Isaiah 53:10-11

Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him

“It pleased the Lord to bruise Him:”

The Lord’s hand was supreme in the business--

1.

In respect of His appointing Christ’s sufferings. It was concluded in the counsel of God that He should, suffer.

2. In respect of the ordering and overruling of His sufferings. He, who governs all the counsels, thoughts and actions of men, did, in a special manner, govern and overrule the sufferings of the Mediator; though wicked men were following their own design, and were stirred and acted by the devil, who is said to have put it into the heart of Judas to betray Christ--yet God had the ordering of all who should betray Him, what death He should die, how He should be pierced, and yet not a bone of Him be broken.

3. In respect of His having had a hand actively in them (John 19:11; Matthew 27:46; Romans 8:32; Zechariah 13:7). (J. Durham.)

The good pleasure of God in redemption

The good pleasure of God. Which the prophet marks to show--

1. That all the good that comes by Christ to sinners is bred in the Lord’s own bosom.

2. The concurrence of all the Persons of the Trinity in promoting the work of the redemption of sinners. (J. Durham.)

The Divine complacency in the sorrows of Christ

There are many expressions in Scripture, which, without explanation, are repugnant to human instincts of justice, and shocking to our intuitions of love. This is a case in point. He had done nothing overtly or morally to deserve severity, “yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him.” It revolts our first feeling of equity and compassion; and when the statement is applied to Him of whom we are taught that God is love, we shrink at the sternness of the words. Had it been said the Lord found it necessary to put Him to grief, it would, have been mysterious enough, and we should have found ourselves asking “Why?” and catechizing our speculative ideals of Divine equity and of moral necessity. But to read that it pleased the Lord to inflict this bruise and to impose this grief is a riddle which seems as harsh as it is contradictory. (A. Mursell.)

The unity of the Father and the Son in atonement

All this confusion and injustice arises from sustaining too literally in our minds the figure of duality which excludes the Father from participation in the sacrifice, and the Son from the acquiescent willinghood of its executive. It is not the punishment of an innocent Son by an angry Father that we have to consider, but rather the co-operation of the entire Godhead in the tragedy of sorrow out of which the redemption of mortality was born. Under the figure of Father and Son, the Deity devoted the full strength and tenderness of the Divine character and resource to the salvation of our race. And, in this respect, there was, and ever will be, a Divine complacency in the sorrow and suffering from which that redemption sprang. (A. Mursell.)

Christ’s complacency in the Divine sorrows

Our topic is the Divine complacency in the sorrows of Christ. It will bear transposition; and we can speak of Christ’s complacency in the Divine sorrows. Here is a blending of pleasure and pain, of joy and sorrow, as full of mystery as of love, but the key to whose mystery is carried in the bosom of its love. The sorrows of Christ were endured in pursuance of the settled and ancient purpose of God. Not of the purpose of a Father to afflict His Son, but of the purpose of the Divine Creator to redeem His universe. There was a compact of pity and of power in the heart and arm of God as soon as man had lapsed, that his lapse should be atoned and his fall restored. The Creator was not to be baffled in His plan. His life was bound up in that of His Maker; and because He lived man must live also. Not only because He loved us, but because He would not be defeated, did the mind of Deity set itself to untie the knot which the serpent had encoiled around the creature of God’s image. (A. Mursell.)

Divine love and Divine suffering

1. The sorrows which atonement involved became a source of complacency to the Divine mind, inasmuch as the Lord foresaw their certain issues.

2. Nor could this complacency in sorrow fail to be augmented by the thought of the universal interest those sorrows would awaken. Earth, for whose sake they were endured, was the last to show that interest.

3. This complacency was made complete because the sorrows it confronted removed the barrier from the exercise of infinite beneficence and love. What is more tantalizing to a soul aflame than love restrained? (A. Mursell.)

The bruising of the Son of God the pleasure of His Father

I. WHOM DID JEHOVAH BRUISE?

II. HOW DID HE BRUISE HIM?

III. WHY DID HE TAKE PLEASURE IN BRUISING HIM?

1. That He might execute His pleasant decrees.

2. That He might fulfil His pleasant promises.

3. That He might redeem the chosen objects of His love.

4. That He might promote His Son to the highest honours.

5. That He might exalt His own glory to the uttermost. (W. Taylor.)

The bruising of Jesus

The Father was “pleased” to bruise Emmanuel.

I. BECAUSE OF THE HOLY SUFFERER’S PERFECT SYMPATHY WITH HIS PURPOSE, as being the vindication of the Divine holiness, “the magnifying of the Divine law,” and the upholding of the Divine government.

