All For Us!
Sermon III in the Series on Atonment
by Jonathan Duttweiler
"'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." Isaiah 53.5 (ASV)
The mercy of God is such that He will not leave us to suffer the just consequences of our sin without attempting to reconcile us to Himself . Many of us, if put in the same situation, would throw up our hands in disgust and say "forget it, they don't deserve anymore of my time!" Which is, of course, exactly the point, God is "long-suffering" where we humans seldom are.
However, mercy is not enough to overcome the problems of forgiving sin! As we saw in the last sermon, it takes an atonement, something substituted in the place of the penalty of the Law which would answer the same ends as would the penalty being carried out. That is, if would show us God's view of sin, His grief and hatred for it, and humble us as we recognize our own guilt and responsibility in rebelling against the Law of God and breaking His Father heart! The suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, as our substitute, accomplishes all of this, and, as we respond to God's great grace in repentance and faith, reconciles us to God.
All For Us
What a wonderful truth that God's word presents to us - He did it ALL for us! "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows...he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him;" (Is. 53:4, 5)
Christ was our substitute, but not just any substitute! Jesus asked his disciples once who they thought he was. They gave him a lot of the popular thinking of the day, what the religious leaders were teaching, what the teachers thought, what the masses were saying. But then he gets to the crux of the matter, "Who do you say that I am?" Peter speaks up, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." The cross of Christ atones for sin not simply because someone died, but because WHO it was Who suffered and died!
Malcolm Muggeridge, the Quaker theologian, once wrote: "One thing at least can be said with certainty about the crucifixion of Christ; it was manifestly the most famous death in history. No other death has aroused one-hundreth part of the interest, or been remembered with one-hundreth part of the intensity and concern."
But lets look at what the scriptures have to say about Jesus, our substitute:
He was, first of all, God in the flesh - "and the Word was God...And the Word became flesh , and dwelt among us..." (John 1:1, 14)
Yet He was also a man, a humble servant - "He was...a man of sorrows , and acquainted with grief:" (Is. 53:3) And Paul goes on to tell us in Philippians that Jesus "who, existing in the form of God, counted not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, becoming obedient [even] unto death,..." (Phil 2:7-8 ASV) This was the person, wholly innocent and blameless, who John recognized as the Sin Bearer! "The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, "Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29 NKJV) As He walked among the people, saw their sin and was rejected by them, Isaiah says He "Surely...hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows;" (Isaiah 53:4)
Then, at the cross, He suffered as our substitute, suffering what we deserve to suffer! As Peter put it, "Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree," (1 Pet. 2:24) As he hung on the cross, Christ agonized over the sins of the world - "For He made Him who knew no sin [to] [be] sin (or a "sin offering") for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." (2 Cor. 5:21 NKJV) Can you imagine this? Nothing had ever before happened like this - the holy and righteous God experienced the agony and anguish of sin! At this point Jesus cries, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?!"
Finally - the weight of sin could be borne no longer and Jesus, Who had identified so intimately with humanity, died of grief - a broken ruptured heart! As Isaiah tells us again, "He shall see of the travail of his soul , [and] shall be satisfied : by the knowledge of himself shall my righteous servant justify many; and he shall bear their iniquities." (Is. 53:11 ASV) You see, Christ did not die from the crucifixion, which often took days, but from the "internal agony of His soul"! No one took Jesus' life from Him, as would be the case if He died from the crucifixion, but rather He voluntarily laid down His life - as He contemplated the vastness of sin, as He took the full weight of the shame and degradation of humanity's rebellion upon His consciousness, His heart literally broke! Jesus declared in John 10:17-18, "I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down..." And thus He did, dying for us, crushed and broken over our sin!
But not only has Jesus died for us, He rose from the dead and intercedes for us with God! Hebrews 7:24-25 tells us that "He [Jesus], because He continues forever, has an unchangeable priesthood. Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them." For Christ to have died and not be raised would have meant the victory of sin, its power left intact. But Christ was raised and lives - a constant reminder of the work that He has accomplished and God's acceptance of it as a full and complete solution to the problems of forgiveness.
We must understand, then, that simply because God loves us and desires to forgive us doesn't make forgiveness simple or easy. C. S. Lewis once wrote, "It costs God nothing, so far as we know, to create nice things: but to convert rebellious wills cost Him crucifixion." "For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, And as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness; And when we see Him, [There] [is] no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, [our] faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. But He [was] wounded for our transgressions, [He] [was] bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace [was] upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all." (Is. 53:2-6)
Christ left His home in glory for us; He became a man for us; identified with our sin; and poured out His blood as a substitute for the penalty we DESERVE! Even though we have all "gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way...the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all!" Can it be that we will ignore Him, that we will take His cross for granted and be indifferent to His sacrifice, when all He has done He has done for us?!