Isaiah 52:13-15 - Pastor Jon Noyes

This morning we're going to be stepping out of our series in Luke and starting our Paschal or Lenten series. Can you believe Easter is coming? This is unbelievable. It's actually the best time of year. I think it's better than Christmas.

It's better than all of it, I think. So over the next few weeks, we're going to be going through Isaiah, and we're going to pick up this morning in Isaiah 52, starting in verse 13, and then over the next, I don't know how many weeks, what is it, five or six weeks? We're going to go all the way through the end of chapter 53. And what I'd like to do this morning is kind of my goal is to lay the foundation for the series, because really, the first three verses are kind of a summary of what we're going to be going through in Isaiah. So I'd like to read the whole passage.

So it's fairly lengthy. I should have looked and seen that we already read 26 or 29 verses of scripture. But can we ever have enough scripture? I mean, some of you are like, yes, we can. But keep in the back of your minds as we read this and as we share the sermon series with you guys, that this is a song, a poem that Isaiah has written.

And there are four servant songs, and this is one of them. This is the last one. This is actually the longest one. And all of them celebrate the sacrificial life of a righteous servant of God. And they explain how God is going to bring redemption to the people of God.

Digging in, let me pick up in chapter 52, verse 13, behold, my servant will prosper. He'll be high and lifted up and greatly exalted. Just as many were astonished at you, my people, so his appearance was marred more than any man in his form, more than the sons of man. Thus he will sprinkle many nations. Kings will shut their mouths on account of him.

For what had not been told to them, they will see, and what they had heard, they will understand. Who has believed our message, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For he grew up before him like a tender chute, and like a root out of parched ground. He has no stately form or majesty that we should look upon him, nor appearance that we should be attracted to him. He was despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.

And like one from whom men hid their face, he was despised, and we did not esteem him. Surely our griefs he himself bore, and our sorrows he carried. Yet we ourselves esteemed him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. But he was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed.

For our iniquities. The chastening of our well being fell upon him. And by his scourging were healed. All of us, like sheep, have gone astray. Each of us has turned to his own way.

But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on him. He was oppressed and was afflicted. Yet he did not open his mouth. Like a lamb that was led to the slaughter. And like the sheep that's silent before its shears, so he did not open his mouth.

By oppression and judgment, he was taken away. And as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living. For the transgression of my people to whom the stroke was due. His grief was assigned with wicked men. Yet he was with a rich man in his death.

Because he had done no violence. Nor was there any deceit in his mouth. But the lord was pleased to crush him, putting him to grief. If he would render himself as a guilt offering. He'll see his offspring.

He'll prolong his days. And the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in his hand. As a result of the anguish of his soul. He'll see it to be satisfied by his knowledge. The righteous one, my servant, will justify the many as he'll bear their iniquities.

Therefore I will lot him a portion with the great. And he'll divide the booty among the strong. Because he poured out himself to death and was numbered with the transgressors. Yet he himself bore the sin of many and interceded for the transgressors. Father, we come before you this morning, already lifted up.

Because we've all met you in this room, presumably. And we all know what it is to be saved, and we all know what it is to fall under the banner of Christ. And we are grateful for this, Lord. But as the Easter season is upon us, God, would you develop in us a heart for those who don't yet know you? Would we take this time as the Easter season is upon us to affect the lost?

And it starts here and now with the reading of your word and the proclamation of it, Lord. And would you go before me and use me as an instrument? Would these be your words, not mine? And as we leave here, Lord, would we be affected? Would we be changed even just a little bit?

Just changed more into the image of Christ your son? Lord, we love you help us love you more and each other better in Christ's name. So I'd like to offer just a little bit of context for us this morning here. I think it's important to understand. See, Isaiah wasn't written to us.

It's written for us. And it points to something. But this is a song, a poem that was written to real people in a real place at a real time. Just like Luke was written with an audience in mind by a real person. So too, was Isaiah.

And Isaiah, he lived and preached in the 8th century before Christ. So he was 700 years before Jesus. Isaiah and his jewish brothers and sisters. They had just witnessed the fall. Of the northern kingdom of Israel.

What's really interesting to me is the northern kingdom, when it fell, it never returned. It was gone forever. And then the southern kingdom, it lasted a little bit. While in its capital, Jerusalem, would survive another 150 more years. Upon which time Jerusalem and the temple.