II. BECAUSE UNDER THIS “BRUISING” JESUS WAS MANIFESTING THE DIVINE LOVE AND SYMPATHY FOR AND WITH US--perfect as it was God’s, and yet true brotherly, as it was man’s.

III. BECAUSE OF WHAT HE DESIRED TO SEE IN US. (J. Wylie, D.D.)

God’s purpose in the awful tragedy of the Cross

It is so utter a perversion of justice, so signal a triumph of wrong over right, so final a disappearance into oblivion of the fairest life that ever lived, that men might be tempted to say, God has forsaken His own. On the contrary. God’s own will and pleasure have been in this tragedy. “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him.” The line as it thus stands in our English Version has a grim, repulsive sound. But the Hebrew word has no necessary meaning of pleasure or enjoyment. All it says is, God so willed it. His purpose was in this tragedy. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D.D.)

Christ’s sufferings; their cause, nature and fruits

The prophet is still dealing with the Jews scandals. Whilst you look only to the outward meanness and sufferings of Christ, you overlook the design of God in Him.

I. THE WILL OF GOD. “It pleased the Lord to bruise Him,” etc., that is the cause of His sufferings.

II. THE NATURE OF HIS SUFFERINGS. “When Thou shall make His soul an offering for sin.”

III. THE FRUITS OF HIS SUFFERING. (T. Manton, D.D.)

Christ’s sufferings Divinely ordained

All the sufferings of Jesus Christ were laid on Him by the ordination and appointment of, God the Father. This appears by Scripture, which asserts--

1. The choice of Christ’s person, and the designation and deputation of Him to the office of Mediator (Isaiah 42:1; John 6:27; Ro 1 Peter 1:20).

2. The bestowing the person of Christ upon us, so that He was made ours John 3:16).

3. The determining of all the sufferings of Christ; not a sorrow, but God had it in His thoughts before all worlds (Acts 2:23; Luke 22:22; Acts 4:27).

4. There are some expressions which seem to imply as if there were more than a bare knowledge and permission in this great affair, as if there were some kind of action in Christ’s sufferings. It will be worthy the inquiring, then, what acts of God, what efficiency there was from Him towards the sufferings of Christ?

(1) Thus far God concurred, by a withdrawing of His presence and the sight of His favour.

(2) By sustaining the wicked instruments in their natures, beings, and actings, whilst they were drawing out their spite and violence against Christ (Acts 17:28; John 19:11).

(3) By serving His love and glory by their wickedness, that bruised and afflicted Christ.

The reasons of this point are--

1. Because all things fall under His decrees and the care of His providence, and therefore certainly this matter of Christ does.

2. Because this was the special design and contrivance of Heaven to bring forth Christ into the world; all other dispensations looked this way. (T. Manton, D. D.)

God’s eternal pleasure revealed in Christ

The plot of the Gospel was long since drawn in heaven, and lay hid in God’s breast, till He was pleased to copy out His eternal thoughts, and give the world a draught of them. (T. Manton, D. D.)

God working His own counsel through human agency

How is the creature to blame, then, for smiting and bruising of Christ? Or if to blame, how is God clear?

1. For the creatures’ blame. They are faulty--

(1) Because God s secret thoughts and intents are not their rule. Hidden things belong to God; and it is He that worketh according to the counsel of His own will.

(2) They had other ends, though God turned it for good. “With wicked hands ye have taken, and crucified, and slain.”

(3) God’s decrees did not compel them to evil; it implieth things will be, though it doth not affect them.

2. For the justifying of God when He judgeth. His justice cannot be impeached, because He infuseth no evil, enforceth to no evil, only ordaineth what shall be. His goodness cannot be impeached for suffering things which He can turn to such advantage for His own glory and the creature s good. God s decrees are immanent in Himself, working nothing that is evil in the creatures. (T. Manton, D. D.)

When Thou shalt make His Soul an offering for sin

Christ an offering for sin

1. It is here supposed that there is sin on the person, and that wrath due for sin is to be removed.

2. That there is an inability in the person to remove the sin, and yet a necessity to have it removed, or else he must suffer.

3. The intervening, or coming of something in the place of that person who is guilty of sin, and liable to wrath.

4. The acceptance of that which interveneth by God, the party offended, and so a covenant whereby the Lord hath condescended to accept that offering. (J. Durham.)

