No. 1
The Apostle Peter tells us that the Old Testament prophets enquired about the salvation that God has given us through faith in Christ Jesus, “the Spirit of Christ which was in them” testifying beforehand “the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow” (1 Peter 1:10-11). In Psalms 69, 88 and 102, the Spirit of Christ anticipates the sufferings of the Lord on the cross, with death before Him, and the closing verses of Isaiah 52 have the cross also in view where “His visage was so marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men.” And do we not hear the Spirit of Christ in the remnant of His people when, in the Lamentations of Jeremiah, the prophet says, “Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? behold and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow, which is done to me, wherewith the Lord has afflicted me in the day of His fierce anger” (Lam. 1:12).
Psalm 16.
The perfect, dependent Man is brought before us in this Psalm, in a life that was completely given up to the will of God. He was the true Meat Offering that answered to the fine flour, the traits of a nature that were perfectly even with no rough parts, every feature blending with every other, the thoughts, the desires, the will, the words, the walk and the actions, all concerned only with the pleasure of God. But the Meat Offering was offered on the altar of burnt offering, and it is with death before Him that the Spirit of Christ says, “Thou wilt not leave my soul in sheol; neither wilt Thou suffer Thy Holy One to see corruption.”
Entering into death in the perfection of His obedience, the Man Christ Jesus rests with confidence in God, knowing that for Him the path of life lay through death, and led onward to the presence of God where was “fulness and joy,” and to God’s right hand where are “pleasures for evermore.” The reality of death is upon His Spirit, but it is not the sufferings of death that are brought out here, but His place there as passing onwards to all that the Father had reserved for Him in resurrection and at His right hand.
Psalm 22.
If in Psalm 16, the Lord is presented to us as the true Meat Offering; no spiritually minded Christian will doubt that Psalm 22 presents to us the Lord as the true Sin Offering. While the sacrificial system brings out in great detail the different aspects of the death of Christ, and the great results for God and men, the Psalms give the feelings of the heart of Christ in the midst of His sufferings.
In this Psalm, the first twenty two verses are all addressed to God. The Lord takes everything from God’s hand, and speaks of all that He is passing through to Him, even when forsaken in the awfulness of that hour. From Matthew 27:46, we learn that the cry, “My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” was about the ninth hour, just before He yielded up His Spirit to God; but they are the opening words of the Psalm, for the thought of His being forsaken of God is uppermost in His thoughts, the greatest of all His sufferings. The question of this awful cry must for the moment be unanswered; but the eternal ages in which the glory of redemption shall shine out, and in which God will dwell amidst a redeemed creation, will give the blessed answer.
Why should His own Son be forsaken? the Son upon whom His love rested with deepest delight, and who had glorified Him in every step of His pathway here below, and who was now on the cross because of the perfection of His obedience. In no other way could God be glorified in relation to the questions that sin had raised in His universe; and in no other way could God secure His counsels of love for the blessing of the creature who had sinned against Him.
Men only heard the forsaken cry; they knew not all that was flowing from the heart and lips of the Son to God, all the deep anguish and perplexity of soul in the midst of infinite suffering. Yet the Son knew the reason for the forsaking, and He justifies God in the words, “But Thou art holy,” A holy God could not look upon sin, and Jesus was made sin, He who knew no sin, that we might become God’s righteousness in Him. The judgment our sins merited was poured upon the head of the guiltless One, that God might be glorified in relation to our sins, and that He might in righteousness forgive and justify guilty sinners. God could not dwell in the praises of His people without atonement; and the atonement of that solemn hour would enable God to dwell in a universe of praise for all eternity.
The fathers of the nation who trusted in God had never trusted or cried in vain; but there was no divine intervention in the hour of the Son’s deepest need. He felt Himself as a worm, not a man who could count on God’s help; though there was none so worthy of God’s help, One who had glorified God in His every step on earth, and whose perfect obedience had brought Him into this place of abandonment, where He still trusted in God in spite of being forsaken. Surely there was never a moment in which the Father found greater delight in His Son than when in the perfection of obedience and trust in HIs God He was forsaken to accomplish God’s will.
