The Willing Servant

"Behold, my servant shall act wisely, he shall be high and lifted up, and shall be exalted." ( Isaiah 52:13 )

Yesterday as I engaged in a bit of barn housekeeping, enjoying the welcoming spring weather, I found myself humming and singing the words I could remember to a perennial Easter hymn from the reformed church of my childhood. Pieces of soiled bedding and manure flung out from the dirt floor and met the open fresh morning air, gently sweeping my happy hens along in the melodious labor and breeze. 

But it's one week prior, and we must endure the cross before we can celebrate the crown. 

Pastor Tim Keller used to tell this story in his sermons to help his listeners better understand the significance of what Jesus had done in wrapping himself up in human flesh and experience. He read from an article written by an African-American woman who wrestled with the Christian faith and the existence of God while she was a journalism major in college. Her mother had been beaten to death by her boyfriend, and as one can only imagine, she had suffered greatly as she remembered seeing the bloody hand prints on the wall. 

When she actually heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ for the first time it moved her to tears and belief because of the power of the sacrifice. She said that she was overcome by the reality that Jesus knew what it was like to be beaten to death by someone who should have loved him. 

The reality that Jesus would leave glory and his Father to lower himself into our world, into our suffering and egregious sin boggles the brain. 

I think of a person who works on sewer systems. That's got to be the dirtiest job imaginable. The workers put on this special suit that protects their skin from coming into contact with the sludge and scum in a septic tank or city sewage drain, and then they lower themselves into the cesspool. 

Like those workman, Jesus lowered himself into our painful, filthy world, but unlike them, he didn't first put on any special gear to protect himself. No, he put on human flesh like all of us so he could feel everything we feel and then some. He allowed himself to feel rejection, suspicion, and mocking. He allowed himself to feel the impact of not only every angry insult, but every brutal fist. He allowed himself to be beat so severely that he wasn't recognizable as a human and cut to pieces by someone who should have loved him, his own creation. 

"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 52:14 ) 

Every part of Jesus's interrogation, trial, and sentencing was unjust. No justice was given to him, so we could be justified. Jesus was humiliated, shamed, and counted among the criminals, so we could be counted among the saints in light. Jesus became filthy with our sin, so we could be washed clean. God rejected and forsook his Son, so he would not have to reject and forsake us. God showed no mercy to Jesus, so he could show mercy to us. He abandoned Jesus so he could adopt us as his children. 

Unbelievable, and yet it's true. Jesus took our place on the cross. 

And not because God made him do it. 

The reason that evocative analogy of the train switch-tender and his little son playing in the gear area or on the railway tracks, it's got several versions, but the reason it doesn't work is because the son is unaware that his father is about to sacrifice his life for a train full of people. 

( There is the original 1884 tale, however; where the son obediently lies down on the track and his prompt obedience saves his life. )

The first story doesn't work because Jesus didn't die by accident, and he wasn't strong-armed into the cross by his Father. There was no so called "cosmic child abuse" involved in his death. Jesus volunteered. And this changes everything. 

In the Garden of Gethsemane, God began to give Jesus a taste of what was to come. 

"And he said to his disciples, 'Sit here while I pray.' And he took with him Peter and James and John and began to be greatly distressed and troubled. And he said to them, 'My soul is very sorrowful, even to death.'" ( Mark 14:32-34 ) 

"And he said, 'Abba Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me, Yet, not what I will, but what you will.'" ( verse 36 ) 

"And being in agony he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground." ( Luke 22:44 ) 

Jesus didn't sweat drops of blood because of the crucifixion, as horrific as Roman crucifixion was in that day, God began to reveal to Jesus the cup. He would drink the cup of God's wrath for the sins of the world. He would be crucified for us; he would make for us penal substitutionary atonement. 

"The Lamb of God," John the Baptist proclaimed, "Who takes away the sin of the world." ( John 1:29 ) 

Do you ever wonder why a lamb? Why was it a lamb sacrificed at the Passover in Egypt, and its blood wiped over the doorposts? Why not a pig or maybe a calf or a chicken? Why did God tell the Israelites to take a lamb and sacrifice it?  

God's children are compared to sheep in the Bible, and Jesus, the Son of God, not giving up his Godhood to become fully flesh, became one of us. All I can say it that I raise sheep and there are not many things in this world as precious and vulnerable and innocent as a soft, baby lamb.  Hurting one seems unthinkable. 

Nails did not hold Jesus to the cross, love did.  

Jesus could have called down a legion of angels to rescue him from his death, but he went knowing full well the cost he was about to pay for our lives with his own blood. After living a perfect life in our imperfect, broken world and freely subjecting himself to our filth and betrayal, Jesus willingly climbed the hill and lay down on the cross. The Lamb of God stayed on the cross for us. But Praise God, he did not stay in the tomb. 

Sunday's coming. 

Because the cross makes a way for the crown. 

💜

"....the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world." ( Revelation 13:8b CSB ) 

 Bible verses from ESV unless otherwise indicated