Christ a guilt-offering

(R.V., marg.):--Hebrews asham (Leviticus 5:14; Leviticus 6:7), to be carefully distinguished from the sin-offering (Hebrews chattah, Leviticus 4:1; Leviticus 5:13). Sin is viewed as a sacrilege, an invasion of God s honour: the asham is the satisfaction paid for it, viz the innocent life of the Righteous Servant. (Prof. S. R. Driver, D. D.)

The guilt-offering

There is a historical passage which, though the term “guilt-offering” is not used in it, admirably illustrates the idea. A famine in David’s time was revealed to be due to the murder of certain Gibeonites by the house of Saul. David asked the Gibeonites what reparation he could make. They said it was not a matter of damages. But both parties felt that before the law of God could be satisfied and the land relieved of its curse, some atonement, some guilt-offering, must be made to the, Divine law. It was a wild kind of satisfaction that was paid. Seven men of Saul’s house were hung up before the Lord in Gibeon. But the instinct, though satisfied in so murderous a fashion, was a true and a grand instinct--the conscience of a law above all human laws and rights, to which homage must be paid before the sinner could come into true relations with God, or the Divine curse be lifted off. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D.D.)

The Monarch self-surrender, a trespass-offering and a sin-offering

What this suffering meant, the prophet indicates in several phrases which we will link together. “His soul shall make a guilt-offering” (Isaiah 53:10). “He shall bear their iniquities “(Isaiah 53:11). “He bare the sin of many” (Isaiah 53:12). These three expressions are derived from the Mosaic ritual; the first, from the trespass-offering, the second, from the law concerning the scapegoat, the third from the sin-offering. Inasmuch, however, as the sending away of the scapegoat was a part of the ceremonial connected with the sin-offering on the great day of atonement, we may let the second and third expressions blend into one. And then we get the thought that this suffering Servant would at once fill up the varied meanings of the sin-offering and of the guilt-offering. (C. Clemance, D.D.)

In Messiah’s offering, the meanings of the trespass-offerings and the sin-offerings were all included

1. That there was a distinction between the significance of the trespass-offerings and that of the sin-offerings is seen in the fact that each kind of offerings had its own specific ritual and set of laws (Leviticus 11:25; Leviticus 7:1). But it is not so easy to point out wherein that distinction lay. They had some points in common. Both recognized sin in some form or other. Though every sin might not be a trespass, yet every trespass was a sin, hence (at least in one case) the trespass was to be atoned for by a sin-offering (Leviticus 5:6). Both of them were for sins of omission and for sins of commission. Both were for inadvertent and for known sins. Both were for sins against conscience and against God. Both were for some sins against property. Both were for open and for secret sins. So that it is not surprising that the two frequently seem to overlap. Still a careful study will help us to draw out some distinctions between them--

(1) The sin-offering recognized sinfulness as uncleanness common to the race; the trespass-offering recognized sin in the specific acts of any person among them (cf. Leviticus 5:17 with Leviticus 16:15)

.

(2) The sin-offering regarded all sin; the trespass-offering only some sins Leviticus 16:34; Leviticus 5:1; Leviticus 5:14).

(3) The sin-offering was for all the people, recognizing their oneness; the trespass-offering was for distinctive cases, recognizing their individuality Leviticus 16:21; Leviticus 5:1; Leviticus 5:14; Leviticus 5:17).

(4) The sin-offering conveyed the idea of propitiation; the trespass-offering embodied that of satisfaction, as, over and above its recognition of injury done towards God or man, there were specific injunctions concerning restitution, intimating a certain value as the standard required Leviticus 16:21; Leviticus 5:18; Numbers 5:5).

(5) The sin-offering had its aspect God-ward; the trespass-offering rather looked man-ward (Leviticus 4:4; Leviticus 14:14).

(6) The ritual of the sin-offering symbolized pardon, “covering,” the “bearing away” of sin; that of the trespass-offering symbolized purification or cleansing from sin (cf. Leviticus 16:16; Leviticus 14:14)

.

(7) The treatment of the sin-offering indicated far deeper reproach than the treatment of the trespass-offering (Leviticus 4:11; Leviticus 7:6). As the sin that poisons all is far more serious than the transgressions which mark each one, so, on the day of expiation, “the victim, because it was (symbolically) laden with the uncleanness and guilt of the whole people, and was consequently unclean, must be taken outside the camp and there burned”(Delitzsch)

.

(8) The attitude of the sinner in the sin-offering was that of believingly recognizing the sacrifice as his substitute God-ward; but in the case of the trespass-offering he must also be ready with his compensations man-ward Leviticus 16:20; Leviticus 5:16; Leviticus 6:1).

(9) In the sin-offering the priest is always the representative of the offerer; in the trespass-offering he is generally the representative of God. “Thus the trespass-offering was a restitution or compensation made to God, in being paid to the priest, a payment or penance which made amends for the wrong done--a satisfactio in a disciplinary sense.”

2. The prophet in the chapter before us declares that the trespass-offering and the sin-offering will be fulfilled in this Servant of God; that His work for man, towards God in reference to sin, will take into account all the aspects of sin, will honour all the claims of God, and will meet all the need of man. And so, in fact, we find it when we come to examine the representations of the work of our Lord Jesus, as given us in the New Testament.

(1) Our Saviour as the sin-offering, “suffered without the gate” Hebrews 13:11).

(2) He atones for sin, and for sins (Hebrews 9:26; Galatians 1:4).

(3) He “bears away” a world’s sin, yet “gave Himself for our sins” John 1:29; Galatians 1:4).

(4) The sins of all are laid on Him, and yet the individual can say, “He gave Himself for me (1 John 2:2; Galatians 2:20).

(5) He is the propitiation, and yet the ransom-price (1 John 4:10; Matthew 20:28).

(6) His sacrifice avails towards God, yet is effective towards man Hebrews 9:12; Hebrews 10:10).

(7) By His work our guilt is pardoned, our sin covered; through it our natures are cleansed (Romans 4:7; 1 Peter 1:2).

(8) As He is our propitiation, there is a reconciliation to be accepted; as He is our ransom-price, our acceptance of Him is attended with repentance towards God, and restitution towards man (Romans 5:8; Ac Matthew 5:23; Luke 19:7).

(9) As our mediating High Priest, He is our representative before God. He pleads His blood before the throne; yet is He also the voice of God to us, through whom our pardon is proclaimed (Hebrews 6:20; Hebrews 7:25; Matthew 9:6). Thus all the ground is covered by the one great Sacrifice, and nothing is left undone!

3. Let us learn, then--of the unity there is between the law and the Gospel. We have this prophecy standing seven hundred years after the giving of the one, seven hundred years before the announcement of the other: yet we find the very phrases of the prophet are adopted from the Mosaic ritual, pointing to its fulfilment in the Messiah; while the New Testament teachings as to the work of Christ are based on both ritual and prophecy, carrying them both on to their fulness of meaning, and revealing their wealth of glory.

(2) We may well look on with profound reverence as the Most High brings out, in ritual, prophecy, and Gospel, that truth which men are most ready to let slip--viz, the exceeding sinfulness of sin!

(3) In Gospel: prophecy, and ritual, there is, in order to meet the world’s need, not only a central Figure, but a central fact. In the ritual, the priest and the offering. In the prophecy, the Messiah and His offering. In the Gospel, the Christ and His offering. Here is a threefold cord, “not easily broken.”

(4) Never let us forget the double aspect of the work of Christ--large enough to cover all the ground; minute enough to point out me and to save me!

(5) We are not saved in sin but from it.

(6) Let us not fail to catch the keynote of the law and of the Gospel, viz that nothing is right with a sinful man till relations between him and God are right. (C. Clemance, D. D.)

Expiation

Both Jews and Gentiles knew pretty well what an offering for sin meant. The Gentiles had been in the habit of offering sacrifices. The Jews, however, had by far the clearer idea of it.

I. SIN DESERVES AND DEMANDS PUNISHMENT.

II. THE PROVISION AND ACCEPTANCE OF A SUBSTITUTE FOR SINNERS IS AN ACT OF GRACE.

III. JESUS IS THE MOST FITTING PERSON TO BE A SUBSTITUTE, AND HIS WORK IS THE MOST FITTING WORK TO BE A SATISFACTION.

IV. CHRIST’S WORK, AND THE EFFECTS OF THAT WORK ARE NOW COMPLETE. (C. H, Spurgeon.)

Christ’s death and the law of God

By His death the Servant did homage to the law of God. By dying to it He made men feel that the supreme end of man was to own that law and be in a right relation to it, and that the supreme service was to help others to a right relation. As it is said a little farther down, “My Servant, righteous Himself, wins righteousness for many, and makes their iniquities His load. (Prof. G.A. Smith, D.D.)

The guilt-offering

It is strange but true, that the saddest, darkest day that ever broke upon our world is destined to cure the sadness and dissipate the darkness for evermore. It is to the passion of the Redeemer that loving hearts turn in their saddest, darkest, most sin-conscious hours to find solace, light, and help.. As though to obviate the possibility of mistaking its meaning, we are reminded again, and yet again, that the death of the Divine Servant was no ordinary episode; but distinguished from all other deaths, from all martyrdoms and sacrifices, in its unique and lonely grandeur--the one perfect and sufficient sacrifice and oblation for the sins of the whole world. The prophet s thought will become apparent, if we notice--I THE COMMON LOT OF MAN. It may be summed up in three words--suffering, sin, death.

