Moving Closer to the Cross - Part 1
Isaiah 53:1-12
Sermon by: Rick Crandall - March 25, 2007
*Today we begin a new series: Moving Closer to the Cross. It will take us to Easter, when we will have a Sunrise Service, breakfast and two worship celebrations led by our Choirs.
*I hope you are praying about many people to invite! This is the invitation card we are using for Easter this year. On the front is a scene from an Easter egg hunt, but the attention-grabber is this question: “Hunting for more this Easter?”
*Many people are hunting for something more, because life runs into trouble along the way, and because nothing in this world can give lasting satisfaction. We know that Easter is about infinitely more than eggs and chocolate bunnies. Easter is about the Cross of Jesus Christ, and how it can change our lives forever.
*700 years before Jesus came into the world God spoke through the prophet Isaiah to help us understand the cross, and in vs. 1, Isaiah asked an important question: “To whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”
1. It will be revealed to us, as we move closer to the Cross. So first of all, let’s see the Lord’s sacrifice.
*We need to understand how much Jesus sacrificed for us. He is the LORD Jehovah in vs. 1, the one with His arm stretched out in perfect power.
-He is the LORD of all, who created this universe and everything in it.
*As Paul said in Col 1:16-17,
16. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him.
17. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
*One of the greatest scientific advances of our lifetime was placing the Hubble Telescope into space. Astronomers found that the universe is twice as large as they previously thought, not 100 billion galaxies, but at least 200 billion.
-Each one containing billions of stars.
*But Isa 40:12 tells us that the Lord measures the heavens with the span of His Hand. And Psalm 147:4-5 tells us:
4. He counts the number of the stars; He calls them all by name.
5. Great is our Lord, and mighty in power; His understanding is infinite.
*Scientists don’t know how big the universe is, but Jesus does, because He created the universe!
*And He is the One who came down to Mt. Sinai to meet with Moses.
-Exodus 19:16-21 described it this way.
16. Then it came to pass on the third day, in the morning, that there were thunderings and lightnings, and a thick cloud on the mountain; and the sound of the trumpet was very loud, so that all the people who were in the camp trembled.
17. And Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain.
18. Now Mount Sinai was completely in smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire. Its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain quaked greatly.
19. And when the blast of the trumpet sounded long and became louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him by voice.
20. Then the Lord came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top of the mountain. And the Lord called Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up.
21. And the Lord said to Moses, "Go down and warn the people, lest they break through to gaze at the Lord, and many of them perish.
*Later on, Moses asked the Lord. -"Please, show me Your glory.’’
-Then [the Lord] said, "I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.’’
-But He said, "You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.’’
(Exo 33:18-20)
*Jesus Christ is the Awesome, Almighty God, and yet He sacrificed Himself to become a man. Isaiah began to describe the Lord in vs. 2&3.
2. For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness; and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him.
3. He is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
*In these verses Isaiah shows us 10 ways the Lord humbled Himself for us:
1-He grew up as a tender plant. (Just a twig.)
2-He was a root out of dry ground. (Puny & withered)
3-He has no form or comeliness. (No glory, no majesty, no royal splendor)
4-He had no beauty that we should desire Him. (Nothing special to see)
5-He was despised.
6-He was rejected by men.
7-He was a man of sorrows.
8-He was well acquainted with grief.
9-We hid our faces from Him. (Too gruesome to look at)
10-And we did not appreciate Him as we should.
*Jesus Christ sacrificed His place and His position for us! He left His throne in Heaven for us! He went from the top all the way to the bottom for us.
*Paul said that Jesus, “Being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant, and coming in the likeness of men.” (Phil 2:6-7)
*Jesus even sacrificed His life for us. As Paul said, Jesus “humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” (Phil 2:8)
*Look how Isaiah described the Lord’s sacrifice in v. 7-9,
7. He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not his mouth.
8. He was taken from prison and from judgment, and who will declare His generation? For He was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgressions of My people He was stricken.
9. And they made His grave with the wicked but with the rich at His death, because He had done no violence, nor was any deceit in His mouth.
*Listen to vs. 9 again.
-“They made His grave with the wicked but with the rich at His death, BECAUSE He had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.”
*Jesus Christ is the only perfect man who ever lived. He died, not because He was bad, but because He was good! Jesus was the only spotless Lamb who could die for the sins of the world. That is why vs. 10 says, “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin . . .”
