Have you ever thought about what Jesus gave up to come to save us? He was with God at the beginning. Scripture says this, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…And Word became Flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, ) full of grace and truth.” (John 1:1, 14). To find out who the Word is let’s go to Revelation 19:11-13, “And I (John) saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and He that sat upon Him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He doth judge and make war. His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns; and He had a name written, that no man knew, but He Himself. And He was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood; and His name is called The Word of God.” Jesus Himself said had this to say in John 8:58, “Jesus said to them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.” And He gave all that up to become like us. But even more amazing than that, He chose to suffer and DIE for us so that we may live (John 10:17-18).
Jesus coming to save us was foretold by many prophets in the Old Testament. One chapter in Isaiah stands out to me. Isaiah 53:1 starts out with couple of questions, “Who hath believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed?” One of the things I like to do is match up verses. The first is an obvious question and the answer was that so many of those Isaiah was preaching to had turned their backs on the Lord our God. The second question made me think a bit – who is the arm of the LORD? For the answer we can go to Isaiah 52:10, “The LORD hath made bare His Holy Arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.”
If you do not see Jesus in the answer above, let’s move on to Isaiah 53:2 which states “For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: He hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him.” Isaiah states He will be an ordinary man, but to us He is most extraordinary!
For now, let’s focus on the first portion of the verse. In many places in the Bible, Jesus is compared to a plant or a root. In one area, Jesus Himself says in John 15: 1-6, “I AM the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman. Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, He purgeth (prunes) it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without Me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in Me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.”
As for the root in the verse, one place we can go is Revelation 22:16 which reveals, “I Jesus have sent Mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and offspring of David, and the bright and morning star” (see 2 Peter 1:19 for reference to the morning star).
The rest of Chapter 53 shows who Jesus is and what he has done for us. You can read it for yourself in the Bible, but I will reprint it here because it is SO VERY important that we understand what He has done for us. Isaiah 53: 3-12, “He is despised and rejected of men: a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 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.
All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to His own way; and the LORD hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth: He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before he shearers is dumb, so He opened not His mouth.
He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare His generation? For He was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of My people was He stricken. And He made His grave with the wicked, and with the rich in His death; because He had done no violence, neither was any deceit in His mouth.
Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise Him; He hath put Him to grief: (and) when thou (we) shalt make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in His hand.
He shall see of the travail (suffering) of His soul, and shall be satisfied: (and) by His knowledge shall My righteous servant justify many; for He shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide Him a portion with the great, and He shall divide the spoil with the strong; because He hath poured out His soul unto death: and He was numbered with the transgressors; and He bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.”
Jesus made the choice to do this for us. Hebrew 12:2 says, “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith: Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of God.” When we see the statement “pleased the Lord to bruise Him,” we have to remember it in the context of “for the joy set before Him.” The Father took no pleasure in the pain Jesus was going to suffer but knew that His Son was going “justify many” and those who abide in Jesus become “strong” through Him, and He will share the inheritance or “spoil.” And we know this because in Galatians 4: 4-6 it states, “But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made (born) of a woman, made under the law, To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoptions of sons. And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.”