Isaiah 42:1-9;   Isaiah 49:1-7; Isaiah 50:4-9; Isaiah 53:11-12

Today I want us to do a bit our own souls preparations for Easter by looking at 4 ancient songs given to people “looking out for a saving servant.  This servant they didn’t see all that clearly when he came.  Just like not many of us know the second verse to our national anthem, the first 3 songs today we aren’t as familiar with either, the forth song we have heard many times.  These four songs from Isaiah are about expectation, looking forward in hope of God in the flesh, the expression of God’s pure radiance of a servant born to save, a servant born to die.  A servant who will transform your life eternally with a new heart and new mind.  As Israel was used to the idea of servants being the representative for the people.  They had seen servants already with men like Moses, then in Samuel and at the height through a servant King like David and much later on through the prophets.  Each one of these servants stood between God & Israel, they had a role that saw them stand in the place of Israel to intercede before God.  The way I want to work this through is to look at each of the songs in turn, looking at each song as if we were the first hearers; then come to ourselves and see how this fits in our lives today as we seek to live and follow Jesus

Song 1:            Isaiah 42:1-9

From the first song we kind of have a king figure explained to us.  He is someone with power like in verse 1

“Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him, and he will bring justice to the nations.

A chosen leader equipped by God with his spirit upon him, and had no small job but that of bringing justice to the nations.  A rather large assignment you would think.  So have a look closer with me at the way he will go about it. From Verse 2 he won’t be out shouting in the streets; instead in Verse 3 he’ll be faithful and go about his business teaching people.  He comes with the kind of teaching that draws people in, and what he speaks and what he says captures people’s souls.  The effectiveness of what he says and how he calls, will be so much so, the islands will put their hope in him verse 4.  It  is a message of salvation his mission is to bring freedom, look at verse 6-7

⁶ “I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness; I will take hold of your hand. I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people and a light for the Gentiles, ⁷ to open eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.

Three times in this first song the word justice is repeated.  Justice in the ancient mind isn’t maybe exactly the same as we would see it today, as for us justice is about the right sentence fitting the crime for us the focus is on outcome.  In the ancient world of Isaiah justice was about who gave the judgment, a king or a judge pronounced a judgment.  This worldwide teaching servant Isaiah speaks about brings the word of God and his justice, his judgment is upon the earth.  It is a message of freedom, eyes opened, release from the darkest dungeon as this servant is described as a bruised read, and a smouldering wick, both objects considered as useless, as a bruised read cannot stand up nor a smouldering wick produce light.  These items were usually discarded at this point.  The difference here is this servant can restore them, the reed he can mend, the wick he can re-ignite.  He will faithfully restore them both.  This servant figure of Isaiah gives an impression of impending failure, instead against the odds he succeeds.         

Song 2:            Isaiah 49:1-7

In this second song we hear the servant himself speak. Like we see in verse 1

¹Listen to me, you islands; hear this, you distant nations: Before I was born the Lord called me; from my mother’s womb he has spoken my name.

A single individual who comes to serve and his work will take a life time, and as someone who will shed light to the nations, and yet who will be deeply despised, and hated also by them.  Look closer at the second part of verse 6 and first part of verse 7

I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.” ⁷ This is what the Lord says—the Redeemer and Holy One of Israel—to him who was despised and abhorred by the nation,

This servant embodies everything Israel was called to be a prophet unlike anyone ever seen before.  His mission is to bring those far off back to save those near through what he will do, and what he says has effect verse 2a and then look at verse 3

² He made my mouth like a sharpened sword,... ³ He said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will display my splendour.”