-God made Himself a sacrificial offering for our sins!
*Anthony Castle told the story of a bloody battle that took place many years ago. The cruel general of the enemy troops commanded his army to kill everyone in town, and they began to ruthlessly carry out his orders.
*But one of the hiding townspeople saw a way to be saved. He watched a squad of enemy soldiers break into a nearby house. Soon they killed everyone in that house with their swords. But as they left the house, they dipped a cloth into a pool of blood and splashed it on the door as a sign to the other enemy soldiers that the killing was finished inside.
*The townsman ran to a large house in the center of the town where many of his friends were trying to hide. At once they knew what to do. There was a goat in the yard. They killed it and splashed its blood on the door.
*Just when they closed the door, the enemy soldiers rushed into the street. Without mercy, they began to murder the people all around them, but when they came to the blood marked door, they did not even try to come in.
-Everyone inside the blood-marked door was saved. (1)
*Like that goat, Jesus was the Lamb of God who sacrificed His life for us. He willingly poured out His blood on the Cross, so that we might have everlasting life.
2. Move closer to the Cross to see the Lord’s sacrifice, and see the Lord’s suffering.
*Jesus Christ suffered more than anyone else has ever suffered.
-In vs. 3 He suffered emotionally, “despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. . .”
-In vs. 5 He suffered physically: “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed.”
-In vs. 6 He suffered spiritually as “the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”
*No one has ever suffered like Jesus suffered.
*Tim Zingale once said: “The cross was real, the pain, the suffering, the agony was real. So real that the earth shock and trembled from the dread and awe of the event. Jesus died upon that cross. He suffered, he bore pain, he felt the sting of death, he felt the wrath of God . . .
*The crucifixion of Jesus has in our time been sentimentalized into a pretty picture of an adoring Jesus who suffered with a smile on his face. Jesus was not crucified on a cross in a cathedral between two candles, but on a cross between two thieves; on the town garbage heap. . .
*He was crucified at the kind of place were thieves curse, and soldiers gamble. Jesus died in a most worldly way, a most inglorious way at the hands of the Romans who felt nothing, no remorse, no piety, no compassion.” (2)
*Jesus Christ suffered like no one else, and all of His suffering was for us!
-In vs. 4, He bore our griefs and carried our sorrows.
-In vs. 5, He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him.
-And in vs. 6, the Lord laid on Him [all of our] iniquity.
*We need to really see how much Jesus suffered for us!
*Just after the Iron Curtain fell in 1989, Pastor Frank Harrington had the privilege of taking a mission trip to Budapest, Hungary. He later wrote:
*I remember sitting at a dinner in Budapest, after I had ridden around the city and seen that they had buildings left that had been riddled with bullets. You could see where the bullets and the shells had hit that building. You could see places where the Communist authorities their offices where they had taken all the signs down. You would ride by a place where there had been a great statue of Lenin and there was nothing there but the pedestal. You could tell this was a nation that had gone though a great deal.
*I was sitting at that dinner thinking about all of that, and I noticed the man next to me. His left hand was missing these three fingers. Missing all those fingers.
*As the evening went along, when we became better acquainted, I said, “You’ve obviously had an accident and lost your fingers.”
*Perhaps I shouldn’t have said it. What he said, and it was the only thing he said was, “I was detained by the authorities.”
*They tortured him, and they tortured him because he was a minister and they cut his three fingers off. (3)
*Why was that man from Hungary willing to suffer for Jesus? Why have countless devoted believers been willing to suffer for Jesus Christ?
-Because they realized how much Jesus has suffered for us.
3. Move closer to the Cross to see the Lord’s suffering, and see the Lord’s salvation.
*Vs. 5 describes our salvation as a healing: “By His stripes we are healed.”
*In Acts 10:38, Peter tells us that Jesus “went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil.” Jesus Christ is the Great Healer.
1-He gives us physical healing. It is a profound thing to go through the Gospels and see how often Jesus healed during His earthly ministry. Take Matthew for example. In Matt 4, 8 and 9 Jesus healed many people.
*Here’s an example from Matt 12:10-15.
10. And behold, there was a man who had a withered hand. And they asked Him, saying, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?’’ that they might accuse Him.
11. Then He said to them, "What man is there among you who has one sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will not lay hold of it and lift it out?
