Isaiah 53:12

The Song ends as it began. God will give great honour to his Servant, who has obeyed him totally.

• As the Servant who obeyed (see Matthew 26:42), Jesus will have his permanent reward (see Ephesians 1:20-23; Philippians 2:9-11). As he was dying, he prayed for his enemies (Luke 23:34). And in heaven he will continue to pray for those who have trusted him (Hebrews 7:25).

Chapter s 54 and 55

The subject of these two Chapter s is the *Lord’s promises to the city called *Jerusalem. God promises a great future for both the city and its inhabitants. Lord ~ God’s name in the Bible; in the original language, it means ‘head over all’ and ‘God always’.
appearance ~ what other people see when they look at a person.'Old Testament ~ the first part of the Bible. It contains 39 books, all from before Jesus was born.
Jewish ~ anything that has a relationship with the people called Jews or Israelites.
Jews ~ people who belong to the countries called Judah and Israel; people who belong to the 12 tribes of Israel.
Israelites ~ Jews; people who belong to the 12 tribes of Israel.
tribe ~ group of the later family of one father.
sight ~ opinion.
sin ~ behaviour that breaks God’s laws; not to obey God.
break ~ not to obey a law; not to perform a promise.
seize ~ to take a person as a prisoner or a slave.
sacrifice ~ to offer a gift of value to God (or, to a false god).
guilt ~ the fact that a person is responsible for evil deeds; the state of a person who deserves punishment for evil deeds.
altar ~ special stone on which priests burned animals as gifts to God (or, to a false god).
sacrifice ~ to offer a gift of value to God (or, to a false god).
AD ~ years after the birth of Christ.
Temple ~ special building in Jerusalem where Jews praised God and offered him prayers and gifts.
Jerusalem ~ at the time of David and Solomon, the capital of the country called Israel. During the time of Isaiah, Jerusalem was the capital of the country called Judah.
Jews ~ people who belong to the countries called Judah and Israel; people who belong to the 12 tribes of Israel.
tribe ~ group of the later family of one father.'New Testament ~ the final part of the Bible. It contains 27 books from the time of the first Christians.
Messiah ~ Old Testament title for Christ.

Old Testament ~ the first part of the Bible. It contains 39 books, all from before Jesus was born.
Jerusalem ~ at the time of David and Solomon, the capital of the country called Israel. During the time of Isaiah, Jerusalem was the capital of the country called Judah.

1. Isaiah: New *Heavens and a New Earth

God’s Servant Saves God’s People

Isaiah Chapter s 41 to 55

Gordon Churchyard

The words in square brackets, […], are not in the *Hebrew Bible. They make the book easier to understand in English. Isaiah wrote his book in the *Hebrew language. Words in round brackets, (…) are explanations.

Chapter 53

v1 Who has accepted (believed) our message? And to whom has the *LORD shown his Arm?

v2 [The servant] grew up in front of him like a weak plant. And [he grew] like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty and he did not look like a king. He did not attract us. We looked at him. But there was nothing to make us desire him.

v3 People hated him and they told him to go away. [He was] a man with sad thoughts. And he knew what it was like to suffer. He was like someone from whom people hid their faces. People hated him. And we decided that he was worth nothing.

v4 Certainly, he lifted up [from us] what we suffered! And it was our sad thoughts that he [carried away] on his shoulders. But we thought that [illness] had hit him. [We thought that] God had struck him. And [we thought] that he was sick.

v5 But [they] stuck a sword into him, although we had done wrong things. [They] squeezed and broke him because of our *sins. [They gave] to him the punishment [that brought] us *peace. His open cuts have healed us.

v6 We have all wandered away, like sheep. Each [of us] has turned to [go] his own way. And the *LORD has laid on him the *sins of us all.

v7 [They] were cruel to him, but he remained humble. And he did not open his mouth. [They] led him away like a young sheep to kill him. A sheep is silent, when people cut off its wool. In the same way, he did not open his mouth.

v8 After his arrest, [they] decided to take him [to die]. And none of his people complained. [They] cut him away from the place of living people. [They] struck him because of the *sins of my people.

v9 [They] gave him a grave with wicked people. And he was with a rich [man] in his deaths. [They did that], although he had not used force to hurt [other people]. Also, he had said nothing that was untrue.

v10 But it was the *LORD’s plan to squeeze him and to break him. [The *LORD] caused [him] to suffer. And although the *LORD made his life a *sacrifice for *sin, he will see his seed (*descendants). He will continue to live [after his death]. And what the *LORD wants will succeed in his hand.

v11 After his spirit has suffered, he will see the light. And it will satisfy him. My good, fair servant will make many [people] good, because they know him. And he will carry their *sins [away].

v12 Therefore, I will give to him many [nations]. And he will have the strong [people] as his reward. [The facts are these.] He poured out his life until he died. He let people count him in with bad people. Also, he carried the *sin of many [people] and he prayed for the wicked people.