II. THE NOTABLE EXCEPTION OF THIS CHAPTER. The Divine Servant presents a notable exception to the lot of man; not in His sufferings, for He was “a Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief;” nor in His death, for He died many deaths in one (Isaiah 53:9, R.V., marg.); but in His perfect innocence and goodness. He had done no violence, neither was any deceit m His mouth. The Divine Servant has passed through every painful experience; has drunk to its dregs every cup; has studied deeply every black-lettered volume in the library of pain. In His case, at least, man’s hastily-formed conclusions are falsified. Generally we pass from singular suffering to discover its cause in some hidden or remote transgression. In the case of Jesus Christ, however, this explanation of His unique sufferings was altogether at fault. Another explanation must, therefore, be forthcoming to account for the sufferings of the innocent Saviour. The explanation lay hid as a secret concealed in a hieroglyph, in the vast system of Levitical sacrifice which foreshadowed the “offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” So, under the Divine guidance, men were led from the conclusions of Isaiah 53:4 to those of Isaiah 53:5. These conclusions expressed here as the verdict of the human conscience, after scanning the facts in the light of history, are confirmed and clenched by the unanimous voice of the New Testament. This is the great exception which has cast a new light on the mystery of pain and sorrow. It may be that there is other suffering, which, in a lower sense and in a smaller measure, is also redemptive, fulfilling Divine purposes in the lives of others; though no sufferer is free from sin as Christ was, and none has ever been able to expiate sin as He.

III. THE PERSONAL APPLICATION OF THESE TRUTHS. “Thou must make his soul a guilt-offering” (R.V., marg.) This term, “guilt-offering,” occurs in the Book of Leviticus. If a man committed a trespass in the holy things of the Lord, he was directed to select and bring from his flock a ram without blemish. This was his “guilt-offering”--the word used here. He was to make a money restitution for his offence; but the atonement was made through the ram (Leviticus 5:1). Similarly, if a man sinned against his neighbor, either in oppressing him or withholding his dues, or neglecting to restore property which had been entrusted to him, he was not only to make restitution, but to bring his guilt-offering to the Lord--a ram without blemish out of the flock--and the priest made an atonement before the Lord, and he was forgiven concerning whatsoever he had done to be made guilty thereby (Leviticus 6:1). Is there one of us who has not committed a trespass and sinned in the holy things of the Lord? Is there one of us who has not failed in his obligations to neighbour and friend? How certainly we need to present the guilt-offering! There is no mention made of the necessity of summoning priestly aid. This is the more remarkable, when we consider the strict Levitical system in which Israel was cradled. It would seem that in the great crisis of its need, the soul of man reverts to an earlier cult, and goes back beyond the elaborate system of the temple to the practice of the patriarchal tent, where each man acted as his own priest, and offered the guilt-offering with his own hand. No third person is needed in thy transactions with God. Jesus is Priest as well as Sacrifice. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)

The atonement and its results

I. THE THING DONE. “When thou shalt make His soul an offering for sin.” “Without shedding of blood there is no remission.” This sentence, written by the finger of God on the page of Scripture, is also written as a received truth on every page of the history of heathenism. However we may recoil from the fearful superstitions of Paganism, and weep over that sad ignorance which can suppose God delighted even with human sacrifice, never let it be forgotten that in the bloodiest rites of idolatry there are the vestiges of a truth which is the very sum and substance of Christianity. We can turn our gaze to the evidence of what is called natural religion, accompanied, it may be, and loaded with what is abominable; and there we find monuments in every age that God, at some time or another, hath broken the silences of eternity, and spoken to His apostate creatures, and taught them that unless there could be found a sufficient sin-offering, the sinful must bear for ever the burden of His displeasure. Thus from the first God gave notices of the plan of redemption, and gradually prepared the way for that oblation which could alone take away sin. In the deep recesses of Christ’s undefiled spirit was paid down the debt which man owed to God.

II. ITS CONSEQUENCES. (H. Melvill, B.D.)

He shall see His seed

Notable effects following Christ’s sufferings

1. “He shall see His seed.” Men by the suffering of death are incapacitated to increase their offspring, but this is a quickening suffering and death that hath a numerous offspring.

2. “He shall prolong His days,” which seems to be another paradox; for men’s days are shortened by their sufferings and death; but though He be dead and buried yet He shall rise again and ascend, and sit down at the right hand of the Father and live for ever, to make intercession for His people.