12. "Of how much more value then is a man than a sheep? Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.’’
13. Then He said to the man, "Stretch out your hand.’’ And he stretched it out, and it was restored as whole as the other.
14. Then the Pharisees went out and took counsel against Him, how they might destroy Him.
15. But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew from there; and great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all.
*Then in Matt 14 and 15 and 19 and 21, Jesus healed many more people.
*Yes, we thank God for the skilled and dedicated people who help us get well. And we thank God for the wonderful medicines that help us get well. But all healing ultimately comes from God, and He still heals today in answer to prayer.
*I know that many times this is a mystery, because people we love are not healed. But according to His sovereign will, Jesus does give us physical healing.
2-And He gives us emotional healing. The Bible tells us that God is the God of all comfort. And in Luke 4:18, Jesus said: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. --He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed.”
*Jesus said: “He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted.” He gives us emotional healing.
3-And best of all, He gives us spiritual healing. When we turn to Jesus Christ and receive Him as our Savior and Lord, “by His stripes we are healed!”
*That includes the forgiveness of our sins in vs. 6, because all of the guilt for all of our sins was laid on Him. But spiritual healing includes so much more, because God isn’t just forgiving our sins. He is in the process of transforming us into the image of His Son Jesus Christ. Listen to the way Paul put it in Romans 8:28-32...
28. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.
29. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.
30. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.
31. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
32. He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?
*If you have turned your life over to Jesus Christ, then God is at work in you right now both to desire and to do His good pleasure. He is at work in you to make you more and more like Jesus.
*Carolyn Gillette told the story of a hospice chaplain, named Larry, and how he became friends with an 80-year-old lady named Mary. Mary was a hospice patient. Larry visited with her many times, and was greatly impressed by her faith.
*One day, he got a call that Mary had taken a turn for the worse, and if he wanted to see her alive, he’d better go that day. Larry went to visit his friend, and found her in a very deep sleep.
*Larry didn’t wake her up, because he knew she’d been in a lot of pain. But just as he turned to go, she opened her eyes wide and stared right at him. She looked intently and then said to him, “Oh, for a minute, I thought you were Jesus."
*They laughed about it for a moment and had a good visit together. Just 2 hours later Mary did see Jesus face to face. But Mary’s comment really hit a note with Carolyn Gillette. “Oh, for a minute, I thought you were Jesus.”
*Carolyn later wrote:
“I believe we all ought to be mistaken for Jesus, every once in a while. God has given you a mission, just as God gave a mission to Jesus. If you’re living it out, if you’re showing his unconditional love, if you’re treating other people with care and compassion, if you’re bringing good news to the poor, and healing to the sick, and freedom to those whose lives are being torn apart, then maybe someone will look at your life and say, “‘Oh, for a minute I thought you were Jesus.’” (4)
Conclusion:
*The closer you get to the cross, the more they will see Jesus in you.
*Believers, let’s move closer to the cross today.
-See the Lord’s sacrifice.
-See the Lord’s suffering.
-See the Lord’s salvation.
*And if you have never taken that first step of faith.
-Know that Jesus Christ died on the cross for you.
-He rose again from the dead.
*And right now, if you will receive Him. -He will save you and give you real life.
1. ANTHONY P. CASTLE, ed., "Christ, the Covenant of God," in QUOTES AND ANECDOTES FOR PREACHERS AND TEACHERS, sec. B4, p.152. Cited in Fuller, Gerard, O.M. I., STORIES FOR ALL SEASONS (Mystic, CT.: Twenty-Third Publications, 1996), 133-134. (Found at christianglobe.com in sermon “Behind Closed Doors” by King Duncan - Joel 2:12-17)
2. Adapted from SermonCentral sermon “The Blood of Christ for Us” by Tim Zingale - 1 Peter 1:18-20
3. Peachtree Presbyterian Pulpit - “Blessed to Give -- Blessed by Receiving!” - Dr. W. Frank Harrington - April 5, 1998 (Dr. W. Frank Harrington was the much-loved, long-term pastor of Peachtree Presbyterian Church in Atlanta, where he served for 27 years, from 1971, until his death in 1999. During those years, the church received almost 20,000 new members.)
4. Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, Sermon: “What God Gives” (sermonillustrations.com weekly illustrations Jan 25, 2004)