1. Notes on chapter 52, verses 13 to 15

This is the fourth (4th) of Isaiah’s Servant Songs. The other three are in 42:1-4, 49:1-13 and 50:4-11.

Chapter 52 verse 13 The *Hebrew word for ‘wisely’ here includes also the idea of ‘successfully’. Also, the words ‘raise’ and ‘lift up’ mean the same as ‘make extremely important’. The words describe God’s special servant. But the words also describe Jesus! God raised him up from the dead. God lifted him up to heaven 40 days later. And now, he is extremely important, because he rules in heaven.

Verses 14-15 To many people the servant looked awful. The *Hebrew word means that they were filled with shock. When they saw his terrible injuries, they felt sick. He looked like a lump of meat, not like a man. But many people understood why it had happened. Nobody told them, but they knew inside themselves. They knew when the servant ‘*sprinkled’ them. ‘Sprinkle’ means ‘pour liquid or powder’ on or into something. Hebrews 9:19-22 says that Moses sprinkled blood to make people, objects and places holy. And Hebrews 9:23-24 says that Christ did something similar in heaven. But Bible students do not really know why Isaiah used this word. Some say that the word should be ‘startle’. ‘Startle’ means ‘do something which people do not expect’. Because of these different translations, we do not know what the servant does! But it makes people understand what he suffered.

2. Notes on chapter 53

Verse 1 The answers to the questions are:

• Who has accepted (or believed the facts of) our message? Nobody, unless it was the people that he *sprinkled.

• To whom has the *LORD shown his Arm? Nobody, if they only look at the human story of the servant. This is in verses 2 and 3.

In this verse, and in many verses in the *Old Testament, the Arm of the *LORD is a name for the servant, or Jesus. Here, we have shown, the word ‘Arm’ with a capital letter ‘A’. This is to remind us that the ‘Arm’ means a person, God’s servant, and not an object.

Verse 2 This verse tells us several things about the servant. It also tells us why people did not accept him.

1) He had an ordinary origin, even as a plant in the ground does. How could a mere man be ‘the Arm of the *LORD?’ People thought that it was not possible! They asked about Jesus, ‘Is not he the son of the carpenter?’, Matthew 13:55. They thought that he was Joseph’s son. A carpenter is a man who works with wood.

2) He ‘grew up in front of him’. ‘He’ must mean the servant, or Jesus. ‘Him’ must be the *LORD. But how could ‘the Arm of the *LORD’ grow up in front of ‘the *LORD’? This is only possible because God is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Christians call them the three ‘persons’ of God, who is one God. Luke 3:52 tells us that Jesus grew both in wisdom and height in front of God (the Father).

3) He did not look very special. He did not have the look of a king. He was like a root in dry ground, where it is difficult for plants to grow.

Verse 3 The servant was very sad. But he was not sad for himself. He felt how sad other people were. Before his death, Jesus felt the weaknesses that people suffer. This included pain. It included the weakness when a person’s body is not strong enough. It included everything that makes people unhappy.

Verse 4 In the *Hebrew language, ‘surely’ is ‘aken’. It emphasises something that people did not expect. That something was this. The servant lifted our sad thoughts from us and he carried them away from us. That is why he was a ‘man with sad thoughts’ (verse 3). But ‘we’ did not know what he was doing. ‘We’ here means every human person. ‘We’ do not know until he ‘*sprinkles’ us, verse 52:15. ‘We’ just thought that he was weak and ill! ‘We’ were wrong. He was suffering instead of us.

Verse 5 The servant died because of our *sins. But the servant’s death was necessary because of God’s law. The Bible says that the wages of *sin is death (Romans 6:23). We deserve to die for our *sins, but the servant took our legal punishment. The *Hebrew Bible does not say who did these things to the servant. Our translation just says that ‘they’ did it. By ‘they’, we do not mean any particular group of people, we mean those legal processes. But the Bible teaches clearly that we all were responsible for his death.