Are ultimately laid in ruins by Nebuchadnezzar. And then the people of God were either ushered off into exile. Or they remained in a ravished and war torn land. And whenever I'm preparing a message, I always try to just put myself in the feet of the original audience, the people that would be hearing this. Because I think, well, for me, it helps understand what's being said.

So imagine the scene with me. If you can put yourself in the shoes of the Judeans. These are God's chosen people. But conquered again. It seems to me like every time they walk in faith and they experience victory, it doesn't last all that long.

They get conquered again and again and again. Having just experienced a time of relative peace. They have their promised land, and they have their capital city, and they have their temple. God's promises fulfilled before them. And finally, hope is spreading.

And then it's all gone. It's in this context that Isaiah is writing. He's speaking to people who are weary, who are battered, who are tired, who are wounded by their losses, both economic and material losses, but also spiritual losses. These people, at this time, they need assurance that their God would still be faithful to them. And they needed hope, hope of a rescue.

And in this way, and this is why I think the context is important. This way. I don't think it's too dissimilar from us today. Some of us are battered and tired. Certainly in the culture.

Some of us are sitting in need hope. So today we get the opportunity to look through the window of the past. The most important thing for us is to take away that God chose to reveal himself in Jesus Christ in real spacetime history, not just 2000 years ago, but even 2700 years ago. And just like with Luke, this is a true historical account about real events. And what's more is here in this poem, in this song, written by a man living in a small country in Iron Age Palestine, we have testimony to Christ.

God has become present in humanity, within human history. And this is nothing short of unbelievable. I feel like this gets lost on us every Sunday morning when we read from this book and when we preach from this book. What we're talking about is God entering time and space and history and actually affecting the world for his glory. And even so, even 700 years before we started, if you remember, in Luke, we started with a story of Simeon and Anna, and they held this baby Jesus and they recognized baby Jesus for who he was, the promised Messiah.

But even 700 years before that, Isaiah here is telling us of his coming. So our passage this morning is an exaltation sandwich, so to speak. We might have noticed it if you look at our verses, just the first three, it's an exaltation sandwich, and it serves as a kind of summary to the rest of the poem in chapter 53. And we're introduced to some of the overarching themes. The first of the theme to keep in mind over the next couple of weeks, it comes in the form of a question.

Who is this servant that Isaiah is talking about? Isaiah doesn't explicitly say Jesus, right? The answer is not fully given to us, but it's clear there's a certain few things about him that are true. For example, he's human. We know that he's a man.

We learned that he's a suffering man. But we also learned that he's a conquering man. And the second major theme that we should be thinking about, I think, is one that flows out of the first. And it's found in a mystery, a paradox, between the servant's exaltation and then his humiliation, his victory and his suffering. This is a thing that even caused the disciples to stumble.

If we remember, in Jesus, they didn't quite understand. What does it look like for a suffering servant to offer us a salvation that we so desperately need? They didn't get it. We read about that a little bit this morning. They didn't understand what that looks like.

But this isn't all, I think, unfamiliar to us. If we actually think about it. We see this very thing, a suffering servant in everything from Harry Potter to iron Man. A suffering servant. The hero first has to suffer before the hero can rescue but this here before us, it's not marvel.

It's real life. This is a true story. You see, all those movies, all those things that we sit down and we enjoy, that we love, are just imitations of a real life hero, Jesus, a hero who provided restoration to jewish exiles, but also to so many more. And here it all starts in our verses with, behold, I love this. Isaiah says, behold, stop.

Every time I say this, I want to bust out in a rap like, stop what you're doing, because I'm about to ruin the image and the style that you used to, but I won't. Oh, I guess I just did. But this is Isaiah. He's saying, stop what you're doing and watch the work of salvation being accomplished through this exalted servant. Stop what you're doing and pay attention.

Pay attention to what's being done to you and for you. And this opening scene here, it belongs to the Lord with his declaration that the servant will prosper and be exalted. This isn't just any servant, though. This is what Isaiah says, my servant. This is God's servant.

This is the servant who's going to be able to do things Israel hasn't been able to do for itself.

This servant's going to be able to bring about total and complete restoration through liberation, a restoration not just for Israel, though, a liberation from more than just foreign rulers, a restoration of all people, a liberation from a marred identity, and ultimately a liberation from a sentence of death. But this is more than just. Behold. Isaiah says, behold. He goes on to say, my servant will prosper.

This is guaranteed. Notice, he says, my servant will prosper. He will succeed in his mission. There's no doubt of this. This is a promise from God.

