The Servant's mission

August 28, 2014

Isaiah 52:13-53:12

Do you recall the Servant mission being addressed in chapter 42:1-9, by the prophet Isaiah, and the same Servant is being addressed in the above Scripture as both suffering and being exalted.  Looking at the suffering Servant, before the cross, Lee Strobel in his book “The Case for Christ” interviews Alexander Metherell, M.D., and PH.D.  Strobel ask this question: “Tell me, what was the flogging like?”  Metherell reply: Roman floggings were known to be terribly brutal.  “The back would be so shredded that part of the spine was sometimes exposed by the deep, deep cuts.  The whipping would have gone all the way from the shoulders down to the back, the buttocks, and the back of the legs.  It was just terrible.”  Metherell paused.  “Go,” I said.  “One physician who has studied Roman beatings said, ‘As the flogging continued, the lacerations would tear into the underlying skeletal muscles and produce quivering ribbons of bleeding flesh.’  A third-century historian by the name of Eusebius described a flogging by saying, “The sufferer’s veins were laid bare, and the very muscles, sinews, and bowels of the victim were open to exposure.”

Metherell, goes on to share the agony of the cross, how spikes that were five to seven inches long and tapered to a sharp point were driven through the wrists, about an inch or so below his palm.  Metherell goes on to explain that in that day the wrist was considered part of the hand in the language of the day.  He goes on to explain the nail would go through the median nerve and the effect would be unbelievable pain.  Then a spike would be driven into his feet causing the same nerve damage there.  Next Jesus’ arms would have been stretched; probably about six inches in length, and both shoulders would have become dislocated.  Psalm 22, foretold the Crucifixion hundreds of years before it took place and says, “My bones are out of joint.’”  It seems impossible to fully grasp the magnitude of what Jesus suffered for one such as I, the song “Who am I that a King would bleed and die for” the first verse; “When I think of how He came so far from glory
Came to dwell among the lowly such as I To suffer shame and such disgrace On Mount Calvary take my place Then I ask myself this question Who am I?

I hope it is clear we are only addressing the fourteenth verse: “As many were astonished at you—his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the children of mankind—“ Isaiah is telling us the Servant was so disfigured by His captors that He will not appear human.  “For God so loved _________ (place your name in the slot) that He gave His only Son, that whoever (all inclusive) believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  Your life story is being written each day of your life by the choices you make, without bowing your will to our LORD and Redeemer, the Creator of all that is, your story will have an eternally bad ending, one you will recall over and over, with no hope of change.  The Scriptures are clear, you will not be throwing a party in hell with your buddies, you will be in total darkness, isolated, with each of your choices being played back, over and over, and over, forever, now that is hell.  So once more it is not God sending you to hell, it is your choice, and my prayer is that you choose to seek Jesus, seek blessing not curses.

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice