Isaiah 53:7

OUR SAVIOUR’S SUFFERINGS AND SUBMISSION

Isaiah 53:7. He was oppressed, &c.

The whole field of Scripture is of infinite value, yet the Christian peculiarly prizes those parts of it wherein Christ, the hidden treasure, the one pearl of great price, is most fully exhibited to the view. This chapter holds a first rank in His esteem, because here, long before our Redeemer’s incarnation, He was evidently set forth crucified. Isaiah here discourses of Him with a pathetic tenderness and minuteness of detail, as if he had been an eyewitness of His sufferings. Had he stood with John at the cross, or watched with Mary at the sepulchre, he could scarcely have presented a more vivid and touching picture of the sufferings of Christ and the glory by which they were followed. The purport of the chapter is, that the Messiah would devote Himself as a voluntary sacrifice, a real and effectual expiation, suffering the heaviest woes and all the bitterness of death, in concurrence with the gracious intention of Jehovah, and for the salvation of rebellious men.
I. THE OVERWHELMING NATURE OF THE REDEEMER’S SUFFERIN

The suffering of Christ in Gethsemane was not bodily pain; physically he was in health and vigour, at the prime of life, and in the flower of His age. The torture of the cross was before Him, with all the preliminary accumulation of woe; but I cannot think that the mere apprehension of these will sufficiently account for what He endured. His mind had long been familiar with the death that He was to die, and He knew and had predicted His speedy resurrection to a glorious life. Now, it seems impossible that an event, however painful, which was to be immediately succeeded by “fulness of joy,” could have thrown Him into such mysterious agony of mind. In after times, martyrs—men and women—had to entertain the prospect and undergo the infliction of death in forms as lingering and dreadful as His; and they anticipated and endured with cheerfulness, joy, magnanimity, rapture … Some other cause must certainly be found for Christ’s darkness and distress of mind, distinct from the mere apprehension of the cross.

The seat of His suffering was the soul. But it is again and again affirmed that He was “holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners;” that He was “without spot”—had no speck or stain of guilt upon His conscience. He could not therefore be oppressed by any feeling of personal demerit. He had no frailty, no defect; He had never erred in thought, word, or deed; He had no conscious deficiencies to oppress Him, nothing to acknowledge and confess with shame, no necessity to pray for mercy, no iniquity to fill Him with terror at the thought of God: in spite of all this, however, His soul was “troubled”—was “exceeding sorrowful, even unto death”—overpowered and beset with bitter anguish.

I know of no principle on which this mental suffering of a perfectly innocent and holy being can be rationally accounted for, except that which refers it to the fact of His being a sacrificial and propitiatory victim. “His soul was made an offering for sin,” &c.… Can any account be given on this ground of the causes and nature of His extraordinary mental agony and terror?

The Scriptures, I think, seem to refer to three sources of this distress and anguish.
There was some mysterious conflict with the great adversary of God and man, from whose tyranny He came to redeem us. When discomfited in the Temptation, the Devil, it is said, “departed from Him for a season,” and in Gethsemane he seems to have returned, for it was then, as Christ Himself expressed it, “the hour of the power of darkness.” … The combined forces of the bottomless pit were brought against Him, and in some way, impossible to be explained, overwhelmed Him with darkness, discomposed His spirit, and alarmed His soul by infamous suggestions.

Then it is also said, that “it pleased the Father to bruise Him and to put Him to grief,” that “Jehovah made His soul an offering for sin;” that He called for the sword, and awoke it against the Shepherd, and pierced and smote Him. Here was some mysterious infliction direct from the hand of God, some wonderful withdrawal of His countenance and complacency, or at least of their sensible manifestation; fire descended from heaven to consume the sacrifice.

It is also said that our iniquities were “laid upon Him,” and that, in some sense, He bore the curse and penalty of transgression. I need hardly say, that we reject the notion that He literally endured the punishment of sin; this would have been impossible, since that includes actual remorse, and Christ could never feel that He was a sinner, though He was treated as if He were; nor would it have consisted with the nature of the Gospel and the display of mercy, since, the penalty literally exacted, mercy would be impossible, and the sinner might demand his release from justice. Still there was suffering in the mind of Christ, flowing into it from human guilt; His pure mind had such an apprehension of sin, such a view of all its vile and malignant properties; its possible attributes and gigantic magnitude so rose and spread before Him, that He started in amazement from the dreadful object, and trembled, and was terrified exceedingly; sin was “laid upon Him,” and it sank and crushed. Him, and, in some sense, its poison and bitterness entered into His soul. The conclusion to which I am led, I confess, is this, that while I deem it impossible for Jesus to have endured that literal remorse, which is the natural and direct punishment of sin, yet I do think that His agony of mind was the nearest to this which it was possible for Him to experience. He was so affected by the pressure of sin on all sides, that He felt something like the terror, anguish, and agitation of a burdened conscience and a wounded spirit. His mind was in a tempest when His agony was at its height; it wrought upon His frame till His sweat was blood; the arrows of God seemed to have entered into His soul, He had all the appearance of a sinner stricken for his sins. I again repeat, that this could not literally be the case; I can only say that it was the nearest to it that Christ could feel or God inflict; and I see not that there is any more mystery in something of this nature being felt, than in the fact of a perfectly pure and spotless being suffering at all.—T. Binney, LL.D.: Sermons, Second Series, pp. 157–162.

As it was no common sufferer who is here pointed out, so they were no common sufferings He endured. “He was oppressed.” Who? “The brightness of the Father’s glory!” We are so constituted as to be more affected by the afflictions of distinguished men than by those of the multitude; our sympathy is awakened when princes endure great reverses and hardships; when sickness clouds the royal brow, and death enters the pavilion of the mighty, whence we are ready to imagine every care is excluded. But here you have the extreme of greatness in conjunction with the extreme of suffering. “HE was oppressed!”

The union and combination of various forms of suffering is implied: “despised,” “rejected,” “Man of sorrows,” “acquainted with grief.” Described as bearing griefs, carrying sorrows, stricken and smitten of God, afflicted, wounded, bruised, subjected to chastisement and stripes, and here “oppressed.” It did not suffice that He was shorn as a sheep—stripped and deprived of His riches, ornaments, and comforts; but His life is demanded. “He is brought to the slaughter.”

1. He suffered at the hand of God. “Smitten of God.” Voluntarily standing in the sinner’s place, He must endure the first penalty of sin. In nothing is the righteous displeasure of God against sin more displayed, His determination to visit us to the uttermost more exemplified, than in the sufferings of Christ. He, even He, must be smitten with the sharp sword of sin-avenging justice (Zechariah 13:7). It would seem as though all the former executions of justice had only been inflicted as with a sword asleep, or in the scabbard, compared with what Jesus felt. Against Him it was awakened, unsheathed, and made to descend with unmitigated force and severity.

2. He suffered at the hand of man. It was much that He was to be “a Man of sorrows,” but more that He was “despised and rejected of men.” He who was ready to relieve every burden and break every yoke, was Himself afflicted by those whom He came to redeem. He who would not so much as “break a bruised reed,” was oppressed through the whole course of His life. Contempt, reproach, and persecution were the requitals for His acts of mercy (Matthew 12:22; Matthew 12:24; Matthew 9:2; John 5:8; John 5:16).

Let this console His suffering disciples, that they only follow the footsteps of the Prince of sufferers; they only drink of His cup. Let them examine, and they will find that the very grief that oppresses them oppressed Him. Be consoled by the consciousness of sharing His sympathy, and by the certain prospect of sharing His triumph. The cross, the grave, the stone, the seal, the Roman guard, and the watchful Sanhedrim were in His case all in vain; and He has promised that the rebuke of His people shall be taken away.

3. He suffered from the assaults of hell (Luke 22:53). The temptation in the wilderness, the agony in the garden, and the sufferings of the cross were all connected with Satanic agency. Satan will not fail to trouble even where he despairs to conquer.

II. THE SILENT SUBMISSION WITH WHICH CHRIST ENDURED SUFFERING.
“He is brought as a lamb,” &c. The lamb goes as quietly to the slaughter as to the fold. By this similitude the patience of Christ is exemplified, not that He was absolutely silent, for more than once He replied to the falsehoods and slanders of His enemies; but it refers to His patience, submission, and moral fortitude. From the beginning to the end He was in a perfect calm; as in His external behaviour, so in His internal frame and temper of soul. Not one repining thought against God, not one revengeful thought against man, ruffled His spirit.
What were the principles that supported Him? Pity for the world that knew not its Saviour; love for the Church He came to redeem; conformity of sentiment with the mind and will of His Father; devout anticipation of the happy results that should flow from His sufferings; the joy that was set before Him—the joy of saving souls.
III. THE PROPER RESULTS IN US OF OUR CONTEMPLATION OF THE SUFFERINGS AND SUBMISSION OF OUR SAVIOUR.

1. Faith in His sacrifice.
2. Imitation of His example.
3. Devout remembrance of His love.
4. Exultant anticipation of His glory.

—Samuel Thodey.

A SACRAMENTAL MEDITATION

Experimental piety does not exempt us from sufferings, but it teaches us how to bear them, especially when we contemplate a suffering Saviour (Hebrews 12:3). Let us take our stand once more by the cross of Christ, and we shall find our grief absorbed in the grief of Jesus, and as we look upon His sufferings, the remembrance of our own will be forgotten.

I. Let us meditate upon the nature and extent of His sufferings. They were anticipated, voluntary, vicarious, unparalleled.

II. Let us muse upon the salutary lessons which Christ’s sufferings teach. 1. The immeasurableness of His love (John 15:9).

2. The enormity of our sins.
3. The debt of gratitude we owe to Jesus.
4. The spirit we should evince in suffering.

Renew your vows of perpetual fealty, and seal them at this sacramental board.—A. Tucker.

CHRIST’S SILENCE UNDER SUFFERING
(Sermon before the Lord’s Supper.)

Isaiah 53:7. He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth.

I. The fact that Christ was silent under His sufferings.

1. He was silent before man. He was oppressed and afflicted, mocked and reviled by wicked men, yet He did not justify Himself before man. This is true—

(1.) When He was taken prisoner.
(2.) In His trial before Caiaphas.
(3.) In His trial before Pilate.
(4.) Upon the cross.
2. Christ was silent before God.

(1.) In the garden; how He was bruised there (Luke 22:44). He might have said, “This is no cup of mine; let them drink it that filled it by their sins.” But no; He only cries that it may pass from Him. Prayer is the cry of one who feels no right to demand.

(2.) On the cross. There God hid His face from Him. Yet. did He say it was unjust? No.

II. The reasons why Christ was silent under His sufferings

1. Because He knew His sufferings were all infinitely just. He was a substitute in the room of sinners.

2. Because He would keep His part of the covenant. Before the world was He entered into covenant with His Father, that He would stand as a substitute for sinners; and therefore when He did come to suffer, His very righteousness sustained and restrained Him.

3. Because of His love. Love to perishing sinners made the Son of God enter into covenant with His Father to bear wrath in their stead. The same love made Him keep the covenant He had made. It was love that tied His tongue, &c.

4. Because He sought His Father’s glory. It is more glorifying to God when sin is punished in His own Son than when it is punished in the poor worms that committed it.

III. The broken bread represents the silent sufferings of Christ

I set before you the plainest and simplest picture of the silent sufferings of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God. In that night in which He was betrayed He took bread. Why bread?

1. Because of its plainness and commonness. He did not take silver, or gold, or jewels, to represent His body, but plain bread, to show you that when He became a surety for sinners, He did not come in His original glory, with His Father’s angels (Hebrews 2:16).

2. He chose bread to show you that He was dumb, and opened not His mouth. When I break the bread it resists not—it complains not—it yields to my hand. So it was with Christ. Some of you believe not. You do not consent to take this silent Lamb as a sin-offering for your soul. Either you do not feel your need of Him, or you have not faith to look to Him. But if you do not truly look to Him, be not so rash, so daring, so inconsistent as to take the bread and wine. You say: It was my sin that lay so heavy on His heart, &c. Come, then, to the broken bread and poured-out wine; feed on them; appropriate Christ in them; and whilst you feed on the emblems of the silent Lamb, do this in remembrance of Jesus.—R. M. M‘Cheyne.

I. There never was such a sufferer. II. There never were such sufferings. III. There never was such conduct under suffering.—I. E. Page.

THE SHEEP BEFORE THE SHEARERS

Isaiah 53:7. As a sheep before her shearers is dumb, &c.

I. Consider our Saviour’s patience under the figure of a sheep before her shearers. Our Lord was dumb and opened not his mouth—

1. Against his adversaries. He did not accuse one of them of cruelty or injustice.

2. Against any one of us. No doubt he looked across the ages; for that eye of His was not dim, even when bloodshot on the tree, and He might have looked at your indifference and mine, at our coldness of heart and unfaithfulness, and He might have left on record some such words as these: “I am suffering for those who are utterly unworthy of my regard; their love will be a very poor return for mine,” &c. But there is not a hint of such a feeling, not a trace of it.