His name is Israel but this servant is an individual so he will be embodying what Israel was called to b.  In this song there is a whole world out there waiting to hear the truth about God and where Israel failed to be this nation of priests now this servant will be the one through whom God will be made known.  Also we see the circle expanding as to those who God is calling to himself.  As we get an ever increasing image of the way he is about to do that

Song 3:            Isaiah 50:4-9

In this third song we catch something more personal about this servant, verse 4-5

The Sovereign Lord has given me a well-instructed tongue, to know the word that sustains the weary. ⁵ The Sovereign Lord has opened my ears;

Along with the suffering that will come his way (vs 9).  He is accused and beaten up (vs 6), mocked and spat upon, verse 6

⁶ I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard; I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting.

See the hardship.  He will not shrink back from suffering.  He does not rest in his own power to endure.  His hope is in the Lord .  The one he trusts will vindicate him.  In verse 9 we find the basis for why this servants has faith.

⁹ It is the Sovereign Lord who helps me. Who will condemn me? They will all wear out like a garment; the moths will eat them up.

Isaiah starts to shift the focus for us to answer the question who are the people of God? The answer is not given by nation or birthright, it is a relationship with God that comes to those who acknowledge and respond to God and his servant.  This is a servant who everyone will decide on whether or not we will follow him.

Song 4:            Isaiah 53:11-12

This forth and final song it turns out the other three songs were hinting at I now made plain .  The song that runs through Isaiah 52:13-53:12 brings this servant out into the open. This is a man of sorrows.  This servant is likened to a Passover lamb who is about to be slaughtered Isaiah 53:6-7

We all like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.  He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.

These well known words of scripture made even more popular by Colin Buchanan Isaiah 53:6.  This song wants us to see this servant will be a sin bearer in Isaiah 53:11-12.  As The Good News always stays a Good News story, Isaiah 53:11-12

¹¹ After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities. ¹² Therefore I will give him a portion among the great, and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.

In the world God has made, it ends up there is only one group that inhabit the earth, It is the very last word of verse 12, transgressors!  Everyone is a transgressor, each one of us steps over the line. (Which is what the word transgression means. To be told here is the line and to then wilfully step over it.)  This servant is the channel of God’s grace to sinners.  He is the key and the plan of God to reconcile the sinful fallen people to himself so that all who believe in the name of his servant will be saved and their sin will be carried away.  It is a personal message to each one of us by our own confession we show the way to others.

So how does this song relates to us?

These songs are all about God’s Good News Story.  The Gospel that is his way of dealing with what is wrong with the world.  God sends his one and only Son the only servant who walked the earth perfectly.  Jesus Christ whose message was “Only God can save you.  You don’t think you can go to him? I’ll go for you.” Or, at least, “Let me go with you.”[1]  It was words from one of these songs that came upon Simeon’s lips when he laid eyes on Jesus.  Eight days after Jesus birth, Simeon is in the temple at Jerusalem going about his work.  He comes across a young couple with a baby.  He lays eyes on him and says this

²⁹ “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you may now dismiss your servant in peace. ³⁰ For my eyes have seen your salvation, ³¹ which you have prepared in the sight of all nations: ³² a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel.”

Also when Jesus began his public ministry.  He went into a synagogue read the passage put before him in Luke 4:18-19.  It was also an ancient prophecy from Isaiah 61:1-2

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, ² to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour

These ancient songs sang about an eternal plan of God to save his people from their sins.  Just as we see in the servant songs of Isaiah, Jesus is the suffering servant of Isaiah 53 finds it meaning.  The cross on Golgotha where what Isaiah wrote takes place in history in Jesus.  As someone put it this way “much as we try to get out of it or find a way around it, there is simply no following of Jesus that does not involve suffering and rejection and death.  No exceptions.”[2]…“All the persons of faith I know are sinners, doubters, uneven performers.  We are secure not because we are sure of ourselves but because we trust that God is sure of us.  Neither our feelings of depression nor the facts of suffering nor the possibility of defection are evidence that God has abandoned us.”[3]  As we come to remember Easter this coming week we come to a saviour who is mighty to save. 

Let’s pray…

David Hassan @ Tamworth Community Presbyterian Church 9/4/17