3. A third effect, which is the upshot of all, is, “the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.” God hath designed Him for a work--the great work of redemption--even the bringing of many sons to glory. He shall pull many captives from the devil, and set many prisoners free; He shall, by His sufferings, overcome the devil, death and the grave, and all enemies; shall gather the sons of God together from the four corners of the earth. (J. Durham.)

Christ seeing His seed

1. A relation implied betwixt Christ and believers. They are “His seed,” such as in the next verse are said to be “justified” by Him.

2. A prophecy of the event that should follow Christ’s sufferings. Our Lord Jesus should not only have a seed, but a numerous seed.

3. Considering the words as a promise they hold out this--that though our Lord Jesus suffer and die He shall not only have a seed, but shall “see His seed.” He shall outlive His sufferings and death and shall be delighted in seeing them who shall get the good of His sufferings. (J. Durham.)

Believers Christ’s seed

1. They have their being of Him.

2. In respect of the likeness that is betwixt Him and them.

3. In respect of the care that He hath of them.

4. In respect of the portion which they get from Him.

5. Because of the manner of their coming to the possession of that, which through Him they have a claim to. They have a claim to nothing, but by being heirs to and with Him. (J. Durham.)

Christ seeing His seed

In “shall see His seed and have long life,” the figure of a patriarch blessed with longevity and numerous descendants Genesis 1:22, etc.) is in the prophet s thoughts. (Prof. S. R. Driver, D.D.)

The Atonement indicates the dignity of man

Men do not launch lifeboats to pick up corks, and we may rest assured that in the atonement there is a just proportion between means and ends. (James Duckworth.)

Messiah contemplating His spiritual offspring

I. HE SHALL SEE THEM ALL BORN AND BROUGHT IN.

II. HE SHALL SEE THEM ALL EDUCATED AND BROUGHT UP.

III. HE SHALL SEE THEM ALL SUPPORTED AND BROUGHT THROUGH.

IV. HE SHALL SEE THEM ALL PERFECTED AND BROUGHT HOME. (R. Muter, D. D.)

Christ’s spiritual Offspring

I. MESSIAH’S GLORY IS INSEPARABLY CONNECTED WITH THE HAPPINESS OF HIS OFFSPRING.

II. THE APPLICATION IS NOT LESS CERTAIN THAN THE PURCHASE OF REDEMPTION.

III. A SEASONABLE AND POWERFUL ANTIDOTE AGAINST UNDUE DEPRESSION OR ALARM ABOUT THE LOW STATE OF RELIGION IN THE CHURCH.

IV. IT IS OUR DUTY AND HONOUR TO CONCUR IN CARRYING THIS SCRIPTURE INTO EFFECT. (R. Muter, D. D.)

Seeing His seed

(with John 17:2, and Ephesians 5:25):--“His Seed.” This clearly implies that the Messiah should be the living Head of a new spiritual race. As Adam was the head of the human family, and Abraham the header the Hebrew people, so the Lord Jesus was to be the head of a spiritual seed. The Psalmist in the second Psalm, plainly a Messianic one, declares: “Ask of Me, and I will give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession.” Our Lord Jesus Himself spoke of those who would be saved by Him as given to Him by the Father. And apostles speak of the Church as composed of men gathered to the Lord, and belonging to Him. Precisely this thought is expanded in Ephesians 5:25.

I. CHRIST’S SURRENDER OF HIMSELF WAS THE EXPRESSION OF HIS LOVE.

II. A LIVING CHURCH, THE CREATION OF HIS LOVE. Just as the sculptor, before he begins to chip the marble into shape, sees with his mind’s eye the figure which is first conceived by his genius and then fashioned by his skill--so with our Divine Redeemer. He from eternity, before man wascreated, beheld him coming into being, placed on His own footing, falling, redeemed, saved. And, as the result of His atoning work, there rises up, through His Spirit, the fufilment of His own ideal, a new creation, a living Church, distinguished the marks of forgiveness, justification, renewal and eternal life.

III. CLEANSING THE CHURCH, THE CONTINUOUS ACTION OF HIS LOVE. “That He might sanctify and cleanse it.” Then He does not love the Church because it is clean, but He first loves it that He may make it clean.

IV. PERFECTING THE CHURCH, THE FAR-OFF VISION OF HIS LOVE. “A glorious Church, without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing.”