And God always fulfills his promises. But even more than succeed the servant, he will be high and lifted up and greatly exalted. Notice the three verbs. There's a triune trifecta of verbs going on here. High and lifted up are what Isaiah said about the throne of the Lord.

In Isaiah 61, in the year of King Uziah, death, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of his robe filling the temple. And you guys, if you can picture this, right? The train of God is filling the temple. And this is the famous words, where the angels in the seraphim, and they're there, and they say, cry out, holy, holy, holy. Is the Lord God almighty recognizing the holiness of God?

And then what does Isaiah say? I am a man of unclean lips. I'm a man of unclean lips, realizing who he is and his desperation before a holy and a just God.

And that train would have been maybe attributed also to this servant, right? They would have pictured these things combining together to form a royal servant. They would have said, is this a ill servant before us? But there's more. The apostle John tells us Isaiah saw this servant himself.

In John twelve, we read these words, these things, Isaiah. About this passage, Isaiah said, because he saw his glory and he spoke to him. Isaiah saw the glory of God, not just as God's train filled his robe, filled the temple space, but he also interacted, presumably with Jesus. This suffering servant, Isaiah talked to him. So this trilogy of verbs, high, lifted up and exalted, point us to the ultimate victory and glory of the suffering servant.

More than that, Isaiah brings this poem to the end of offering hope to a people who are completely dejected. They're downtrodden, rejected. By pointing them to the end of the servant's work, ultimately to the thing the apostles pointed people to a few hundred years later, Jesus. Right. That's what he's pointing us to.

All of this here in Isaiah is foreshadowing the anticipated exaltation of Jesus, the suffering servant, the one in front of whom every knee will bow and every tongue will confess as lord. Then they'll do every single knee. Everybody who ever lived will bend their knee in front of Jesus. And the scripture tells us in Philippians that they're going to do so unto the glory of God the father. Now Isaiah takes his audience from exaltation to humiliation.

And as high as the exaltation might be, the humiliation will be deep.

Just as many were astonished at you, my people. So his appearance was marred more than any man in his form, more than the sons of man. Saints of God. Notice the prophet here is declaring the ultimate outcome. The ultimate victory is going to be accomplished on a path that's going to surprise us.

You see, the jewish people were crying out for a victorious warrior, and they're going to get a suffering savior.

And it's interesting because Israel, they would have been able to relate to these words and to the person that Isaiah is pointing to. Israel knew what humiliation was. Isaiah is writing to a humiliated people, a kingdom split in two, half of which has been completely eradicated, the other under subjugation, foreign rule, and in ruin. Even so, the humiliation of the servants, so much more than that of those he's come to serve. You see, the prophet Isaiah is offering his people a preview of a humiliation our imaginations can hardly grasp.

Every year around this time, multiple times, I watch that Mel Gibson movie. I forget the passion of the Christ because I think it comes close. That's probably the movie that comes closest to actually depicting the humiliation that this servant will suffer.

It's a humiliation that's defined by violence. So much so that those who see his suffering servant, they'll wonder if he's even a human being unrecognizably disfigured. And this is something I think we often lose sight of. Even during the Easter season. I think often our minds conjure up images of Jesus and jeans that hang on the walls of youth departments at church.

I'm not saying these things are necessarily bad. I'm not attacking anybody for these things. But I think they might maybe give us a false depiction of who, you know, a Jesus who looks far too similar to ourselves. A pretty Jesus with beautiful blue eyes and well conditioned hair.

But we have to be fair. We have to allow the Bible to inform us on who this servant is. Jesus. Friends, Jesus was not the high school quarterback or the prom king. Isaiah here tells us when people looked at him, at the culmination, at the very most important thing that this servant is going to do, when people looked at him, they were appalled at what they saw.

We're going to see this next week. Jesus was one from whom men hid their faces. They didn't esteem him, they didn't honor him. They didn't give him his due glory. And friends, notice something else.

Isaiah is saying that his disfigurement was so great that he didn't even look like a man. You see, the people didn't look at him as he bowed under the weight of his cross. The people didn't look at him coming out of the violence that he had just experienced at the hands of the temple guards and say to one another, hey, do you think this is the messiah?

Hey, do you think this is the savior?

I mean, even the closest to him didn't get it.

They didn't look at one another and say, is this the servant of God from Isaiah's song? No. They looked at one another and said, is that a human being? Is that a person?

They looked at him and said, what is that bloody mess?

What is that tortured figure? You see, friends, the exaltation that he was to know in all of its height, the highest place that heaven affords by his sovereign right, is an exaltation that came by way of the deepest degradation. Jesus was despised. He was refused esteem.

