Even though we despised and rejected Him, the Suffering Savior bore our sorrows and grief. He did it willingly. This daily devotional looks at different actions that prove the Suffering Savior suffered willingly.
Nuggets
- The Suffering Savior chose to lay down His life for us and did not complain while He was accomplishing His mission.
- The Suffering Savior had to willingly be wrongly accused and arrested, follow through with the substitution, and have no regrets.
- The Suffering Savior was laid to rest among those He had come to save.
Devotions in the Suffering Savior series
We’ve been looking at Isaiah 53. Looking back on it, it seems like the verses are building one each other.
Isaiah started out talking about how the Savior suffered. Then he said that the suffering was for us. That in itself is mind boggling.
What comes next takes mind boggling up a notch. The Suffering Savior suffered willingly for us. Let’s take a look.
Let's Put It into Context
So far in this series, we’ve learned:
- We know how much trouble the Israelites had in believing that Jesus was the Suffering Savior — and we have trouble, too.
- It looked like God’s promise that a descendant of David’s would reign forever had withered and died, but the stump got an offshoot.
- Jesus didn’t just know grief’s face so He could wave as He passed by; He was on a first-name basis.
- Jesus loved us so much that He bore our griefs and sorrows.
- Even though Jesus was sinless, He became the Suffering Savior to bring us salvation.
- Disciples are told we should be sheep who follow, not sheep who go astray.
The Suffering Savior Suffered in Silence
“He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth” (Isa.53: 7 ESV)
The Suffering Savior chose to lay down His life for us and did not complain while He was accomplishing His mission.
We get it that the Suffering Savior didn’t stand up for Himself for the most part when His accusers were giving Him a mock trial.
- “The high priest stood up and said to him, ‘Don’t you have an answer to what these men are testifying against you?’ But Jesus kept silent …” (Mt. 26: 62-63 CSB).
- “But he didn’t answer him[Pilate] on even one charge, so that the governor was quite amazed” (Mt. 27: 14 CSB).
- “So he [Herod] questioned him [Jesus] at some length, but he made no answer” (Lk. 23: 9 CSB).
Oh, yeah. Jesus did have to say something eventually. “‘You have said it,’ Jesus told him. ‘But I tell you, in the future you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven’” (Mt. 26: 64 CSB). He had to move the trial along to achieve the conclusion His plan needed.
Isn’t it human nature that we want to defend ourselves? Even if we know we are in the wrong, we want to argue so we come out the best possible way we can.
Jesus had done nothing wrong. He would have been justified in defending Himself against the false accusations.
He let it play out. Jesus knew what the outcome was supposed to be. Even though He did nothing to deserve the death penalty, He was fine with the outcome.
We generally just think about Jesus not shouting His innocence to His accusers. Really, He didn’t complain either. He didn’t attack them, calling them cruel and heartless. He didn’t accuse them of any wrongdoing.
Jesus just stood there and took the punishment. Manton wrote that this showed His love and patience.
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When we think about all the oppression Jesus endured, we begin to question how He could keep silent.
- “Then they spat in his face and beat him; others slapped him” (Mt. 26: 67 CSB)
- “They stripped him and dressed him in a scarlet robe. They twisted together a crown of thorns, put it on his head, and placed a staff in his right hand. And they knelt down before him and mocked him: “Hail, king of the Jews!” Then they spat on him, took the staff, and kept hitting him on the head. After they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe, put his own clothes on him, and led him away to crucify him” (Mt. 27: 28-31 CSB).
- “… So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha” (Jn. 19: 16-17 CSB).
Jesus went through all of this in around a day’s time. It would have been a continuous intense time.
I thought the switch in the sheep metaphor was interesting. In the last devotion, we were looking at the Suffering Savior being the Shepherd. We have some great advice from Manton.
We can get some good advice from Manton’s sermon.
- If we don’t have a Shepherd, we are not going to make it to the next pasture.
- If we get lost, we aren’t going to find our way back ourselves.
- If we play follow the leader, we need to follow the right Leader.
- If we leave the fold, we are setting ourselves up for some dangerous trails.
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But now, we are looking at the Suffering Savior as being a sheep.
I can see that. Jesus was part Man. In fact, He was 100% man as well as 100% God.
Manton felt the suffering Savior was likened to a sheep because “It is an emblem of innocence, meekness, and patience. It may import weakness and slenderness of appearance in the world.”
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It is amazing that Jesus was able to remain silent through all He went through. But that shows His dedication to His mission. It shows His love for us.
The Suffering Savior Was a Willing Prisoner
“By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?” (Isa. 53: 8 ESV)
The Suffering Savior had to willingly be wrongly accused and arrested, follow through with the substitution, and have no regrets.
Ooo, baby. Let’s get to the hard part.
The first sermon I read on this verse said that there are multiple interpretations. All righty, then.