V. PRESENTING THE CHURCH TO HIMSELF, THE REALIZATION OF THE IDEAL OF HIS LOVE. (C. Clemance, D.D.)

The posterity of Christ

Jesus is still alive, for to see anything is the act of a living person. Do not be afraid that Christ’s work will break down because He is dead. He lives to carry it on.

I. THE DEATH OF CHRIST HAS PRODUCED A POSTERITY. We do not read that the Lord Jesus has followers. That would be true; but the text prefers to say He has a seed.

1. All who truly follow Christ and are saved by Him have His life in them.

2. Believers in Christ are said to be His seed because they are like Him.

3. They prosecute the same ends, and expect to receive the same reward. We are towards Christ His seed, and thus heirs to all that He has--heirs to His business on earth, heirs to His estate in heaven. They speak of the seed royal. What shall I say of the seed of Christ? You may be a poor person, but you are of the imperial house. You are ignorant and unlettered, it may be, and your name will never shine on the roll of science, but He who is the Divine Wisdom owns you as one of His seed. It may be that you are sick; by and by you will die. But you are of His seed, who died, and rose, and is gone into glory. You are of the seed of Him, “who only hath immortality.” It follows if we are thus of a seed, that we ought to be united, and love each other more and more. Christian people, you ought to have a clannish feeling l

II. THAT POSTERITY OF HIS REMAINS. If it had been possible to destroy the Church of God on earth, it would have been destroyed long ago.

1. Only read the story of the persecutions under Nero, etc. As to our own country, read the story of persecutions here.

2. There have been laborious attempts to destroy the Church of Christ by error.

3. Worldliness has gone a long way to destroy the Church of God.

III. THIS POSTERITY IS ALWAYS UNDER THE IMMEDIATE EYE OF CHRIST. “He shall see His seed.” He sees them when they are first born anew. Wherever His seed may wander, He still sees them. This look of Christ is one of intense delight. He will see all His seed to the last. What a seed He will have to see in the morning. It will be a part of His heaven for Him to look upon His redeemed. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

He shall prolong His days (with Hebrews 7:15; Hebrews 7:25)

The enduring life of Christ after His sufferings

In these passages we have given to us, first in Hebrew prophecy, and then in Christian teaching, the doctrine of the enduring life of the Christ after His sufferings are over.
The Old Testament prophet sees from afar the new life of the Messiah, in a blaze of glory. The New Testament prophet declares the life already begun, and indicates the purposes for which that life is being spent as well as the glory with which it is crowned. The words quoted from the Epistle to the Hebrews are a goal rather than a starting-point. They teach the following truths--

1. Jesus Christ is now exalted: He is a Priest upon His throne.

2. In Him there is the power of an indissoluble life.

3. Because of an indissoluble life, there is an intransmissible priesthood.

4. This life and this priesthood are in action for the purpose of saving.

5. Since the life is indissoluble, and the priesthood intransmissible, there is an infinitude of saving power. (C. Clemance, D.D.)

The pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand

The “pleasure of Jehovah”

The “pleasure of Jehovah” is the Servant’s religious mission (Isaiah 42:1; Isaiah 42:4; Isaiah 42:6; Isaiah 49:6; Isaiah 49:8). (Prof. S. R. Driver, D.D.)

The success of Christ in His work

I. WHAT ARE WE TO UNDERSTAND BY THE PLEASURE OF THE LORD, the work which is here said to prosper?

1. What is the work to which the declaration refers? The term “pleasure of the Lord,” as here used, must he considered as expressive of His gracious design to save a number of the human race from sin and all its fatal consequences; to render them perfect in holiness; and put them in full possession of happiness in the heavenly state. It includes in it, therefore, what has been termed the work of grace in the soul while here, and the full fruition of glory hereafter. In this work there are two things to be considered--

(1) The purchase of redemption.

(2) Its application.

2. Why is this work called “the pleasure of the Lord”?

(1) It is the free and sovereign purpose of His will.

(2) It is a purpose in the accomplishment of which He takes great delight.

II. WHAT PART HAS THE REDEEMER IN THIS WORK? The management of it is wholly committed to His care. It is “in His hand.”

1. Reconciling sinners unto God is a principal part of the work of salvation committed to the care of the Redeemer.

2. It belongs to the Redeemer, as their Saviour, to preserve His people from every thing that is evil in death.

3. The Redeemer has it in charge to perfect the salvation of His people, by putting them in full possession of glory, honour and immortality, in the heavenly state.