To that point, keep in mind, don't be fooled either. Had you or I been there, we would have joined with the crowds in this. Behold the man upon that cross, my sin upon his shoulders. Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice call out among the scoffers is how the hymnist puts it. The unbelief that Isaiah here depicts is the same unbelief found in the world today.

Why is that? Well, because Jesus doesn't fit the current power narrative that's ruling our culture right now. A culture that's hoping that just one celebrity would rep. Just. I just saw it this last weekend with the Super bowl.

We're just wanting that one Super bowl man, Mahone, whatever his name is. What's his name? Mahomes. He said, glory to God. Somehow that solves our problems, man.

If that Taylor Swift just came out as christian, so many people would. Guys, we already have the most famous person who ever walked the earth as captain of our team, and his name is Jesus. Yet we're constantly looking to that famous person. Do you remember the whole Kanye mess? He's Christian.

He's Christian. Listen to some of his new album.

This man is not Christian. But he was going to solve our problems, right? Well, no, Jesus has already solved our problems. The suffering servant has already solved our problems. Remember, Isaiah says kings will shut their mouths on account of him.

Not Kanye West, Taylor swift or Mahomes.

No, it comes by way of a suffering servant. It comes by way of Jesus. It's in revelation that John says they will wage war against the lamb, but the lamb will triumph over them because he is the Lord of lords and the king of kings, and with him will be his called, chosen and faithful followers. That's me and you, by the way. John will go on to say, on his robe and on his thigh is the name written, king of kings and Lord of lords.

This is our Lord.

He is enough. And that same power that Isaiah is alluding us to, the same power of a salvation, of a fallen and dawn trodden people in Israel, is the same power that raised people from the dead today. And that same power that's at work in raising people from the dead, is at work in me and you. Currently, right now. We just prayed for revival.

Friends, the answer to our prayers are sitting in the seats this morning right here in front of me.

You, through Christ, are the hope that this world so desperately needs. We don't need a football player or whatever to rep Christ. We are his representatives. You are ambassadors of Christ. Begging on behalf of Christ.

Be reconciled to God, is what Paul says.

Even so, it seems to be these modern celebrity christians might say pleasant and complimentary things about the Lord of glory. And like mahomes, like these guys, they'll praise his ethics, his teachings and his morality. They'll declare that he was a good man and a great prophet and the only one who has answers to the societal problems. Maybe they'll go that far. That confront the world today.

Maybe they'll go that far. But where they stop short is they won't acknowledge that they too are sinners, deserving of everlasting punishment, and that the death of Christ was a vicious sacrifice designed to satisfy the judgment of God and to reconcile and offending God to the sinners. Men will not receive what God is saying concerning his son today. Also, the servant is despised and rejected of men, and men do not esteem him. That's what the Bible says.

This is what's wrong with the whole he gets us movement, by the way. He gets us, but do we get him? That's a whole other sermon.

So while Isaiah says, many were appalled at him, verse 15 says, he will sprinkle many nations. Kings will shut their mouths on account of him. For what had not been told them, they will see and what they had not heard, they will understand. Verse 15. Friends, this is like, in my estimation, after studying the last maybe three weeks for this message, I think that this is possibly the most important verse in this whole poem.

The picture Isaiah is painting would have been understood by his audience as a ritualistic cleansing outlined in the law coming out of Leviticus, like 18 and 14. Each of these cleansings that these people knew so much about, and they're in exile, and certain cleansings can't happen, and they can't go to the temple and do what they need to do on behalf of God, and they're struggling with this. And then each of these cleansings, even so, are temporary in this context, these people need a cleansing. They need to be cleaned. But at best, these cleansings, they're band aids.

But the sprinkling done here that Isaiah is pointing to, the sprinkling done here by the servant, is a real and lasting one, a once and for all remedy, a cure, and the result of the servant's humiliation, it's an everlasting purification. And this is fulfilled when believers in nations all over the world, as Peter says, who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God of the father by the sanctifying work of the spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with his blood, to be washed clean through the blood of.

And this here, friends, is at the heart of the scandal of the gospel. It's here that we find what it means to be a Christian and affirm that God justifies the ungodly, that God justifies sinners, that it was while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Again, friends, this flies in the face of the notion that somehow God rewards good people and punishes bad people. Jesus turned that all on its face. Jesus was the best person who ever lived, and he suffered more than anybody else who ever lived.

