearken how another voice later takes up the ring,
But instead of pointing ahead, down the centuries,
Points to one at his side and cries, 'Behold the Lamb of God!'
Look heavily at that life; at that death; at that tomb;
At that resurrection, that authority, and that intercession:
And ask thyself, 'Of whom speaketh the prophet?'

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son,
That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."