Verse 6 It was God who started those legal processes. God laid on the servant our *sins. It is dangerous to ‘wander like sheep’. This is because the sheep have left the *shepherd. And without a *shepherd there is nobody to rescue the sheep from danger. Here God is the *shepherd, the one that looks after the sheep. We have wandered away from him. Also, we did not obey God’s rules. We ‘turned to go our own way’. This means that we made our own rules. We did what we liked!

Verse 7 ‘Not open his mouth’ means ‘said nothing’. Here, the servant is like a young sheep, which is called a lamb. Another name for Jesus is the ‘Lamb of God’. Jesus was like a lamb (young sheep) that God provided as a *sacrifice. When he died, he carried away our *sins. As Hebrews 10:4 says, animals’ blood cannot carry away *sins.

Verse 8 Here, the passage is describing the actions of the people who actually killed Jesus. ‘Cut off’ means that they killed him. The ‘place of living people’ means this world. It is still a legal process, as in verses 5 to 7.

Verse 9 Probably, people did not understand this until Jesus died. There were criminals with him when he died. But people buried him in a rich man’s grave. ‘Deaths’ is unusual. Perhaps it is to emphasise the importance of his death. Bible students are not sure why it is not just ‘death’. Perhaps it means that he died for each of us. Some people often fight and they use force to hurt other people. But Jesus was not like that. He was always gentle and kind.

Verse 10 ‘He’, ‘him’ and ‘his’ in this verse all mean the servant. This verse repeats the idea in verse 6, that the *LORD put our *sin onto the servant, Jesus. Here, the verse repeats the ‘success’ idea from 52:13. ‘His seed’ are the people that trust in Jesus. They are the children that the *Jews asked about in Isaiah 49:21. These people accept that Jesus’ death was for them. There is a note on ‘seed’ in Isaiah 65:23.

Verse 11 ‘He will see the light’ probably means ‘He will live again.’ But another translation is ‘After his spirit has suffered, he will see the results.’ Whatever the servant sees will satisfy him. He is a very good servant, who obeys God. Only God is really very, very good. But there are some people that know his servant. He will make those people good too. He will ‘justify’ them. To ‘justify’ someone means ‘to declare that person as innocent’. Our *sins are ours, but Jesus suffered the punishment for them. Because he carried our *sins away, we are innocent. It is ‘just [as] if I’ had never done wrong things. And ‘just [as] if I’ sounds quite like ‘justify’! That is an easy way to remember the meaning of the word ‘justify’.

Verse 12 The ‘many nations’ probably refers to those people that trust in Jesus, the servant. They are the ‘many nations’ in Isaiah 52:15. The ‘strong people’ are probably the kings in Isaiah 52:15. Bible students are not sure. But this makes a better end to the Fourth Servant Song than other translations. Many Bible students think that this one is the right one. However, we often see another translation of this verse. It begins like this: ‘Therefore, I will give him a reward with the great [people]. And he will share the things [that he won in battle] with strong [people].’ If that is the correct translation, it emphasises the servant’s reward. He has done what God wanted him to do. So he has a great reward, like someone who wins a battle.

3. Something to do

Read Acts 8:26-40.

17. heavens ~ another word for ‘skies’. It can also mean the place where God lives and the skies above us.
    Hebrew ~ the language that Isaiah spoke.
    LORD ~ LORD is a special name of God. In the Hebrew language it is YHWH. It may mean ‘always alive’. So LORD is a sign that the Hebrew word is YHWH.
    lord ~ master. When it has a capital L (that is, ‘Lord’) it is a name for God.
    Hebrew ~ the language that Isaiah spoke.
    sin ~ not to obey God. Or, what you do when you do not obey God.
    peace ~ a calm and content attitude. The word often means simply that there is no war. But ‘peace’ especially means the calm and content attitude of a person who has a right relationship with God.
    sacrifice ~ something that the priests put apart (or separated) for the LORD. Usually it was an animal. They killed it and burned it.
    LORD ~ LORD is a special name of God. In the Hebrew language it is YHWH. It may mean ‘always alive’. So LORD is a sign that the Hebrew word is YHWH.
    lord ~ master. When it has a capital L (that is, ‘Lord’) it is a name for God.
    Hebrew ~ the language that Isaiah spoke.
    descendants ~ future members of a family.
    sprinkle ~ to pour liquid or powder on or into something.'Old Testament ~ the earlier part of the Bible.
    shepherd ~ a person who looks after sheep.
    Jews ~ the people that lived in Judah (which sounds like ‘Jew-dah’) and Israel.