That's not how the economy of God works. You see, church people look upon the servant, mistakenly, due to his condition, as if he was there on account of his own sins. But nothing could be further from the truth. We see this in Isaiah 53 six. I think this is going to be two weeks from now.

All of us, like sheep, have gone astray. Each of us has turned to his own way. But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on him. And what's most amazing about any of this is that without compromising his righteousness or his holiness, God justifies sinners through the redemption provided through his servant son. And on account of his willingness to do this, it's Christ, and Christ alone, who can sprinkle the nations with the news of his forgiving love.

With this triumphant story that Isaiah is alluding to, that he's pointing his fellow brothers and sisters in exile to with this triumphant story that although he was there in all of the darkness and abject humiliation, while he was there suffering on that hill on a cross at Galgotha, that God raised him to life again after he died a humiliating death, and then he ascended into heaven. And at that ascension, as he ascends, the kings call out to him for rulership. And screaming from that grave isn't just a resurrected Jesus. And in that ascension, screaming down from heaven is the understanding that, friends, you don't have to try to fix yourself, because you never know. I just did a podcast interview.

I just did a podcast interview last week, and it was fantastic because I got interviewed by this woman. And on the screen, so it was like a video thing. On the screen was a young girl, 17 year old girl from Denmark. And she didn't want to talk, but I was addressing some questions that she had. And as I'm speaking to her, I'm giving her an argument for the historicity of the Bible.

It's like super apologetics. Geek stuff, right? I shared with the gospel with her on the podcast, and then the podcast ended and we start talking and what was really interesting is what this girl understood. She says to me, she says, john, I thank you for your time in doing this, because I really like the way that you say things. I can actually understand what you're saying.

It's not like the super academic stuff, which is what we do at standard reason. We try to break things down in an understandable format for people to grasp low hanging fruit, so to speak. And then she said, I came to realize. This is what she said to me. She says, during, when you were talking, I've come to realize that Jesus is who he says he is.

But the reason why I don't want to believe it is because I have to give up so much.

And then I said to her, I said, wait a, like, let's talk about this for a moment.

So Jesus is who he says he is. He's the king of kings and the lord of lords. But because of the sin in your life, because of the messed upness in your life, you don't want to run to him. Do you know? This is what I said to her?

I said, do you know that Jesus isn't waiting for you to be perfect? Because if he was waiting for you to be perfect, you'd never come to him. I said to her, jesus wants you just as you are, broken, battered and weary, full of sin. Jesus came to save the sinners, not the righteous. Jesus came for you, and he came for me.

And that's the point here, friends. We don't have to. This is what Isaiah is saying to Israel. They don't have to fix themselves. They can't fix themselves.

They never could do that. You don't have to try and justify yourselves by blaming others. Israel was stuck offering scapegoats. I don't have time to get into it, but offering scapegoats, but it's only temporary. Jesus is the everlasting scapegoat of which every single sin, past, present and future, was affixed to, because he's the only one who could handle it.

We don't have to do away with our shame. Jesus does away with our shame. You don't have to do away with your guilt on your own. Jesus has handled your guilt. He does it every day.

When sinners repent and they call out to him and ask him for the rescue that he's offering, they receive the forgiveness in Christ. This is what Isaiah is talking about. It is finished, friends. This is the gospel that he comes to us and says, all of your guilt will be mine, and all of my righteousness will be yours. And that's why we're focusing on this passage this Easter season.

This Easter season. This is what we, your elders here at Soli, we want to give to you every weekend. Every weekend. We want to give you a degraded, exalted, glorified, everlasting servant. Savior.

And he's true and he's real. And this isn't a fairy tale. And these things aren't empty platitudes that we share with you just to hope that you feel good. We don't get paid enough just to focus on how you feel. We want to tell you what's true.

And friends, this is what's on display for us at this table every weekend. A suffering but victorious servant that's been once and all delivered in the scriptures. And here at this table, there's a reminder of a work that's been once and for all accomplished on your behalf. And between this table and the word of God that's proclaimed here every week, God speaks to us. And he speaks to us about his finished work and the word of truth who brings salvation to all men.

It's here at this table where we get to be reintroduced to Christ every single weekend. Where we get to dine. We get to dine with this suffering servant every single weekend. And it's here at this table that our hearts are knit together in the joyous news of which we've just heard, preached and sung about in our songs and prayed about in our prayers and heard from the proclamation of the words. It's here at this table where we get to experience the full life of christian being.

This is why this table is so special, so cool. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for the opportunity to preach your word, worship you. We love you in Christ's name amen.