How awful was the treatment of the Son of God by the people of Israel whom He had come to bless, and who had constantly received of His gracious bounty, as He healed their sick, fed their hungry, opened the eyes of the blind and raised their dead to life. His words were words of grace, bringing to them the revelation of God and the knowledge of His love. For all this He was despised of the people; they laughed Him to scorn, and He is taunted by the chief priests, scribes and elders, while upon the cross, with the words, “He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver Him: let Him deliver Him, seeing He delighted in Him.”
There is no answer for Israel’s leaders to their scorn, but He says to God, “Thou art He that took me out of the womb…Thou art my God from my mother’s belly.” His life from beginning to end was of constant, unfailing trust in God, and remained so in spite of all the taunts and the forsaking of God. Israel’s leaders were like “strong bulls of Bashan” in oppressing Him on the cross; yea, under the influence of Satan, “They gaped upon Me with their mouths, as a ravening and a roaring lion.”
The depths of His weakness and sorrow are told out to Him who alone could understand, but in words that enable us to realise the depths are beyond human ken. He is poured out like water, His bones out of joint, unable to do anything; His heart is like wax, melted in the midst of His bowels. His strength is dried up; His tongue parched and unable to speak; and He takes all from the God who has brought Him down to the dust of death.
If the leaders of Israel, characterised by satanic energy, assail Him, the Gentile dogs are there too, and assembly of the wicked who had mocked Him, and now pierce His hands and His feet, Emaciated in the midst of His sufferings, a condition depicting the deeper agonies of His soul; and heartless in the hour the soldiers, indifferent to His sufferings, part His garments and cast lots upon His vesture. There is no help for Him from man, nor does He look for any, but He turns to God in these sorrows, saying “But be not Thou far from me: O my strength, haste Thee to help me. Deliver my soul from the sword; my darling from the power of the dog.”
Every bit of reproach and suffering, whether from the religious leaders or the godless soldiers, is intensely felt by Jesus. How very sensible was His feeling to every insult, how infinite His capacity for suffering; and His cup was filled full in that hour. But as He cries for help, even to the end, there is none until He reaches the horns of the unicorns, when He cries, “Save me from the lion’s mouth.” All the while the lion, Satan, had been there. He had used the leaders of Israel to assault the holy Son of God in the time of His sufferings, but he too was there endeavouring to overthrow the Son of God. But the Lord Jesus sustained all that was brought against Him, even suffering the abandonment of His God in whom He trusted.
But the moment came when all was over. Death in the fierceness of its power had been met, the judgment of God had been exhausted on the holy victim; there was nothing more that Satan could do, and his agents had expended all their hatred and malice in vain upon that sinless One. Now He is heard from the place where death’s power is broken, and as a victor over all that assailed Him, He is able to cry, “Thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns.” He had cried in the daytime, and in the night seasons, and there was no response, saving the outpouring of divine wrath; now, when the judgment is over, He is heard, and He comes forth from death’s fastness a mighty victor.
Coming out of death, His first thought is the making known of the Father’s Name to His own; and we know how this was done through Mary Magdalene on the resurrection day. It was with the deepest delight He spoke to His own of the Father, and of their new place with Him in relationship with the Father. Now, in the midst of His own, the Lord sings the Father’s praises. He had known the place of deepest sorrow, now it is His to have the greatest joy, both at the Father’s right hand, and in the midst of His own.
Soon the day will come for Him to be associated with His earthly people Israel, after they have passed through the trials that await them, because they rejected Him; then His praise shall be to God in the midst of His earthly people, who will own their blessing to His work on the cross, to the blood of the New Covenant He shed to redeem them and bring them to God.