III. WHAT ASSURANCE WE HAVE, THAT THIS WORK SHALL PROSPER IN THE HAND OF THE REDEEMER, so as to be fully and finally accomplished. The language of the text. What is here asserted is supported by many other passages of the Word of God. Consider--

1. The character of Him to whom the work is entrusted.

2. The merit of His obedience, and the perfection of His atonement.

3. The progress He has already in the work. (G. Campbell.)

The salvation of sinners the pleasure of God

This will appear if we glance at the means which He has graciously provided for its accomplishment.

I. HE HAS GIVEN HIS ONLY-BEGOTTEN SON.

II. HE HAS HAS GIVEN US HIS WORD.

III. HE HAS ESTABLISHED A GOSPEL MINISTRY. The salvation of sinners is the pleasure of the Lord, and this shall prosper in the hands of Christ.

1. Omnipotence has promised it, as the reward of His obedience and death.

2. He is gone to carry it on before the throne of God.

3. He will descend to complete it when He shall come to judge the world in righteousness. Have we entrusted our souls into His hands? (Essex Remembrancer.)

Human redemption a pleasure to the Almighty

I. HUMAN REDEMPTION IS A PLEASURE TO THE ALMIGHTY, It is not a mere work of intellect, it is a work of the heart. It is “His good pleasure.” It is the highest qualification of His benevolence. It is benevolence restoring the rebellious to order, the sinful to holiness, the miserable to blessedness. What is most pleasing to a being always--

1. Engages most of his thoughts.

2. Enlists most of his energies.

II. HUMAN REDEMPTION IS ENTRUSTED TO CHRIST. It shall “prosper in His hands.” He has undertaken the work. Four things are necessary to qualify a being to succeed in any undertaking.

1. He should enter on it from a deep sympathy with it. We persevere most in the work we most love.

2. He should foresee all me difficulties that are destined to occur. When difficulties arise which we never anticipated, we often get baffled and disheartened.

3. He should have power equal to all the emergencies of the case.

4. He should have sufficient time for its accomplishment. Death often prevents us from finishing our work. Christ has all these qualifications.

III. HUMAN REDEMPTION IS DESTINED TO SUCCEED. It “shall prosper.” An argument for the certainty of its accomplishment.

1. Therefore do not be perplexed by the dispensations of Providence. The result of all the outcome of the chaos will be glorious.

2. Therefore do not be discouraged in your Christian labours. (Homilist.)

The Divine purpose fufilled

I. GOD HAS FORMED A PURPOSE OF MERCY TOWARD MANKIND. This is intended by the expression “the pleasure of the Lord.” Notwithstanding the state to which mankind had been reduced by sin, a state in which God, with justice, might have abandoned them to hopeless punishment, that God has adopted towards them a far different mode of procedure. In these mysterious depths of eternity there was a Divine determination that a way of recovery should be opened for the guilty. This is styled “the eternal purpose of grace,” “the good pleasure which the Father had purposed in Himself,” “the good pleasure of His will,” “the good pleasure of His goodness.” The manifestation of this pleasure of the Lord began on earth as soon as the need of mercy existed. The new-economy, established at an ever-memorable era, has explained what might be ambiguous, has illuminated what might be dark, has supplied what might be deficient under preceding dispensations, and it lays open before us in substance the whole counsel of the Eternal. We now discern that the entire fabric of creation, and the entire system of Providence, are subordinated to the stupendous achievements of redemption, those achievements the attributes of the Divine nature being united in harmony to conduct and to perform.

II. THE FULFILMENT OF THIS PURPOSE OF MERCY IS COMMITTED TO THE LORD JESUS. “The pleasure of the Lord is in His hand,” the hand of the Messiah, the Son of God, committed to Him to be by Him accomplished. That the Lord Jesus does sustain this momentous trust is obvious from the entire testimony of revelation. The Lord Jesus performs the purpose of His mercy, we observe more particularly, by His own atonement for sin, and by the communication of the Holy Spirit.

III. UNDER THE ADMINISTRATION OF THE LORD JESUS, THE PURPOSE OF MERCY SHALL BE PERFECTLY AND TRIUMPHANTLY ACCOMPLISHED. “The pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.”

1. The certainty of the accomplishment must appear from the mere existence of a Divine purpose to that effect. The supreme majesty of the perfections of God itself secures the fulfilment of whatever He has designed.

2. The certainty rests upon the inherent excellency of His own character and work. The proper deity of the Lord Jesus Christ renders failure in His work impossible.

3. We observe the Divine assurances solemnly pledged to that effect. Besides general declarations to which we might easily appeal there are recorded assurances addressed by the Father to the Son in His mediatorial capacity respecting the exaltation He was to receive as a specific recompense of the shame and suffering which on behalf of men He had endured. (J. Parsons.)