I’m beginning to fear that I may be becoming like Jesus in ways I had not anticipated. The morose line from scripture which stalks my days?
He was a man of sorrows…
Yeshaiya 53:3
Think about living like the Messiah of mankind.
Forgiving? Sure. Sometimes I want to forgive others.
Loving? Definitely! The Lord Jesus exemplified love of those who seemed not to deserve God’s love in this brief mortal life.
But “a man of sorrows,” from the description of Isaiah? This I had never considered.
Isaiah 53:
53:1 מִ֥י הֶאֱמִ֖ין לִשְׁמֻעָתֵ֑נוּ וּזְר֥וֹעַ יְהוָ֖ה עַל־מִ֥י נִגְלָֽתָה׃
āman?
Who has believed it?
Indeed, not only Jews have rejected their Messiah. And what Christian wants to believe the report that our Christ is a man of sorrows?
Which hopeful worshiper of God desires to embrace sorrows for this brief mortal life?
Not me. But it gets worse.
He is despised and rejected of men;
a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief:
Isaiah 53:3a KJV
- Despised?
- Rejected by others?
- Acquainted with grief?
WHY would anyone want to be like Jesus Christ, the Messiah of God, IF we must resemble any of these descriptions of man in God’s own Image?
AND it gets worse. For Isaiah continues with the expected reactions of other men to this tender shoot from the dust of the promised land:
.. and we hid as it were our faces from him;
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Isaiah 53:3b KJV
Acquainted with sorrows
Jesus was a Man of sorrows. And yes, more lately it seems that so am I.
For I too am a man acquainted with sorrows — and with DEATH.
We shudder to think about this inevitability and finality of our own mortality.
In fact, you too are a man or a woman of sorrows IF you dare think about sin and death. All see it.
We know those who have died. Some we love deeply: our mother, father, a beloved grandparent, a sister or brother who dies before us — even a wife or husband, a beloved lifelong friend…
They die…, one and then another, and leave us behind to grieve a great loss of love we embraced for so brief a time.
Sadly, I surmise: I am a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief…
Why am I despised and rejected?
Some confession here: I have often felt despised by those who I thought mattered most in the world. Certainly I’ve been rejected by those holding the keys to power and influence in the world.
Aren’t most of us? (I always thought it was just me.)
Looking back though, I now see through the mist of life that each time I witnessed Jesus Christ as Lord to those who reject Him, I was hated. And look what Isaiah says about the Messiah:
..there is no beauty that we should desire him. ‘We turned our backs on him and looked the other way. – NLT
The scene we encounter is man hiding from the LORD in Eden – a scene of our sinful hiding from God every time we want to be like the Messiah – a second adam’ sent to atone for our sins.
Dear grieving worshiper of the Lord suffering the sorrows of your faith,
Do not despair over what the Sacrifice of the Savior has done for you.
אָכֵן חֳלָיֵנוּ הוּא נָשָׂא וּמַכְאֹבֵינוּ סְבָלָם וַאֲנַחְנוּ
Do you understand the substitution of the Sinless Son of Man for your sins?
- He has borne our griefs
- and carried our sorrows
- חֳלִי chŏlîy, khol-ee’; from H2470; malady, anxiety, calamity:—disease, grief, (is) sick(-ness).
- מַכְאֹב makʼôb, mak-obe’; sometimes מַכְאוֹב makʼôwb; also (feminine Isaiah 53:3) מַכְאֹבָה makʼôbâh; from H3510; anguish or (figuratively) affliction:—grief, pain, sorrow.
He IS the sacrificial LAMB of G-d who takes away the sins of the world.
But He was pierced for our offenses,
He was crushed for our wrongdoings;
The punishment for our well-being was laid upon Him,
And by His wounds we are healed.
Isaiah 53:5 NASB20
Jerusalem, Jerusalem..
7 He was oppressed and afflicted,
Yet He did not open His mouth;
Like a lamb that is led to slaughter,
And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers,
So He did not open His mouth.
8 By oppression and judgment He was taken away;
And as for His generation, who considered
That He was cut off from the land of the living
For the wrongdoing of my people, to whom the blow was due?
He was a man of sorrows
.. they took the branches of the palm trees and went out to meet Him, and began shouting,
“Hosanna!
BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD, indeed, the King of Israel!”
The Good News of John 12:13 NASB20
