Isaiah 53

This is one of the most powerful chapters of Isaiah and one that gives so much information about Jesus and God’s plan for our salvation.

Here is the life of Jesus. Growing up from a baby into adulthood. He was not beautiful. He certainly did not look like the Western paintings depicted Him. Certainly as He was taken to the cross He was not beautiful to look at.

Those who had idolised Him dropped Him just as quickly and hid their faces from Him

He took on our pain and our suffering. The people of the time considered him to have been punished by God but they didn’t realise He was taking on their punishment.

We, the defenceless sheep, had wandered shepherdless. We had all turned to our own thing, forgetting God. But God placed all our sinfulness on Jesus’ shoulders.

He did not fight to be released from the burden of carrying our sin. Even though he dreaded what was to come He chose to accept God’s will. He became our sin offering. The eternal sin offering.

That is the greatest prophesy about our Messiah, Jesus. 

So many people see a baby in a manger. Fewer see a man hanging on a cross. Still fewer see a risen saviour. Only a handful see the child then man who grew to adulthood and took up the ministry to God that was His to serve. 

Somewhere between Christmas, with all its commercialism and Easter with its commercialism, we forget about the baby who grew to be a man. This chapter summarised all that and reminds us why that baby arrived in the first place.

Isaiah 40 especially 3-5 and Isaiah 11:1-10

Today I am starting the second week of Advent in my blog. 

For my family, this second week candle is the Peace or Prophet Candle. 

In this second week we look at the prophesies of the Old Testament that speak of God’s coming Messiah.

For me, the prophesies were messages of peace and calm. Promises that no matter how hard the present moment was, there was a time to come when something wonderful would happen. When our Saviour would come to earth, save us, and usher in God’s Kingdom.

Isaiah 40 starts with God speaking words of comfort to His people. Then there is what one of my Bible teachers once said was the multiple layering of much of the Bible. God speaks of preparing the way for the people to return to Jerusalem, to remember God and remember His greatness. But more importantly for the future, these same verses speak of a deeper promise. The promise of He who tends His flock like a shepherd, through whom all of creation was created. This was the symbolic return to Jerusalem as the place where people could be in God’s presence.

For those studying the scriptures later, they saw the promise of God coming to earth. Of His arrival being heralded by a prophet who would come first and prepare the way. 

To ensure we understood this prophesy spoke of Jesus, they were mentioned in the New Testament. For example, John 1 uses words from this prophesy to describe John the Baptist and Jesus.

As a reminder of the covenant made by God with David, Isaiah 11 speaks of the shoot coming up from the stump of Jesse. Of one who will sit on an eternal throne in the line of David. Although the people of the time could see God’s promises for their futures, there was the deeper meaning of the time when the promised Messiah would come. 

The people heard these prophesies and were filled with hope for the time when they would come true. This hope gave them peace. The peace that comes from waiting and having faith in God’s word being fulfilled.

Psalm 89, 2 Samuel 7

David was a shepherd. The youngest son. He was thought so unimportant that when Samuel came to anoint one of Jesse’s sons as the new King he was not included in the line up. Yet God called this shepherd boy to follow Him. And he served God faithfully. For years he lived the life of a fugitive as Saul tried to destroy him. He knew God had anointed him as king, but he refused to take the place as King until God allowed it. 

The shepherd became King and continued to serve God. And God made a covenant with him, this shepherd boy from the house of Judah. God made a covenant to establish his line and throne forever. Forever. What an awesome promise. David must have stood in awe before God, wondering at such a magnificent promise.

In the years when his son’s faltered and God punished them, ripping the throne away from them, it must have seemed that He had changed his mind. But one was coming who would fulfil the covenant God made with David.

This one would be the hoped for Messiah.