One of the interpretations, according to Skinner, is that “… He was put to death without opposition from any quarter, and in defiance of justice.” The second indicated would be be a judicial procedure gone wrong. The last is He was “… released by death, or taken by God to Himself.” I can see arguments for all three.
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“… who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living …” (Isa. 53: 8 ESV) probably addresses Jesus’ arrest. Thomas contended that Jesus wasn’t actually incarcerated. He agreed, though, that He was a prisoner.
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Yeah, Jesus may have been kept up 24 hours (or however many it took). But that would mean everything would have to have been orchestrated down to the minute.
Oh, it may have happened. “First they led him to Annas, for he was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest that year” (Jn. 18: 13 ESV). Annas could have been waiting for Him, as could Caiaphas.
Jesus didn’t get to the council until the next morning. “When day came, the assembly of the elders of the people gathered together, both chief priests and scribes” (Lk. 22: 66 ESV).
One would think, though, that once Jesus got kicked up to Herod and Pilate’s level, He had to wait. They were influential people. Would they have been sitting there waiting for Jesus to be escorted in?
The “… and as for his generation …” (Isa. 53: 8 ESV) confused me. Crosby wrote that generation here would be what we consider a lifetime. He was discussing how short Jesus’ ministry was. He wrote, “He comes, and He goes, and there is an end of Him. Who will take the trouble to think about a life that is cut off so soon, and leaves, apparently, no trace? He has no successor, no family, no descendants to preserve His name.”
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Skinner identified other scholars who took a totally different read on this phrase. Instead, they thought it referred to the state of mankind during Jesus’ life on earth. Men were sinful.
But then Skinner also discussed an interpretation equating it to spiritual children. I can see that as the verse ends with “… stricken for the transgression of my people?” (Isa. 53: 8 ESV).
Skinner gave a couple of different definitions for the word generation. He disagreed with Cosby’s belief that it had anything to do with the length of life.
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I am still confused.
I think what it all boils down to is that the Suffering Savior willingly substituted Himself to take the punishment meant for us. We should have been judged. We should have been found guilty. We should have been incarcerated at minimum, more likely executed.
Glossary
Hall brought up some really good points. God designed the Plan of Salvation, but Jesus voluntarily became the Suffering Savior. God had the authority to make the plan work, but Jesus couldn’t have forced into it.
But it only worked if Jesus was totally sinless and aligned with us. If He had committed any sin, He wouldn’t have been a substitute. If He wouldn’t have been one of us, His sacrifice wouldn’t have affected us.
Hall goes on with other great comments on the substitution. These are the ones applicable to the discussion at hand.
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It tells us that the Suffering Savior had to be willing to start down the road to fulfill the plan. But He also had to carry through the plan and not have any regrets. He hasn’t.
The Suffering Savior Went Willingly to the Grave
“And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth” (Isa. 53: 9 ESV)
The Suffering Savior was willing to be laid to rest among those He had come to save.
This was another confusing verse for me. It is talking about the wicked and the rich. Let me process what the sermons are telling me.
- Davidson felt the two words were synonymous, making the poor to be godly.
- Smith thought He was given a convict’s grave.
- Delitzsch agreed with Smith that He originally would have been given a convict’s grave, but instead, was laid to rest in a rich man’s grave.
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I agree with Delitzsch and disagree with Smith. We know who owned the tomb in which Jesus was laid to rest.
- “As evening approached, Joseph, a rich man from Arimathea who had become a follower of Jesus, went to Pilate and asked for Jesus’ body …” (Mt. 27: 57-58 NLT)
- “He placed it in his own new tomb, which had been carved out of the rock …” (Mt. 27: 60 NLT).
Personally, I disagree with Davidson. If the words are synonymous, that means the rich are wicked. However, non-believers are identified throughout Scriptures by the terms wicked, cursed, and evil. That does not address their socioeconomic status.
It cannot mean that rich people cannot be disciples. Read verse 57 again. “As evening approached, Joseph, a rich man from Arimathea who had become a follower of Jesus” (Mt. 27: 57 NLT).
I think it means that Jesus was buried among men — the sinful men He had come to save. Isaiah rightly prophesied that it would be a nice tomb — a tomb fitting the Suffering Savior.
Making the Connections
I know this passage is called the Suffering Servant, and I am calling it the Suffering Savior. Jesus was a Servant in that He voluntarily chose to suffer.
By choosing to be the Suffering Servant, He became our Savior. He could only be our Savior by suffering.
How Do We Apply This?
We were the reason Jesus choose to become the Suffering Savior. He wanted our relationships restored with God. To do that we need to ABCD.
Jesus, in all He did, showed how He was willing to be the Savior of mankind. His actions pointed to that. What He allowed to happen pointed to that.
Willingly … for us.
Loving Father. We are humbled that Jesus loved us so much that He would substitute Himself for us. He was willing to suffer and died for us. Throughout eternity, He has and will be committed to being out Savior. Thank You. Amen.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
What do you think?
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