Narnia: Behold, The Lion Of Judah Has Come And Conquered Series

Behold His wisdom and humility...52:13-53:3

God tells us to “Behold” to give our complete attention to Jesus Christ His Servant because Jesus knows and Jesus does what is necessary to bring us back from condemnation into communion with God. Because of Jesus’ willingness to humble Himself to do God’s will, God exalted Jesus to the highest place, gave Him victory and made Him Lord over all.

When earthly kings seek victory, when they seek to spread and secure their domain they humble others and make others their servants. They never chose to be humble servants to achieve victory. Remember King Herod and how he made the Wise Men serve his interest in locating the Christ Child so he could destroy Him and thereby secure his own throne? Remember the White Witch, the self-proclaimed Queen of Narnia, and how she humbled Edmund to serve her selfish ends to bring his sisters and brother so she could turn them to stone and secure her throne in Narnia?

God says kings will shut their mouths because in Jesus they now understand what they never saw or heard, that humility is the way to victory; humility is what the arm of the Almighty Lord looks like. Who would have believed that a little baby born in a feeding trough could deliver Israel from an oppressor stronger than Rome? Even John the Baptist needed God to reveal to Him that Jesus was in fact the Savior of the world because Jesus did not look like a Savior.

He grew up like a shoot to be cut off. He grew up like a root out of dry ground; came up for the purpose of dying. Jesus was poor. He did not have earthly possessions, power or glory. David killed his ten thousands and had beautiful eyes. Joseph was ruler of Egypt and was handsome and well-built. Jesus did not have these earthly attractions. Therefore, He was dismissed and rejected by people – considered worthless and unworthy of our attention. Jesus was a “man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief” with such disfigurement and humiliation that He did not look like Himself, He did not even look human! And so, we refused to believe that victory comes through humility and did not give Jesus a second thought but we hid our faces from Him. But God tells us to turn our faces to Him and pay the closest attention to Him because when you do you understand that victory comes because Jesus was willing to come and sacrifice Himself and suffer for our sins.

Behold His sacrifice and suffering...53:4-9

Remember when Aslan said that the White Witch has renounced her claim on Edmund’s life and the whole camp cheered? But remember how Lucy noticed that Aslan didn’t cheer but seemed deeply sorrowful? Aslan was planning on taking Edmund’s sins and bearing them for him. In a similar way, when we saw the pains and sorrows of Jesus we thought God was punishing Him for some sin He committed. That’s how dull our sins make our perception. But in reality it is certain that Christ, who had no sin, was lifting up our griefs and shouldering our sorrows and carrying them away from us as if they were His own to bear them on Calvary in our place.

Remember how the White Witch scorned sacrificial love and said she would take all of Narnia including Edmund’s life and then she pierced Aslan to death? What she didn’t know and what we need to know is that it was Christ who was pierced through violently until dead for our rebellions. Jesus was pulverized into many pieces for our perversions.

Jesus was struck down violently so we would no longer be God’s enemy but would become God’s family. Jesus was scourged so healing might be available to us. God made Jesus who knew no sin to be sin for us so in Jesus we might become the righteousness of God.

We are all like sheep with attitude. We go astray and want our own way and our perversions, like a boomerang, return to strike us down. We are all like Edmund. Once we taste our Turkish Delight we get fixated on our lusts and we are willing to betray family, even God to satisfy our appetite. This is why God says to behold His Servant Jesus because of His willingness to be our substitute and be sacrificed in our place and struck down for our perversions. Do you remember how the White Witch wished to sacrifice all of Aslan’s troops to spread her reign over Narnia? Her mouth was eventually shut and king’s mouths were shut because God’s Servant Jesus Christ secured His reign not by sacrificing you but being sacrificed for you. For that, He should have our complete attention.