Not only the heavenly company among whom He sings the Father’s praises, and the earthly company soon to be blessed, but “All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before Thee.” Here are some of the universal and eternal results of the sufferings of the cross, and the answer to the forsaken cry.
R. 20.11.64
No. 2
Isaiah 53.
Of the many prophecies concerning the life and death of the Lord Jesus, Isaiah 53 is probably the best known. It has primarily to do with the Lord’s coming to Israel, His rejection and death at the hands of the nation, His suffering from God as the sin offering, and the glory that is His as risen from the dead and in His coming kingdom. There are also the blessings that accrue from the death of Jesus, and these cannot be confined to Israel, even if Israel may be specially in view in this remarkable chapter.
The opening words are quoted in John 12:38, supporting the words, “But though He had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on Him.” His message from the Father had been refused; and they had not perceived in One working such mighty acts “The Arm of the Lord.” He had grown up before the Father as a tender plant, the object of His care, but yielding infinite pleasure to Him, and drawing all His resources from Him.
Although so full of moral beauty, and so pleasurable to the Father, Israel could not discern His perfections, and had no desire for Him. There was nothing in the Son of God that attracted them, but this only exposed the awful state of their hearts, and their ignorance of God and what was pleasing to Him. The prophet enters into the guilt of the nation, as associated with them, though free in his own spirit from their treatment of God’s Son.
With true prophetic vision, as enabled by the Spirit of God, He sees Jesus “despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” Such was the Son of God in Manhood here. His message was refused, but He was in His own Person despised and rejected. Israel’s condition in the days of Isaiah was indeed low morally, the ten tribes going into captivity for their sins, and the two tribes ripening for judgment. But how much lower the moral state that so treated the Son of God and His heavenly message from the Father.
Again the prophet enters into the nation’s guilt, when he says, “We hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not.” The whole nation bears the guilt of Christ’s rejection, the remnant represented by the prophet owning their part in it. In His ministry, the Lord had borne the griefs of Israel, and carried their sorrows, when He by His power healed their sicknesses and other ailments, but bore on His Spirit before God that which He removed in His power.
When the Lord was crucified, Israel viewed His death as the judgment of God upon Him for His sins, little realising that it was indeed God’s judgment, but for their sins. This the prophet realises, and for the remnant, godly and repentant, he says, “But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed.” This will be the language of the repentant remnant in the coming day, when they look upon the Lord upon they pierced.
But the wounds, the bruises, the stripes that bring blessing are not those that He received from the hands of men; they tell us what our sins merited, and what He bore for us at the hand of a righteous and holy God, when He bore our sins. For this work was not only for Israel, but also for us. All who believe on Him can take up the words uttered by the prophet, and know the blessedness of having Him as our substitute on the cross.
Like Israel, for whom the prophet now speaks, we can say, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way.” This is true of every man, but not all will own it. The remnant will own it even as the prophet has for them already; the rebellious who will not own it will come under divine judgment, as will also all among the Gentiles who have not in contrition confessed their waywardness and guilt. Those who do confess before God in true repentance can also say, “The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” How wonderful it is to know that Jesus has died for our sins bearing our sins on His own body on the tree.
In verse 7 we have the Lord Jesus before the rulers of Israel, and before Pilate and Herod, opening not His mouth in spite of all the false accusations, and the malicious assaults and spitting. How gentle the Lord was; how wonderful His meekness, as He submits to all the reproaches, the indignities, the refusal of His claims as Son of God, and to the iniquitous judgment that condemned Him because there was no fault in Him.
Humiliated, with every mark of unrighteousness, before the High Priest and the kings of the earth, there is none to declare His generation. What a solemn moment for Israel is the rejection of their Messiah! They slay the originator of life, cutting Him off from the land of the living. But the prophet, while owning Israel’s part in it all, sees behind what is transpiring the thoughts of God, for he adds, “For the transgression of my people was He stricken.” It was indeed God’s way of dealing with Israel’s sins, and with ours.