3. Against His Father.

4. Against the severity of the punishment of our sins. I see in this complete submission; a complete absorption in His work [1647]

[1647] He had never been slow of speech when He could bless the sons of men, but He would not say a single word for Himself. “Never man spake like this Han,” and never man wag silent like Him. Was this singular silence the index of His perfect self-sacrifice? Did it show that He would not utter a word to stay the slaughter of His sacred person, which he had dedicated as an offering for us? Had He so entirely surrendered Himself that He would not interfere in His own behalf, even in the minutest degree, but be bound and slain an unstruggling, uncomplaining victim. Was this silence a type of the defencelessness of sin? Nothing can be said in palliation or excuse of human guilt; and, therefore, He who bore its whole weight stood speechless before His judge. Is not patient silence the best reply to a gainsaying world? Calm endurance answers some questions infinitely more conclusively than the loftiest eloquence. The best apologists for Christianity in the early days were martyrs. The anvil breaks a host of hammers by quietly bearing their blows. Did not the silent Lamb of God furnish us with a grand example of wisdom? Where every word was occasion for new blasphemy, it was the line of duty to afford no fuel for the flame of sin. The ambiguous and the false, the unworthy and the mean, will ere long overthrow and confute themselves, and therefore the true can afford to be quiet, and finds silence to be its wisdom. Evidently our Lord, by His silence, furnished a remarkable fulfilment of prophecy. A long defence of Himself would have been contrary to Isaiah’s prediction. By His quiet He conclusively proved Himself to be the true Lamb of God.—Spurgeon.

II. View our own case under the same metaphor. We can go, and do go, as sheep under the shearers’ hands. Just as a sheep is taken by the shearer, and its wool is all cut off, so doth the Lord take His people and shear them, taking away all their earthly comforts at times, and leaving them bare as shorn sheep. I wish when it came to our turn to undergo this shearing operation it could be said of us as of our Lord. I fear that we open our mouths a great deal, and make no end of complaint.

1. A sheep rewards its owner for all his care and trouble by being shorn. There is nothing else that I know of that a sheep can do. Some of God’s people can give to Christ a tribute of gratitude by active service, and they should do so gladly every day of their lives; but many others cannot do much in active service, and about the only reward they can give to their Lord is to give up their fleece by suffering when He calls upon them to suffer; submissively yielding to be shorn of their personal comfort when the time comes for patient endurance (H. E. I. 157, 158).

2. The sheep is itself benefited by the operation of shearing. So when the Lord shears us, we do not like the operation any more than the sheep do; but it is for His glory, and for our benefit, and therefore we are bound most willingly to submit (H. E. I. 204–212).

3. Before sheep are shorn they are always washed. Whenever a trial threatens to overtake you, before it actually arrives you should ask the Lord to sanctify you. If He is going to clip the wool, ask Him to wash it before He takes it off; ask to be cleansed in spirit, soul, and body.

4. After the washing, and the sheep has dried, it actually loses what was its comfort. It is thrown down, and you see the shearers; you wonder at them, and pity the poor sheep. It will happen to you that you shall lose what is your comfort. Will you recollect this? Because the next time you receive a fresh comfort you must say, this is a loan.

5. The shearers, when they are taking the wool off the sheep, take care not to hurt the sheep. They clip as close as they can, but they do not cut the skin. Be ye sure that when the Lord is clipping and shearing us He will not hurt us; He will take our comforts away, but He will not really injure us, or cause a wound to our spirits. If ever the shears do make us bleed, it is because we kick, because we struggle.

6. The shearers always shear at a suitable time. It would be a very wicked, cruel, and unwise thing to begin sheep-shearing in winter time. Whenever the Lord afflicts us He selects the best possible time.

7. When God takes away our mercies He is ready to supply us with more. It is with us as with the sheep, there is new wool coming. Whenever the Lord takes away our earthly comforts with one hand, one, two, three, He restores with the other hand six, twelve, scores, a hundred; He takes away by spoonfuls, and He gives by cartloads; we are crying and whining about the little loss, and yet it is necessary in order that we may be able to receive the great mercy.

III. Imitate the example of our blessed Lord when our turn comes to be shorn. Let us be dumb before the shearers—submissive, quiescent, even as He was.—C. H. Spurgeon: Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, No. 1543.