After man has done His worst to His Son, God intervenes, and will not allow them to bring His dead body into shame. They might make His grave with the wicked, associating Him in burial with the malefactors, as they had by putting Him on a cross with them; but He was with the rich in His death. God had His man ready, and Joseph of Arimathea had the privilege of taking the holy body that would see no corruption to his new tomb, and Nicodemus had the privilege of supplying the mixture of myrrh and aloes. This was God’s vindication of His Son’s freedom from violence and deceit before His vindication of Him in the mighty power of resurrection.
Earlier, the prophet had acknowledged that Jehovah had laid on Messiah the iniquities of His people, now, in verse 10, he speaks of Jehovah bruising Him and putting Him to grief as the offering for sin. All that men could do to the Son of God would but bring upon them divine judgment; but as the sin offering, and entering in to the judgment of God for us, the Son of God would put away sin from before God by the sacrifice of Himself, and take away all our guilt, and bring us to God.
Then follows the great results flowing from Christ being the true sin offering. First, He shall see His seed; secondly, He shall prolong His days; thirdly, the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand. Already He has a generation in His life and nature as risen from the dead; and soon He will also have a generation on earth, a seed that shall serve Him (Psalm 22:30). His days are prolonged indeed, as the Risen Man He lives before God, and shall remain Man, to be with His own for evermore. Glorified in heaven, all things are given into His hand, and soon all in opposition shall be put under His feet. God’s pleasure will prosper in Him in His millennial kingdom, and throughout all eternity.
The fruit of all His travail will be found with Him in the coming day, but already He has His own, His brethren associated with Him before the Father; and He shall be satisfied in the affections of His people, and in their praises. As God’s Servant, the Lord instructs the many that are blessed through Him in righteousness, and this will have special reference to the remnant of Israel when the Lord comes again for their blessing. Those He teaches are those whose sins He bore, whether now taught in righteous grace, or taught when He comes.
Because of having entered into death to bear the sins of His people, God says, “I will divide Him a portion with the great, and He shall divide the spoil with the strong. How wonderful it is that those that God counts great are those whom the world despises, who share Christ’s rejection. They are also reckoned by God to be strong, though weak in themselves; and they are to share with Christ in His kingdom the spoils of His great victory. We shall also have our portion with Him before the face of the Father where Christ is the Firstborn among many brethren.
God has not forgotten all His Son passed through on the cross, and His kingdom and glory will give an answer to His being numbered with the transgressors, for God will give Him the highest place among the many sons He has blessed, even as He has already given Him the highest place in heaven (Eph. 1:20–22), far above all the greatest of every age. His place of glory is also the answer of God to His being the sin-bearer on the tree, and to His intercession, when He cried “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.” What deep, deep pleasure that cry of intercession gave to God. On account of this cry, Israel were dealt with as having committed a sin of ignorance, and God sent His Gospel with forgiveness to them. We too owe our blessing to His intercession.
Daniel 9:26
It must have been an enigma to Daniel to hear of Messiah being cut off, and having nothing, and no doubt Daniel was among the prophets of whom Peter speaks who “Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow” (1 Peter 1:11). Already, in chapter 7, Daniel, in vision, had seen the Son of Man come to the Ancient of days with the clouds of heaven, and receive a universal and eternal dominion. Now he learns that Messiah is to be cut off with nothing, and the time of this solemn happening is actually given.
We can look back to the time when Messiah was cut off, when the Spirit of Christ in the prophet Isaiah says, “I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nought, and in vain; yet surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God” (Isa. 49:4). But we can look up to where He is in the presence of God to see Him crowned with glory and honour. The Spirit has come from the exalted Christ to tell us of His glory; but He also has told us of “things to come.” Soon the once crucified Messiah of Israel will have the kingdom they refused Him on earth; soon, as Son of Man, He will have the universal and eternal kingdom that Daniel saw in vision.
R. 20.11.64